I felt closer to God in ways I had never experienced, connected with the team of student leaders, and ultimately, I was able to show the light of the Lord in a new way that I never had before.

When I first heard about this serve trip for the High School Ministry Leadership Team, I was excited about the opportunity and more than willing to serve in this capacity. Before this, I had never been on a mission trip, and I had never even been out of the country! I tried to have no expectations and I wanted to wait and see what the Lord would teach me on the trip. We partnered with our global partner, Kingdom Builders Ministry, to build a house for a family that is a part of one of their churches. When I first learned that we were building a house in two days, I had doubts about whether we would finish it in time, but I trusted the process and sure enough, we built a home together.When we arrived on the site, it was a concrete slab, but after lots of hard work together, we left and there was a safe home with walls, a roof, and a door that locks. This was not only a physical transformation of a piece of land into a home, but also a spiritual transformation for me. I received a true sense of what service for the Lord is. On the second day of building the house, before we started any work, our team got to write prayers and verses on the walls before we put up the drywall. This experience was incredible. The night before, I sat in my bed at the dorms we stayed at and I wrote out a page of verses for me to write on the wall. We got there and played worship music, and spent a good amount of time praying over the house and writing verses. This experience was a reminder that we weren’t just building a home but a foundation of faith and trust in the Lord. The biggest thing I learned on this trip was that despite huge language barriers, we still worship the same God.

On our first night in Mexico, we went to the local church’s worship night, and I realized that although we may worship in different languages, God understands it all. He knows exactly what we need and when we need it.One of the best parts of the trip was getting to connect with and love on people while we were there despite the language barrier. If we weren’t working on the house, we were playing soccer or duck-duck-goose with neighborhood kids or dancing to worship music. Although communication was challenging, we made it work and this taught me that talking to people isn’t as hard as we sometimes make it out to be. As I reflect on the time we spent in Mexico, I realize more and more that we weren’t just there to give our time and to serve, but we were also there to learn and to grow with each other. This trip taught me what service is, and the Lord worked in my heart in so many ways. I would love to be given another opportunity like this because the three days on this trip were some of the most transformative days of my life.By: Payten Archer
Sophomore, Hillside Student Ministry Leadership Team