Effective Engagement in Short-term Missions represents the single most ambitious effort to date to understand and improve upon patterns of ministry in STM. In six sections, the authors explore topics such as the links between STM and older patterns of long-term missions; engagement with people of other cultures; international partnerships; specialized ministries such as medical missions; legal and financial liabilities; and last but not least, the impact of STM on participants. The goal of this book is to improve the ways in which STM is carried out and to improve the understandings needed on the part of all who engage in the ministry. In short, this book attempts to provide a knowledge base for those who provide leadership within the short term missions movement. Youth pastors, mission pastors, lay leaders, college and seminary students, and missiologists will all find information that is helpful and relevant to their concerns.

Effective Engagement in Short-term Missions represents the single most ambitious effort to date to understand and improve upon patterns of ministry in STM. In six sections, the authors explore topics such as the links between STM and older patterns of long-term missions; engagement with people of other cultures; international partnerships; specialized ministries such as medical missions; legal and financial liabilities; and last but not least, the impact of STM on participants. The goal of this book is to improve the ways in which STM is carried out and to improve the understandings needed on the part of all who engage in the ministry. In short, this book attempts to provide a knowledge base for those who provide leadership within the short term missions movement. Youth pastors, mission pastors, lay leaders, college and seminary students, and missiologists will all find information that is helpful and relevant to their concerns.

Short-term mission trips are great ways to impact the kingdom. Yet they can lack effectiveness because of mistakes or naiveté on the part of participants. In this insightful and timely book, David A. Livermore calls us to serve with our eyes open to global and cultural realities so we can become more effective cross-cultural ministers. Serving with Eyes Wide Open is a must-have book for anyone doing a short-term mission or service project, whether domestic or overseas. Foreword by Paul Borthwick.

Going on a short-term missions trip can be a life-transforming experience, but it can also involve weeks of physical and spiritual challenges. In this revised and expanded ten-week course, you will find a concise summary of crosscultural principles, help in facing spiritual warfare, tips on avoiding a tourist mentality, spiritual preparation through individual or group Bible study, and discussion and reflection questions.

When Helping Hurts is a paradigm-forming contemporary classic on the subject of poverty alleviation with over 300,000 copies in print. This stand-alone resource applies the principles of that book specifically to short-term missions. Helping Without Hurting in Short-Term Missions: Participant’s Guide aims to train and debrief team members, preparing them to do short-term missions as effectively as possible. To do this, it provides practical examples and guidelines for team members, and it creates interaction and reflection opportunities through questions and journaling. With eight units, six of which are built around free online video content, this book equips teams to avoid harming materially poor communities and to translate their experience into lasting and mutual engagement with missions and poverty alleviation. In conjunction with the separately available Leader’s Guide, it is an ideal resource for churches, Christian colleges, mission agencies, and missionaries.

Lead short-term mission trips (STMs) that catalyze trip participants into mission-oriented disciple-makers when they return home. STMs can be mutually beneficial service opportunities that have positive long-term impact on both trip participants and national hosts. While this is possible, it is not always the outcome of many STMs. STMs often prioritize the short-term experience of trip participants and miss the longer-term discipleship opportunity they offer. STMs can be a context of significant, mutually beneficial work between both trip participants and national hosts. This work can serve as a catalyst for meaningful, long-term growth for both parties, but an appropriate philosophy and trip structure is needed. This book studies and reveals best practices for both.

Remarkably, thirty percent of North American teenagers—millions of people between the ages of 13 and 17—have engaged in religious missions or service projects. Building on this statistic, the authors of TransforMission believe that short-term mission is one way God is taking the gospel to the nations and, concurrently, transforming the lives of these student participants. Writing to youth ministers, missiologists, church leaders, adult volunteers, and post-high school students, they assess strategies for further promoting this kind of involvement by exploring several questions: • What mechanisms is God employing to achieve this advance in mission? • What is taking place in the lives of believers who are obediently participating in the fulfillment of the Great Commision? • What are the theological and theoretical foundations for the life transformation that is occurring? • What is the most effective means of conducting short-term mission experiences?