BY AMANDA SAUDER

WALKED INTO HIS OFFICE PREPARED TO GET an interview.

What I got, instead, was a blessing.

I was there to see Basharat Masih, senior chaplain at Porter Adventist Hospital in Denver, Colorado. I'd heard he had a great story and was prepared to hear it. Or so I thought.

With a warm smile and gentle handshake, Chaplain Basharat whisked me to his back office. I fumbled through my notes, not sure where to begin telling this monumental life story. So I asked.

"Chaplain Basharat," I said tentatively, "tell me . . . how did you become a chaplain here at Porter Adventist Hospital?"

"Well," he answered slowly, "it's a long story how I became a Christian, because I come from an orthodox Muslim faith."

And with that, the dramatic life story of Basharat Masih began.

Unorthodox Beginnings
Born on February 22, 1940, into the orthodox Muslim Pashtun (Pathan) tribe as Mohammed Iqbal Ali Khan, Basharat remembers "a very bad childhood." Basharat's biological mother died from complications during childbirth when he was just 4 years old. Despite his young age, Basharat still remembered the love his biological mother gave--the "hugs and kisses"--and he missed her love greatly after her death. "I never, ever got any hug or expression of love from my father," says Basharat. "I hungered for love, I hungered for affection . . . until I met Jesus."

Shortly after his mother's death Basharat's father remarried. Unfortunately for Basharat, his stepmother didn't give him hugs and kisses. Instead, she physically, emotionally, and psychologically abused him. "There was no love in the family," says Basharat. "It was a prison for me."

One night when Basharat was just 15 years old, he and his 17-year-old brother stole some of their stepmother's jewelry and escaped their childhood home of Hyderabad, India. Basharat traveled northwest to Bombay, while his brother fled further northwest to Pakistan. He never saw or heard from his older brother again.

"I spent a homeless life as a teenager in Bombay," says Basharat. A friendly priest from a local mosque allowed Basharat to sleep in the mosque in exchange for his cleaning services. "I had a tough life," he remembers.

Although it was illegal, Basharat sold khaja--a flat sweet bread--in an open marketplace. "I would usually make about one and a half rupees a day," he recalls. One day, though, his luck ran out; Basharat was arrested for selling the khaja and thrown in prison.

But the friendly priest did not forget Basharat. A soccer team from Basharat's hometown, Hyderabad, had come to Bombay for a tournament. The priest approached a member of the team and told him, "There is a young man here from your hometown, living homeless on the streets. You must help him; he is one of your own." So the player took Basharat as his assistant, and Basharat was able to travel with the team back to Hyderabad.

Basharat didn't return to his parents' home, though. Instead he continued his homeless life on the streets of his own hometown. He made money by washing plates in a restaurant many of his father's friends frequented. One day one of them recognized Basharat. The man relayed the news to Basharat's father and insisted that he bring Basharat into his home; it was a disgrace for his son to be homeless in his hometown, washing dishes in a restaurant. But Basharat's father refused to take him back. Instead the friend took Basharat into his own home. Basharat quit his job washing dishes and enrolled in pharmaceutical training. Once he received his license, he "flew from home" and began practicing as a hospital pharmacist. He was just 18 years old.

The Methodist Nurse
While working as a pharmacist at a hospital in Aurangabad, Basharat frequently argued with the nurses over religion. "They would try to present to me Jesus as the Son of God and Savior of the world. I would laugh and say to myself, 'Hey, these people are crazy. How could God, who is holy, who is one, have a son?' I was thinking in human terms: 'If God has a son, where is God's wife and Jesus' mother?'

"I truly hated the Christian doctrine of Jesus being the Son of God," says Basharat, "because for a Muslim it's blasphemy."

These frequent religious clashes didn't keep Basharat from becoming friends with the nurses. In fact, "there was one nurse I was particularly friendly with," he says. "I was trying to tell her what I believed as a Muslim, and she was trying to explain her faith [as a Methodist]. We came to the point where we liked each other and wanted to be life partners. But how could we? She was a Christian, and I was a Muslim."

Basharat thought he had the answer. "I made some evil plans to force [Sheila] to become a Muslim. With my Muslim friends I planned that there would be a time when I would make her read a kalma--a Muslim creed that, when read, makes the reader a Muslim. There doesn't need to be a ceremony for that, so I was planning to trap her, to force her to read the kalma and follow my religion.

"But God had His own plans," says Basharat, "and I decided that it wasn't going to work. This plan would hurt her, and I didn't want to hurt her because I loved her very much."

Basharat and Sheila were married in a court ceremony on September 23, 1959, he a Muslim, she a Methodist.

The White Church Across the Street
A seed of curiosity had been planted in Basharat's Muslim heart. Who was this Jesus? How could He be the Son of God? "I was convinced in my heart, without knowing Jesus or having read the Bible, that there was something fishy in biblical doctrine," says Basharat.

So Basharat began searching for a Bible in his original tongue, Urdu. After unsuccessful visits at two Christian churches, Basharat went to the post office. When his errands at the post office were finished, he turned around and saw a white church across the street. It was a Seventh-day Adventist church.

