MBCollegiate Ministry: Collegiate Impact at UMKC
Campus Missionary: Benjamin Kirtley
Mission Trip Dates: March 24-31, 2024
Destination: Fort Smith, Arkansas
# Students on Trip: 4
# Nonstudents on Trip: 3
Organization(s) Served: UAFS BCM, Trinity Baptist Church, East Side Baptist Church, River Valley Christian Life Group, Great Commission Baptist Association of the River Valley, Southside Baptist Church in Alma
What did your group do during the mission trip?
We cleaned out the Trinity Baptist Church Building so the River Valley Christian Life Group could use that space to further reach struggling women. Part of that was moving a pool table that accounts for roughly a third of Earth’s mass. We delivered that pool table to a family in rural Oklahoma. Kaitlynn shared the Gospel with them.
Much of what we did with the BCM pointed towards Easter Weekend. We tabled and did other evangelistic activities with the BCM at the UAFS. We wrote with chalk on the sidewalks (Chalk the Walk) that pointed towards a campus-wide worship service. We participated in the BCM’s dinner and worship.
We helped East Side Baptist Church with their Wednesday night live Easter walkthrough (Easter in Five Letters). We worked with FBC Fort Smith to do evangelistic tabling on campus. We worked with East Side Baptist Church to participate in Fort Smith’s city fair. The girls on our team painted faces! We helped with a community block party led by Southside Baptist Church in Alma. Each student shared their 3-minute testimony with the crowd. Every person on the team had Gospel conversations.
One family in particular was very well connected with and the church is coming around them to care for and love them. Throughout the week, we stayed with East Side Baptist Church and worshiped with them on Easter Sunday.
Tell us a bit about how God worked on your trip.
We connected with a family in Alma during the block party. Throughout the afternoon, one of our students and I had separately and unknowingly shared the Gospel with several members of the same family. After several 15–20-minute conversations, two elementary age girls expressed a strong desire to
go to church! The church gifted one of the girls a new CSB Study Bible and arranged for rides for both of the girls. Later, the mom also asked for a study Bible so she could start reading also! As of the last update, the girls are still going to church gathering.
Any noteworthy decisions (salvations, baptisms, life transformation, etc.)?
After we left, the BCM saw a salvation every week for the rest of the semester. Many of those salvations were connected to conversations our team started.
What was one challenge your group experienced?
The weather got in the way. God had enough work prepared for us that we could still be faithful to Him even though plans changed.
What was one way you saw your group grow through this trip?
Every student had to share their testimony. This forced those that haven’t thought about it to think through what God has done for them and in them. All of them grew in their consideration of the
importance of evangelism. After the trip, they were all more excited about sidewalk evangelism. They saw that the goals and strategic activities Collegiate Impact does is not limited to our campus. Every campus ministry is pursuing evangelism and discipleship.
Also, three of the four students planned to be on Core Team before they went on the trip. The trip convinced the fourth to also join Core Team! She will be a great grad student influence with the young Core Team members.
Anything else you want us to know about your trip?
We did a debrief at the end of every day. Even though we had very full and tiring days, the students were still excited to discuss how they saw God work that day. Each evening we would spend half an hour praising God by testifying what we saw.
