One of the hard things on this Tanzania trip was having a very sore neck. At first it was from sitting so long on the plane. On the way to Tanzania, our longest flight was 13 hours, and two other shorter flights, plus sitting for six hours in the airport when one of our flights was late, causing us to miss our next flight. A few times my neck cracked and felt better but later, sleeping on unfamiliar pillows, it became much worse.
A brochure in our room advertised a massage therapist, and I was finally hurting bad enough to try to get an appointment. I went down to the reception desk and was told that the massage therapist was in and I could go right up which I did. The massage room was on the 2nd floor in the gym, and fortunately there was a cute little boy to entertain me while his mama exercised!
Eventually, it seemed there had been some miscommunication, so after waiting for some time, I made an appointment for the next morning. This time we connected.
I hoped to have a meaningful conversation with the massage therapist while she worked on my neck, but I realized quickly that her English wasn’t very good so I just relaxed. When she finished, I groaned and said, “It still really hurts.” She left the room for a few minutes and from what I could gather, she changed her next appointment so that she could work on me longer.
As she worked she apologized for her poor English and we started talking. I can’t remember how the conversation began, but she said something about praying. I asked her if she prayed to Jesus. She assured me that she did, and our conversation continued. I told her that Jesus is so important because the Bible says we can’t come to God unless we know Jesus and we can’t go to Heaven unless we know Jesus. In spite of her limited English, we had a good conversation.
Then my therapist told me she wanted me to go in the sauna. I wasn’t thrilled because I’d never been in a working sauna, but she assured me it would only be for five minutes. Also, she left the door open slightly so I didn’t feel too claustrophobic. She was right, it really did help, and I did have a day or so of relief from the awful neck pain. Best of all I felt like the Holy Spirit had enabled us to communicate!
The waitresses and the women at the reception desk were all so welcoming and treated us like royalty during our entire time at our hotel for reasons that I couldn’t understand. Last evening Donn and I were listening to a message by a motivational speaker. She talked about speaking to someone cleaning a restroom and showing her kindness. She said people often don’t pay any attention to folks like that and it means a lot to them when someone does.
Donn said, “Honey, maybe that’s why the waitresses were so good to us. You paid attention to them!”
He was right. We were at that hotel for six days so we saw those who worked there often. I always noticed them, spoke to them and smiled just because it’s my custom to do that, and perhaps they responded by giving us special treatment. I hadn’t connected that to the kind of treatment we received. Even one little man in a suit who obviously had some special position hovered around our table to make sure we had everything we needed.
The day we left and they realized I was saying good bye, one of them said, “So next week, you’ll be gone, and then the next week you’ll be here Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday…”
I shook my head and laughed. “No, no, no. We’re going home to Pennsylvania. We are too old to make that trip again.
Vennie, the woman at the far end of the picture above, went and put cookies I’d said I liked in a container and the container in a bag for us to take along. She walked us up to our room on another floor before she gave us the bag. On a whim, I asked if I could pray with her. She said, “Yes.”
After I prayed, I said, “Are you a Christian?” When she smiled and said she was, I said, “I thought so because I see Jesus in you.”
Baraka, who met us at the airport with a sign that had our name, also gave us special attention every time we met.
When we were leaving our hotel to go to the airport, my massage therapist arrived and came to say good bye. She seemed very pleased when I hugged her in farewell.
As I thought back over our time in Tanzania, I realized that God had given us favor everywhere we went in that country. It reminded me that when we were in Japan, I read somewhere that favor is worth more than a million dollars when we are in the places God sends us to minister. I thanked Him for all the encounters He had orchestrated from the beginning of our journey to the end. Best of all, I can continue to pray for these people in the years to come.
Father, thank you so much for your ability to give us supernatural favor when we are doing what you ask us to do. I pray that you will continue to cause our thoughts to become agreeable with your will (Proverbs 16:3) and pour out your favor upon us. Amen.