At the end of the hectic stressbomb that is year 12, and despite being asked by everyone I know, I still had no idea what I wanted to do with my life – let alone what God wanted to do with it. Not wanting to get caught in the school-to-uni deathtrap without a direction, I decided to take a discerning year off… some minor study, some work, and lots of room to think. Then I heard about Big Year Out. It seemed like a big commitment, to give a year to God. But I had time on my hands and encouragement, so I eventually registered.

I can honestly now say, partaking in the Big Year Out has been one of the best decisions of my life. It’s difficult to try and summarize what it has been like or means to me. However I can confidently say that the Big Year Out has been instrumental in transforming and expanding what was my sheltered, white middle-class experience of Christianity into something more passionate and authentic.

Everyone’s Big Year Out journey is different. Mine has included
- in Adelaide: visiting Sudanese migrant families and caring for their toddlers at a playgroup, playing darts and listening to the journeys of people with mental-illness at a drop-in centre,
- in the Philippines: sipping out of coconut husks, singing in cave churches and visiting the Banaue Rice Terraces, wading through flooded cathedral water, listening to talks about the devastation of climate change, visiting unjustly imprisoned inmates and touring the rubbish town of Smokey Mountain 2.

One of the best things about Big Year Out is its practical element. The structure of Big Year Out is unique in that it combines learning, devotional and community time with what it’s all about: getting out there like Jesus did and engaging with the marginalized communities of our modern world. The friends I’ve made and the experiences I have been blessed with through this program will never forget…. they continue to challenge and inspire me to this day, a year later. If you are considering taking part in the Big Year Out, I offer my story as encouragement. The Big Year Out is relevant, exciting, challenging, thought-provoking, and utterly fantastic.

Grace
(pictured top right)