I had sponsored children before, once in college and again with my husband a few years back. Both of those children have since moved or stopped their need for the program, which is great! That’s the goal! During my time as their sponsor, I cared about them and wrote to them and looked at their faces on my refrigerator every day! And I’ve been doing the same with Kevin these last 6 months since Logos decided to collectively sponsor 150 children in Guatemala.

But meeting him? Oh meeting him was something different. A few Tuesday mornings ago, I walked into a fast food restaurant in the middle of Antigua, Guatemala at 8:00am and locked eyes with a friend I’d never met. He recognized me instantly, but it took me a minute to be sure it was him. He’d changed so much since his photo! It makes sense, considering the rate at which children grow and transform.

The connection was instant. We hugged and the first thing he told me was how excited he had been to meet me. Well, actually, the first thing he did was ask where my husband and my boys were! He wanted to meet them as well! Kevin remembered every name from our letters (including the dog!) and said he had our picture up in his room.

All day we walked together, sat together, and talked together. I also got to know his mom and little sister and eventually they began to open up about what their lives are really like. Kevin’s parents have problems, much like we all do, but they weighed heavily on him. And for some reason, the fact that I picked his card off of a table in McAllen, Texas made him feel like he could trust me with those. I was blessed to be able to pray over him and his family that day.

“You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.” (Leviticus 19:34)

Even though we were strangers, we were also family. He loved me. I loved him. Why? Because it was Christ who united us. It was God who brought us together and what He binds together is strong.

Saying goodbye to Kevin was hard. But it was also a time of excitement because I know, God willing, I will see him again when our team returns to Guatemala next summer. In the meantime, I’ll be praying for him and he will be praying for me. We will write, we will send photos, and my hope is that he will remember that a family in the Rio Grande Valley loves and cares about him because God cares about us.