Alex's First Missions Trip

Hi, I'm Alex and I'm going to be one of the youth that will be traveling to India during Easter. I have never been India, but I feel that it's going to be good experience. The part of India we're going to is North-Eastern India, the part that borders Nepal.

 



I am hoping that this trip will give me a bigger perspective on the different cultures and people there are in the world. On the other hand, I am slightly nervous of being away from home for a week. I can already predict that I will miss my computer at home dearly.
 
Overall, I am extremely excited to go on this trip, apart from spending a week with my friends, its also an opportunity for me to lend a helping hand to children and people who might not be as fortunate as all of us living in Hong Kong.

Today, please join us in praying for these things:
 
Team Preparation
That our team meeting tomorrow would prepare us to enter a new culture with humility and leave us excited and reliant on God's provision during the week.

Logistical Preparations
That the last two visas would be approved, our schedule would solidify and that we would have all the supplies and resources we need. Also, praise God for financial provision for the trip- we surpassed our fundraising goal which will also us to bless the Home even further!

The Staff and Children at LFCH
For physical health for the children and staff. Also pray that through our interactions, each person at the Home and from Community Church would know and love God better.

Cody: Why I'm Going Again

Hey Everyone! Most of you probably know me as the pastor’s son, but a lot of you probably didn’t know that one of the main reasons I decided to become a Christian two years ago was because of this trip. It was such an eye opening and inspiring experience that it really allowed me to grow a lot in terms of my faith and putting trust in Jesus. 

Before going to India two years ago, I found myself being resentful at God for ‘not making himself present’ in my life and as a result I hardly put any of my trust in Him. Going to India and seeing children that had so little, yet completely put their wholehearted faith in Him astounded me and during one of the nighttime chapel services I sat down and poured my heart out to God. I poured out all of the spiritual brokenness, hurt and distrust to Him and for one of the first times in my life, I felt his arms around me. 

I think one thing that set the India trip apart from every other church trip I’ve been on was there wasn’t much of a long-lasting ‘mountaintop experience’, meaning that on other church trips I would be on a spiritual high for the week, but after I returned home that high would die down. For me, the India trip showed that God deserved our trust, something that was long-lasting in my life and definitely didn’t fade away after returning home.

This year, I’m hoping to experience the same spiritual growth that I did two years ago and for God to use me to speak into people’s lives. 

 Today, please join us in praying for these things:

Team Preparation
That the team would prepare well to teach Bible stories, songs, and to share our testimonies of how God has worked in our lives.

Logistical Preparations
That final steps of planning and communication would be smooth, specifically with our schedule for the week and the projects we'll work on.

The Staff and Children at LFCH
That the staff would be physically and spiritually healthy as they offer care to the children. 

Steven's Missions Confession

Below Steve, Community Church's Youth Intern, confesses his reservations about the usefulness of missions trips and why he's excited to head to LFCH anyway.

Steven, looking a little less cantankerous than he claims to be

Hello! Thanks for reading. I hope that these blogs are both useful milestones for us to look back on after the trip, but also places where we can connect and bring those who are not going on the trip physically with us. I want to talk about short term missions trips and my journey with them.

When I was in high school back in the States, every summer the incoming senior class would go on a trip to the Dominican Republic in the Caribbean through a missions organization called “Meeting God in Missions” (MGM). At this time, believe it or not, I was much more cantankerous than I currently am, and thought that such a trip was a horrible idea! To send 100 seniors down there on a missions trip was an absolute waste of resources in my opinion. Think of how much you could do with all that money that was being spent on the planes, the food, the passports, the visas, the bags, etc, and how much good you could do if you either just sent the money directly to MGM to create sustainable solutions, or if you used the same time and money locally where you could save on all the travel costs and also continue serving in the long term. I viewed all short term, non-local missions trips in this light, as a wasteful attempt at a type of spiritualism. To make matters even worse, MGM claimed specifically that their organization was not for the people who we were going to serve, but rather for the people going on the trip.

Now you may be saying, well… I guess you are right. Your accusations are well grounded and make sense. And that is because that is true. The money could be better spent, the time could be more wisely used, the local needs are still there, but all of these are facts which make sense in our human perspective. The resources of the Kingdom of God are much, much different than the resources of a country or a company. Now, that doesn’t mean that we throw caution to the wind and neglect the reality around us, but that also means that spiritual realities must also be taken into account.

The blessing brought to the kingdom by the relationship between MGM and my high school, the students that went on the trip and the Christians they met and served, has had long range impact on both the physical and spiritual world. Many of those students that went to MGM have since gone back and are working and giving their resources for the long term to that mission and those people. The “short term” missions trip was just the experience that God used in their life to open their eyes to the real needs that we are not exposed to us as openly in the first world, the real Christianity that exists in a world in need of it, and the interconnected nature of the Church across national and linguistic borders.

And now, still a cantankerous fellow, I have put down my self-righteous stance on these trips in the absolute. There are still places where such a trip can be detrimental, and we should be wary of that, but the long term effect that a short term missions trip can have on the lives of individuals, the relationships it can bring to God’s people across the globe, and the fact that Jesus also commanded his disciples to do similar things has disarmed me. And so, humbly, for the first time, I step forward to go on a short term missions trip, and ask that God fill me, fill us, and send us out to do this weird thing called short term mission, not because it makes sense, not because it is the best use of the physical resources he has given us, but because it is where he has called us to go in the here and now. So let’s go- expecting great things from a great God.

We're Going Back!

It’s been nearly two years since our first visit to the Little Flower Children’s Home and we’ve loved getting to continue our friendship with them. We’ve traded letters and Christmas cards, some of the kids have kept in touch via Facebook, and last year, Spectrum students led Community Church in fundraising over $30,000 to purchase new school uniforms, books, bags, and shoes for all of the kids at the home. 

