During our Discipleship Training School Outreach, Dave offered to carry a table for a mom who was struggling to wrangle the unwieldy piece of furniture home. The road back to her house was long and he had plenty of time to get to know the mom, Ana, her common-law husband, Luis, and their two kids, Miguel and Damaris.
After that day we visited them other times, including throwing a birthday party for little Miguel. Sometime near the end of the DTS we found out that Luis was suffering from a cancerous tumor and the doctor was giving him a dark prognosis if they couldn't scrape together the money for surgery. We prayed for them, but knew that God was looking for a greatest level of response.
Dave shared the testimony of Luis and Ana's family during the DTS graduation and a generous couple named Mike and Gloriann came forward with an offer to pay for the entire surgery, as well as covering all the expenses for the family post-op when Luis couldn't work. Dave sat in the hospital with Luis and Ana for days while Luis recovered from the intensive surgery, praying for complete healing. A couple months later the doctors pronounced Luis as cancer-free.
This miracle happened almost three years ago. Since then we've had the joy of getting to know this family better through many visits and having Ana attend our literacy class in 2014. In May they announced that they were considering getting married and invited us to come to the wedding.
It took a couple months to get everything arranged, but this week while we were in Antigua we finally saw our good friends commit their lives to each other in marriage. When we visited Ana at the beginning of the week to find out the plan for the wedding day, we asked her how she was feeling.
She said, "I feel valued that he wants to marry me. I feel safe because now if something happens to him I know that the kids and I will be taken care of. I never thought this day would come."
The day they married, Dave and I signed the papers in place of Ana's family, who weren't able to be there. She said, "You are my family. You have cared about me when no one else did. Many good things have happened because you came into our lives." She smiled all day.
"I didn't think this would ever happen to me," Ana laughed as we walked through Antigua after eating dessert in a restaraunt. "I will never forget this special night."
Congratulations Luis and Ana
May God bless your new marriage.
 |
| Z and Damaris walking to the wedding |
 |
| The ceremony (they will be having another church ceremony later) |
 |
| Officially husband and Wife |
 |
| Signing in place of Ana's mom |
 |
| Luis' Mom signing |
 |
| The newlyweds! |
 |
| The three amigos |
 |
| Walking to the reception, hosted by a friend of Ana's |
 |
| Reception dinner, cow-heart soup with rice, tortillas and coffee |
 |
| We took them for dessert/pizza in Antigua afterwards. It was the first time they'd eaten in a real restaurant. |
 |
| No leftovers here! |
 |
| Enjoying a walk through Central Park |
 |
| Luis' side of the family |
No comments:
Post a Comment