When I was about six years old my family had a powder blue Mercury Cougar. It was roughly the size of a battleship so when we drove around it must of felt like we were announcing the birth of some admirals baby boy. My father, who was a police man, took me to get a happy meal at McDonald’s for lunch after picking me up from Kindergarten.  We had just gotten a puppy not long before and he was sitting on the seat between my dad and I and we ordered, pulled around and waited behind the other cars until we could go up to the window and pick up our food. Suddenly a man to our left was dancing and howling “Your Car is On Fire, Your Cars

On Fire!” My dad being the trained police officer that he was calmly pulled out of line and parked in the far end of the parking lot where we intended to get out and access the situation. However when I went to open my door what I can only describe as a wall of flames stopped me. In an instant my dad grabbed me, grabbed the dog and snatched us out of the car just in time to watch the car become engulfed in flames. So we stood there and watched our powder blue Cougar slowly burn up, or to continue the metaphor we watched our battleship sink. It was very traumatic for a kindergartener. The next little bit is fuzzy in my memory but I do remember the smell more than anything and also sitting down in the parking lot and eating my happy meal. It’s incredible to be able to say that my father literally saved my life, he pulled me from an actual burning vehicle, however he did more than that, he also comforted me. At some point in the middle of what had to be a pretty chaotic scene, he must have gone inside and gotten my happy meal. It’s not enough that he was a hero he was also filled with compassion. He did several amazing things that day, he drove the car away from buildings being willing to sacrifice us so no one else would get hurt, he kept his cool and pulled a squirmy puppy and a scared child from a burning vehicle. He even managed to make friends with a family at some point because I remember him talking to them and there I was, this curly haired kid, calmly eating a hamburger and feeding fries to our dog.

I shared this story a few months ago at dad’s funeral and it was impossible not to draw a comparison of this story to the one of Christ who when he knew we needed saving did what any father would do and saved us. We were helpless just like me and like our puppy and desperately in need of saving and when nothing else could have, a loving father made a way where there was no way and not only did He save us, He comforted us.  It’s not a huge secret that dad was not super excited about us moving to Africa, something I’m sure every parent feels when their child is going away, but after he got really sick we were able to discuss it and he seemed at peace about it. I loved my father and I know he loved me and I miss him. I picked up the phone yesterday to call him during the Memphis game and had to be reminded again that I can’t do that anymore. However, I know he knew Jesus and because of that I know I will see him again.

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When I came to the Y in 2011 it was only supposed to be for a couple of months. I was asked if I wanted to work at camp with teens  for the summer and I thought the prospect of getting to be a camp counselor again at 36 seemed amazing. I worked like mad that summer and did my best to keep it under 40 hours because I was part time which was hard if not impossible, especially when we started doing lock-ins and weekend events. I thought this was an opportunity to have kind of a last hoorah of being at camp all summer until I knew what I was going to be doing full time but what it became was the beginning  of some of the most important training I would ever have. I had always been good at working with youth and teens, what hadn’t already come naturally I had honed with years of just doing it. However, there was so much I didn’t know, budgets, human resources, how to be my own advocate for programs I really believed in, how to recruit and train staffs, how to build a cohesive team of paid and unpaid workers . These are just some of the things I learned at the Y.

To be honest when I first started doing daily bible study with my campers I wasn’t even sure it was something I was supposed to do. I never actually asked anyone’s permission, I just started doing it. That led to more opportunities within the Y to share my faith which lead to me also working with Cherokee Baptist Church as their lay youth pastor merging our teens groups and beginning to do camps there in a wonderful marriage of programs. If you ask any teen who came through our programs or any camper who came to our camps what is the one thing Brett taught you, I hope it is that God loves them. It was my mantra. I said it so much it became the thing I said when I wasn’t sure what I was going to say. Knowing that I had the opportunity at the Y to tell youth and teens that God loved them is what kept me going on 36 hour das and even on one occasion 42 straight hours of YMCA programming. I am so thankful to have been part of the Y, and in 2015 to have been honored as the association employee of the year.