Some of the kids lining up to go to school in their new uniforms.

This year we’re returning from April 3-11 with a team of 8 students and young adults. As we prepare to visit again in a few weeks, we’ll be posting what we’re thinking, learning, and feeling about the upcoming trip. Check the blog to get to know the team better and to learn about specific ways to pray for the upcoming visit.

Today, please join us in praying for these things:

Team Preparations

That the team- Rachael, Alexander, Lindie, Cody, Gillian, Bo, Steven, and Julie- would allow God to prepare them spiritually to serve at LFCH

Logistical Preparations

That plans for visas, flights, and hotel arrangements would be arranged smoothly

The Staff and Children at LFCH

That the kids would grow and develop in physically and emotionally healthy ways

Cody's Thoughts

I can honestly say that this India trip was life-changing. I prepared and went on this trip expecting my heart to be broken and to feel sorry for these kids. With that being said, I was completely wrong. I was simply astounded at the sheer level of dedication and love for God that emanated out of these children.

The children's home was situated on the top of a hill and was a 15 minute hike from the nearest street. We pulled up at the trail-head at about 8 o’clock at night and through the window, we could see a mass of kids waiting for us. The energy levels in our car immediately rose and those sleeping sprang up out of their sleep. As we unloaded the luggage, the children came up to us and told us that they would help. While I was walking up the hill, two kids that couldn’t have been older than 9 came up to me and asked if they could help me carry my duffel bag. I smiled and said “sure”, not expecting them to get very far with it. As soon as they both had their hands on it, they shot off up the hill, laughing and giggling all the way.

Another aspect of the children's home that really struck me was the hospitality. From the moment we entered the home, we had a meal sitting on the table, always accompanied by a couple pots of locally-grown tea.

During the week we painted the inside and the outside of the girls’ dorm. On Monday we went down to the local paint shop to collect the paint. After waiting for what seemed hours, we carried the numerous buckets of paint up the trail to the children's home. After we delivered the paint, we had to sand the inside of the dorm and then apply paint thinner to the inside and outside. On Tuesday, we painted the inside and outside of the dorm. On Wednesday, we were not able to paint the dorm but instead washed all of the children's clothes while they were at school.

On Thursday, we had to paint over wooden walls inside of the dorm with a special type of paint that Nick Houghton and I had to retrieve from the paint shop. On Thursday Night, we had an outreach activity at the local church. We performed a skit, shared a couple of testimonies and played worship for the local community. The audience was predominantly children (which we weren’t expecting) with the parents of the children at the back. Because of the audience being mostly children, a lot of us had to alter our testimonies into shorter and simpler versions.

One of my favorite parts of the trip was on Thursday night. We had just finished our outreach program at the local church and were eating with the children out on the patio. All of us were spread out talking to different groups of children. There was an ambiance of peace that I have never experienced before. We were then told to go into the chapel where the kids had prepared a ‘surprise’ for us. The surprise turned out to be a bunch of heart-warming performances put on by the different age groups of children. The worship after the performances was astounding. The first song that was sung had the words ‘We cannot be conquered’. As the children sang their hearts out with these words, I stopped to thank God for these children. They’ve all come from broken families and have literally been to hell and back but God has provided them all with a new family and an amazing new life.

I would like to thank everyone so much who helped this trip to happen, it was a really amazing week.

Natalie's Reflections

The whole week in India was unbelievable, I learned so much while I was there.
I made lots of new friends and gained so much. One of the best moments on
the trip was the last night we were at the Children’s Home. Everybody on our
team and everyone at the home were all sitting together outside eating dinner.
I was sitting with a couple of the team and a couple of the kids, and we were
having a great discussion about God. It was really cool to see us all
sitting together, enjoying each other’s company. We were all so intent on our
discussion, and it was really amazing seeing how people who had only known
each other for a couple days talking to each other like they had known each other for
months. It made me realize how much I enjoyed the trip and being around the
kids, and it was great feeling God so present during the trip and in the lives of
everyone at Little Flower Children's Home.

Julie's Reflections

Students will tell you lots of the highlights and details of our trip, so I'll just briefly tell you one impression that I left India with.

God deserves our trust. Many, many times this week I saw God answer prayers, provide for our team, and demonstrate his faithfulness.

I saw God's trustworthiness as he kept us safe and healthy. No one became sick. Our biggest injury required a single band-aid. We even survived several jeep rides on zigzagging mountain roads sans pavement and guardrails!

I saw God's trustworthiness as we heard stories from Jonathan and Ussa, the couple that runs Little Flower Children's Home. They amazed us with their descriptions of how Ussa faced persecution within her own family, their early years together traveling across the Darjeeling region preaching, and the establishment of fourteen churches and the orphanage in a place where Hinduism is still the primary religion. They told us how God provided them with protection, places to live, funding for the Home, and lots of community and friendships.

I saw God's trustworthiness as our students took many risks to live and share their faith this week. They took God seriously when he said to serve like Jesus served- up close, sometimes uncomfortably, and with love for people. And each student shared, either during our evening programming or in a community-wide outreach event, part of their journey with God. For many of them, it was the first time they'd had to articulate their story and all of them were nervous. But they did it and got to watch as God used their stories to deepen their friendships with the kids and start conversations about faith with community members.

Our team so enjoyed participating in the work that God is doing in Pedong. And over and over again God reminded me of how worthy he is our of trust. I think Ussa summed it up well when she said "We sometimes faltered, but God is always faithful."

Thank you all for praying for us and supporting the trip financially! This trip was truly incredible and I can't wait to see how God continues to grow what began last week!Jul