“Have the same mindset as Christ Jesus…”

In Philippians 2, Paul instructs the believers at the church in Philippi to “have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death – even death on a cross!”

Notice, that this statement is not just a factual statement about the selflessness of Christ, it is an instruction to the believers in Philippi. Christians are to be people who serve with humility.  If there has been anything that has served to damage the reputation of short term mission trips, it has been an approach based not out of humility, but out of arrogance.As the director of a short term missions program, I would like to out of hand dismiss the critics claims against short term missions, but I can’t. The problem is that there have unfortunately been way too much truth in their criticisms to dismiss them. I know this because I have seen them first hand.  As a short term missions ministry, we have as a primary goal, being a blessing to the long term, year round ministries that we partner with. This assumes coming to them without our own preconceived agenda but rather with the desire to serve them in ways that will be the biggest blessing to them and to those they serve. As a mission that is committed to meaningful relationships with the long term ministries we partner with, we work with them closely to ensure that we are truly a blessing to their ministry.  We are very thankful that for the most part, the churches that have sent teams to partner with us have understood the need to humble themselves and their own notions of what should and should not be done and to submit themselves to the wisdom of the people who minister in their specific cultural context on a consistent year round basis.

Unfortunately, however, there are others who don’t approach their ministry with this type of humility. We have actually been told by a group that they simply did not want to do the ministries that had been set up for them in accordance with the needs of our ministry partners because they were  “at a different level of mission.” They saw themselves as being better than the ministries that we worked with. They wanted to bypass them all together in order to do their own thing which they saw as more valuable. In reality, they had not been in the city long enough to know the real needs, but were more interested in pursuing a preconceived idea of what needed to be done, rather than the actual needs in the city.

This type of activity is not simply unhelpful, but I am convinced that it is simply not in accordance with the Scriptures. Take a minute to think about the radical humility of Christ.  He entered into humanity and became like us for our sakes and for his glory.  Or think about Paul who had the degree of humility to say “I become all things for all men.”  In order to be effective in short term missions, we must have the degree of humility to set aside our preconceived ideas and notions and to learn from and help the people who are in the city year round, live beside and with the people they are serving, and understand how to best communicate the gospel to them in their context.