As I start this post, I just shake my head at the wonder of it all. We serve such a big God that our world becomes very small.
That’s how it is in God’s family. We’re all connected.
It’s easy to become so self-absorbed in our day-to-day routine, that we forget as followers of Christ the amazing connections God brings our way. I shouldn’t be surprised any more by this — after all, I have lived in six different countries, experienced church all around the world. Yet, lately, I’ve been watching my connections become those of the next generation — of my sons.
Here’s what happened:
Over nine months ago I was connected with a couple on the other side of the world. They are doing a wonderful ministry in disaster relief, and I was writing an article on them for the Missions Mosaic magazine. It was the first time I had agreed to write a piece on anyone serving cross-culturally, but I enjoyed the challenge and really liked hearing their story and writing about them. The article will be in the October issue.
Fast-forward nine months, and I was tasked to do a quick follow-up, to check in on the couple and see what had been happening since January. Well, it was obvious that COVID happened. It has been a very hard, but busy season for them, as they chose to remain in their country of service instead of taking a chance to come the states on a short furlough and get stuck here.
That meant, instead of watching two sons graduate college and medical school and meeting their first grandchild, they coordinated hunger relief projects for those suffering from the pandemic. I was so touched by their sacrifice and thankful again that I had the privilege of writing about their work.
Last week, my son and daughter-in-law invited me over to enjoy a meal cooked on their new grill. We had eaten and were just visiting, when my engineering son shared about a special training that he was going to be taking online. It was an intensive week of training to certify him to become an engineer who can help with disaster relief here or overseas.
“Wow, that’s really interesting,” I said. “I just wrote an article on a guy who coordinates disaster relief in Asia.”
My son then told me the name of the guy leading the training — It was the same man!
He then goes on to inform me that he’d actually met him a long time back at a meeting with a group of engineers he works with. Their son had even graduated from the same university as mine.
I could not wait to get home to write this couple to tell them of the new connection we had. Of course, we already had The connection in Christ, but here God was connecting us in even more ways.
What ways do you see God connecting you with others? What does that teach you about our God? What do you think he wants us to do as a result of these new connections?
Of course, I’m now praying for this man as he and his wife continue to faithfully serve. I’m praying for my son as he takes his training. I’m praying for God to provide opportunities to use this training in his life to serve others. I’m praying for the new grand-baby and new graduates, that the days will not be too much longer before they can celebrate these events in person.
I’m thanking God that it is truly a small world in his BIG family.
Grace and Peace