"It was a hot and humid day," he remembers, "and the pastor invited me in. He treated me well and gave me a glass of orange juice."

The pastor, S. B. Shinde, sat down with Basharat and began to tell him about Jesus. The first verse the pastor presented was: "Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it" (Matt. 7:13, 14, NIV).

"The text hit me hard because although I claimed to be a pious Muslim, reading the Namaz--which is a worship Muslims do--five times in a day . . . still I was not happy."

Pastor Shinde helped Basharat purchase an Urdu Bible, and Basharat began studying the life of Jesus. "All of my colleagues were Muslim," he recalls, "and whenever they would come to visit me, when they would knock on the door, I would hide the Bible under the Quran, as if I was reading the Quran and not the Bible. But actually I was reading the Bible; I was very deep into it."

"He used to read the Bible a lot, and when his friends came over he would hide it under the Quran," laughs Basharat's wife, Sheila. "They used to think, Oh, he's reading the Quran; he's a holy man. But he was really reading the Bible."

Basharat read the birth account of Jesus, but he did not stop there. In fact, he read all the way through the New Testament. "I cannot explain the power that caught me and the belief I had when I read the four Gospels that indeed Jesus is the Savior of the world. And I needed Him in my life."

Indeed, Basharat was deeply involved in biblical study. "I would read a passage and then stop and think about it and absorb that passage into myself. It was not like reading a novel or some other book; I was trying to stop and understand what the gospel message was.

"I longed for love until I met Jesus," says Basharat. "It was beyond my comprehension . . . God--holy--dying for Basharat?"

Soon Basharat's convictions led him to conversion. "I came to the point where I decided in my heart that I wanted to follow Jesus," says Basharat. "Nobody taught me to pray; I started praying on my own. When I was a Muslim, I used to pray five times a day. I changed that; I stopped praying to Allah. Instead, I started praying five times a day to Jesus. I still do."

A Baptized Basharat
Basharat called Pastor Shinde and asked to be baptized. But Pastor Shinde was hesitant. "We were living in a very Muslim-populated area, and he was afraid for both our lives," says Basharat.

Basharat's decision was a quiet one, though his friends and coworkers were becoming more and more aware that he was leaning toward Christianity. One day, during the Muslim holiday of Ramadan, Basharat was supposed to attend the big festival of Ramadan--along with all other Muslims--and don new clothes. Instead Basharat stayed at home.

"My colleagues and friends came to the door and said, 'Come on; it's time to go to the festival.' But I told them I was not going."

Then there was a second knock at the door. Basharat, thinking it was his persistent Muslim friends, yelled, "I told you, I don't want to go." But the knocking continued. "And then the person on the other side of the door said, 'I am Pastor Shinde.' Then at that point he was fully convinced that I was sincere and ready to be baptized." It had been six months since Basharat had requested it.

"They took me to a faraway place where they had annual camp meetings," says Basharat. Both he and Sheila were baptized on April 2, 1960, there in the Toka River. "It was such a profound experience, being baptized in the name of Jesus," says Basharat, "that I changed my name to Basharat Iqbal Masih. Basharat means a messenger, one who goes and proclaims. Iqbal means good news, a blessing. Masih says that I took a robe of Christ's righteousness. So I am proclaiming the good news of the gospel; I am a preacher of the gospel." Basharat was just 20 years old.

Losing Friends, Leaving Family
Basharat's life changed dramatically after his conversion to Christianity. "I used to smoke and drink," says Basharat. "I was a bad boy. But then I attended a Seventh-day Adventist church, and the pastor gave a sermon on how the body is the temple of God. I had a packet of cigarettes in my pocket with four cigarettes in it, and I threw it out the window. I never touched them again."

Soon his newfound faith began affecting his relationships with Muslim friends and coworkers. "My best friend was an engineer. He wanted to take me to a bar, but I told him I didn't drink alcohol anymore. He said I could order coffee or tea, but I still refused, and he got mad. I lost my best friend right there in front of that restaurant," says Basharat. "But I'm glad, because I found Jesus."

Soon after their baptism, trouble began for Basharat and Sheila Masih. The Muslim people from the town began to persecute them. Basharat's family was especially angry. They felt betrayed by his conversion to Christianity and alienated him from the family. Their hatred was especially kindled by the Islamic belief that if a Muslim is converted to another faith, that individual becomes a kaffar--an agent of Satan, no longer a follower of god. Muslims also believe that one who kills a kaffar will go straight to heaven when he or she dies.

Because of this belief, Basharat's family tried to have him killed at least three times. "I get emotional when I see how God, in His providence, obviously protected me and kept me and my family safe," says Basharat.

Besides his family's acceptance, Basharat also lost his rights to the family inheritance when he became a Christian. "I come from a very rich family," says Basharat. "They call us banjardar, which means big landlords. We had mango gardens and so much more. But I left everything for the sake of Jesus," he says.

