We had a sad week last week. Byron McGuire, a good friend of the family, went home to be with Jesus.

Many years ago Byron took his wife and children to be missionaries in Ecuador. While there, he and his eldest son, Duvon, both became extremely ill with a water born disease. Duvon later invented and patented a water purification system that can be used by entire villages to create safe drinking water. Byron founded and ran New Life International, www.waterfortheworld.com which is where we met him several years ago.

After Byron’s funeral service, we were in the procession driving to the burial. Jim and I were amazed to see that every car in the opposite lane heading toward us was pulled over to the side of the road and stopped. During the entire 15 minute drive to the cemetary, there was only 1 car that did not pull over. We had never seen this behavior before. Where we’ve previously lived (on the east coast), you weren’t always sure people would even allow you to go through a traffic light as part of the funeral procession. We wondered if this was a midwestern thing?

Later on, we asked somebody about it. He told us that no, people didn’t usually stop like that. He said that Byron was so well known and respected in this area, that people knew it was his funeral and stopped as a sign of respect. Wow.

We’ll never forget Byron.