Hello friends and family! This is my FIRST blog post!!! I am approaching a large deadline, so this post will mainly be about fundraising. Some people are receiving letters, some are receiving this blog link. So if you have already received a letter, no need to read further! It’s the same!
Looking for how to donate? Click on the link “Support Me!” on the left!
THANKS EVERYONE!
Hello there! I want to start by thanking every one of you for contributing to my mission adventures with Youth With a Mission (YWAM): to Denver for discipleship school, to India and Nepal for outreach, and to Montana for Bible training. Whether you supported financially or prayerfully, you were a huge part of it all, so thank you. Or if this is your first time to receive a “Whitney Letter” I’m still grateful for you too of course! 🙂
I have a lot of stories from India and Nepal that I would love to share with you. I’ll share one briefly now. One day we were spending time with children in an orphanage in Jaipur, India. We took arts supplies: construction paper, glitter, glue, markers, etc. We told all the kids to write their name on the paper and then we could decorate it. Our whole team was writing ours super elaborate: W H I T N E Y across the whole sheet. I looked over and the kids were writing their name very small on a corner of their paper. They didn’t want to waste it. This was all they were given, all they had. They didn’t want to use it all up in one sitting, but wanted to savor it so they could play with the sheet of paper time and again. Wow! Humbling! These precious kids were so grateful for the supplies, we left all our remaining arts supplies with that orphanage. Beautiful people!
During my three months in India and Nepal with my team, I felt a dozen prophecies from the Lord that He would bring me back. A random person on the side of the street telling me I would come back to India, a group full of girls who couldn’t speak English miraculously telling me they’d see me again, stuff like that. So I have leaned on the Lord that He will fulfill His promises of taking me back some day.
Well, friends, I have reached that destiny! It has been 7 years since college graduation and spending a couple of years in YWAM. I am ready! The timing is perfect in my life right now to give more to God and go on another adventure with Him. I feel homesick for places I have never even been!
I am being sent out through Adventures in Missions (out of Atlanta) to go on The World Race. No no no, not another marathon and not The Amazing Race show on TV. This is called The World Race. 🙂 It’s a Christian mission trip travelling to 11 countries in 11 months. Whoa! I have known of this organization for a while, but they usually go to a few countries in Africa, South America, Asia, and Eastern Europe. I have always felt wholly called to Asia and didn’t want to spend several months elsewhere just to spend a few in Asia! Well The World Race just announced an all-Asia route! MY HEART!! This September I will be sent out with a squad to spend a year backpacking and camping all around Asia in Jesus’s name: India, Nepal, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Malaysia, Japan, China, Mongolia, and the Philippines – in that order, a month in each country, to return August 2015.
What will I be doing? One month I could be in a small village with no electricity or running water, the next month I could be in a major metropolitan city. We will be working with a local contact in each of those countries. We will help out however is needed! Right now teams overseas are helping build fences at orphanages, teaching English in schools, training local pastors, digging wells, volunteering at hospitals – partnering with ministries all over the world. Why am I doing this? Why would I want to spend a year of my life in these foreign places? I have been given this wanderlust heart from the Lord to go and be and do and see for Him. He clearly put Asia on my heart while I was in college, fulfilled that desire by taking me there with YWAM, and He is continuing in His faithfulness to take me back. Our message is a message of reconciliation: reconciling the world back to God. God longs for His children to know Him and to have faith in His death, resurrection, and return – the hope for the world. On the Race, I will be His light in the darkness, proclaiming truths of love and grace. I’ve been called and I am responding.
Will you join me? As you can imagine, a year-long trip all over a continent could be a little pricey. It’s really not that bad… remember we will be backpacking and camping, not living a life of luxury like a vacation! I need to raise only $17,500. I believe that God called me and God will provide. Would you take part in this mission trip by helping fund my finances? Of the whole price, $15,500 of that includes food, lodging, and air, land, and sea travel. It also covers administrative, setup, coaching, debrief, and training costs prior to and at the start of the Race. The remaining $2,000 will cover roundtrip travel to the training, travel to the starting point, return travel home, medical insurance, and vaccinations.
I will need to raise $3,500 due June 27, $4,000 more due August 22, $3,500 more due December 1, and the remaining $4,500 due March 1, 2015. This is the $15,500 to cover the actual trip. The other trip preparation goal of $2,000 can be raised any time. To cover the personal preparation expenses (thank you!), contact me directly instead of following the provided steps below.
This is an invitation for you to participate in the Great Commission. Jesus commands us to make disciples across the nations. There are three ways to do so: go, pray, and give. I am going. I am asking you to pray and give!
A one-time donation is extremely helpful. However, if you can pledge to give monthly, please pray about doing so. This is a tax-deductible gift towards the mission of the church, similar to a tithe. If 16 of you contributed $100 a month for the next 11 months, I would reach my goal. Or if 32 of you could promise $50 a month for the next 11 months, I would reach my goal. Again, all donations are tax-deductible. There are several ways to give. All information for giving (mail, online, check, credit card, etc.) is listed on the enclosed FAQ page. I would love to discuss with each of you about this trip and my heart for Asia. You can contact me directly at [email protected] or by cell phone at 469-569-7092. I am also trying to plan other ways of funding, like a garage sale or a Chick-fil-a giving night. I will keep you in the loop via my blog: whitneyvines.theworldrace.org – follow this for giving info and for updates while I’m gone!
Please pray for my heart as I start on this journey of fundraising and trusting in the Lord. It sounds like a lot of money, but God owns it all. There have been over 100,000 missionaries sent with Adventures in Missions, with a 99% success rate of becoming fully funded! Pray that I remain steadfast and do not shrink back in fear or worry as this is a huge commitment: a year of my life, a lot of money, and I will turn the big 30-years-old traveling from Mongolia to the Philippines! Pray for my safety. Pray for the people I will meet, to have open ears and open hearts to believe the Good News. My desire is for this trip to do one of two things: either this will satisfy my wanderlust spirit and I will come home and settle down, or that God will place one of these countries on my heart to focus on full-time.
If you know of someone who may be interested in hearing about my story or funding my trip, share this letter and my blog with them! And please give me their contact information; I’d love to meet them!
Life is a whirlwind. I’m along for the ride! Join me?
Please let me know if y’all have ANY QUESTIONS!!! Contact me here:
email: [email protected]
blog: whitneyvines.theworldrace.org
cell: 469.569.7092
The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit. John 3:8
Let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity. Hebrews 6:1
Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Jesus Christ. Philippians 3:13-14
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. Matthew 28:19
India 2007 with YWAM
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