I HATE telling people my middle name. For starters, it’s weird. In all my years of sleepover secret-telling, no one has guessed it: I have an unguessable, somewhat ghetto, and strangely spelled middle name. Sorry, Mom. I know there’s significance to it—that lady who took care of me a few times and repeatedly fed me chili. I get it. It was her name.
For years, I’ve wanted to get married FOR THE SOLE PURPOSE of ditching my middle name. Mueller would make a fantastic middle name. Let’s be real.
In about 22 days, I’ll be meeting up in Atlanta with 45 crazy new World Racers. I’ll be sleeping on hard floors next to them through India, Nepal, Thailand, Laos and Cambodia. At some point in the chaos of the long travel days and in the celebration of the holidays, we will become family. It’ll be this strange happening, as we will smell something close to donkey-hide and might look like a bad Halloween costume. But, I guarantee you—it will happen. It always does.
This morning I awoke with that same feeling that has been sitting in my soul for three months now: hope. I can’t explain it. I know, somewhere in my knower, that there are good things in front of me. I’m scared. I don’t know if I’m really equipped. But, there’s a bucket of hope right next to my heart. And, it’s whispering about these next five months.
I love these beautiful, crazy and wild 45 new travel buddies of mine. I barely know their names, but I can feel their heartbeat in a way that I’ve never felt about any group of people before. It’s like I can see their journey, their past heartaches and the trenches they will walk through this year. I can taste the tears that will fall from their eyes as they see the wretched things of this world. I can sense their excitement, their fears and their dreams.
If there was one thing I could say to these 45 beans, I think I would say: hope. Hope that your year will be greater than anything you can imagine. Hope that you will feed the orphan and care for the widow in her distress. Hope that you will heal diseases and raise people from the dead. Hope that your life is more meaningful than you’ve previously thought. Hope that you are a child of a God who is more than routine and obedience.
Hope for the things that are wild. Hope for the joy that is yours. Hope for beginnings. Hope for friendships that will last through eternity. Hope for yourself. Hope for each other. Hope for the nations that are broken. Hope for Iraq. Hope for Ukraine. Hope for those who cannot hope for themselves.
I’m convinced. I have traveled and seen. And, there is hope to be taken like a thief takes diamond. Steal it. Take it back. For hope is for those who want to see.
Rise up, you 45 men and women of God. Put your hope in God. And in each other. For you are now family and you have the right to hope for each other. Share your lives. Break bread together. Cross into the risk of deep love.
And, know this: my heart is yours. I awaken to hope for us. I hope for you. And for me. I hope for us to become a family that shares stories and secrets. I hope.
