Unexpected Encounters
It was a frustrating day. I tried to make plans to get together with different local friends, but no one was available. The apartment was too hot to be comfortable, so I decided to take my 18 month old daughter to the park thinking that at least she could be happy! While my daughter played, I sat down on a bench and turned to a woman near me who was holding a boy about my daughter’s age. “How old is he?” I asked just like I ask most moms I meet. This time this simple question was different. Little did I know that before I even opened my mouth, *Naomi somehow knew that we would become friends. By the time we left the park, we had exchanged phone numbers. In our brief encounter she realized that my daughter obeys in a way that her son doesn’t. I had the opportunity to tell her that I follow Jesus. I explained that the Bible teaches children to obey their parents and that as I teach my daughter to obey me I am teaching her to obey God. I was amazed how much I was able to share and that she listened with interest. A week later my husband, daughter and I were invited over for her birthday celebration with several of her close friends. We were honored to be included and look forward to see what God will do in this relationship.
(A few days ago…)
I was visiting Naomi again for tea. This time her mom was there too. Previously Naomi told me that her mom had been friends with some foreign Christian women years ago. I think she said that her mom had read some of the Bible with them. So this week the mom told me more about her foreign friends. They had explained a lot to her about the Bible and Christianity. To round out the discussion she had tried to explain about Islam, but she told me that she didn’t know a lot about it to tell them. The one thing she did know for certain was that if someone cut her veins, she would bleed with Muslim blood, and if someone cut the veins of her foreign friends, they would bleed with Christian blood. I haven’t heard it explained to me so clearly before. The people with whom we work hold a deeply profound belief that religion has to do with nationality and geography. Praise God that He has the power to overcome ethnic “barriers.” Praise God that He is not just the God of Americans!
