Families on Mission

The following post was written by Maria Brannen.  Maria is presently serving as a State Missionary in Discipleship Ministries for the Georgia Baptist Convention.  She is a Ministry Consultant for the following areas: Preschool/Children’s Discipleship; Children’s Bible Drill; Youth Bible Drill, and Student Speakers Competition.  She has served in this position since 1998.

Summer has arrived!  Kids are glad to be out of school and it is time for vacations, camps, VBS, and relaxation!  In the midst of these plans, include a week or some days throughout the summer to be on mission together as a family.

One of our family’s favorite times of the summer is joining in with others from our church for the family mission trip.  Each year moms, dads, children, teenagers, and grandparents join together to participate in a week long missions experience that includes backyard Bible clubs, VBS, and construction work across our country.  It is a great opportunity to incorporate missions into your family’s DNA (who you are as a family) as you serve together.

Most do not have a built-in opportunity to do a family mission trip, but there are many great opportunities to do missions together as a family this summer:

• Contact a church, association, or ministry in another city or state and ask how your family could help serve for a week (prayer walking, clothes closet, food pantry, VBS, backyard Bible Club, yard work for someone homebound, etc.)

• Find a mission church or any church that needs help with VBS (across town, in another city, or across our country) and volunteer as a family for a week to help them do VBS.

• On your family vacation – dedicate one day of your vacation to doing missions together as a family.  Contact a church, association, or ministry near where you are vacationing.  Ask them how you can help serve for a day.

• Schedule a weekend or Saturday mission trip – contact a church or association in another town and ask if there is a weekend this summer that they need volunteers to help with a ministry event.

• Look for local ministries and schedule a few days this summer to serve – food pantries, making sack lunches for distribution in your town, clothes closets, visiting a local nursing home, etc.

Let us know how your family will be on mission this summer!