How missions experiences expand my classroom experience

Olivia Lasater began her Institute experience with a mission trip to El Salvador, then returned there in 2021. This summer, she will do a mission trip to Uganda. For Institute students, three to four mission trips are factored into their student experience.

“Now the LORD said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you, all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” Genesis 12:3

God’s mission is and always has been to work with his people, to bless them so that we would be a blessing to all nations.

When God called Abraham, his promise to Abraham was that all the nations would be blessed through his obedience. Going further in the narrative, God calls Moses to lead the Israelites into the wilderness for an educational experience. Through this experience, they are charged to remember the long way that the Lord had led them, how he provided for them, never letting their clothes wear out or their feet swell. In the wilderness, God teaches his people who he is and who they are- and to what purpose he has called them. While “blessing” can often be hijacked in cultural Christianity to refer simply to wealth or prosperity, the kind of blessing the Lord wanted his people to bring was shalom. Restoration of the human being unto a life that could be fully lived. This is the ministry of Jesus. 

I get to participate in this holistic ministry at The Institute through international mission opportunities. Before college, I went on a 4-week mission experience to El Salvador. I did the same after my sophomore year, and I’ll head to Uganda this year. These trips are part of The Institute’s curriculum, making students like me take on a global consciousness in line with the biblical story since Abraham.

The education the Lord knew his people needed was rigorous and immersive in the Word of God for their minds to be washed with the Word of God. This was a thorough process of learning to trust the Lord, having their values and culture deconstructed so the Word of God becomes their new foundation- much like what has to happen for us as we approach our Biblical education.

At The Institute, international mission experiences are the test for what students have larned in the classroom. When students are confronted with need, complexity, suffering, poverty, in a longer than “drive-by missions” experience, will they know the Scriptures to turn to?

Missions are not separate from education. It’s reflective of God’s heart for his people to be a blessing to the nations.

To become people who can be a blessing to the nations, carrying out Jesus’ mission “of bringing good news to the poor, proclaiming release to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to let to oppressed go free, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor,” we have to have the Word of God written on our hearts. ( Lk 4:18–19) — this is what’s happening in the classroom. 

Yet, the nearness to God you gain through education in his Word was never meant to be kept to ourselves. Jesus’ priority was not to be served but to serve and demonstrate sacrificial love daily. He served the poor and marginalized, the bleeding and the lame. He spoke on behalf of the voiceless, and he advocated for them. He restored the identity of broken and damaged people and restored them. God’s mission has always been to bring light and justice to the communities of the entire earth- more specifically, to bring life to those experiencing death. He is always depicted as giving his attention to the sick and needy. He is near to the broken-hearted, the poor, the oppressed, and the afflicted. Those people are God’s priority. 

This summer, 20+ students from The Institute for GOD will go to Uganda to serve as a part of GOD International’s Summer Internship program. To learn more about this program or to apply, visit their website.

If following Jesus is our goal, serving the poor should be a significant component of biblical education.

As disciples of Jesus, we are not going into the classroom to compile a head knowledge to make a good argument about why someone should believe in Jesus. We enter the classroom as Bible students, attached to a historical narrative of God’s people.

We enter the classroom to come out of it a new person. We enter and stay because we recognize that our education is much more holistic than a typical college education. Entering the classroom is entering a process of baptism by the Word of God, where you find yourself so immersed in the Lord that you become a different person on the other side of your education. We are learning to live as he did. His example includes caring for orphans, widows, and immigrants, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and visiting prisoners. 

These activities are not exclusive to going abroad. As students, we regularly serve the elderly, homeless, immigrants, and refugees in Nashville through weekly ministry projects. However, going abroad and walking alongside the poor in the third world will change you forever.

Walking alongside the poor changes you. From doing laundry to cooking meals, to assisting them with daily chores or labor, or staying in their homes and eating their food. These are the activities we mean when we call our trips “immersions.”

Fulfilling Christ’s mission is only possible through a proper discipleship training process—demonstrated first by Jesus and his disciples. Jesus gave specific attention to the poor. He was a voice for the voiceless. God’s mission for the world is to bring light and justice to communities.

International missions inform and expand your understanding in the classroom because they enable you to understand just how vital your education is and how much it isn’t just for you. Learning with your brothers and sisters in the third world in mind informs your understanding in the classroom. President Garner sometimes says, “the more you understand something, the more you’ll enjoy it.” This is true of understanding God’s mission and the practical, cultural understanding we gain in the classroom.

If you approach your classes with this understanding, it changes your motivation. You’re no longer learning for yourself only. You’re learning for others because you recognize you have been entrusted with a responsibility.