Sharing the Love of Christ: Grace Hamilton Steps Out of Her Comfort Zone
[Estimated reading time: 4 minutes]
Grace Hamilton is using her skills in engineering to serve with TWR in West Africa this summer.
“I still don’t know what God is doing through it all or what my future holds, but I know my plans and future are in his hands, and whether I’m in the United States or somewhere overseas, I can’t help but be involved with ministry,” says Grace Hamilton.
Grace is experiencing a whole new culture by serving with two other interns in West Africa with TWR Broadcast Operations. She has enjoyed using her mechanical engineering degree to test power units, change seals on a backhoe and work on a generator among many other smaller tasks. When Grace comes back from West Africa at the end of this summer, she’ll finish her last year at the University of Idaho.
What led you to joining TWR?
Faith ultimately led me to join TWR. I heard about TWR through an online Google search. It’s a long story, but I received two emails last winter, one from TWR and the other an internship offer to work with a reputable company and receive high pay. After lots of prayer, listening to God’s voice and conversations with my mentors, God clearly directed me to surrender my own plans and worldly opportunities to pursue the internship at TWR.
What are you looking forward to while working at TWR?
I’m excited that I’ll be sharing the love of Christ and being a part of God moving in the lives of those around me. I’m looking forward to everything I’ll learn, all the people I’ll meet, the places I’ll be and all the things to come during this internship.
What is one of your biggest challenges this summer?
Communicating with local people. I speak very minimal French, and communicating is difficult with locals or even with some people at the station. Sharing the gospel also looks different with the language barrier.
When and how did you get interested in ministry?
From a young age, I wanted to support missions and help people who were poor. When I was 16, I went to Guatemala, saw the poverty and helped at local orphanages. At that point, I started praying about and considering long-term oversea missions. God clearly called me to engineering, but throughout that time, I felt the Lord continue to put evangelism and missions on my heart. As I continued to pray and step outside of my comfort zone, I had many opportunities to grow in evangelism, faith, trust and missions at a local level through my church and college.
How is this internship preparing you for your future?
It’s shown me how engineering can be used in missions and how even the simplest role like greeting someone in the morning with a smile is sharing the love of Christ with them. This internship is also stretching me beyond my own abilities or comfort level, especially in communication when I’m leading a project (that I may have little understanding of) or presenting what I’ve learned.
The practical skills I’ve learned so far have been awesome! Before coming, it never crossed my mind I would be working with diesel engines (which I’m less familiar with than gasoline engines); or that I would learn to drive manual vehicles and a three-wheeler, motor bike and backhoe; or learn to start up and dismantle an industrial generator; or fly a drone and learn more about electronics; or drive kids through mud on an ATV ... the list goes on and on.
How are you finding West Africa?
One thing I didn’t expect was how much kids call us white person in their language. When we walk through the market, many people just call us that, and some kids will even chant it behind us.
The amount of fear people have toward spirits is interesting. Many houses have very small or no windows for fear of evil spirits entering. The amount of Voodooism was also unexpected, and the rituals they have are downright evil based on the description [Station Director Garth Kennedy] gave me.
Fun fact: Grace enjoys participating in martial arts, including kickboxing, karate and Brazilian jiu-jitsu.
Images: (top, banner) Grace spends time with local children while serving with TWR in West Africa, (middle, right) Grace holding a small dog, (bottom, right) Grace gets her hands dirty, working on one of the generators on TWR's transmitting site property in West Africa.
