The story of the green house

This story comes from Allison Pohlmeier, a missionary to Kenya.

Eight years ago while in college, I took my first trip to Mexico. We went to Matamoros, Mexico and worked in a neighborhood. We built a green house. We spent huge amounts of time prayer walking the neighborhood, doing VBS, and building a green house for a sweet family. We loved on that family like no other. During spring break the following year we went back to Mexico and visited them again. It was great to see their house up and them healthy. We prayed with them and said our goodbyes.

This past spring break I went back to Matamoros to visit the FYM program and seek vision from the Lord. As we were driving to the FYM housing I thought that the neighborhood looked familiar, but being that there are thousands upon thousands of people there, I dismissed the idea.

One morning I woke up and spent some time asking the Lord what in the world he wanted me to do. I heard him say, “Find the house painted green.” I thought that was a ridiculous idea. I decided to keep praying and I kept hearing, “Find the green house.” But I kept ignoring it because I really thought that absurd. Then the Lord commanded me, “Allison, find the house painted green now!” So I got up and put some clothes on and began to walk in the neighborhood.

I walked down one street and there were all these men, so I turned around and saw a young girl walking towards me. I pulled out a picture from our trip 8 years ago and told her this might sound strange but wondered if by any chance she knew the family in the photo.

She looked at me, and looked at the photo, her eyes were huge and she said, “That’s me.” The first girl that I just happened to happen across was part of the family that we had built the house for 8 years prior.

Coincidence? I think not! God planned out that whole encounter with the girl, Maricela. One of out a million people that I bumped into happened to be the girl we built the house for? What a huge God we serve!

Maricela grabbed my hand and around the corner was that house painted green. The Lord allowed me to visit and pass time with them not just that afternoon, but throughout the week.