When people ask me what am I going to miss most about Memphis I don’t give them the Elvis answer and say everything. I give them the honest answer and tell them my family at the YMCA. From the CEO all the way down to our youngest campers, these have been my family the past 6 years. My best friends are at the Y, my teen group who are like my children are at the Y, not to mention my wife literally also worked at the Y for 17 years but I’m taking her with me to Africa. I’m so thankful to have been a part of such a special organization and I will treasure the memories from the YMCA of Memphis and the Mid-South forever.

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I just watched a video about a dog who was stuck in vines in a freezing river and a guy in a kayak was trying to help him and finally just got in the water with him and pulled him out. If that’s not a reminder of was Jesus did for us I don’t know what is. We serve a God who knew we needed rescue and became like us so he could not only show us how to live but died for us, rescuing us from our sin.

Bronwyn and I have always had dogs, in fact I think we have both had dogs all of our lives. Dogs are the best, however they are totally incapable of taking care of themselves. Without us they would definitely  die because they are totally dependent on us and none of them have ever seemed too concerned about that, probably because we have always taken care of them. At different times our dogs have done dumb stuff that we had to rescue them from, for example:

• We came home and Scout had somehow got tangled in a rope that was hanging from our tree to the point she was just hanging.
• Trooper ran off into the woods while we were backpacking and I had to go find him because he got stung by a yellow jacket.
• Mayflower became hopelessly entangled in vines while we were hiking to the point I had to pull my knife and cut him out.
• Ozzy ate an entire bag of chocolate smores marshmallows and I will spare you the rest of that story.
• Scout ate streamers and it upset her stomach so she started eating the Christmas tree, when she finally vomited it looked like the prettiest bird nest ever.
• Scout got swept up in rapids and instead of swimming just stared at me while she floated away knowing I would rescue her.
• Tracker would regularly jump into the neighbors yard, immediately regret the decision and bark until I came and got him.

Dogs are the best and they constantly  remind me of my relationship with God. I do dumb things and need rescuing but I wish I could relax in the arms of my Heavily Father the way our dogs have always been able to relax in ours.

Thursday I was sitting at the table and doing my quiet time as I often do and Ozzy was sitting at my side just staring at me. I was praying about Africa and and our support and vision for the ministry and Ozzy is just looking at me. Finally I said to him if you would just tell me what you want, I’ll do it! And it hit me, I bet God does that with me. I  Pray about things but don’t always come right out with it. Here is what I want, I don’t know for sure what your will for my life is but here is what I want and guess what? God will always answer that prayer. It might be yes, it might be no, it might even be wait a while but I guarantee you just like I would always do what is best for my dogs even if they don’t like, it will always be whats best for you.

John 10  and Psalms 79 refers to us as sheep and God as the Good Shepherd. I’ve never owned any sheep and rarely even been around them but I know dogs. I’m alright with thinking of myself as a dog, even the kind of dog who would eat a bag of marshmallows and get very very sick or escape a yard I am perfectly fine in and then make noise until I’m rescued. He is the Good Master and I am glad He is.

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On August 26th I started 100 days of prayer. That doesn’t seem so long ago but it actually ends on Monday. Not that I’ll be done praying but this was a special time set aside for intense focus on our mission to Africa and building our support team. To give you an idea of how long ago this was I’ll remind you that:

• Hurricane Harvey was downgraded overnight from its Category 4 peak to Category 1 after making landfall in Texas late Friday.
• North Korea tested three short-range missiles Saturday morning.
• A man brandishing a sword and yelling “Allahu Akbar” was arrested Friday night outside Buckingham Palace, the residence of Queen Elizabeth II in London.
• The highly anticipated boxing match between Floyd Mayweather and Conor McGregor takes place Saturday night at 9 p.m. ET in Las Vegas.
• Taylor Swift released her first single in three years, titled “Look What You Made Me Do,” late Thursday night

