17,000 - What is Teen Missions… and why us?

17,000 is a nice round number don’t you think? What could you do with say $17,000? You could probably buy a decent car, roof a house, pay for a year or two of college, finally do that kitchen remodel you’ve wanted, or go on that around the world cruise that you and your spouse have always dreamed about but never thought you could afford. Or maybe you could do something a bit more altruistic, and put the money towards something good like supporting your local union gospel mission or homeless shelter, supporting that missionary who keeps on sending you monthly letters requesting your help, or donating it to the church building fund and get some room (please don’t let it be the bathroom!) dedicated in your name. Suppose you didn’t have $17,000 but rather you had 17,000 lbs of some precious metal like gold or even silver! Imagine how much your net worth would go up then! Just the tithe off of that would put any church in the black for the next hundred years or so! Just imagine what you could do with that!

Suppose you had 17,000 people at your disposal who would do whatever you like whenever you liked it? With those kind of resources you practically could accomplish just about anything you set your mind to. With that many people to draw from surely you could find someone good at business who could take a few hundred people and build the next great investment company to be listed on the Fortune 500. You could probably also find a few engineers and computer guys and try to usurp Micro-Soft as the top supplier of computer software to the world. With that many people at your finger tips you could accomplish all kinds of humanitarian aid to all kinds of nations all over the world. Just imagine the possibilities! Even better, what do you think God could do with 17,000 people? No doubt anything our imaginations could cook up on this blog would pale in comparison to what God would do with them!

So why am I fascinated with the number 17,000? Because each and every year for quite a few years now this is the number of people who come to a saving belief in Jesus Christ as a direct result of the various ministries of Teen Missions. The first time people hear this number they are often staggered by the amount while I am not. However, after explaining to them the vast array of ministries that TMI participates in I often begin to see the recognition on their faces. Let me explain.

The North American based Boot Camp in Merritt Island, FL, where currently some 500-700 people are sent out each year on short term mission trips is just one aspect of our ministry. Most people don’t realize that the “I” in TMI stands for “International.” There are TMI bases scattered around the world from the central American bases in Honduras and Belize, Asian bases in India, Cambodia, Mongolia, Indonesia, and the Philippines to list a few, a base on the East Coast of Australia, and bases literally scattered across both the continents of South America and Africa. When you begin to add it up there are over 30 TMI “Boot Camp” bases around the world and it doesn’t take long to crunch the numbers and understand why over the last 40-years of ministry over 40,000 teenagers have been through the North American Boot Camp, over 300,000 teenagers have been through the various international Boot Camps, and literally hundreds of thousands of people have been led to the Lord as a direct result of the Holy Spirit working through the lives of those involved in the ministries of Teen Missions.

But TMI is so much more than Boot Camps! Back in the earlier formulations of Teen Missions the director had a burden to provide a solid bible school education for free to each and every teen who had come on a mission trip with TMI. So, through faith and whole lot of prayer, and support of many local pastors TMI bases around the world began to open “Bible, Missionary, and Work Training Centers” to those who had completed a summer mission trip with TMI. Did I fail to mention earlier that with exception to the North American and Australian based boot camps it doesn’t cost a single dime to any national who participates in the our summer mission programs? So yes in almost every country that TMI works the mission trips are free and a free bible school education is also available. Sound too good to be true? Well keep on reading.

As many of you may or may not know TMI specializes in short term mission trips that support existing mission organizations around the world. So suppose a Wycliffe Translator needs a church built for the people that are being won to the Lord as a result of having a translation of the Bible in their language for the first time. They call TMI, and TMI begins to send teams out to build the church, hospital, or school that is needed. Suppose you work with YWAM or OM doing street evangelism and you would like to teach others how to do the same? TMI will send a team of youth to be mentored. Suppose you just need someone to help teach English in China, rebuild a church in Cuba, help maintain a church camp in Greece, clear out a landing strip for supply planes in the jungles of Brazil, Papua New Guinea, or the Australian Outback, change diapers of the orphans in Romania, Thailand, or Brazil, or give an orphan whose parents died of the AIDS virus their first pare of shoes in Sub-Saharan Africa. All of these and so much more are things that TMI has done and will continue to do for as long as they are in existence. But don’t stop reading yet.

Back in the 80’s when the world was first beginning to become aware of the implications associated with the AIDS/HIV viruses people began to realize that an unintended consequence of these viruses was the literally millions of orphans that were being left behind in Sub-Saharan Africa. People tried building orphanages, but the reality was that they could build over 100 orphanages a day for the next 10 years and still only have enough housing for less than 10% of the orphans that were being created as a result of these deadly viruses. In addition to this the African mindset proved to be very different than the Western one. Where in western civilization orphans frequently have needed to be sheltered in Africa it is customary to take in the orphan of a relative but not without exacting some kind of payment in return. As a result many of the orphans in Africa while they do have a “roof” over their head are forced into indentured servitude and in many cases “sold” or used for something far worse. Instead of taking a traditional approach to this problem TMI thought outside the box and started literally taking the orphanage to the orphans by starting what they called the AIDS – Orphans Rescue Unit program. The rescue units are portable shelters than can be set up almost anywhere out of which two missionaries can live and provide aid to all the orphans in a given area. The missionaries can conduct school for the kids, provide and teach basic hygiene and first aid, teach them how to garden and grow their own crops, and in many cases help provide a means by which the orphans now take care of themselves. As a result of this ministry TMI has been able to work with tens of thousands of orphans and witness significant life changes in an environment where death is an all too frequent reality.

All this because in 1970 a 17-year girl complained to her dad that she wanted to go on a mission trip but no organization out there would let her go. All this because that dad in return thought something should be done to address this issue and in his garage he founded Teen Missions. Yes, some 40 years later this is Teen Missions! And yes if today we continue to channel the energy of this generations youth in the right direction we can truly raise the next generation of missionaries who can go out and quite literally rock the world for Jesus! You could say that Erin and I have 17,000 reasons why we’ve chosen to join staff with Teen Missions. My question for you is simply this, is 17,000 really enough, or is it just a nice round number?