I asked Vincent Carmen, the Team Leader of Tates Creek Baptist Association Vision Team to share some thoughts about getting his team ready for Panama. (See Panama! post) Here’s what he had to share.
Preparation
I think that it is essential for a team to be prepared well for their trip. We have put together an orientation manual that we use for all our teams. That material has come from several sources. Some of it was gleaned from material that other associations have used; material that the IMB has put together; information from the missionaries that we work with; and perhaps most of all, the experiences of our own volunteers. We begin by securing volunteers well in advance of our trip. We then meet once a month for a minimum of four meetings. This does a couple of things. It gives us time to cover all the areas of the trip. We discuss in detail what we will be doing on the field, as well as our own preparation before we leave. Shots, how to pack, the airports, customs, immigration, tickets, etc., are all discussed in detail. By the time the volunteers get on the field, they are prepared for most anything that happens. We don’t want any surprises when they get there. It also gives the team a chance to get to know one another. By the time we leave, our volunteers have blended together to form one team – a team that prayers together, cries together, rejoices together, and supports one another. Spiritual preparation is the most important preparation we can make. We elect a prayer captain that leads us all through the orientation process and during the actual trip. There have been serious problems arise in airports and on the field that required immediate action. The prayer captain calls us all together and prays right then and there. We have seen God’s great hand working out problems right before our eyes. On this trip, although all of us have been on volunteer trips before, we have been meeting to prepare for this trip. As of now, we have done everything we know to do for this trip to Panama.
What we expect
Concluding a seven-year mission partnership with Botswana, we are now ready to once again look upon the fields for they are white unto harvest. We are praying that God will open our eyes to that field that God would have us labor in. William Carey on May 31, 1792, at Friar Lane Baptist Church in Nottingham, England, preached his well-known sermon on missions. In it he read from Isa 54:2-3
2 “Enlarge the place of your tent, And let them stretch out the curtains of your dwellings; Do not spare;
Lengthen your cords, And strengthen your stakes. 3 For you shall expand to the right and to the left,
And your descendants will inherit the nations, And make the desolate cities inhabited. NKJV
For the past twenty years my heart has been in Africa. I am praying that God will enlarge my vision to include other areas of the world.
In Christ,
Vincent Carman
Tates Creek Baptist Association
