Last week I posted about reasons youth workers are struggling to get kids to commit. One of the most frequent “complaints” was that parents weren’t supportive of the mission trip. Or said another way – Going on a mission trip isn’t as important to parents as band camp, sports camp, summer job, family vacation, etc.

What can you do when you face this? Here’s a couple helpful hints and action steps you can take.

- Make sure a mission trip isn’t just “something the youth group does.” If your group’s mission trip isn’t integral to your overall ministry, parents will sense that. Going on a mission trip shouldn’t receive the same attention and energy as every other retreat, amusement park trip, summer camp, lock-in. You need to make the mission important – integral to your ministry – if you want parents to even begin to see it as important to their child. A mission trip is a big deal. Make sure yours is!

- Help parents understand how a mission trip develops their child. Parents want to know that going on a mission trip, instead of summer camp or a summer job, will help develop their kid into the adult they hope they will be. That’s why parents feel soccer camp, dance camp, band camp, or a summer job are so important. Those things teach their child life lessons. Lessons like – working hard, responsibility, getting along with others, learning new skills. Well… So Does a Mission Trip! Anything you can learn at another summer experience you will learn on a mission trip. Mission trips teach teenagers about working hard on a project, getting along with others in sometimes difficult situations, learning new skills while serving someone in need. Tell parents that. Let them know that their kid will get so much more than just a week away from home.

- Be professional and organized. Going away from home is big deal. Even if it’s just two states away. But more if it’s an ocean and a continent away. How can you expect parents to commit their child to a trip, if you aren’t completely prepared and organized. You can get away with a permission slip and “show up at 7 am” for a trip to the water park. You can’t behave like that taking your students on a mission trip. Period. Parents need to trust you. They are giving you their kid and you’re going to have that kid swinging hammers, sleeping who-knows-where, eating who-knows-what, serving the kind of people they probably would like the to avoid… It’s a big deal!

- Explain how a mission trip fits into the overall spiritual formation goals of your ministry. Whether you take your group on a mission trip every year or every third year as part of a rotation – you have reasons why you do that. Tell parents those reasons. If you believe a mission trip every other year in conjunction with an evangelism training event is the best way to give students a balance of living out their faith and sharing their faith, tell parents. If you believe that the combination of things that happen on a mission trip (students outside their comfort zone, serving someone in need, being away so God can connect with them) is the absolute best way to help students grow in their relationship with Jesus, make sure parents understand that. A parent that understands a mission trip is part of something big that is good for their child, they more likely they are to support it.

The more you completely integrate and highlight a mission trip with these ideas – the more parents will understand why they should make sure their child is part of the trip.