Family Missions

This summer on Thursday nights, the kids have been learning about how missionaries help those in other parts of the world, and how they can be missionaries.

Somewhere along the way I picked up this definition of a missionary that I have been sharing with the kids each night as we learn. " A missionary is someone who goes somewhere to tell another person about Jesus love, no matter if it is across the hall, across the street, across town, across the country, or across the world." I want each of these kids to know that they can be a missionary, and that it doesn't have to wait until they are grown ups. Every one can share the love of God with someone else.

During my lifetime I have had the opportunity to go on mission trips to other locations. And some of my favorite trips have been those where families are ministering together. One such trip was one where a group from the church I was attending went to another state to do Vacation Bible School for the kids and teens in that community. You would think that this would be a job just for adults, as they would be the ones doing the teaching. But we had whole families that went, and so the kids were given a job to do at VBS as well. Their job was to show the love of God through friendship. The kids we took had already experienced this VBS so now they were to help the others around them understand the stories we were telling. They got to be the ones to play with the kids and begin conversations about the God they were hearing about. Everyone on that missions team had a job to do, including the kids. And I have to tell you that watching the kids on our team, play and talk with the kids in the community was a joyful thing to see. Connections were made that would have had no place had we not brought peers for the kids in the community. And the joy on the faces of the kids on the team is almost indescribable. No one is too little, or too young to share God's love with someone else. I wish that more families would embrace this pattern of ministering together through missions. It doesn't have to be going to a foreign country. Family missions opportunities can come through serving at a homeless shelter, a nursing home, or even partnering with an intercity ministry.

I would like to encourage you as parents and grandparents to seek out opportunities where your whole family can serve together. Show your kids that missions work knows no age limit. I can promise that the work may be hard but will definitely be rewarding!

Continually Growing at The Grove!

Miss Megan