Volunteer Missionaries Commissioned

During a commissioning service, friends, family and a group of missionaries recently gathered around and laid hands on the 30 or so volunteer workers who are being sent by the Christian Reformed Church in North America this summer to countries and ministry sites all over the world.

The volunteers have worked through ServiceLink, the CRC’s volunteer coordination office, and in collaboration with agency staff, to help determine their gifts and to discern where they could best use their skills in various settings.

The volunteers spent a three-day orientation, coordinated by ServiceLink, in which they had a chance to learn how to address and meet the needs of the people they will encounter on the mission field, as well as practical things including ones on spiritual preparation, culture shock, poverty, community development, and anti-racism.

Rev. Dave Vroege, a pastor in Halifax, Nova Scotia, helped to lead the worship service. Vroege, too, participated in the orientation as preparation for his assignment in Ukraine, where he will be teaching and helping the evangelical church through worship workshops.

"Jesus Christ is the one who sends us," he said. "Christ is the first-born of all creation . . . All things are created by and of him. He is the head of the body."

The commissioning service took place on Friday, May 27. Prayers were spoken, songs sung, and encouragement given during the hour-long service.

"I'm telling you to go and invite people to join our family," said Caspar Geisterfer, a CRWM missionary in Honduras. "You will need to take off your religious and American clothes . . . You'll need to put on the robe of righteousness. God says to go and be his righteousness."

Geisterfer reminded them that they are going with a God-given message to present. "It is about the Word; we are to let the world know about God . . . We have to become Christ-like. We must work to overcome our humanness. We are God’s mouthpiece. When we walk the streets of this world, this is what we need to speak."

Leanne Geisterfer, team leader for Christian Reformed World Relief Committee in Central America, recited a litany, a powerful prayer, and asked everyone to respond.

Andy Ryskamp, director of CRWRC in the United States, reminded the volunteers that "we work among brokenness and we pray for reconciliation to resonate through us and through the churches we are able to touch and reach."

As people gathered around and laid hands on those being sent out to do the Lord’s work, Joel Hogan, international ministries director for Christian Reformed World Missions, gave a charge to them.

"Lord, let them go with your strength working through their weakness . . . Teach them much through the people they interact with in Africa, Central America, Asia and Europe . . . Go well!" he said.

Afterward, the volunteers, their families and others mingled for a time. Among the volunteers were Jenifer Kanis and Derek Buteyn.

Jenifer left the day after the commissioning service to take part in HIV/AIDS work in Jos, Nigeria, for CRWM and CRWRC. The senior at Dordt College, in Sioux Center, Iowa, said the week of training had been very fruitful in allowing her to connect with others and helping her to "think how I need to prepare and how can God help me grow when I am there."

She had been thinking and praying about taking part in missions and this opportunity showed itself in her life and she embraced it. "I believe this is something God wanted me to do."

Derek will be working at a school for students with special needs in Nicaragua. He, too, appreciated the week of orientation and how it allowed him to be with people "who have similar goal and desires."

He just graduated from Dordt College with a degree in psychology and exercise physiology. He hopes to one day become a physical therapist. "I am so appreciative to have been here this week and learn from everybody’s wisdom."