I remember that night fairly well because Bronwyn and I were actually fasting and praying that Saturday into the Sunday and the house behind us that I can’t ever remember hearing a peep out of was having a party. A very loud party… Bronwyn and I also read through Nehemiah that day and prayed heavily for the missions organization we are joining and all of the staff affiliated with it. I’m looking at my prayer journal now from that day and I swear it looks like some kind of code book. I have no idea what all I was saying and praying but no doubt God was weighing one thing heavily on my heart. I wrote on big letters at the bottom right corner that “God is Testing My Faith”. And no doubt he still is. We leave for Africa in 42 days and we are not where we need to be in regards to support. However, I know God has called us to this mission to do this work for Him in Africa. I also know that God has a plan in this and that we prayed from the very beginning that He would do something that man couldn’t do, that only He could do and that people would rejoice because of it. So I still stand firmly in my faith. God will do it, it may not look like what we expect it to but I know God has a plan and I am excited to be a part of it. The world may say we are foolish and that’s ok because the things of God are foolish to people, especially people who don’t know Him. (I Cor 2:14) But I know my God can do exceedingly more than I can ever think. (Eph. 2:20)

If you are reading this I am asking you again to pray, really ask God if you are meant to be a part of this ministry by joining our support team. Ask If God is urging you to commit to praying for us and helping us to serve him oversees. It may not even be a lot, $25  month maybe even less. This weekend we will be in fervent prayer again and we ask that you would pray for us then too. God is doing something special in our lives and we want you to be a part of it. You can join the team by clicking the link below, we are a registered nonprofit so all donations are tax deductible and go towards making it possible for Bronwyn and I to live and do ministry in Nairobi, Kenya.

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Bronwyn and I were married August 7th 1999. At the time we were both still in school I was working at Highland Heights Baptist Church as a Youth Director and nights at Target. I made very little money and Bronwyn was focusing on finishing her last semester of school so she wasn’t working at all other than coaching a few cheerleading squads. However we made it just fine. In fact I don’t remember ever being worried about money, God provided. Looking back we should have been worried all the time but we never were. I honestly don’t think we have ever had a fight about money and she is proofreading this so if it’s still there it must be true.

As the years went on we both worked but always at Christian nonprofits but still money was never a concern. Neither of us were ever extravagant spenders and never minded taking a couch from someone or a TV or even cars. We have to this day only ever bought one car from a lot and Bronwyn was determined to get the price she wanted to pay for it, and of course she did. We do enjoy travel but again Bronwyn is a deal hunting machine, you can get a pretty nice place to stay in Cancun when everyone is afraid of swine flu. I’ve never thought of us as cheap, we just are easily satisfied. When we left jobs to go work at a camp one summer we had no idea what we were doing after that but God provided. When we took 6 month sabbaticals from full time jobs to hike the Appalachian Trail working with North American Mission Board, God provided.  When I was laid off I actually knew it was positive because I had been working outside God’s will for some time and I knew He had something better for me but I was afraid to move on. God has taken care of us when we have been in the center of His will and when we have be in rebellion, He has loved us through it all.

Now we stand on the biggest faith walk of all. We are a mere 54 days from leaving for Kenya and we have prayed from the very beginning that God would do something only He could do, that others would see and rejoice. We are not where we expected to be with support at this point but this is after all a faith walk and if it were easy it wouldn’t require faith. We trust in the Lord, He is Jehovah Jireh and we stand anxiously waiting to see what he does. In the meantime, we will continue to tell our story and share as we  look forward to the testimony we will have similar to what Paul wrote in Philippians 4 and we aren’t even under house arrest. We place our lives in His loving care and stand firm on the hope that is the Truth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

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Over the past few weeks we have told the story of our call to Nairobi dozens of times. Sometimes to individuals and sometimes  to entire congregations. We have really enjoyed the process of getting out and meeting new people, going to different churches and hopefully getting people excited about what God is doing in our lives so they can get excited about what God may be doing in theirs. Being fully reliant on God is a pretty amazing thing. I mean Bronwyn and I are trusting Him completely with our lives in a way we have never done before. Everything begins and ends with Him and what we have prayed from the very beginning is that God would do something that has to be from Him so people couldn’t see it and marvel at what man did but would be forced to see God’s hand in it. We want our lives to be a living testimony to faith in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, living out Romans 12:1&2.

