One individual can make a difference. That’s what Justin Davis, a Fishers resident, realtor and global missionary, wants everyone to know. For Davis, the groundwork for adventure and serving others was laid early. He remembers his father taking a month-long trip to Sierra Leone to build schoolhouses, and recalls being very intrigued – and proud – that his dad took the opportunity to help people who needed it.
Years later, after starting his freshman year at Indiana University, Davis got involved with Christian Student Fellowship, an on-campus student ministry.
“I owe so much to that ministry and the folks involved,” Davis says. “That’s when I started taking mission trips, working at summer camp and getting plugged into a good church back in Indy. Everything good seemed to flow from that campus ministry.”
Davis has spent a week in India helping at a children’s home through ServLife, an Indianapolis-based mission organization, 12 days in Nepal helping at another children’s home, and a month in Turkey for a cultural immersion trip through Common Ground Christian Church. He also spent a week in Provence, France, where he stayed with a family of seven and helped on their organic grain farm, waking up at 3 a.m. every day to help the father bake over 100 loaves of sourdough, rye, baguettes and focaccia in a massive wood-fired oven.
For 23 years, Davis has been visiting various parts of Mexico. He’s been to San Luis Potosí, home of the Casa De Niños mission, over a dozen times through Christian Student Fellowship.
“Casa De Niños [now Emanuel Mexico Mission] takes children that have been abused, neglected or abandoned and loves them as much as they can,” Davis says. “I keep visiting this mission because I just love it. These children who have no family and no one to love them are given an ultra-safe, Christ-centered family and it completely changes their lives.”
He has also led a group of students from IU Christian Student Fellowship in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina in 2007. Together they helped clear out mold and debris from homes that were flooded by the hurricane. Shortly after, in 2010, Davis visited Haiti just four months after the devastating earthquake that took the lives of more than 100,000 people. He assisted one of his mentors, James Gray, on a documentary that interviewed Haiti locals and missionaries. The trip was through Christianville, a mission based in Gressier, Haiti, with a stateside headquarters in Indianapolis.
On most mission trips, Davis’ work involves construction projects, painting, cleaning out water tanks on top of children’s homes, teaching kids and helping them with daily tasks, leading teens on adventure trips, fundraising, organizing and throwing big neighborhood garage sales, and taking medical supplies and food to locals who need it.
“When I became a Christian shortly before college and started going on mission trips, a whole new world was open to me,” Davis says. “I could not only get to visit new cultures, make new friends, learn new languages and try new foods, but I was able to do that while engaging in work which I believe honored a loving God and humanity. There’s no better feeling than helping someone.”
When Davis is not serving others, he is spending time with his wife, Sarah Wright Davis, a longtime teacher at Fall Creek Junior High, and growing his real estate career with the Fishers-based Berkshire Hathaway office as a real estate agent. The couple also has a 16-month-old son, Jack.
“I love real estate,” he says. “I love meeting and serving new people and walking them through one of the most important times of their lives. I try to give my clients the same devotion and commitment I’ve seen missionaries devote to the children in Mexico. It’s less philanthropic work, of course, but it’s still a very tangible and real way to serve others when they need it.”
Above all, Davis urges those interested in serving others to seek it out. He is proof that one person can make a difference.
