Stories from the Mission Field | CGO Blog

In a small town just thirty minutes south of Kisumu, Kenya, is Matongo Lutheran Theological College where, among the other students, we meet thirteen women who are studying to become deaconesses. Some are from various regions of Kenya, and others have traveled the long distances from their villages in Uganda and Tanzania.

On the other side of the world, in northern California, lives Pamela Boehle-Silva, a deaconess and registered nurse, who, since 2006, has traveled to various parts of Asia and Africa to teach and provide care to people in India, Sudan, South Africa, Tanzania, Kenya, and Madagascar. And this past September, Pamela returned to Kenya with an invitation to teach a weeklong class for deaconess students and a two-and-a-half-day seminar for trained deaconesses. 

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Africa

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Mission Trip

“I will treasure this forever,” said nine-year-old Simon, as he clutched his new Faith Alive Bible. Simon lives in the remote village of Cormorant in Manitoba, Canada. He and his friends, along with the other children in this isolated community, wait anxiously for the return of a VBS youth mission team who arrive every summer from Peace Lutheran Church in Columbus, Nebraska. For eleven years, this team of ten to twelve high school youth and a handful of adults has worked with LAMP-Canada to bring the saving love of Jesus Christ to the children in Cormorant.

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Mission Trip US and Canada

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Negativity and hatred bombard us in our newsfeeds, on our TVs, and even in our conversations. Evil invades our lives and often drives us toward despair. In this tornadic darkness, one message of love slices through the bitter gloom—the message of Jesus.

Our mission as Christians is to share the unconditional love of Jesus with the world, and that often involves modeling Jesus’ love for those in need. Shepherd of the City Lutheran Church, an inner-city LCMS congregation in Fort Wayne, Indiana, sought to share that love by supporting new parents in their community.

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US and Canada

Sometimes God opens doors softly, subtly. I was nearly walloped in the face as He tore one from its hinges; two weeks after a harried phone call, I was on a plane to Belize! While wallowing in a planned mission trip to Guatemala that didn’t pan out, the words of Proverbs 16:9 struck me: “The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps.” As I scrambled to forge ahead with yet more plans, the Lord established a way for me to go to elsewhere in Central America! Shortly before a team from The Lutheran Church of the Webster Gardens was set to depart, I was approached about taking the place of a participant who dropped out at the last minute.

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Latin America Mission Trip

On November 20, 2015, Jonathan Ruehs and fourteen other missionaries boarded a red-eye flight to Guatemala City. Stocked with more than 200 books from Concordia Gospel Outreach, the missionaries fearlessly headed for a poverty-stricken village that had been considered “too big” for many other groups to take on: El Progreso, Guatemala.

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Latin America Children's Outreach

Jenny Cree works with little people all day, so she knows that big things can come in small packages.

Jenny is the first-grade teacher at Salem Lutheran School in Orange, California. During the holidays, the school’s adjoining church gives its congregants a challenge: to spread hope to others through giving. Jenny wanted her students to learn that even a small act of giving can do just that.

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Children's Outreach US and Canada Kids Helping Kids

St. John’s Lutheran School in Mukwonago, Wisconsin, sure does take its mascot seriously.

The 115 students rally around their panther (not a real live one, of course). And just like big cats do, the students move in “prides”—small groups that come together to work on special projects during the school year. The 2015 holiday project? Helping families in need, both physically and spiritually.

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Children's Outreach US and Canada Kids Helping Kids

In February 2010, a tsunami ravaged the coastal town of Constitución, Chile, washing away lives and homes in the ensuing tidal waves. Mere days after the freak tsunami, Rev. Omar Kinas, who had been called by the confessional Lutheran Church of Chile to serve in another location, was asked to go to Constitución instead. Rather than shy away from tragedy, Rev. Kinas asserted that the people of Constitución needed the Gospel more than ever.

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Latin America Children's Outreach

Dave Grieshaber and the rest of his volunteer team almost didn’t get to go on their mission trip to Acuña, Mexico.

It wasn’t just some chance of fate how it all worked out, and it certainly wasn’t luck. By God’s design, another mission team was unable to make the trip. So in summer 2015, the team of twenty-six missionaries from the Lutheran Church of Webster Gardens answered God’s call and headed down to Mexico.

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Latin America Children's Outreach