The Day We Had a Divine Appointment with Constantino & Mary
Of all the moments from my last trip to Uganda, I keep coming back to the day we visited Constantino and Mary.
It took over three hours to reach their home. We were bringing clothing and Bibles to their community, and our vans bumped along rough roads through mile after mile of bush. When we arrived, Constantino and Mary were sitting in front of their small mud house, dressed in bright white clothes and smiling at us.
Constantino is over 100 years old, and Mary is in her late nineties. I wondered how they had lived so long in such a remote place with no nearby water source, transportation, or medical facility. But they welcomed us so warmly that my questions faded away.
The young women from our tailoring program had traveled with us. They gathered around Mary with great tenderness, helping her into a beautiful new dress they had made. Her face lit up like a lightning bug on a summer’s night—it had been a long time since she had worn a beautiful garment!
As we sat together, Constantino and Mary told us about their many years of marriage and the thirteen children they had raised. Then our conversation turned to growing old. I told them that the older I became, the more I longed to see Jesus. Then I asked, “Do you want to see Jesus?”
Constantino leaned forward, his eyes bright and with a sweet smile on his face. “So much,” he said. “There are so many nights I dream about seeing Jesus. I want to see Him more than anything.” Then he shared the worry beneath that longing: “What if I am not good enough?”
I shared the story of Nicodemus in John 3. We talked about God’s love and the gift of salvation through His Son—a gift received through faith, never earned by living a good enough life. Then, Constantino and Mary eagerly prayed, asking Jesus to come into their lives. Their faces beamed as Remmy, our discipleship director, knelt beside them and spoke in their own language, assuring them they could trust Jesus’ promise.
On the long drive home, I kept thinking about Constantino’s words—how night after night, he had dreamed of seeing Jesus. God knew that longing and had surely sent us down those roads for a divine appointment that day.
Romans 10:15 says, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!” I saw it in the young women bearing clothes, in Remmy kneeling beside them, and in the miles we had traveled. But most of all, I saw it in the faces of Constantino and Mary, who now have the assurance that one day they will fall into the arms of Jesus!
Written by Betty Jo McLelland
