Today we’d like to introduce you to Nicole Cain.
Nicole, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
Getting to where I am today is a mixture of a lot of stories. I’m a Youth Pastor and a Missionary, which are two things I’ve wanted to do for a long time.
I grew up in church and going to Youth Group was my favorite place to be. I loved it more than in school and more than at home. Wednesday was the night I spent all week looking forward to it. I can remember as far back as being 12 years old and thinking I’d love to work at a church when I grew up. Not what most 12 year olds dream of but it was always mine. I think somewhere along the way I started to learn it wasn’t just that it was a fun place but that I had gifting in helping others and I enjoyed it. Later on in my high school years I became a Student Leader at my youth group and I interned at summer camp during college. I realized I not only enjoyed working with youth, but I’m also really good at it. I figured it was the key to something and around my third year of college I finally has words for it: I wanted to a Youth Pastor. I think I always did. It just took me a while to admit it because it’s a really big job to have.
I majored in Youth Ministry at Christ for the Nations Institute. I had expected to jump into that right after graduation but things didn’t exactly go according to plan. I ended up having to wait for that opportunity for another four years. I didn’t fully understand why God wanted me to wait until this past September.
In September, I had just gotten back from a month long mission trip and then joined the staff at a church I talked to back in April that needed a Youth Pastor. They asked me to participate in June, but knowing I was leaving soon, they told me they would wait until I got back from Europe. I’ve been at my church in this position for about six months and in hindsight, I’m thankful for the waiting period. I know now that I needed it.
Being a Missionary came later and was more unexpected. I grew up saying I’d never go on a mission trip. I was proven wrong on my first mission trip to Hollywood in 2013. After that, I realized I said what I said because I didn’t fully understand what missions is. Though even after that trip, I didn’t aspire to do it for my life. It would actually be five years until I went on another one.
After I graduated college and was in that waiting season, God started to give me a heart for the Nations of the world. I didn’t want to do it at first because I thought it would take away from doing youth ministry. It actually took me a year of going back and forth before I decided I would do it. And another few years after that before I went on another trip.
In September, I joined a class at a non profit (Initiative Network). Around that same time, my plan for doing missions fell through. It was arguably one of the worst disappointments in my life but I do find it interesting it just happened to coincide with me joining this class and getting a community of people around me.
After my plans fell apart, I started looking for another way. I generally don’t stay down on things for long before I’m back trying to find something else. I looked for other organizations to go with but couldn’t find anything. I told God if I’m supposed to go He can bring it to me, I wasn’t going to keep looking. Not because I was giving up on going, I just didn’t want to try to make things happen unless they were supposed to. A week after praying that I went to church and the first thing I hear from my Pastor (this is my old church for reference) is “we have a missionary from Europe with us today.” I talked to him after service because the video they showed gave me goosebumps. Ultimately I ended up applying for their summer program called Surge. It’s a month or two in either Berlin or Budapest for 18-28 year olds. I didn’t know if it would work, but I figured I had nothing to lose. I applied and did get accepted.
The next six months were all about preparing and fundraising. I quickly began to get a growing heart for Germany and the people of Europe. I was actually born in Germany but left before I even turned two, so I had no memories or anything of it. It was just the place I happened to be born, which was never a big deal to me, but as time went on, I couldn’t wait to be back.
Fundraising was an adventure all in itself. Asking for help doesn’t come naturally to me, so it was definitely an area of growth to step out and do the thing I hate. But in all of that I saw God show up and provide what I needed. I had six months to raise the money and in two months I was fully funded. I didn’t leave until July but I was fully funded by mid-April. I didn’t grow up rich or even comfortable, so seeing a financial breakthrough like that was crazy to experience.
My time in Germany changed my life FAR more than I could’ve guessed. We got to do street outreach, homeless ministry, prison ministry, lead a couple church services, etc. I didn’t want to leave. I loved having nothing on the schedule but to go out and do outreach for five hours everyday. I think my whole direction for my life has taken an unexpected turn that I’m okay with. I’m going back this summer but this time I’m going all summer.
I can look back on years ago when I thought doing missions would take away from doing youth and see how wrong I was. There’s plenty of room for both in my life and I’m honored to get to do what I’m doing. For years the question from people was always, “what do you want to do?” I still get asked, but now I can answer “I wanted to be a Youth Pastor and a Missionary and I’m currently doing both”
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
It has been anything but smooth. I got depression right after I graduated from college. I learned this is a pretty common thing among recent grads. For me, I think I set it up in my mind so precise what life was supposed to look like that when things didn’t look how I planned, I wasn’t sure what to do with that. Also I went from being in college and seeing people all the time to working most of the time and in that season I made very little time for community. That part was my own doing. I got too consumed with working so much so I could get to my goal sooner that I didn’t concern myself much with being around people, which was never healthy to begin with. I’m about 65% extroverted and only 35% introverted, so not being around people as much as before was rough.
I actually hadn’t had depression before, so I didn’t even know I had it for months. I knew something was off with me and I hadn’t been myself for months but I just never put the two together. I actually found out because I read something online someone shared about it. I just remember thinking, “is that what’s wrong with me?” It was a light bulb moment for me because for months, I was frustrated knowing something was wrong but not what. I had this going on for about eight months. In April 2016, I went to an event in L.A. and I was healed of depression that day.
Another obstacle that I mentioned briefly before was when my plans fell apart. I had been planning on going on a trip with another organization but that one fell through. The bump in the road came in because I had never once thought “what if it doesn’t work out?” I just naturally assumed it would so when it didn’t, I wasn’t sure what to do next.
Any shoutouts? Who else deserves credit in this story – who has played a meaningful role?
I definitely wouldn’t be where I am today without all my teachers from my school, CFNI. They taught us, encouraged us, and drew out things we didn’t know were in us. I could probably write an entire article just about them. My friends with the program I did with Initiative played a huge part as well. They were my biggest supporters last year as I prepared to go to Germany. They always had me in prayer and over half of my donations came from these people.
And the summer definitely wouldn’t have been the same if we hadn’t had such an amazing team. We had a team of 25 this summer (the biggest Surge team to date). We all go to live together and do the summer together all month. A lot of places aim to become a family and our team really was one. And I wouldn’t be able to Youth Pastor well if my fellow church staff members weren’t around. Our church is small, but I’ve never felt by myself in it.
Contact Info:
- Website: newhopegarland.com | europeaninitiative.org
- Facebook: New Hope Fellowship Garland | European Initiative
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