In this orphan advocacy life, I’ve uttered it as much as I’ve heard it.

Defend the weak and the fatherless.

Seek out the meek and the marginalized.

Run to the voiceless and the vulnerable, and, as God did for you, call them daughters and sons.

But opening your eyes to the 132 million single-orphaned children around the world is one thing; practically running to them is another.

Because it costs something.

Like it cost these deserving children everything.

And it requires broken people running to broken people, together putting their hands and their stories in the only Hands who can redeem, restore and rewrite them.

H1S hands.

This fall, I had the sacred honor and privilege of telling the story of a family who doesn’t just talk helplessly about the millions of marginalized children around the world; they RUN to them.

Five different times.

And then started an entire jerky store with the sole purpose of reclaiming hope for the fatherless around the world.

And they did it, always full of joy, between the demands of deployments, cross-country moves and a medical roster that keeps them in hospital waiting rooms and emergency care facilities half of their daily lives.

There’s a word for a life lived like that, with wide open doors and wide open hands and wide open hearts that just scream, “Here I am, Lord. Send me!”

It’s called surrender.

And it’s what’s required if we are really going to be the hands and feet of Jesus on this earth.

Want to see what it looks like to live a life outside of self?

A life that sees ALL children not as numbers or figures or hopeless statistics but as precious, priceless, treasured image bearers of Him?

Light the fire, grab your favorite blankie and turn on the coffee pot for some snuggled-in Saturday morning reading. Because once you get a glimpse into this beautiful family’s world, your view of God, the orphan crisis and our calling to value EVERY person on this planet as an image bearer of H1S will never be the same.