The day right after Christmas I got up early to begin the trip of my life with the Michigan Conference Teen Mission group. After traveling roughly 12 hours by plane from Detroit to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, we continued our journey with a two-hour truck trip to the Adventist University where we would stay.

I figured we would stay in terrible living conditions, but the university turned out to be very decent. There was running water, fine eating facilities, well-kept dorm rooms, and air conditioned classrooms.

The next morning came quickly and was spent organizing medicine, toys, dental equipment, and other things. By the afternoon we were ready to venture out to our first clinic. We loaded up the bus and van and set out.

I was first assigned to the medical clinic to help the doctors. There, I saw things I had never seen before. People came in with scabies all over their bodies and just about everyone had parasites. This was just a taste of what I was in store for over the next two weeks. I had to deal with things like this, seeing people suffering and too poor to afford help. Ministering to these people about Jesus by helping them was truly a great experience.

By far, my favorite clinic was optical. After standing in line, patients came inside, sat down in front of the auto refractor, and got the readings after their eyes were checked. Then the doctor would give the patient the final word on their eyesight. After that, they took a prescription to us and we picked out which pair of glasses they needed.

This was the interesting part; not only did I get to use the Spanish I learned in school, but it also made me realize poor people are picky too. When I brought people reading or prescription glasses, they kept telling me they were "muy grande" (very big). When I would try to find a smaller pair of glasses and couldn’t, I just brought them the whole box and tried to say, in my best Spanish, that big glasses were all we had. After hearing that, they either took the glasses or just walked out. It left me wondering why a person would be so picky about glasses—especially when they needed them so badly.

At the dental clinic, I got to pull teeth, stick people in the gums with needles, and clean and polish teeth. I think out of all the clinics, this one served the most people.

This 12-day trip gave me the experience of what Jesus did while He was on this planet. It showed me that helping others is a blessing in itself. Almost every person who came to the clinics smiled, praised us, and thanked the Lord we had come to help them. It just showed me God can bless you wherever you are.

We touched people’s lives on this trip. I hope and pray the people we helped saw Jesus through our work and accepted Him as their Lord and Savior. Missionary work is simply doing God's business.

Malcolm Jessup Jr. graduated from Peterson-Warren Academy last spring. He plans to pursue a career in mechanical engineering. Malcolm estimates his mission group served over 10,000 people in 18 different locations.