Sandy Roland | Generosity Story

Spiritually, I grew up in a Christian home.

I was pretty quiet in my, in my spiritual growth.

 You know, just not going to church.

I wasn't participating in any small groups, I wasn't serving.

For as long as I can remember I wanted to do a mission trip, I wanted to go on a mission trip just to travel and see another part of the world really intrigued me, the biggest thing was it was a video that they played at Westside, and we were only going to Westside, gosh, maybe once a month at the best.

It just so happened we were there on that Sunday, which was actually just amazing in and of itself.

I feel like when I saw that on the big screen was the first time in a long time I heard God just say, "You have to go do this."

I hadn't been open to hearing from Him in a long time, so I think that life had really kind of gotten in the way prior to going on that mission trip.

So when I went on this mission trip, it definitely just opened my eyes to a completely different world.

I'd never seen poverty like that, but in the midst of all the poverty I'd never seen people be so happy and joyful and loving.

And I can remember we were painting the front of this school and Mike Crosby pulled me aside, I said to him, I'm like, you have to get these kids over here, we've got to get this done, we're never gonna finish before we leave.  And he said, you know what, it doesn't matter if we leave and this isn't finished, what they're gonna remember is the time we spent, the relationships that we made and that's what matters.

It made me really think a lot more about relationships than the task.

When you get out of God's way, you just let Him, you know, guide you, then you just -- it always turns out better.

So when I came back, God just gave me a heart for serving.

I just, I felt really compelled to just serve in some capacity, whatever capacity, all capacities.

And then from that point forward we went to church every Sunday because I served in the student ministry.

And he never questioned it, but just because I was doing it just kind of pulled him along to do it.

And then getting my kids involved just kind of caused them to be pulled into it as well.

Now, you know, he and Jack, they go and they do serve things without me, I don't have to be the one that says let's go do this.

She went first five years ago to the South African mission trip, and when she came back she was a completely different person.

She was new energy level, just happiness -- it was contagious to the whole family.

So you can show up to church and, you know, that's half the battle, but going and serving is something completely different.

I think it ages you spiritually, millennia, it's crazy how much you age.

I kind of learned that you need to take it in and learn from it.

So when I went to South Africa I would say I grew up the most when I came home.

That's what I took away from it, is like I can serve here, I can implement this in my community and make it better.

So our spiritual maturity now, compared to five years ago, I would say it wouldn't even be in the same book.

If we hadn't had the growth that we'd had in the last five years, I don't know how we would have gotten through the last six months.

It would have been hard.

And just having him just be so supportive and to see him lean on God like he leans on God just gave me so much more strength.

So it just -- it would have changed everything.

I couldn't be more grateful for Westside providing these opportunities, because just thinking about all the generations that were changed on this one trip.

Just this one trip is like, you know, the kids that I went there to help, I didn't just help them, but they saw like the love that people could give them.

Just crazy, you know, remembering those moments.