“I’m so glad I was able to change my seat to this one,” I commented to the young lady who sat next to me on my flight from London to Chicago. “It has been a real pleasure to have your company on this journey.”

“It’s been a pleasure for me, too,” she said. “I had a very unpleasant seatmate on my flight from Prague to London yesterday, so having you sit with me has made up for it. When my friend decided to go back to the States eight days before our original plans, I wondered who would be sitting next to me, and I’m so glad it was you!”

I was flying to the States to meet up with Graham, and I had not been looking forward to traveling on my own. However, God provided me with some lovely traveling companions. This young lady was from Colorado and had spent three weeks backpacking in Europe, so we had a lot to chat about.

As I waited at the bus stop outside the airport terminal in Chicago, I thought I might spend most of the three-hour bus ride sleeping, but that didn’t happen. Instead, I started chatting with a lady across the aisle from me. She was on her way home from a three-week trip to Ireland. Having spent summers in Ireland for six years when my father was the Irish Mission President, I had visited many of the places she had seen.

I discovered this lady provides housing and hospitality for international students, mostly from the Far East, so I was able to share with her about Lynette’s experience in Southeast Asia and what she is doing now. The conversation flowed freely, and I was able to talk about God and the church in a very natural way. “I’m sorry you’re getting off so soon,” I said to her an hour later. “It’s been good talking with you.”

I didn’t pay much attention to the other passengers boarding the bus, but as one lady turned from asking the driver a question, she looked at me and said, “I know you.”

“Your face looks familiar, too, but I can’t remember your name,” I admitted.

“You stayed with us a few years ago when you visited your brother on the east coast.”

“Maud?” I asked in surprise.

“Yes!”

“That was five years ago! You’re the last person I would have expected to see today! Come and sit with me.” For the next couple of hours we did a lot of catching up.

“I was just reading your article in Adventist Frontiers,” she said, “so it’s nice to have a very personal update on your family and the
mission projects.”

As the bus stopped once more, a man from a few rows behind came forward and shook my hand. I immediately recognized him as a retired missionary I had gotten to know at the Stevensville Church during the time we lived in Michigan. “My wife and I are on our way home from Kenya where we have been visiting our daughter for the past six weeks,” he said. “We felt sure we knew you, and we finally realized who you are.” I turned to wave at his wife.

I was amazed once more as I recognized how God cares about the little details of our lives. It had been three years since I was last in the States, and traveling on my own, I thought the journey might have been boring and long. But not only did He provide me with two new friends to talk with, He also arranged meetings with three old friends! Before setting out on my journey, I had prayed that God would help me be a blessing and lead me to the people He wanted me to connect with that day. I certainly felt blessed at the end of my trip, and I hope my conversations with the two ladies on the plane and the bus planted some seeds.

• Twitter