Summer Missions Scholarship

God has blessed The Fellowship to be able to send six of our own people as full-term career outreach workers in foreign fields. These six represent about half of our outreach budget.

One factor in seeing so many choose this kind of ministry is a number of creative initiatives designed to encourage people on this track: PartnerTeam (the outreach support consortium), training opportunities like the Perspectives Course, summer teams and short terms supported by The Fellowship, and the whole Faith Promise plan that underwrites a very aggressive mission budget.

Now we are about to launch yet one more initiative.

Before one can manage the huge step of commitment to a lifetime of cross-cultural work, it’s helpful to have smaller first steps. One of the most useful can be a full summer of in-depth ministry that goes well beyond the common one or two week trip. We want anyone seriously considering lifetime service to have this opportunity. Yet many students explain they cannot afford to take a summer off from earning money for school.

So we are creating the Summer Missions Scholarship, SMS. If this year’s Faith Promise is strong enough to fund it, we will select one applicant each year to receive an SMS. The 30% to 50% support we offer other summer workers will stay in place, but for one selected individual each year, we will go well beyond conventional support. SMS will provide up to $6,000 for full support of expenses for an approved 6 to 12 week training experience, plus an added $4,000 scholarship to replace summer earnings that could be earned otherwise.

Let no one think this is a cozy escape for someone who can’t find a summer job. The standards are high, the program demanding. It is only for college students, only for those well established and involved in The Fellowship, and only for those who have taken other steps that demonstrate a serious movement toward career ministry as an outreach worker. The summer program to be enrolled in must be chosen by GO-Team and Pastor (in consultation with the applicant, of course) from programs offered by a limited number of agencies – agencies who will cooperate with The Fellowship in training and mentoring the applicant. Furthermore, to warrant this high level of support, SMS is a highly targeted program geared for certain fields and certain defined kinds of work, not for any-and-all types of outreach. Those interested in other types of summer ministry can still find support through our conventional channels. Fuller details are available on request.

Let us pray for this, yet one more step in fulfilling Jesus’ call for “laborers for the harvest” (Matthew 9:36-38).

~Bernie Powell