From Culture Shock to Shared Humanity: The Impact of a Short-Term Mission Trip2 min read

“If I had known about the poverty, I might have been too scared to go.” Those are Alex Holcomb’s reflections on the impact of a MOST Ministries mission trip he took as a teenager to Nicaragua in 2010. With a group from his home church, and with his dad as a chaperone, Alex traveled to a village in rural Nicaragua to help the community have access to clean drinking water.

Alex’s job on the mission was to help make water filter systems using barrels, sand, and gravel. Water to put into the filters wasn’t available in the village, Alex remembers, so villagers using a cart and a very under-nourished horse brought water “a long distance” to put into the new filter. This filtered water was a real improvement in the lives of people living with no modern conveniences and residing in handmade huts with dirt floors.

Alex became a poster child for how culture shock affects a teen from the U.S. He remembers his shock at being in such surroundings—children playing in the dirt streets and begging the visitors for money, livestock wandering among the houses, chickens living in the front yards, and adult males sitting around, apparently without jobs to go to. It was depressing! Alex wanted to turn around … to go home!

What turned his mind around in that moment was being asked to play soccer (fútbol) with the local boys. It was definitely a “God moment.” Alex encountered a boy his age who was friendly and just wanted to have fun like kids everywhere. The boy wasn’t a complainer. He was outgoing and hospitable. A soccer ball and a dirt street were all that was needed for a game.  Alex realized he had more in common with this boy than he thought at first glance. “The rest of the week wasn’t all easy or fun, but in retrospect, it was very rewarding.”

As a result of his experience, Alex today seeks out the mission field. “Now I see it as ‘we can’t close our eyes to the problems.’” He has a heart for teaching people, and especially children, the hope that is in Christ. Alex serves as Worship Arts Director at Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Saginaw, Mich., and currently is enrolled in seminary to become a parish pastor.

Author’s note: Water filters have come a long way since 2010. The team written about here influenced the change in how MOST Ministries helps communities with their water. MOST now sends Sawyer filters to the field, where each filter can provide a family with decades of pure, healthy water for drinking and cooking.

_{Photos courtesy of Alex Holcomb. In the cover image, Alex is the young man in the light blue shirt.}