I’ve had wonderful opportunities to visit some amazing countries and spend time on the mission field of helping those in need, mainly targeting kids who have been living in orphanages and waiting for adoption. I most recently was in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia where I was able to spend a few days with a group of 200 young girls at an orphanage. No doubt, they loved having an older white guy with grey hair hang out with them for a few days. It was a mission trip of a lifetime.

I think I helped a little. Maybe. As I was there, I thought about what it cost to get there, the cost of housing, travel, and meals, and wrestled a bit with the vast amount of dollars it took to get there….just to be on the mission field. Nonetheless, it was a great trip. An eye-opening one. To see the need of these young girls encourage me to want to help more. In reality, I knew there was very little that got accomplished. Traveling all that way and spending all that money that produced very little, in my eyes was a bit disheartening. But that trip didn’t prepare me for what situation and mindful conflict I would come home to.

I live with 60 struggling teens that come from all over the country to live in our residential counseling program called Heartlight. This beautiful place is a haven of peace, a respite of hope, and a mission to parents and their struggling teens. But something happened not 400 yards from our place of hope that still puts a lump in my throat to this day.

A 14-year-old young lady named Kim, who lived not 400 yards from our property in East Texas….400 yards from a “respite of hope”, had a bad day while I was in Ethiopia spending time with 200 young girls at the Ketchanie Orphanage. She was so overwhelmed in the midst of her bad day, that she picked up her 2 little dogs, put them under her arms, and walked out to the railroad tracks and stood there until an oncoming train took her life. Just 400 yards from where I live. 400 yards.

Here I thought that I had to go thousands of miles away to find a mission project, and I missed the very one that lived just a little way away. I felt I had missed a chance to help a neighbor.

Last weekend, Jan, my wife, and I drove to Tulsa, Oklahoma to visit her recently widowed Dad, to spend a couple of days cleaning up his yard, trimming trees, cutting branches, scrubbing out gutters, and catching up on yardwork of his once pristine home landscape. He had focused his efforts for the last 5 years taking care of my ill mother-in-law (an absolute jewel!) and neglected to take care of everything else around him. He’s 94, worn out, sad, lonely, and feels a little lost in fulfilling his purpose of taking care of his bride of 73 years.

Shearing bushes, cutting and tearing down trees, bagging leaves, and chainsawing remnants of trees that had passed years ago, became an act of love for a man that feels much like his yard….neglected, ignored, dying, and in need of some revitalization. This two-day excursion to Tulsa to help my father-in-law, had got to be one of the most important mission projects I have ever worked on and been a part of. And it was right there in my family; not a foreign mission that I needed to travel thousands of miles to “help”.

I wonder if we all sometimes miss the mission projects right in our own backyard (our family) because we feel that to be “in mission”, it’s got to be somewhere far away and more exciting. I wonder if we miss the very “mission” that God has placed in our family, the opportunity to help those that have played a significant part in our lives.

Now don’t hear me saying that mission projects should all be at home. Or, that we should never travel to help others. What I am saying, is that there may be so many people in need right around us, that we don’t have to go far to extend them the hand of Christ. The apostle Paul said, “Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality.” (Romans 12:13) Your mission field may be right out your back door. Maybe just 400 yards away. Or someone in your family that desperately needs hope that is wrapped up in a little help.

Would you consider taking on a mission project? It could be someone in your family. Or a neighbor that is within a stone’s throw of your porch. Or, someone in your church that is too proud to ask for help, but needs it more than anyone will ever know. Here’s some ideas:

• Go take care of someone’s yard. When you mow yours, go ahead and mow theirs. When you trim bushes, trim theirs. When your rake leaves, rake theirs. And don’t just do it once. Make it habit to help take care of something that might just mean the world to them.

• Commit to helping a family that has a special needs child. And don’t just do it once. Commit to “give them a break” by saying that you’ll be over at their home every Tuesday afternoon, ….for the next 4 years…to give them a respite and some time to refresh.

• Look around you and find a person that looks about as neglected as their home, and take on a small project to make life just a little easier for them. Fix a faucet, help paint a fence, get rid of their garbage. You’d be surprised how small thing mean a lot to those who can barely take care of themselves much less a house, a barn, their property or anything that once meant the world to them.

• Instead of keeping your kids from hanging around those “bad kids”, take those kids on as a mission project. God may have placed those tough kids around you so that you can help change their lives. I’ve found that these “bad” kids really aren’t bad, they’re just lost. And helping someone find their way when they’re lost is one of the greatest things anyone can do for another.

There are people around you that are just like the young lady, Kim, who had lost all hope. There are father-in-laws just like mine all around you that need help, but are much too proud to ask for it. Just do it any way. And there are those that are in a stone’s throw from your home that are praying for someone just like you to come lend a helping hand.

What I thought was going to be a horrible 2-day time of sweating, getting worn out, and purposeless, ended up being my mission project of the year….right in my own family. I’ve never been thanked so many times as we sat and talked about his wife, getting older, the future and yet to be made decisions about a retirement home, and what to do about a dog that is seeing her last days. God had other plans for my time for those days than what I thought.

And I was the one that drove home with a sense of fulfillment that my efforts had truly made a difference in the life of one man….right there in my own family.