God's Big Family

I never stop being amazed at just how God's family takes care of each other around the world. I (Kevin) experienced this myself when I went to the Ukraine more than 10 years ago. To go somewhere, not know anyone and within a matter of days (sometimes hours or minutes) feel the peace of God's presence that only comes through His family. It's amazing. Two weeks ago Benay and I went to an art exposition here in Porto Alegre. While there we met two women from Uganda. Benay began having a conversation with them in English about the paintings they brought from their country. We stayed and talked for a while, traded emails and spoke about them coming back next year. The exposition was really a neat experience as around 20-25 different countries were represented. We decided to take the kids a few days later and let them see all the different things as well as meet our two new friends. The kids had a ball with Alinda (with the shaven head) and Reste. Our kids were taught new words in a new language and they learned things about another culture. We found out that Alinda and Reste would not be leaving town for a couple of days so we invited them to dinner the following night. They came and enjoyed some of Benay's beef stew. The night was fairly cool (45 or 50 degrees) and, because we have no central heat as well as them not being accustomed to colder temperatures, they were FREEZING! They were happy to eat a warm meal and drink hot tea. Benay and I told them how happy we were to have met them and that they were eating and spending time with us and our kids in our home. Alinda said she had been praying that God would bring some people into their lives on this trip that would treat them nicely and He had. We felt honored to be used by God to reach out to these women. We prayed together with our sisters in Christ asking God to bless their trip and their businesses as well as their country. We have some friends who were missionaries in Uganda and it was a blessing for us to meet people from the land where they taught, lived and learned for many years. God blessed us so much from our time with our new friends and we hope to keep them in our house next year when they come back.