All heart. Grit. Grind. That’s been the mantra of our city for the past couple of years ever since the “Grindfather” (Tony Allen) was asked to describe how our basketball team (Go Grizz) wins and our people operate. It’s something that led me to fall in love with Memphis all over again as I chose to come home from Mississippi College and move into Orange Mound, following what I thought was the Lord’s calling on my life, honestly, probably prematurely. And it’s been my mantra since my return, living in neighborhoods people don’t want to visit, working with at-risk youth, and high-labor, low pay construction. I wanted to embody what my city embodies. Heart. Struggle. Perseverance. But it’s also what led me to beg God for a break from Memphis. Because, as anyone who lives here will tell you, our city has a lot of heart and pride, but the daily grind and the seeming hopelessness in our inner-city areas can wear on you. So I prayed for a break and found one when the Lord mercifully opened the doors for me to go on the World Race and faithfully, through the people of Memphis, provided the funds I needed.
Even in leaving, I knew I was coming back, and my heart ached for my city. Ask my teammates. Every Grizz win, every free trolley night, every #youaintfrommemphis twitter rant, every MTR classroom drive, every news story about one of our youth dying too soon, or every touchdown pass highlight of my brother’s I saw, had my heart full and yet aching to return. This city has become part of me since I returned in 2011. I love everything about it, I pray and weep for it. I love the people, the history, the culture, the grittiness. And I long for God’s Kingdom to come here, in Memphis, as it is in heaven. I long for urban renewal. My heart aches for the crime ridden, drug infested neighborhoods, for the injustice in the education system. And I was so privileged to be a part of the change that has been slowly happening in our city over the past 10 years, and was sure I’d be apart of it for many years.
So when we were in Vietnam during month 7 of the Race and one of the world race logistics staff emailed me about the possibility of working for AIM, I brushed him off. Heck no. I’m never leaving Memphis again. I can’t wait to get back. And to go to a place where half of my salary is support raising? No, thank you. Plus my whole life is in Memphis. And working for AIM does NOT match up with what I want to do with my life.
So a few months go by and the Lord is slowly changing my heart. It’s like a game of chess. I’m a team leader now, in Zambia, and through my new team and my contacts He has been teaching me a lot about the Kingdom. For one, how all the money in the world is His, support raised money, job earned money, given money, all of it. His. And just like the early church community in Acts, He demands that His church spread it out for the greater good, not that we horde it. He taught my team this very painfully. Small move though, I just lost a pawn. Then He showed me that in order to minister, you yourself must be filled and must be in tune with the Spirit, and if we aren’t ministering out of fullness of life that Jesus gives, we are doing no one or ourselves any good. In fact, we are going to burn out (me in Orange Mound a few years ago). He just took a Rook. Around this time, my friend Julian, a recruiter for AIM, contacted me again about the possibility of me coming on staff. My reaction? Absolutely not God. I’m going home. Why do you keep doing this? Yet in my mind, I know He just took the bishop guarding my king and I’m close to losing this fight. The next move was even more painful. I don’t remember who it was, but a squadmate and I were having a conversation about all of this, and basically I was confronted by the fact that Memphis doesn’t NEED me, and God doesn’t NEED me in Memphis to expand His Kingdom. He can use whomever and whatever He wants. “But I’m missing the rebuilding process! I want to be able to say that I was there and I stuck it out when Memphis became the city it is today. That I was apart of that.”- comes my response, almost through tears. Ah, but it’s not actually about YOU, it’s about the Kingdom coming and the Glory of God, and that might mean that He has you laboring somewhere else, and He is allowing someone else to reap the harvest in that city. It can come without you. He just took my queen and now I’m in check.
But everything I have is in Memphis. My family. I have good community of friends that I love dearly. I have a great home church in Bartlett Baptist and a great away from home church in Christ City Church, both of whom have been tremendously instrumental in my walk with the Lord. I have connections and a network that will be instrumental in helping me start the business that I want to start. Jobs lined up. The grizzlies. Orange Mound. Barbeque. Everything.
But then I’m reminded how on the Race the Lord showed me that absolutely nothing except following Him and pursuing His will for my life will satisfy. How I’ve tried to run and do my own thing but it never worked. How He’s always opened doors and guided me to walk through them, and even though some were painful and my heart ached for what was behind, it has always been better. And then I go to searchlight and meet the AIM community. A vibrant, Jesus-pursuing community where I have total confidence that I will grow tremendously in the next few years. A job that is geared towards the logistics skills I developed for the Race, and will help fine tune them for the future travel business that I want to pursue, while providing networking. An area where my passion for serving missionary contacts overseas can be exercised and enjoyed. And I’m learning how to be the wind beneath the sails that drive missionaries out as they seek to bring in the Kingdom of God by loving the poor and hurting. Checkmate.
So, that’s why I’ve accepted a position as a regional logistics coordinator for Adventures in Missions, based out of Gainesville, Georgia for the foreseeable future. I’ll know next week my exact region, but it looks like I’ll be operating in South America or Africa. I will be coordinating with contacts on these continents to help World Racers come alongside them and serve them as they work to bring the Kingdom of God to their area of the earth. I’m excited.
Of course, with working for a sending agency comes raising support. Half of my salary is subsidy from AIM, but I also need to raise $1,000 a month as part of the job. Yes, I’m support raising to work a 9-5. Yes, what we do is a vital cog in the machine that is the Kingdom of God, as we seek to send out and empower world racers as they bring change all over the world. So, if you believe in the mission, I want to ask you to prayerfully consider partnering with me monthly. If you don’t, then don’t. I understand. I thought it was crazy too. If you would like to give, you can do so at my blog site or you can email me or text me for more information. I’ll provide all that information at the bottom.
I love Memphis and my people here dearly, and I’m hoping that the Lord will call me back here, more mature, more full, and more capable of being used by the Spirit to affect change here. But for now, my calling is in Gainesville, and obedience is sweet. So with an elated, yet heavy heart, I’m leaving home, and taking that all heart, grit, grind to Gainesville.
Much love,
Andrew Chambers
901-355-0369
