While most college students looked forward to a relaxing summer by the pool, hitting the highway for a road trip with friends or making some extra cash for the fall term, 20-year-old Brianna Ackley was more interested in saving souls.

Brianna, a member of St. Paul's United Methodist Church in Orangeburg, joined 19 other Christian college students from South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Illinois and Montana to become a Yellowstone Christian Innovator -- student missionaries appointed through the North American Mission Board to participate in short-term ministry work while working regular jobs to support themselves.

"My paid job was housekeeping. I was a room attendant," Brianna said. "Oh my goodness, it was a terrible job."

Brianna, a senior biology and chemistry major at Columbia College, left the comforts of her Cordova home and headed West to Yellowstone National Park in Montana on May 22. She returned to South Carolina more than two months later, on Aug. 4.

Her mom, June Ackley, said Brianna had no doubts she wanted to take part in the Yellowstone Christian Innovator program this summer.

"She started planning to do this the beginning of her junior year," June Ackley said, adding that her daughter turned down the opportunity to make more money working a summer job at the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources to share the love of Christ at Yellowstone. "She said, 'I think I need to go the way I feel God wants me to.' She really never even applied for the other job."

While at Yellowstone's Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel & Cabins, Brianna and fellow innovators prepared and led Wednesday night fellowships for coworkers. Each of the five innovators at Hot Springs was responsible for some aspect of the fellowship time, which included games, songs and a short Bible study and devotion time; Brianna served as the group's recreation coordinator.

"It was kind of our way to reach out to lost coworkers, to show love to them," Brianna said. Other Mammoth Hot Springs innovators were Josh Dokey of Georgia, Kevin Singer of Illinois, Blake Bell of Montana and Jackie Cadle of Georgia. Innovators were situated throughout Yellowstone National Park at Grant Village, Old Faithful, Canyon Village and Lake Yellowstone.

Brianna said as soon as her fellow innovators discovered she was pre-med, she became the unofficial nurse of the group. She joked that she was fully stocked with all the necessities -- including Band-Aids and aloe -- and treated everything from blisters to sunburn while at Yellowstone.

On Thursday nights, the Mammoth Hot Springs innovators were joined by the group, A Christian Ministry in National Parks. Brianna said there was always a good turnout for that gathering.

"And on Wednesday, they would come to our Bible study to show support for us," she said.

While no one at Mammoth Hot Springs turned their lives over to Christ, "I think we actually ended up touching way more people than we knew," she said. "We got to just show people love and give them a different impression of how Christians live."

Brianna said a young woman complimented them on the way they witnessed to the workers.

"She said, 'You didn't try to force it on me; you just loved me for me,'" Brianna said. "It felt good just to know we made some kind of difference."

The innovators' impact on one young man in particular stood out in Brianna's mind. She said he was a Christian who had veered off God's path and happened to be working in Mammoth Hot Springs for the summer.

"We saw him grow so much in the gospel," she said. "We weren't bringing him to Christ -- we were helping him grow in his walk and strengthen his faith."

During their final Wednesday night fellowship, Brianna said the innovators presented him with an engraved Bible.

"Clearly, we made a huge difference in his life," she said. "He said his summer would have been completely different if we hadn't been there."

The Yellowstone Innovator Ministry began in 1978 as an outreach ministry to Yellowstone employees during the construction of Gardiner Baptist Mission. Sponsored by First Baptist Church of West Yellowstone, the ministry's focus is reaching the more than 3,600 employees who work at the park.

Three couples acting as "ministry parents" stayed at the church in RVs, preparing weekend meals for the innovators and supporting their ministry at the park. Weekend gatherings would consist of games, food, skits and praising the Lord, Brianna said.

"It was just a good time to get together," she said. On Sundays, the innovators would attend FBC of West Yellowstone, which serves as the ministry's home church.

Being an innovator was not Brianna's first missions experience. She worked last summer at the United Methodist camp Asbury Hills in Cleveland, S.C., and has traveled with her church's handbell choir to Florida on several occasions.

She said her experience at Asbury Hills last summer helped prepare her for becoming a Yellowstone Christian Innovator.

"That's what really drew me to the outdoors to begin with," Brianna said. "I found my love of nature there."

In addition to the NAMB, a portion of Brianna's mission trip was funded by the Baptist Collegiate Ministry at the University of South Carolina.

In fact, she said it was during one of the BCM meetings that she learned of the Yellowstone Innovator Ministry.

"Once I read about it, I knew it was something I wanted to do," Brianna said.

She said mission work will always be a part of her life. Her profession goal is to become a pediatrician.

"It's been awesome," Brianna said of her experience this summer. "It was, by far, the most amazing summer ever."

Brianna's experience wasn't limited to mission work and cleaning rooms, however -- she also had the opportunity to see some amazing Yellowstone sites. She and fellow innovators took overnight hikes once a week, and it was during one such hike that Brianna said she climbed Electric Peak, the second-tallest peak in Yellowstone National Park.

"It was just a good way to experience the park and see places," she said of their weekly outings. "The hiking was hard sometimes, but it was worth it just to see what was out there. It was a gorgeous place."

The animals, too, were a new experience. "Whistle pigs," or ground squirrels, were among the wildlife Brianna became accustomed to in Yellowstone National Park.

"If you would leave your trash bag on your (cleaning) cart for too long, they would eat little holes in your bags and scatter your trash everywhere," she said. "They're pretty humorous, until you have to clean up after them."

Moose are considered one of the most dangerous animals roaming in Yellowstone National Park, Brianna said, and innovators were warned not to go near them. Elk, on the other hand, roam freely on the grounds of the hotel where Brianna worked, and she said it wasn't unusual for them to walk up to the doors of the cabins.

"The elk are really peaceful animals. They just lay there," she said. "We saw so many animals out there, it was ridiculous. Yellowstone road jams are ridiculous. Any time you want to go anywhere, you have to schedule an extra 30 minutes for bison or bear jams."

June Ackley said she is glad her daughter had the opportunity to travel to Yellowstone and be a witness for the Lord during her last summer in college.

"It certainly matured her," she said. "(Brianna) is able to achieve things she didn't think that she'd be able to do. It's made her a stronger person in every aspect of her life, built her confidence.

"I think it's important that we encourage our children to go through new experiences. I think Brianna just thought it was important to stretch herself, to try new things, to see if she could rise to the challenge."

In a letterJune Ackley sent to her daughter this summer, she included the verse Jeremiah 29:11 -- "'For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.'"

"That's what I needed to say to her, 'Yes, you're there for a reason. Yes, you've made the right decision,'" June Ackley said. "Before, she left as a college student, a young Christian girl. She came back as a Christian adult. She's gone to the next level, she has taken the next step to increasing her faith and walk with God."

T&D Features Editor Wendy Jeffcoat Crider can be reached by e-mail at wjeffcoat@timesanddemocrat.com or by phone at 803-533-5546. Discuss this and other stories online at TheTandD.com.

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