A Spontaneous Train Ride, a Ready Hospital
Basharat and Sheila were tired of the persecution they were receiving from Muslim townspeople in Jalna. "One night we were so fed up," recalls Basharat, "that we just left that town. We left all our belongings in our apartment. We didn't know where to go; we just carried two trunks with our bedding and went to the train station."

The two hospital workers felt they could easily find a job in a large city, so they booked a one-way train trip to Bombay. Partway through their trip they had to change trains in a town called Khandwa. During the four-hour delay Sheila remembered that she had a friend who worked as a nurse in the Khandwa hospital, and the two decided to make a quick visit.

Basharat and Sheila took a tonga, a horse carrier, to the civil hospital in Khandwa. As their tonga approached the hospital's front porch, two orderlies came running to meet them. "Saheb, maimsaheb, just follow us," the orderlies told them, grabbing their luggage and running toward the hospital. The Masihs were confused, but had to follow the orderlies since they'd taken their luggage. "We literally had to run to catch them," remembers Basharat.

"They brought us to a room that was set for two people and told us, 'Take a shower and get ready. Supper will be served at 6:00.' I looked at my wife and we asked the question 'What's going on?' These orderlies didn't know anything. They said, 'We were told to help you to get settled down in this room.'"

The Masihs were hesitant at first to accept their offer, but because they'd been traveling all day in a coal-engine train, a shower was tempting. Their faces were covered in soot; they were exhausted and dirty, grateful for the chance to rest and clean up. "So we took a shower and prayed and went to bed," says Basharat.

"In the morning breakfast was served, and we asked the orderlies, 'What's going on?' The orderlies answered, 'Sir, don't ask us anything. We don't know. I was asked to make you comfortable in this room. The nursing superintendent has asked to see you at 8:00 this morning.'"

The Masihs were thoroughly confused, but went to meet with the superintendent. They sat down, and she began addressing them as Mr. and Mrs. Sharma. "So we told her, 'We are not Mr. and Mrs. Sharma,'" says Basharat. "'You are not?' she asked, and her eyes and mouth went wide open. 'Then who are you?' she asked us. 'I am Basharat Masih, and this is my wife, Sheila Masih,' I told her. There was a silence full of shock and surprise for a moment, and she thought about it. She told my wife, 'Since this is a new hospital, we always need nurses here. You can start working tomorrow.' And for me, she told me, 'I cannot give you an appointment order, but the CEO will be back on Monday, and I will make an appointment for you to see him.'

"I got a job, my wife got a job, and we started working. And this hospital [had] sent a job offer to that Mr. and Mrs. Sharma, asking them to come join the work. And the letter came back. They sent personal messengers. But there was no Mr. and Mrs. Sharma," says Basharat, tearing. "They never existed," he says, obviously shaken by the powerful experience. "Who were these people?" he asks, taking off his glasses to wipe his moistened eyes. "They were no other than angels, of course," he says quietly, humbly. "Those people--in flesh, in blood, in bones--never existed. God had made a place for both of us long before we made a plan to take a train and travel to Bombay, stop at Khandwa, and go to see my wife's friend.

"I have a lot of stories about God's providence," says Basharat. His miraculous stories range from abundant blessings during his 14 years as a literature evangelist, to the financial opportunity to attend Spicer Memorial College in India, to narrow escapes from family plots to have him killed.

"So when was it that you came to America?" I ask Basharat.

"It was February 9, 1983," he answers.

I am struck by the irony. It was exactly 20 years and four days before our interview.

God's Chess Game
Today Basharat Iqbal Masih serves as the director of pastoral care for Porter Adventist Hospital. He is the president of the Seventh-day Adventist Healthcare Chaplains Association (SDAHCA). "When I think about God lifting a homeless person from the streets of Bombay, making him director of pastoral care--it's amazing," he says. "God is a good chess player. He knows how to move people around. Look at where God has brought me.

"My life is a life of prayer," says Basharat. "Talking to God is my life, it's my breath. I cannot live without breath, and I cannot live without God. I still pray five times a day."

Basharat and Sheila are still happily married. "My husband is God's gift to me," says Sheila. "He is a good man, a good father."

They have three grown children and six grandchildren. Avinash, their eldest son, is working on a master's degree in health-care administration in Boston, Massachusetts. Their second son, Arun, is a surgical pathologist in Wooster, Ohio. Their youngest, Nina, is working on her doctorate and is currently a counselor in private practice in Palm Beach, Florida.

"They are all Adventists," says Basharat, "and all very active in the church. What else could we ask God for? I don't need anything."

"Basharat had a hard life," says Sheila. "But I think God was all the time with him. He wanted him with Him, so He allowed him to go through those things.

"We have so many stories," she continues. "If we sat and told them all to you, you could write books and books."

As our interview came to a close, I couldn't help thinking of a certain verse I've read: "Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child; children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death. All men will hate you because of me, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved. When you are persecuted in one place, flee to another" (Matt. 10: 21-23, NIV).

I had walked into his office prepared to give an interview.

What I got, instead, was a blessing.

_________________________
Amanda Sauder is a senior public relations/journalism major at Union College in Lincoln, Nebraska.