The Mission Made Co.

The story behind The Mission.

Hello! We are the Widdison's! I'm Heather, an ambitious, God loving world traveler and mother of four. My husband Joe is equally ambitious, is a dentist and loves to use his gift of dentistry to bless those in need. But it wasn't always like this...

In 2018 I was a lost soul. I was a young stay at home mother of four very little children and Joe worked nearly 70-80 hours a week starting up two dental practices at the same time. We had been raised in a very strict religion that quite frankly was in NO way fulfilling our spiritual needs and we were both exhausted and frustrated with life.

Knowing this, I had a very kind friend reach out to me and invite me on a humanitarian mission trip to Peru. I hadn't had a break from motherhood in nearly 10 years and desperately needed time to myself. After A LOT of scheduling switches and delegating my motherhood responsibilities, I finally felt like I could confidently go.

I had never been to Peru and to be honest, I was just incredibly grateful for some me time! When we arrived we were greeted by the most genuine and kindest humans I had ever met! The program I went with was partnering with a local organization called Peruvian Hearts. Peruvian Hearts is organization that rescues young girls from poverty and sponsors them with better living conditions, healthy food and ongoing education.

I remember being so taken back by the girls big hearts and pure love for life despite their very hard circumstances. After hearing their personal stories of being rescued from severe poverty, my heart was so touched. I couldn't believe the life changing resources and better circumstances just a few dollars a day gave these girls!

On the third day we went into their villages, met their families and saw first had their living conditions. My heart broke. I had heard the stories, saw the pictures and watched the videos of third world living conditions but nothing prepared me for the first hand experience of it.

As I looked around at the dirt floors, hay beds, mud walls, leaky thatched roofs, no running water and a hole in the ground (in the kitchen) for a toilet, I knew my life would NEVER be the same. My perspective was drastically shifted. I had NO idea people actually lived like this! Growing up in the US, I had NEVER been exposed to this level of poverty. (Naïve, I know).

For our humanitarian project, we "renovated" two of the girls homes. We installed stairs (instead of a ladder) to go upstairs, we put in a simple toilet, we gave them mattresses to sleep on, and re plastered the walls that were literally falling apart. I will NEVER forget the smiles on their faces, the endless tears of gratitude, the HUGE heart tugging hugs and the immense joy we brought to these families.

Even though this particular mission trip was not ministerial, for the first time in my life, I felt the love and presence of God. As a 36 year old woman, I FINALLY understood what spreading the love of Christ actually looked and felt like and at that moment, I realized my life mission and that I mattered!

Throughout the trip I continued to feel the immense love of God not only on me, but on the Peruvian people. My eyes were completely opened to the amazing and powerful work God does in the hearts of those who believe in Him. Time and time again, I was jolted into the joy giving reality of Jesus Christ even in the midst of poverty! I could NOT wrap my head around how the Peruvian people were so genuinely grateful and joyful even though they had very little.

On my way home, as I journaled all about my experiences over the last 10 days, I felt like a completely different human being. My entire life outlook and perspective had drastically changed and my heart was briming with purpose and love. Somewhere between the tiny villages of Cusco Peru and the amazing jewel of Machu Pichuu, I gave my life to God.

My desire to know God more and serve his people fueled for many years as I continued to travel, serve on missions and raise my babies. God continued to ignite within me, a fire to love and serve his people from all walks of life, in many different places.

In 2021, our life had settled down a bit and our kids were a bit older. As we prayed and asked God what this next chapter had in store for us, Joe and I felt a very strong call to somehow combine his profession of dentistry with missions. We had made contacts all over the world with local ministries doing amazing things in their communities but how could we possibly grow the kingdom with dentistry?

We reached out, planned, scrimped, racked our brains, tried our hardest to come up with plans… yet over nearly EIGHTEEN MONTHS not much happened. We were so confused and frustrated as the call got heavier and heavier with each passing day.

I couldn't bare it anymore and found myself on my face in my prayer closest begging and asking God why He put this calling in our hearts if nothing was happening with it? I heard the Lord say to me " Heather, why are you focusing so much on the how when you should be focusing on the why and the who. I will take care of the how. "

I sat straight up with bulging eyes and was completely floored. Once again, Joe and I had fallen into the self sufficiency trap of depending on ourselves instead of God! We we have been trying to undo this religious mindset trap and way of living for the past 5 years...and here we were again... stepping back into one of the biggest things we had laid at the foot of the cross a hundred times already!

I apologized to God right then and there and fully released this mission to Him. I asked Him to make us willing and empty vessels to follow His plan and depend on Him instead of ourselves for everything. I promised Him we would do our best to focus on HIS people and the ways He wanted us to serve them.

THAT DAY A HUGE door opened and then MANY more to follow within the next weeks. These were all HUGE doors that ONLY GOD could open. I cannot express the exhilaration, the pure joy and the complete relief it feels to be walking in God's plan for our lives.

We have NO idea where God is taking Mission Made…all we know is that we are open, willing and available for what He wants to do IN US and THROUGH US.

EACH OF US have a unique call in this life to BLESS God's children and make this world a better place! I know it is in our own unique callings that we find TRUE JOY and COMPLETE FULFILLMENT! My hope is that each of us on this planet humble ourselves enough to get out of God's way so that HE can lead our lives and we can come into alignment with HIS PLAN…not our own!