Saturday evening we were invited to join our good friends, Seni and Mama Seni, for supper at their home.  We have known these wonderful people for about 17 years and have spent a lot of time in their home.  They usually try to have every team and visitor we have to their home one night for supper while they are here with us. 

Seni and Tim have been close friends for all these years and have spent lots of time traveling and working together. Our daughters, Jenn and Sarah, love Seni and his family. 

Saturday evening we arrived around 6:00pm and we ate supper about 7:30; we were waiting for other guests to arrive.  The General Supt. of Zambia along with the Mission’s Board from the church finally arrived. Seni’s parents and Mama Seni’s parents live with them; there are no nursing homes in Tanzania and it is the custom for the elderly to live with their children.  They are loved and treated with great respect.  Seni’s father is 99 years old!  Amazing, especially here in Tanzania.

We had a wonderful and abundant Tanzanian meal of fish, chicken, rice, potatoes, cabbage, greens, brown beans and gravy.  At the end of the meal they were preparing to take Seni’s father to get ready for bed.  He is very sharp mentally although he can no longer see. Before he left the table, he took each of us around the table by the hand one at a time and prayed a very specific blessing over each of us.  As he prayed for me, he first gave thanks for God’s healing touch on my body and for bringing me safely back to them and then he prayed for God to bless me with good health in the years to come. 

It was a precious example of the custom we see throughout the Bible of a father placing his hands upon his children and blessing each of them with a specific and individual blessing.