“I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship, Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is good and acceptable and perfect.” (ESV)

However it doesn’t really feel much like a sacrifice to live for God daily. It feels more like a privilege to walk with God and be a part of His plan. The plan that honestly we know He created us for, the plan He built us for. Anyone who has ever heard me talk to teens has probably heard me say “God loves you, and God has a plan for your life”. In fact during our interviews with BlueSky, someone asked me if there was anything I felt like I always had to let youth and teens I work with know and I was like YES. Now being loved by God is pretty easy, you just have to let Him love you. The second part can be more complicated, letting God be the God of your life can be extremely challenging for everyone. It’s the root to all sin, we don’t want to let God rule our lives. We fight it, struggle with it, compromise what we know is right and even flat out rebel against it. But letting God be God leads to the most joy, the most satisfaction and the most fruit. In the book of John, Jesus is quoted as having said, “I have come that they may have life and have it abundantly”. That is exactly what this move feels like, having the abundant life that God had created for us, the life God designed us to have.

Bronwyn and I want to able to share what God is doing, that’s why we started this blog. That’s why we have 5 speaking engagements this coming week, we are excited about what God is doing and we want to share it. We will be getting into Africa two months from today and between now and then we will never stop sharing our story of what God has done, continues to do, and hasn’t even done yet. So please, pray for us and if possible become part of our support team and thanks for reading.

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1. Pray God will supply all our needs
2. That God will open doors in Nairobi to share the gospel in exciting ways
3. That the Holy Spirit will go before us preparing hearts and minds
4. That God will make BlueSky a dynamic and Christ led unified team

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I don’t know that I have ever been more sure of anything in my life than our calling to Nairobi, Kenya. In the last 10 months, God has showed us more and grown us more than maybe any other time in our 20 years together. Constantly God has walked us through this process step by step from literally the very first day to right now as I sit here on November 2nd writing this. Every time I start talking about it I get excited whether it’s one person or a room full, I love telling them about what God is calling us to. Inevitably I work into every conversation that we are indeed raising our own support for this ministry. I get a lot of responses to that, things like why isn’t BlueSky just paying you? Well if they could they would, I have seen the budget and there just isn’t enough revenue to pay staff. The ministry has to have people support it to operate. Some say why don’t you do what Paul did and make tents (have some sort of trade) and support yourself that way while you do ministry? This is a fair question and if opportunities arise in Nairobi where we are able to do this Bronwyn and I will certainly take advantage of it. It’s why we are still working at the YMCA now while we are only 2 months from moving. However, if you look at it closely you will see there were only a few times Paul actually did this and every time he had an objective in mind and it was only temporary. Paul did however have a tremendous support team and if you look at      I Corinthians 9:14 it’s pretty clear what Paul had in mind for Christian workers.

“In the same way, the Lord commanded that those who proclaim the gospel should get their living by the gospel. (ESV)

We are not looking to get rich, in fact anyone that knows us knows we don’t care much about money. We have never had fancy anything and never really cared to. All we know for sure is that God is calling us out of Memphis and to Africa and we want you to be a part of our support team. So, what does a support team do?

1. Pray for us, everyday. And not that “God Bless, mommy and daddy, and fluffy” kind of prayers but take our names to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords and ask Him boldly to do tremendous things through us in Kenya.
2. Advocate for us, help us tell our story. Share with people what we are doing and our struggles and victories. Share our blog or our pictures or videos so others can see and be inspired but what God will do when you abandon your life to Him.
3. Support us financially if possible. We are looking for monthly supporters at any level. People who are trusting that God will provide for their needs as you help provide for ours.

That’s it, that’s all we ask and you will join us on this amazing calling. You will be a part of every camper we see come to know Christ and every teen who is discipled by BlueSky. You will hear everything we are doing and know that you helped make it possible. Bronwyn and I are excited to see what God is going to do and how he is going to do it. Join us, be a part of our support team and then let God work in your life as he works in ours.

