Four years ago I was beginning my 27th year in my hometown and my daily life looked something like this on repeat:
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Wake up
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Go to work
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Come home
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Eat dinner
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Watch TV
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Go to bed
I loved what I did. I was working for First Presbyterian Church in Harrisonburg, Virginia as the Director of Youth and College Ministries. The youth I was working with provided a daily dose of something fun in my life and working with them was something I enjoyed. Though I loved what I did, I was not particularly happy. As you can see above, my life was relatively predictable. This is a flow of life that many around the world do as well, and it’s really not that bad. But though I loved what I was doing, I wasn’t doing much of anything that was difficult for me. I wasn’t being challenged. I didn’t feel like I was growing. In fact, if anything was growing, it was perhaps the feeling of a distance between the Lord and I. There was little adversity in my life and by January, 2014 I had fully settled into a pseudo-comfortable Christian experience…and my mind, body, and spirit knew it. I needed something new.
I began to ask the Lord what I needed to change WITHIN my circumstances to feel like I could come back around to a place of thriving. Not long after I started asking, the Lord changed my question. He told me that I needed to ask Him what I needed to change ABOUT my circumstances. Enter: The World Race.
Two and a half years ago, I launched on the World Race. It changed the trajectory of my life. The Lord needed me to be stretched and uncomfortable so that He could help dig out the junk in my life that entered in during a stagnant period prior to leaving. In the process of removing the old, God ignited a passion for something new…storytelling and videography. I ended the Race with a new passion that I felt the Lord calling me to cultivate throughout the next season.
One and a half years ago, I responded to an opportunity involving just that. I moved to Gainesville, Georgia to begin working in marketing and video production with Adventures in Missions doing an eight-month program called The Fellowship. This felt like a pretty safe step in the direction of pursuing the passion the Lord gave me on the World Race. It felt like something new. About two months into this new job, however, the Lord told me to pivot. Adventures in Missions was sending a team of World Race Alumni storytellers to Southeast Asia for three months to tell stories of missionaries and world racers working out in the mission field. All of a sudden, the Lord was throwing me a curveball. After battling with some very bad excuses I was making for not going, I finally gave in and said yes. After all, this was precisely what I was feeling the Lord calling me to do. He had been faithful up to this point. I wanted more for my life a few years prior and He had orchestrated a series of unexpected and new adventures that had gotten me to this place. So I went.
Eight months ago I landed back in Atlanta, made the hour-long drive back to Gainesville, and began a month-long process of figuring out what was next. The job I came here for was ending soon. I was unsatisfied. I wanted more. I had learned innumerable things from my recent trip that I was ready to use, but I needed an outlet. An opportunity.
Seven months ago I brainstormed with Seth Barnes (Founder and CEO of Adventures in Missions…also not related to me) about an opportunity to go again, but with a twist. Seth and I wanted to put together a media team to go shed light, build awareness, and provide opportunities for action in one of the worst humanitarian crises that the world has ever seen. For years now, millions of South Sudanese men, women, and children have been fleeing the South Sudan in search of safety from a long-standing civil war. They settled in neighboring countries in various refugee camps seeking survival. Over 2 million refugees have found safety from the war in northern Uganda but they are now facing the challenge of surviving despite being clear of the war. Access to food, water, and shelter is minimal. Medical supplies are scarce (and expensive) in a region that has some of the highest risk of contracting malaria. Hope, a valuable commodity in a situation such as this, has widely deteriorated. And one of the biggest problems of all, only a small percentage of people around the world even know this is happening. This is a situation where awareness of what is happening could unlock a more hopeful future.
After a few weeks of brainstorming, I was hired on full-time at Adventures. I was brought on staff to work 50% of my time in marketing as a video producer and 50% of my time recruiting and training a media team to travel to northern Uganda to capture stories of what is happening in these refugee camps. Our mission is simple: we want to capture stories through video to raise awareness and activate response so people around the world can provide resources to empower refugees in Uganda. Our dream is to see a community developed in these camps where the refugee population has been knit together as a family. We want to be the catalyst for helping them overcome the challenges of being a refugee in a hopeless situation. Ultimately, we want to see disciples made, physical needs met, and a healthy community established. We want to engage and empower. I’ll be sharing more about our plan soon, so be on the lookout for more details to follow.
We have a team of eight incredibly motivated and talented World Race alumni who will be launching in SEVEN days to film our project: Citizens of Refuge. We’re asking that you consider joining us financially (all donations are tax-deductible) and prayerfully as we go. We literally cannot do this without your support. If you want to know how to give or how to pray for us, let me know. Email me at [email protected] or leave a comment below and I’ll be certain to follow up!
As for me individually, when I think back to where I was just four years ago, I cannot help but be amazed at the places the Lord has taken me. From a couch and Netflix addiction to a tent in a refugee camp. From spiritual apathy to spiritual purpose. From vocational uncertainty to a passion that I can’t wait to keep developing.
Check back in for more stories and follow along on Facebook at www.facebook.com/citizensofrefuge/
To read more about the team, here are their blog links:
http://haleyhuckabee.kingdomjourneys.org/
http://calebpauls.kingdomjourneys.org/
http://donovanmccloskey.kingdomjourneys.org/
http://jesshines.kingdomjourneys.org/
http://sammann.kingdomjourneys.org/
http://tiaramenjivar.kingdomjourneys.org/
http://suekafoglis.kingdomjourneys.org/
