Partner Spotlight: Kylie White

Kylie, third from the left, pictured with her four children and three of our African staff.

Meet Kylie White.

In 16 years of this ministry, our faithful partners have carried us through graduating over 45,000 clients. We’ve been so encouraged specifically by the faithful support of Kylie White, her husband John, and their four children. Since becoming a part of the Untold community, the Whites have been champions of our organization in many ways, including going on multiple Impact Trips and inviting those close to them to join the Untold family. We got to hear from Kylie firsthand about how their family’s approach to generosity has impacted their life over the last 12 years of partnership.

Kylie’s second oldest child, Wheeler (right), pictured here on one of his first Impact Trips.

How did you become involved with Untold?

We were invited on a trip March of 2013 with a friend who was involved. John took our son Wheeler, who was at the time turning 5. Once John came home from the trip, he encouraged me to go. We had previously been praying about our family mission and purpose and had decided that the buckets on influence we wanted to pour into were the orphan crisis, marriage and the unreached. After seeing work on the ground in East Africa, John realized Untold hit all 3 of our buckets. It hits the orphan crisis by preventing hundreds of thousands of kids from being orphaned, it restores marriages and families with counseling in hopes of the family unit staying together, and it reaches out to the unreached and outcast of the community both spiritually and physically. We knew this was the ministry our family wanted to go deep with and give sacrificially to. 

What initially drew you to Untold, and what makes you still passionate about our mission after all this time?

Being an adoptive family, we have a close up view of the pain and trauma of kids not living with their first family. Adoption is one response to this tragedy but our true hope is, when healthy and possible, for kids to grow up with loving parents in their culture and community. We know adoption cannot be the only way to tackle the orphan crisis— it’s too big. Orphan prevention became our heartbeat, and one of our favorite Untold statistics is the over 150,000 dependent children that have not been orphaned and are being raised by healthy parents! In addition to this, our desire is for people to come to know Christ and have healthy relationships. Untold does a beautiful job of this, working through the local church and indigenous staff to reach and love their community. Untold has also given us the opportunity to bring our kids time and time again to see the work. It was hard for us to find a ministry we could pray, give, AND go with! It makes generosity a fun adventure together where the kids have real relationships and have seen God move globally with their own eyes.

In what ways have you been involved in Untold? How did that involvement impact you and your family and the way you view generosity?

Kylie and her husband, John, pictured at an Untold event they hosted in their home.

I have lost count, but I think I have been on around 15 Impact Trips with Untold and invited over 100 people to see the work there and get involved. Last summer, I was able to extend my trip to spend a month in Kenya on my own trip, getting to see the rural centers and encourage staff. It was an amazing time connecting with the work and our staff on a deeper level. Recently, we were able to facilitate an Impact Trip with parents and high schoolers at our kids’ school to partner the school with Untold’s work. I previously served on the Board for 6 years as well, and have gotten to host a handful of events in our home to expose people to the amazing work of the organization, including my parents. Since getting my parents involved, I have seen them utilize their counseling skills with the extra time they have after retirement. Last year they spent 6 weeks in East Africa doing leadership trainings with Untold center pastors and their spouses. It brings me such joy to see others get involved and love it the way we do!

Our involvement partnered with our investment in Untold has changed our family completely. It has allowed us to bring generosity to life and move from "check writing" to "life living" with an organization. Our kids don't really understand the impact of us writing a check without their physical involvement. Because of their childhoods unfolding in East Africa time and time again, they now have a heart for the global church, the outcasts, and their own relationships with the Untold African staff that they care deeply for. Our oldest daughter has been so transformed by seeing God move in her own life through Untold, she decided to major in Christian ministry and pour her life into missions!

In the interactions you have had with our clients and center staff, are there any in particular that stand out to you as being specifically impactful?

Kylie embracing a female client.

