“Greater Things” ‘Thursday’ #24 – The Mission Travel Fund

Each Thursday (yes, I know it’s Friday, but we’ve been posting VBS stuff all week), we are emphasizing an area in which Lebanon Road is seeking for Greater Things in 2011. “Greater Things” is our theme for the year. For an introduction and video to the theme, click here.

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Summer means “vacations” for lots of people. Many take a week off work, while others just enjoy the nice weather for a weekend and go see something they’ve never seen before, or return to an old favorite spot to relax.

Lebanon Road has an interesting way to help families choose some different spots for their travel, and it doesn’t have to be in the summer. We currently support 9 mission locations, and all of them are in the United States. The greater part of them are in the Southeast. Since we are striving to help these congregations any way we can, we want part of that support to be the “human touch.” In other words, we want members to visit these congregations and check in on the work.

So, a couple of years ago, our elders set up a fund in the framework of our budget to encourage just that. If a family will travel to one of these mission points, Lebanon Road will help pay for their gas as well as their hotel for that night! All the elders ask is that the family write a report about their visit, so the elders and the mission committee can have a good handle on what is going on in these locations.

Since most of the congregations we support are within a day’s drive from Nashville, we have several families who will take advantage of this fund for a weekend trip. Others will make it part of their summer vacation (maybe stopping by one of these congregations on their drive back home on Sunday). Either way, it is a wonderful way to show our support for the congregation, as well as keeping the lines of communication open.

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For “Greater Things” to occur, we need more folks to visit the congregations we support. Our goal is to have at least 2 visits each year to each of the nine congregations. I’m glad to say that, so far in 2011, we are well on our way to meeting that goal. But how about exceeding this one! What an encouragement it would be to the members of these congregations to see folks from Lebanon Road on a somewhat-regular basis!