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Two Traits You Need on a Short-Term Mission Trip

Two qualities every person should take along on their short-term mission trip.

Nov 12 2015

Whether it’s your first short-term mission trip or your 10th, making a packing list is probably on your mind. In fact, your team leader may even hand you a list with specific details about the weather, appropriate dress, evangelistic materials to disperse or even the much-appreciated advice to throw in some granola bars, just in case. None of what you pack in your duffle, however, is going to make or break your trip. You are not a tourist but an advocate for God and His love. The most important part of your preparation will be all about the heart. This leads us…

There are beneficial things you can do to help yourself thrive after a short-term missions experience. Photo by TEAM

Aug 14 2015

All short-term trips are supposed to end. But having a return ticket in your backpack doesn’t make the journey home a breeze. Below are six simple steps you can take to weather one of the toughest parts of going overseas: coming home. 1. RESUME YOUR OLD ROUTINE Your body doesn’t know if it’s 3 a.m. or 3 p.m., your pantry is empty and your clothes are tangled at the bottom of a suitcase. After a season of adventure, it might sound like the last thing you want to do, but getting back into a normal rhythm of life is crucial. Sleep…

Along with other volunteers, Alecia planted wheat seeds into the soil after cleaning up the debris left behind by the tsunami floodwaters. Photo by Alecia Tallent.

Sep 16 2014

We asked Alecia Tallent, TEAM’s Global Ministries Administrative Assistant, to share about her experience on a short-term missions trip to Japan. Alecia and her husband went with TEAM Serve to provide relief work after the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami disasters. Even though it had been more than seven months since the disaster, debris still littered the coastline, and thousands of people still lived in temporary housing. TEAM had partnered with CRASH Japan, a relief organization, and we lived at one of the CRASH bases in Tono that was being run by TEAM missionaries Jim and Eileen Nielsen. The Nielsens…

Millennials are changing the missions landscape and taking on challenges in ways previous generations have not.

May 20 2014

The highways of online media are strewn with attempts to explain millennials, my hard-to-pin-down generation that’s currently somewhere between the ages of 14 and 34 — and even that range is a little squishy. Churches, marketers and, yes, missions agencies, would love to know exactly what makes millennials tick. But most attempts to put us in a box fall short. Millennials — even millennial Christians — are not monolithic. They defy unifying definitions, aside from superficial observations (“Those millennials and their iPhones!”) that often apply as much to other generations as they do to 20-somethings. There is little doubt, however,…

It may be that what you do before (and after) your mission trip matters even more than what you do during your trip. Photo by TEAM

Mar 13 2014

Spring is just around the corner, which means we are well into the season for summer mission trip fundraising. Many of the questions we get asked at TEAM are about raising support, and there are lots of great fundraising resources out there. But if you’re planning on raising funds for a short-term trip — whether for two weeks or a year — here’s a big idea that many people overlook in their support-raising approach: Your potential supporters are investors. Treat them that way. We need to learn from the sharks. If you’ve never seen the popular show Shark Tank on…

Self-funding a mission trip is not for everyone. But some professions lend themselves especially well to paying your own way in short-term and even long-term missions. Photo by Timothy Yiu

Nov 12 2013

This is the last of a three-part series exploring self-funding short-term missions. In this post, we explore whether you should consider self-funding your next mission trip. Read Part I and Part II of this series here. An estimated 2 million people or more in the United States take short-term mission trips each year. If you’re one of them, or even if you’re considering long-term missionary service, should you try to pay part or all of your own costs? Should you fundraise for the whole amount? “There’s really no best way to do it,” said John*, who uses seasonal work to…

Chelsea Burdick used savings from freelance design work, among other jobs, to cover part of the cost of her recent trip with TEAM to Thailand. Photo courtesy Chelsea Burdick

Nov 05 2013

This is the second of a three-part series exploring self-funding short-term missions. In this post, we explore the financial aspects of self-funding a mission trip. Read Part I of this series here. Or jump to Part III. John* began working summers as a firefighter on a tip from a friend. The gig got him through college. He kept it up after graduating, using his earnings to serve on repeated trips with TEAM as a short-term missionary in a creative-access country, at around $10,000 per trip. Now those summer wages are putting him through graduate school, and he has more mission…

An estimated 2 million Americans go on mission trips each year. Should more of them cover their own costs? Photo by Mark Bickel

Oct 29 2013

This is the first of a three-part series exploring self-funding short-term missions. In this post, we look at saving for a mission trip as a spiritual discipline. Read Part II. In August, Eliza* got two pieces of good news: a nannying job, and the email she had been hoping for. It was an offer to participate in the School of Biblical Studies, a nine-month Bible training program offered through Youth With A Mission (YWAM). As with most YWAM programs or any mission trip, participants generally raise support to cover their costs. But as Eliza considered fundraising, she peeked into her…

Hand in Hand: A U.S. short-term missions team serves closely with Mexican workers in Baja California, Mexico. One TEAM missionary offers ways to make trips more about long-lasting relationships than "projects." Photo by Mark Bickel

Sep 16 2013

Last year, Marcela Garcia, a university-educated Mexican woman who studied political science and Mexican history, sat down with a TEAM missionary in Baja California to discuss the American short-term missions teams that were coming to their church. Garcia runs the VBS program at Emmanuel Evangelical Church of Los Cabos, and the missionary, Vicki Reyes, wanted to know how visiting missions teams could be more effective. Their conversation produced valuable insight into preparing for a short-term mission trip to do the most good and the least harm, prioritizing relationships above all else. 1. Use Caution With Gifts First, the women discussed, groups…

Tag - mission trip

Two Traits You Need on a Short-Term Mission Trip

Six Steps for Thriving After Your Short Term Mission Trip

Planting the Seeds of Love

3 Ways Millennials See Missions Differently

Mission Trip Fundraising – Treat Your Supporters Like Sharks

Is Self-Funding for You?

Does Paying for Your Own Mission Trip Make It Better?

Should You Pay for Your Own Mission Trip?

Preparing for a Short-Term Mission Trip: What Nationals Wish You Knew