Esma and Pelin

Thousands of miles away from the classrooms and boardrooms where the suit-and-tie-clad patriarchs of the church teach and preach and plan for missions, I called on a friend one day at her home. “Aloooh!” I called, ringing the doorbell and listening to the jingle playing on the other side. A young woman opened the door with a huge smile on her face, and two little girls came running.

“How are you, Esma?” I asked as we gave each other the traditional cheek-to-cheek kiss and began discussing each other’s families and lives. Esma showed me into the living room while her mother made tea and her little sisters pulled toys out to share with my boys.

Esma had been our real estate agent’s assistant when we bought our house, and her family had welcomed us as friends and neighbors. One of the first things I noticed about Esma was that she kept written prayers posted over her desk at work, and that she had shown me her personal copy of the Qur’an. Once she tried to explain to me that Jesus had never died on the cross but only appeared to, a common Muslim belief. I had only nodded and said, “So they say,” because my language was limited. Many times in our friendship the conversation edged toward faith, but Esma only pursed her lips with a little knowing smile and shook her head. About a year after we met, she began to wear a headscarf and a long dark dress.

“It’s so hot,” she would say to me on a hot summer day, “but not as hot as hell!” She explained to me that we should all go to hell for a period of time to pay for our sins. She followed that up with her belief that the more merit she could earn through proper dress, fasting, and prayer, the more time she could shave off her sentence in hell. Again my mind filled with things I would like to tell her, but I halted, unsure of how to best communicate these truths, and knowing she would only brush me off.

One day Esma and another friend asked me if I would join them for ezan, a Qur’anic prayer. Many Muslims believe that the Qur’an is so powerful that if an unbeliever once hears it recited, they will break down in tears and pronounce the shahada, accepting Allah and Muhammad and becoming a Muslim. We covered our heads, and two of the women raised their hands while a third stutteringly read the unfamiliar Arabic words in a singsong voice.

Later I looked up this surah, only to be completely appalled by such verses as “Here is the hell that I warned you of, burn in it for your unbelief,” and “We could drown them, and no one would respond to their cries” (Surah Yaseen Ayat 36:43, 63-65). But as the prayer ended that day, I was quiet, weighed down heavily by the longing to share light and by the depths of what seemed like impenetrable darkness. I am sure Esma was disappointed that I did not fall to my knees and join her faith.

Overwhelmed

I often begged God to give me wisdom and boldness to speak up for Him more freely. Rarely did I find opportunities to share simple truth; more often I felt muted and overwhelmed. I grieved. Was I ashamed of the gospel of Christ? Was I too ignorant? Was the Holy Spirit not with me? Sometimes I wonder what is taught about missions in our institutions that relates to these moments of deep prayer and silence in the presence of such a dark misrepresentation of God’s goodness.

I often begged God to give me wisdom and boldness to speak up for Him more freely. Rarely did I find opportunities to share simple truth; more often I felt muted and overwhelmed.

Do students labor through a foreign language, eat and drink with unbelievers, make minor lifestyle compromises to adapt culturally, and experience being minorities in major non-Christian environments? Do they grapple with seemingly insurmountable obstacles to the gospel, with prejudice, and through encounters during which it seems that the enemy wins? Do they discuss the value of seed sowing without obvious signs of conversion, much less baptismal numbers? Do they know that the word for “grace” in Islamic literature accompanies a description of a god that is anything but gracious? What are they studying, really? Do their lessons or dissertations have wisdom that would give me just the words to speak with Esma and her family?

My burden became so great that I had to level with God. “If You don’t open my mouth, I’m not going to agonize over it anymore. It’s too much for me!” Perhaps there was a good reason God held my tongue. Perhaps this time with friends, drinking tea and talking about mundane things that often felt fruitless, was exactly what He wanted me to do, and I just needed to do it patiently and faithfully. As much as I wanted to see conversions, baptisms, and great gospel movements, perhaps this was not His timing.

The Right Time

As we visited that day, Esma’s sister Pelin came in and greeted me excitedly. She was extra talkative, and as she sat close beside me, I could smell a strange odor on her breath. Pelin was an unapologetic partier, slowed down only by having a baby and a husband who had moved her away from the city where most of her friends lived. She had once or twice asked me a faith-related question, but she seemed more amused than curious. After reflecting on her questions for some time, I had written her a letter and drawn her a picture illustrating the Good Shepherd.

“I have your letter up in my living room,” she told me as we sat with her family, “My in-laws don’t like it. They say it’s not true. But I respect all the prophets!”

Esma was unamused by her sister Pelin’s statement of belief, and they argued while I sat quietly between them. After a while I was drawn into the conversation, and the walls were broken down. I felt free to speak about Jesus and challenge my friend’s views. I was sure my words were clumsy, spoken in a second language and based only on my personal experience, without any religious degrees. But I also knew that God had opened the doors and that the Holy Spirit, who advocates for me with unutterable groans, could turn my awkward speech into just what my friends needed to hear. Pelin left early in the conversation, but Esma and I continued talking.

“I believe that one day Jesus is going to appear to you and invite you to follow Him,” I told her, knowing that this is often part of the process for Muslims who turn to Christ. Although I had walked with God personally, studied His Word, undergone mission training, crossed the sea, learned a foreign language and its customs, and built these trusting relationships, I knew that I was still powerless to break through the barriers without divine intervention. I appealed to her to accept His invitation. Only in time and with the Spirit’s gentle nurturing can those fallen seeds blossom, and that invitation be understood and desired.