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For over 20 years I’ve been working with teens in one capacity or another. Sometimes as my main job and other times as a volunteer, most of the time it’s been a mix of both. I’ve seen people who worked with teens who were very good at it and those who had no idea what they were doing. I get asked a lot how to do it, how to have a strong teen program, how to engage teens, and how to make them want to be a part of something. I always give lots of answers, usually the best answer is that you have to have the right person doing it. It really doesn’t matter if they know everything about it or nothing, I’ll say that if they care about teenagers it will be the right person. However, the honest truth is I have no idea. I don’t know why teens are drawn to me or why I’m good at working with them or how to replicate any of the programs that we have accomplished over the years. All I know is working with the teens is what I’m called to do. I didn’t work as a youth pastor so I could become a pastor, I didn’t work as a teen director so I could become an executive director. I worked with teens because it was what I was good at, what I was passionate about, and sometimes just because people let me.

But here is something I have learned, and it’s probably something you have heard before but I’ll reinforce it. Every teen is different but also exactly the same, they all have the same basic needs of love and understanding but you may have to show it in radically different ways from one to another. I hate this new “snowflake” expression where it’s now an insult to be called a snowflake. What a sad word to rob from our lexicon, snowflake should never be used as an insult. We are snowflakes, I know I am, and so is every teen I’ve ever worked with. We are different, and we are fragile. Being a teenager is hard, isolating, it can even be desperate at times. It doesn’t matter if you have the greatest home situation or the worst it’s still always hard. I have laughed with and cried with more teens than I will ever remember. I have seen the happiest days of teens lives and their worst. I have worked with honor students and parolees, scholars and dropouts, and everything in between. I’ve just been there, sometimes awkwardly but still been there, sometimes with hugs and sometimes in the distance. So how do you work with teens? Two words really sum it up, show up.

In less than 80 days our new home will be Africa and we will be working with teenagers from all over the world in Nairobi and I don’t expect things will be radically different. I mean we may be doing different things, we may be doing them a different way but I know as long as we are showing up in the lives of teens, God will do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine.

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In a box in our guest room, well we actually don’t call it that we call it our Nerf room because of the wall of Nerf guns, is a box full of prayer journals that go back to 1995. There are unfortunately periods of time in the last 22 years that are completely missing. I wish I could say they where lost in a flood or a fire but unfortunately they represent times when I wasn’t seeking God as diligently as I should have been. Some of those missing time periods are very long too, years even. Times when I decided not to take the time out everyday to write out what God was doing in my life, times when I got out of the habit of daily coming before the Lord with all my burdens, with my praise, with my prayers for myself and others. It’s unfortunate because it’s wasted time I could have been growing but I wasn’t, times when I was adrift and not looking to be connected deeply with my Lord and Savior.

In the picture I posted are 2 journal entrees, one is from 3/29/17 and it was the first page of a brand new journal. It’s also words written as prayers to God just before Bronwyn texted me about Kenya for the very first time. I know you can’t read it, deciphering my writing is next to impossible. I joke with Bronwyn all the time that when I die it’s her job to make a book out of all it, good luck. But what it says is amazingly profound, I won’t type it all but I did pray/write:

“I pray for new paths, new joy in new work. Not only for me but for us. May we have new paths, new joy in new work. Am I too bold to ask these things?

move quickly and clearly

move in a way that it can only be from God that others will see and rejoice

ground us so we won’t be tempted to fall away, support and love

use us in our gifting together.”

This is what I prayed just before my beautiful wife send me the “wanna move to Kenya” text. I don’t think I even really need to go into much after that. Whenever any doubts creep into my head about Kenya I just think back on this and am absolutely content that we are in the center of God’s will.

Now what about the other journal in the picture? Well for starters it says “New Beginning” at the top. That seems to be a recurring theme with the first page of journals.  But I did write this:

“Lord I am to give up my all, every bit of personal (stock?) my own flesh and life in service to you.”

I was obviously very dramatic in 1997 but the words are still true. I am thankful that even though I have had times away from God he was never through with me. Even when I didn’t live for Him he died for me. We don’t deserve His love and that’s kind of the point, it’s a free gift and I can’t wait to tell people about that gift in Africa.

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