More Than Paint a Building

Teen Missions trips are definitely “IN” right now. Every church seems to be sending students to cross-cultural settings where they are put to work and challenged to grow in their faith. At the end of the trip, they may leave behind a new concrete basketball court and some memories. These trips are beneficial, but recently, some groups are not satisfied with these one-time trips.

The Senior High youth group from Liberty Bible Church in Chesterton has begun a 3-year, 4-trip relationship with a group of students from Hebron Baptist Missionary Church in San Jose, Costa Rica. 18 team members just returned from the first of those trips. Sonlife Ministries in San Jose has organized trips like this one for about ten years now. In each case, an American church with an intentional and functioning youth ministry is connected with a Costa Rican church that has some kids, but little plan for how to move forward for Christ.

Trip 1 focuses on building relationships between members of the two groups and training the Costa Rican students on the basics of the faith. In an effort to model student ministry for the Costa Rican teens, nightly training sessions are student-led. Youth pastors and sponsors limit their involvement to pre-trip preparation. The group from Liberty taught training sessions on identity in Christ, prayer, worship, God’s word, love, and service. Small group training throughout the year is done by the missionaries there in Costa Rica, Michele (VonTobel) and Lisandro Montenegro.

Next summer another student group from Liberty will return, focusing on evangelism. Part of that trip will be a weekend retreat where the Costa Ricans invite their school friends. The goal is to introduce them to the claims of Christ and then follow up on any decisions that are made. In the Winter of 2013, about a dozen of the Costa Rican students will travel up to Chesterton for trip 3. During those 2 weeks they will get to see first hand one way that an intentional, holistic youth ministry plan might be implemented.

Trip 4, back to Central America, will take place that same summer when the students from Chesterton join with their Costa Rican peers and help them partner with another group – possibly in Nicaragua – to begin the entire process all over again, with the Costa Rican youth now doing the training. The plan is that when the American teens leave, after 4 trips, they will leave behind more than a repaired building or a new camp. What’s left is a healthy, self-multiplying youth ministry. After trip 1, that plan is still firmly in place. Because of FACEBOOK and email, the gap between the two groups, both in time and distance is growing smaller all the time