I could write a BOOK on this one. I have so many names and faces and stories that would both make you weep and jump for joy. Two stand out. First, Melka was a client we visited in her home more than 5 years ago. Upon finding out her status, she was badly abused by her spouse and was put in prison for retaliating in self defense. In prison, she birthed her daughter alone in her cell and grew in her faith in Jesus. After getting out, her sickness got worse and her daughter was hit by a motorcycle. During that vulnerable time, she found Untold and Melka’s health was revived. She was able to learn skills that she uses to make a living now, found community to love and encourage her, and even got medical and financial help for her daughter’s lasting injuries. Upon returning to her home this spring, 5 years after we originally met, we got to see Melka still thriving and now serving her Untold center as a volunteer health worker and economic empowerment teacher. In that second home visit, she looked at all four of my kids and told them she hopes they hear the power of God's love and forgiveness in her story. My oldest daughter started to cry and Melka put her hand on my daughter's knee and proceeded to pray for over 10 minutes for my kids. It was powerful and moving!

What insight would you offer to someone who is considering partnership with Untold?

I would say take a step! You will lose nothing by stepping in to a generous life. You will gain more than you could believe. I would also encourage you to GO! Supporting financially, rallying my community to support financially and praying frequently has been so impactful to me, but nothing quite has moved the needle for us as seeing the work with our eyes. Take your kids. Let them see God at work in the world. Don't settle for a Christian twist on the American dream it isn't fulfilling. Step into the grand adventure of faith and generosity as you experience a culture that has so much to teach us. Once you see the work, meet the staff, sit in a home, dance at a graduation, you cant help but feel the urgency and excitement to partner with God in what he is doing. The Bible comes to life in the impoverished communities of Nairobi and walking the dirt roads of Mombasa while you hear the Muslim call to prayer go off. The conversations it has allowed us to have as a family are ones I could not conjure up and lessons I couldn't teach with words otherwise. Our kids are more resilient than you think! Stretch them (and yourself!) outside your comfort zone— there is joy immeasurable on the other side of that obedience and faith.

What is your family philosophy generosity, and how do you integrate that into your home?

We long to be generous— not as a duty but as a JOY. How can we teach this to our kids? Experience it. Make it tangible, exciting, risky, and fun. This has been our family heartbeat. Traveling to Congo to add two children to our family was the hardest and most rewarding journey, but making service a part of our daily, monthly, and annual rhythm has been an investment we will see eternal returns on. We want our kids to see that following Jesus may be scary at times but it is always worth it. He meets us right where we are and blows our minds with how good and how big He is. We want their generosity to be an outflow of their dependence on Him and their understanding for how God has been generous to us. We want to create environments where they have to depend on Him and they get to see God is bigger than the box we often put Him in, and East Africa has been their greatest classroom. Once you've been, you now have a memory to connect to as you pray and give. You have faces that come to mind, you have friends that you miss, you have moments etched into your mind forever. Our kids call Kenya their second home. They have done lemonade stands, sold African jewelry, given up their allowances, and invited their friends to East Africa to see the work themselves. My two high school daughters even arranged their high school mission trip to see the work of Untold. It was their idea because they've experienced it firsthand. We could have just given on our own and let our own family be changed by it, but it’s kind of like the gospel; you don't want to keep something that wonderful to yourself. It has been such a joy to see other families and individuals forever changed by this organization. Your heart truly follows your treasure!

There are so many exciting things in our future - our 45,000th graduate, our South Africa expansion, Nairobi campus project, piloting an adolescent and youth program - is there a specific initiative that excites you most?

So many things excite me! To hear that South Africa has a higher HIV need than all of the 3 countries we have been operating in previously is astounding to think about - both due to the need and the potential impact. But I'll tell you what is crazy to me; not that long ago I was dancing down the church aisle in Nairobi at a graduation with Anne, who was our 5,000th graduate. To think of the impact that is now at a pace of such multiplication is so exciting. Not just because of the sheer number, because these are not numbers to me. Each of these 45,000 graduates typically represent more than 3 kids. This is generational change! To picture some of these teen moms and young boys who would often resort to life on the streets now being welcomed into and served by their communities is so exciting to see!

How can the Untold family be praying for and supporting you?

Having 4 teenagers at home and launching our first one to college, I need all the prayers I can get! :) Just continue to pray we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus and not distracted by busyness or schedules and keep him as our first love and priority. Also, pray for the high school Impact Trip I am leading this spring break! I am so excited to keep exposing kids and parents to Untold’s work in Africa. We’re excited to continue to be a part of the amazing work you’re doing.