We have made it home after one of the most amazing years of our life!!! I think it goes without saying that this last year was one of our hardest and best years (so far)!!!
There was one underlying theme this year….love. We where shown love this year by strangers, by our friends and family back home, by our team/community that we were living with 24/7, and of course by God. Although it was not always easy, it was very rewarding.
I’m hoping that the love we encountered will continue to be the type of love I show to everyone in my daily life. I hope that my words of love will speak loudly and that my actions of love will speak even louder. This can be a very hard thing to do, especially to those who are “harder” to love. We all have some of “those people” in our lives. (some of us may even be “those people”) I’m just being honest. But what I come to realize over this year is that love goes a long way, especially to those who are not used to being loved. For some of us it may be hard to imagine that there are millions of people in this world who have never been shown any kind of love! They have never heard the words “I love you” or been shown love in any way. It is our responsibility to show God’s love to everyone. Yes, everyone. Even those who are “hard” or inconvenient to love. You can look anywhere and find people who are longing to be loved. They are in every house, city, and country in the world. They are at work, in the grocery stores, and even in churches. They are even possibly in your own families.
So my request to all of us is simple, in this next year lets strive to love people. Don’t worry, it doesn’t have to be a huge show of undying love, it can just be a smile, a polite gesture, or word of encouragement. Trust me, it WILL go far!! So on that note, let me begin….
We want to thank every single one of you for loving us this year. Even when it was hard, even when you might not have even known you where, we felt it.
Thanks to our families for being selfless and letting us leave to travel around the world and serve others for a year.
Thanks to our friends who followed, prayed, supported and vicariously lived through us on our amazing journey.
Thanks to our financial supporters who not only spiritually, but materially backed us and helped us go on this trip.
Thanks to our squad mates/community for helping us every day these last 11 months and for loving us so well.
Thank you for everything!! For all of the prayers that where lifted up on our behalf, for reading our blogs and giving us encouragement along the way, and for loving us and supporting us in all that we did.
Thanks to God for protecting us and blessing us this last year.
We are already beginning to see that we are different people than the ones who left in January. Much of the change is due to the amazing people we have met along the way. We will always be thankful for the opportunities we have had to serve alongside such giving and selfless people. We hope that our lives will reflect their love and devotion to others throughout this next season of our lives.
Recap:
2011 has been an exciting and adventurous year for the Hanes’. We had the privilege to spread the love of Jesus all across the world; we served others, we challenged ourselves and we are forever changed.
We hope that in 2012 we have the opportunity to continue serving, to continue challenging ourselves, and to continue seeing ourselves and others changed. We pray that you will be led to do the same.
We will be having a get together for all of our friends, family, supporters, and stalkers the second week in January. We will post another blog with the where and when details soon. So stay tuned…..
