After Holly dramatically rededicated her life to God at age 26, she felt the call to spend nine months caring for unwanted children in Africa. But where would the money come from?

My life of complete dependence upon God began one dark night at the beginning of 2011. I had just quit a nannying job I loved to move back home with my parents, after two years of living with a deadbeat boyfriend, and all I had to show for myself at age 26 was huge debt and a reputation for drinking and smoking a lot. Overcome with shame and desperation, I turned to God.

Two days before my flight, my house group held a fundraiser dinner and auction for me. It was packed with non-Christian friends from my past and new friends from church. I needed £7,000 and we raised £11,000!

“I can’t take it!” I cried. “You have my life, because I don’t want it anymore!”
In that moment, everything changed. Filled with the Holy Spirit, I felt Jesus saying to me, “Give up your things and follow me,” to which I stupidly replied, “but what about the money?”

“Don’t worry about the money,” I heard him say. “Do not spend anything; I will take care of the rest. Just give up your things and follow me.”

So I did. I woke up the next day with joy in my heart. I had a new desire to go to church and a thirst to follow Jesus, no matter what. In the following months I gave away all my possessions, I didn’t spend any money and I waited on God to show me what to do next. One Saturday, whilst praying, I kept hearing, “St Mark’s, St Mark’s.” I was very confused, since my church is called St Clements. My dad reminded me that my youngest sister went to a church called St Mark’s, so the next day I drove all the way across London to see what God was trying to tell me, only to find it was a service on being a missionary.

But I couldn’t believe God would choose me, out of all people, to be a missionary. For the next three days I prayed, fasted and asked God what he really wanted me to do. On the third day, I came to a passage both in Jeremiah 31 and Matthew 2: “A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted because they are no more.” It put such a powerful love for unwanted children into my heart that I knew that this was what God was calling me to.

I found AIM online, and they offered me a placement in Uganda called SMILE AFRICA, which works mostly with Karamajong children, who have been rejected by their families. The Karamajong are themselves a despised tribe in Africa, rejected and outcast. These children were doubly unwanted and I knew this was the place God was sending me. It wasn’t until the AIM Open Day that I realised I was becoming a missionary, after all.

Nobody could deny God that night. He used other people–like you–to pour out his provision for me, so that I could follow Jesus to Uganda…

By now it was already July and I was meant to go in September, giving me little time to raise support. But I had no fear. After all, God had told me not to worry about the money. Time ticked by. A week before my departure I still had no money. People couldn’t understand why I was so calm. One of my non-Christian friends said she would actually go to church if this money turned up. Two days before my flight, my house group held a fundraiser dinner and auction for me. It was packed with non-Christian friends from my past and new friends from church. I needed £7,000 and we raised £11,000!

Nobody could deny God that night. He used other people–like you–to pour out his provision for me, so that I could follow Jesus to Uganda, where I met him daily as I cuddled and loved little babies that the world had rejected. I came back to England this month, but I know I can continue to trust him for my every need.

By Holly Petit, Synergy, Uganda