I spent the past two summers volunteering with a non-governmental organization in Honduras, and I have lost track of the number of times I have been praised for the sole action of “going.” Before the person even knows what my role was or how prepared I was for it, they applaud my willingness to travel and devote my summer to “serving others.” Every time, it astounds me that they have no idea of the impact I had or did not have on that community, and yet they praise me. The same phenomenon happened in high school, when I went on a short-term mission trip with my youth group. Looking back, this was potentially very harmful to the communities I visited, and yet, I received so much support from the church, my relatives, and my peers.
This is a self-perpetuating cycle: we are encouraged to “go” in order to serve underprivileged or in-need populations, and in doing so we venture into communities that we have no knowledge of. We learn a few words of the language (high school Spanish, anyone?), set our hearts on being “the hands and feet of Jesus” and connecting deeply with everyone we meet, build a few fences, churches, or community centers, and then pack up our bags and go. We never speak to the people we “connected” with again, and we soon forget about the shallow experiences we had, covering them under catch phrases like “it was a transformative experience” and “I thought I was changing them, but they changed me”. This positive feedback encourages others to do the same, and then we’re back to the beginning of the cycle.
Without a cultural connection to the community you’re volunteering within, or the necessary qualifications to fulfill an actual need within that community, international volunteering can be an incredible waste of resources and can even be harmful to the community receiving the “help”. With a limited ability amount of time to spend in the host community, you are going to have a difficult time learning enough about that community to be able to hear the needs they have and support them in meeting those needs. This leads to shallow, ineffective trips that would have been better presented as international travel for the sake of travel – not international service.
It can be disheartening to learn that not every action done in the name of “service” or “helping” actually helps the community in a sustainable way, even if it stems from good intentions. But guess what – this isn’t where the story ends! God has given you the capabilities to serve others, and it is okay that this may not be in an international context. To be certain, there are many who serve abroad in a beautiful way, be it as full-time missionaries, with a non-governmental organization as a professional in some capacity, or in other ways. God gave them those gifts, and he may be guiding you towards a similar point. But even before that, God is pointing you towards communities you know.
Every single community has some area of need. Communities are composed of human beings, which are, by nature, broken. As Christians, we are called to step into that brokenness and spread the love and joy and generosity and forgiveness and hope that we have received from the Father. This is something we can do best when we know that community and we can connect with them on a deeper level. It is not something we can do best when we are in a foreign country, building wells that community members will never use and speaking in a tongue they do not understand. (This is not to say that God cannot use you in some small way in those contexts you don’t understand – He can do miracles! But this is a miracle, not a norm.) When we can do it best is when we step into spaces we are surrounded by all the time, to intentionally hear the needs that community recognizes and discern what gifts or resources you have that could provide them a hand-up (instead of a handout) in meeting those needs. We are called to serve where we are, with what we have, and who we’re with. We are called to serve now – not to wait until next summer when you’re in Costa Rica.
Serving where you are can look many different ways. It can look like narrowing in on the social issue that most interests you, and finding ways to serve in that social issue at home. There are schools in your own community that could use peer mentors – you don’t have to go across the world to find them. There are community health programs and entrepreneurship initiatives and vocational training providers that could all use a helping hand on occasion. Serving can look like donating your time to your church or ministry, local non-profits, or any other arena that has expressed the desire for support. Serving can even look like recognizing that you are not equipped at the moment for international service, and choosing to contribute the resources you would have used to travel to organizations that are connected to the community and use those funds in a highly effective way. Serving looks like praying for those you know in need and those halfway across the world that you don’t know. And, at a minimum, serving is treating those you interact with every day with the love that the Lord has given you, and viewing them as He does. That is a call we can all aspire to, regardless of our resources or qualifications to serve in international contexts.
For those who are already committed to going on a short-term mission trip, I challenge you to reflect on and pray for your trip as you prepare. Pray about your intentions going into the trip, your actions throughout the trip, and the potential positive and negative consequences of those actions. Pray for an open heart that is ready to learn from and truly, humbly serve the people you will meet on your trip. View the service component of your trip with the weight and respect it deserves, instead of as a side perk of international travel. It is a blessing to be able to travel abroad and work in different contexts – treat it as such, and allow the Lord to use the experience to teach you and grow you.
Lauren is a junior studying Psychology and International Affairs at Florida State University. She is passionate about industrial/organizational psychology, effective and ethical aid, and the intersection between Christianity and social justice. Right now, the Lord is showing her how to rely on Him instead of herself, in anything and everything.