By: Maria Johnson
Some of you may or may not have seen me sportin’ around my favorite new accessory. It’s a round, white button that reads, “ASK ME WHY MY HAIR’S CRAZY!” I love wearing this thing because it’s a good conversation starter, even though there is the occasional person who very obviously stares at it, then my hair, then walks away. I guess it’s easy for some to pass up an open opportunity to make a new friend. Or they’re just illiterate and I mistook their looking at the letters longingly for reading them.
Anyhoo, hopefully you’re curious by now as to why my hair is crazy if you didn’t already know. I’ve transformed some of the natural brown to green, blue, pink, yellow, red, and purple not just because of my rebellious teenage soul, but also for the sake of helping a friend help others. Jess Goodwin, a senior at Charlestown High School, plans to take a journey to Kathmandu, Nepal from June 8-18 with Sojourn Community Church for a mission trip to love the people there. She needs $3000 to get there, and we’ll be fundraising likes it’s nobody’s business to make it happen. I’m asking people to donate as much as they are able and willing, and for every $25 donated through me, I dye another strip of my hair something crazy cool. We’re sacrificing all the talent, time, energy, and blessings (like hair) we can and learning a lot about trusting the Lord in the process. ‘Cause when God wants a girl to go to Nepal, there’s no messin’ around, and she’s going to Nepal.
As Goodwin has previously found out, mission trips are a great experience, for those helping and those being helped. Both are so positively impacted. NAHS sophomore Harvest Ham has also come to know the joy of traveling to love. In eighth grade, Ham went to Japan with her youth pastor and a few other youth. Most of the services they offered were hanging out, building relationships and encouraging people to feel more comfortable learning about God in their youth groups.
“It wasn’t really a ‘labor-intensive’ mission like what people generally think of when they think of mission trips,” Ham said. “The main impact we wanted to make was to help befriend and make an easier connection between the leader’s family and these students because so many families are closed off to religion that it takes a lot of time and effort for them to even be able to invite students or friends to their ‘youth groups’ and get-togethers.”
A lot of people have been raised or led to believe that “having a relationship with God” immediately means “getting your stuff together and doing things right or God hates you”. Mission trip-attenders are often big on clarifying that the whole point of Jesus is that they know they can’t “do things right” or be “good enough people” to earn God’s love. Christians know they screw up, and they don’t expect anyone else to be perfect for God. If we could be perfect and get His love by our own works, why would we need Jesus or grace at all? But there is love available that we don’t deserve. And if it’s received, it should certainly be shared with people in the community and across the world. Of course, the love is found reciprocated on many mission trips.
“I learned so much about hospitality it was unreal,” Ham said. “They are so conscious of their surroundings and guests. You are treated like their close family when you go and stay with them. I think about Japan every day and get so worked up thinking about how it was just a dream come true – the beauty God’s placed there in the land and people is like no other!”
Clearly, Ham did not regret leaving home for a short time. Goodwin expects her sojourn in Nepal to be just as rewarding, and totally worth the cost. If you’re interested in assisting in getting her there, please email [email protected] and learn how to help spread the love!
