First Steps in Mission Trip Planning

Unsure where to begin with planning your next mission trip? We're here to assist you! Check out these first steps to kickstart your mission trip planning process.

Pick a location

The first step of any mission trip experience is deciding where you're going to go. If you already know where want to travel with your team, then that's great! But what if you're not sure where God wants you to serve yet?

Wanting to stay local? In the United States, we have ten locations with different opportunities for teams to serve. With the possibility of serving relationally or through service projects, domestic mission trips are great for your younger students desiring to serve on a mission trip. 

Trips in Latin America are great for first-time groups wanting to travel internationally because they feel more accessible: they require less travel time, are more affordable, are often in similar time zones, and some of your students might be learning Spanish in school. Consider which trips offer ministry opportunities that might be a good fit for your church, such as VBS, sports outreach, evangelism, light construction, and more. Our team can help talk through some options that might be a good fit for your group.

Why Servant Life?

When you travel with Servant Life, you can trust that your trip is part of a gospel-centered, Christ-focused, long-term strategy with our missionary partners to reach their community. 

All of our trips feature work with established missionary partners in the Servant Life network. These are either missionaries or ministry leaders who have a history of service in the country (or location), as well as ministry opportunities and programs that align with the mission and vision of Servant Life, our core values, and what we believe. The people leading your team for the week are going to be the people who are staying behind and continuing to serve that context well after your team leaves. We believe this is important, as we do not want to be "rogue missionaries" dropping into a context, trying to find some ministry to do, and then departing without any kind of follow-up strategy or ministry plan. We know the importance of working with local partners who have a long-term strategy in place, viewing short-term teams as a catalyst for much larger kingdom impact.

It is our prayer, that your group catches the vision and returns year after year to serve with our missionary partners.

Register

Our trips are all-inclusive, which means that we focus on the details so that you can focus on ministry with your team. Our team will work with in-country missionaries to take care of food, lodging, transportation, and ministry experiences for your short-term mission trip. In addition to securing your airfare with our professional travel agent, we also provide international traveler's insurance, trip devotionals, training videos, and other resources as part of your basic trip cost. Servant Life exists to be a fantastic resource for churches as you make disciples of all nations.

Ready to get started? Find your preferred trip location on our website and request information about dates and availability. Once dates are confirmed with our partners we will reach out with registration details and access to our trip Prep Center.

Must-do's

Before you hop on the plane or get in the van to head to your mission trip, there are some must-do steps that you need to take care of sooner rather than later.

UPDATE YOUR PASSPORT

If you're going on an international mission trip and you don't have a passport, you're going to need one. Or if you have a passport, but it's expiring within a year, go ahead and get it renewed. Many countries require that your passport be valid for at least 6 months out (from when you travel).

Save yourself the headache and don't wait to get your passport or get it updated. Passports can take anywhere from a couple of weeks to a couple of months to arrive after you submit your application. If you submit your application early, you won't have to worry if you get caught on the “couple of months” side of things. To view current passport processing time (updated daily), to submit your first passport application, or to renew your passport, click here.

BOOK YOUR TICKETS

We recognize that this is a daunting hurdle for many groups, so Servant Life offers to book all airfare through our travel agency, though you may book with your own travel agent if you prefer to do so. We simply want you to get the best rate possible! Generally everyone on your team must travel together, though we may be able to take exceptions on a case by case basis; we book group airline tickets and therefore cannot always accommodate special requests for different individual flights. Due to commitments to our missionaries to have groups there on set dates, trip dates are not always flexible, but once again we are happy to consider requests on a case by case basis. Generally with our travel agent, we can hold your airfare tickets with a deposit a few months in advance of your trip, but then the full price of the ticket is due around 45 days before your trip. If you cancel an airfare ticket, we will refund you anything that the airline refunds us, but you would have to pay the cancellation penalty that the airline sets. Airline tickets are non-transferrable as they are tied to a person's name, and they are only partially refundable based on whatever policies the airline implements for your specific booking. Airfare can be a headache to tackle by yourself, but we try to alleviate that burden for you and make it easy!

RAISE SUPPORT

Get lots of tips and ideas for raising support here.

Raising support is everyone's favorite part of a mission trip, right? Okay, maybe that's a stretch. But it is a crucial part of planning for a mission trip. You'll need financial, relational, and spiritual support for your trip.

• Financial support gets you there (and back, hopefully).

• Relational support keeps you encouraged and energized while you're there.

• Spiritual support produces the life change that happens in both you and the people you serve.

Don't wait to start raising support. Give yourself plenty of time to get the word out about your trip and meet face-to-face with friends and family. Getting started early means that the people in your circle can be part of the whole experience with you, not just the week that you're traveling.

Tip: Try to be creative. You don't want your support letter to look like an English 101 term paper! Add color. Add pictures. Upload a YouTube video. Start a Facebook group. Make up a hashtag . . . You get the point. Engage with your friends and family and show them how excited you are to be serving!