Service and Family

I saw the most perfect picture of service a human can offer last week. We had foot washing at the Maundy Thursday service, and one little boy there offered to wash all of our feet; he just went down the line and washed our feet. And then he wouldn´t let us wash his. He lowered himself to what would´ve been considered the position of a servant and chose to keep himself there instead of letting us switch places with him. But, that´s not even the whole picture that I´m talking about. We went to the church in the city to serve them and bless them and do things for them, but I don´t know that that really happened. Yeah, we painted their church and sang for them (they all think we sing like angels! where they get that idea is still so far beyond me I´d need a NASA telescope to see it!) and spent time with them, but I´m pretty positive that we were a heck of a lot more blessed by them than they were by us. They opened their homes to us and gave us beds to sleep in and fed us...a lot. Seriously, we were never hungry. Even if we said we weren´t hungry they´d buy food (usually pan dulce) anyway and put it in front of us. And if we wanted something they didn´t have, they´d go buy it. Another thing, one night I asked where I could buy a phone card to call home since I hadn´t done that yet this semester, and, not only did my dad go out and buy one but, when said card didn´t work, our mom pulled out her cell phone and had all four of us call our US families. And she offered her phone to us every night after that, giving us the option of calling again. Do you know how expensive it is to call the US from Mexico? Pretty darn. And they refused to accept repayment for the cards and calls. Reading over this I realize how inadequate these words are to describe what we experienced last week, but they definitely showed us what it is to be the Body of Christ.

I mentioned above my US family, and I realize that, to some extent, I really do have to diferintiate now. Obviously, my family in the US is my first/main/however you want to put it FAMILY, and they always will be. I have 22 years with them that nothing and no one else can compete with. But, I now also have two families in Guatemala and two families in Mexico, and they´re family, too. When we were leaving Mexico City Sunday afternoon, we all gathered in a big circle and held hands, praying, singing, and sharing together one last time. Looking around that room, I saw my family grow yet again. Maybe we don´t share the same culture, language, or ancestry, and maybe we only had a week together but we´re united by our faith and that week of memories. And, like my brother in Coban, Guatemala said, if we don´t see each other again here on earth, we´ll see each other in Heaven because we´re brothers and sisters. And there, any barriers that may come between us here will be nonexistant.