Not many 22 year olds get to celebrate their birthday in Southeast Asia traveling and serving the world’s people.
I chose the atypical path that God laid in front of me.
There’s this song about feeling 22, maybe you’ve heard it. It’s by this little-known artist named Taylor Swift.
My plan for my 22nd birthday was to film me and my teammates doing the things Taylor talks about in her song. Dressing up like hipsters, making fun of our exes, eating breakfast at midnight, etcetera.
When it didn’t happen, I began reflecting on what feeling 22 really means to me. It’s different than a lot of people my age. I’m not making plans for after graduation. I’m not applying for jobs. I’m not dating a potential spouse. Dating isn’t even on my radar.
I’m on a bus in Malaysia, surrounded by people who don’t know me and don’t understand me. People who follow millions of gods, one god who seems to be like mine but doesn’t quite match up and people who don’t believe in anything at all. Maybe one of them is a Christian. The odds are against it. I just left a ministry where I prayed for the city of Kulim to be wrecked by the gospel, for the churches in town to be overflowing with new believers, and for the chains of addiction and violence to be broken forever. I left a ministry where I spent my Saturdays and Monday afternoons with a group of kids who have been abandoned, abused or used by their so-called parents for monetary gain. I left a ministry where the church community shakes your hand at the beginning and end of every service. They look you in the eye, smile and pray that God blesses you. I left a ministry run by a family who has been through hell and back for the sake of the call God has put on their life to do ministry in the form of leading a church.
I experienced all of that in the first month of my 22nd year, and it’s only just the beginning.
Feeling 22 will always mean something special to me. It will always take me back to the time in my life when I was racing around the World with the lover of my soul. The time in my life where I was still so unsure of so many things, but completely confident in the fact that God has something better than I could ever imagine waiting for me to say yes to. 22 will always mean “happy, free, confused and lonely in the best way”.
I don’t know about you, but I’m feelin 22.
