Missions

World Deputation

University Ministries and UPC have been sending students on summer missions for 53 years.

To date, over 1,000 students have participated in the World Deputation program, serving in over 40 foreign countries and 20 states in the U.S. These teams of students venture all over the world for cross-cultural experiences with the purpose of spreading the gospel and stretching their understanding of the world.

But more significant than all these numbers are the countless lives that have been touched by the love and faithfulness of Christ.....my life was one of those touched by World Deputation. In 2004, the Lord sent me to Ireland for 8 weeks and those 8 weeks changed my life. Now in 2008, I have come full circle and I am now on the deputation committee which is the committee that comes together to pray over the deputees and the sites, and eventually has the privilege of fixing each deputee within a specific site.

It truly is the only mission opportunity I currently know of where you sign up to go without knowing what it is that you are actually signing up for...so last week I was asked to share a deputation experience at the meeting and shared my experience with disappointment and expectations. I had mentioned during my deputation interview that I wanted to go to Africa or at least somewhere third world...however on the Big announcement night I discovered the Lord had other plans for me and intended on sending me to Ireland, which some people would have been so very excited about. But I had a difficult time with it and was disappointed, especially when I would tell people I was spending 8 weeks in Ireland doing mission work and people would say ohh...Ireland..I was there on holiday a few years back..lovely country, beautiful people...and I would just smile sweetly when inside all I wanted to scream and shout and say WHY ME??..at the time I just thought Ireland didn't fit my idea of a mission trip, but I must say my disappointment was short lived.

As soon as I stepped off the plane and got myself outside the airport...i truly felt as though I had just come home...maybe i felt that way because of the weather and the fact that it was drizzling outside even though it was July?...or maybe it was simply the smell of the rain on the pavement..or the humor and light heartedness of the people. But whatever it was, the feeling was right and i never once doubted the Lord's decision to send me there.

So then, at the deputation debriefing retreat everyone shared their stories and experiences, and I sat there listening to all the experiences, which were all so uniquely different. And I realized even if i could have handpicked my team and where I went...I wouldn't have changed a single thing!!

i realized that I didn't have to go to a Third World country to do mission work and my eyes were opened during this experience...and on a mission trip one can't expect too many things and so many things are unpredictable, but they can expect to encounter the Lord and to be transformed and this in itself is such a wonderful thing!!