There’s a big debate as to whether or not the money spent on Short Term Mission Trips by churches in North America is worth it. A blogging friend of mine who also works in Europe did a great write up about this on his Tall Skinny Kiwi blog (he’s from New Zealand), however I wanted to add my two cents worth:

• Short Term Mission Trips are the reason I’m on the field now. I started going on short term mission trips when I was 15 and went on too many to count from Pittsburgh to Brasil to Dominican Republic to Mexico to Kentucky. People do not just go into missions these days - they want to test the waters and see if it is God’s calling or they never would have thought about going into missions had they not gone on a short term mission trip.
• Most people who financially support missionaries have gone on short term mission trips. People walk away with a more global view of the world and understand and support global mission efforts because of that.
• Churches who actively send out people and spend the money and effort to do mission trips are more likely to understand what it means to reach out to their local communities. People learn on short term mission trips that what they do over there is more about the attitude of being a servant and can see that that works just as well in their local communities.

Here’s some things that I would suggest that you remember if thinking about doing a short term mission trip:

• Short Term Mission Trips are more for the spiritual growth of those that go on them more than those they are going to minister to. God uses us on trips to minister however God usually gives so much more back to those that are willing to go. Talk to almost anyone and they will say that they feel like they received more than they gave.
• As a church body, just remember to not put all your efforts into short term trips and forget about those that go full time into missions. There’s a lot more that could be said (and misinterpreted) so I’ll just let the Holy Spirit speak to you there.
• Make sure everyone in church leadership goes on a short term mission trip. When the leadership understands and has a global mindset, the church body will follow. If your pastor has not been on a cross-cultural mission trip - get them to go (heck, get on the plane with them!). You will see wonderful changes in your church’s attitude when the leadership experiences short term missions.

If you are interested in going on a short term mission trip in Europe, check out our eDOT Teams site at eDOTTeams.com or another Greater Europe Mission Ministry called EuroTeam (all they do is short term teams) at www.Euro-Team.org.

We have been the United States now for over 6 weeks and our times is coming close to an end. Honestly, I can’t say I know where the time has gone except I do know that I haven’t really had the time to think about it. Here are some reflections that I have about the past few weeks:

• We have an awesome sending church - Lake Forest Church. While we only got to be there for a few Sundays, it was awesome to worship there again and to see so many of our friends there was truly awesome.
• We have a second church home in the US now at Fellowship of Christ in Cary, NC. Our time there was very good as we felt like this was a body of believers that really cared about us. They were just really friendly with us.
• We have a lot of friends whom I could go on and on talking with. We had so many get togethers with people where we could have talked all night had it not been for a very exhausted 7 year old (not to mention his parents were exhausted). We so enjoyed meeting with so many different people during these weeks.
• Compared to German drivers, US drivers need to go back to driving school! Let me just say - PUT THE CELL PHONE DOWN AND DRIVE IN THE RIGHT LANE!. Enough said.
• I am very grateful that I have a sister who traveled about as much as we did so that we could have plenty of catching up time during this summer. Thanks Sis.
• The US is a beautiful country - check out my pictures of Washington DC here. I’ve got pictures of Boise, ID coming.

So what’s coming next - well, right now I’m in Boise, ID meeting with a partner we have, MAF - Mission Aviation Fellowship. Once I return from there, Krista and I will be traveling to some churches in Parkersburg, WV. After that, we’ve got some more meetings with supporters (and potential supporters) but most of it is getting ready to return to Germany. We’ll have a lot of laughs and a lot of tears as we say “Good-bye” once again to family and friends. (We have to say “good-bye” a lot).

What can you be praying for:

• We still have a lot more support to raise. While we have talked with quite a few people, they haven’t made decisions as to whether or not they will support us.
• August is a busy month. Krista and Alex will be getting our apartment back together from us being gone and preparing for Alex’s return to school - He’s a second grader now. Meanwhile, I’ll be traveling to Hungary, Austria, and Ukraine. I’ll also be managing a team that is pulling all of our network cabling in our new offices.
• We will have adjustments to make as we go back to Germany. Every time you go from one culture to another (no matter how long you’ve been in one culture or the other) you have to make adjustments.

Thanks so much for your prayers and support. I’ll try to increase my blogging from here on out.

Well, we haven’t blogged in a while because we’ve just been on the move quite a bit since setting foot in North America. Just a quick run down on what’s been going on with us:

• We’ve gotten to spend some good times with family and friends (and eaten some really good food too)
• Spent time with Krista’s dad (who lives in Kenya) who happened to be in the same town as us for a day. So we all went to a science museum here in town that Alex loves to go to with his Grandpa. (We also got to have both of our fathers together for Father’s Day)
• Went to Washington DC for our home church’s denominational meeting. Our church is a part of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church (http://www.epc.org). We were at this meeting for two reasons - 1) Courtney’s dad was being installed as Moderator (which means for one year, he leads the denomination) and 2) we were commissioned as World Outreach missionaries (World Outreach is the mission arm of the EPC - we are still Greater Europe Mission missionaries but now we are with two agencies.)
• Continued to work on different projects and things that just can’t wait until our return to Europe in August. Thank the Lord for the Internet so we can continue our work even while traveling.

We have a lot more meetings coming up so please continue to pray for our travel and these times that we get to spend with current and future (hopefully) supporters.

God bless.

Ok, only in Germany where the race for everything to be environmentally friendly is being won. Including the product discussed in this article –> http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20080527/sc_livescience/environmentallyfriendlybombsplanned

Now I’m not a politically correct person but how is a bomb ever truly “environmentally” friendly? I mean, I bet the person killed by it doesn’t viewed it as a positive?

There’s a line - somethings cross it.

Just wanted to tell ya’ll that we’re back in the States. We had some good flights (maybe I’ll tell you more later) and a nice dinner with the family at Chili’s. We decided to leave Chili’s because we were all “zoning”. I just have to say that it feels very weird being back in the US. Please pray for our time here in the States and that we can make a lot of new connections for partnering with us both financially and prayerfully.

God bless.