I have arranged to meet with Amina today for a video meeting. The last time I met her and her husband was on a trip to the Danish European Mission's projects in a country in Central Asia.
"The devil has moved into my house! Everyone has become Christians! Get out!"
Amina says: "Both my parents are deaf, so it has influenced my childhood. In our country, deaf people are seen as second-class citizens who don't really benefit society. When I was a child, we lived in a village with my grandmother, who was in charge of the house and the family as my parents couldn't hear. But then one day my mother came to believe in Isa (Jesus, ed.) through a friend who was also deaf, and my mother started going to church, and after a while our whole family came to church. That was back in 2002.
It was too much for my grandmother, who was a practicing Muslim. 'The devil has moved into my house! Everyone has become Christians! Get out!' she shouted angrily, and then she threw us out of the house."
"So we moved to the city and I remember my mother often reading the Bible to us. My father had stopped drinking alcohol, and we were happy about that. He helped a lot in the church and also with the renovation of the church building, but when it was finished he unfortunately fell away from God and my brothers also left the church and later became practicing Muslims. However, they also met Isa later in life, but they should probably tell that story themselves. Yes, God is great, he really is," smiles Amina.
Re-educated, like a good Muslim!
"When I was 10 years old, my father sent me to my grandmother because she said: 'Send Amina back to me so she can be re-educated to be a good Muslim!' So I lived there for four years, went to the village school and was taught Islam by my grandmother. She took me to the mosque every week."
Amina continues: "My mother and sister continued to believe in Isa. But I lived in the village and slowly became a devout Muslim. In 2010, I came back to my parents here in the city and after a while I felt Jesus calling me in my heart! 'Amina, Amina it's me Isa, whom you knew in your childhood! Will you let me into your life?'. I did, and I accepted Isa as Savior and Lord, and a few months later I was baptized," she smiles.
"All my classmates chose to write about the Prophet Mohammed, but I chose to write about Jesus"
What was it like to live as a Christian, I ask.
"Life with God was wonderful," she smiles, but then adds "but also sometimes very difficult".
"When I was 16 years old, I entered high school and I eventually realized that I was the only Christian in the school. Not long after I started, our class teacher told us to write an essay about a prophet. All my classmates chose to write about the Prophet Mohammed, but I chose to write about Isa. Many read their essays to the class, and then our teacher looked around the class and said: 'Well, haven't any of you written about another prophet? Abraham, Elijah or David?' 'Yes I have,' I said, and everyone looked at me. Then I read and told them about Isa (Jesus, ed.) and said 'he is very special to me and I like him a lot! My teacher asked me: 'Well, how do you know all that?' and I told her it was from the Bible and that I was a Christian. Almost the whole class was shocked, 'Are you a Christian?", and many people asked me about my faith afterwards. But my class teacher wasn't happy about it and tried to convince my classmates that I was wrong. She even went to a mullah, but he couldn't convince me. Later, the school contacted my parents and said: "Your daughter has betrayed her Muslim faith and has become a shame to you!".
'I know that church well! You can let her go there, so don't forbid her to go there!
- Mullah
"I think my grandmother must have been stunned by the Mullah's answer!"
"My grandmother heard that too, and she was very disappointed and angry with me.
She would contact the mullah here in town and ask him to talk to me. I said to my grandmother: 'Ask the mullah if he is convinced that he is going to heaven', because I knew that in Islam, you are not sure of your salvation, and he would say: 'Only Allah knows! She asked and he replied: 'No, I'm not! Then I said to my grandmother: 'I am convinced that I will go to heaven because of Isa'. She gave this answer to the mullah, and when he asked how I knew that, she told him which church I went to. But the mullah answered her very surprisingly: 'I know about that church! You can let her go there, so don't forbid her to go there!
"I think my grandmother must have been stunned by the Mullah's answer!", Amina laughs, "and what could she say to that answer? So she left me alone."
"My grandmother has since become much more positive towards me and we have a really good relationship. She has also become much more skeptical of Islam and the words of the mullahs, and she says she no longer trusts these scholars. But she hasn't accepted Isa yet, nor has she distanced herself from Islam. But I pray for her!".
"You have to marry a good Muslim, because no man will want you because you have become a Christian!".
"My grandmother said in the years after I became a Christian: 'You have to marry a good Muslim, because no man will want you because you became a Christian!
"But God blessed me with a good Christian husband," she says happily, "and as a married couple we have served God ever since," she smiles. "My husband actually comes from a radical Salafist Muslim background, but you'll have to get him to tell you that story sometime. He is a very passionate Christian, so that makes my heart happy," Amina smiles happily and continues: "God has worked strongly in my family, and over the years God has also worked in my relatives. Some are still very closed to me and say: 'You have betrayed the true faith!', but there are also many of my relatives who now say: 'You are probably living the right way and are right in many of the things you say, Amina', but they still haven't accepted Jesus. So I continue to pray for them," she smiles.
Can you name a situation through which God has worked strongly in your family or relatives, I ask.
"God broke down their resistance and hardness of heart through our acts of love"
Amina thinks for a moment and answers:
"During the corona pandemic, many people lost their jobs and couldn't earn money due to lockdowns, and it was hard for many, including my relatives. They sold their belongings and the gold they owned, even their wedding rings! Many of them also got into debt and some went hungry."
"But the Lord provided for our family so we could help them," she smiles. "My husband and I still had a paid job so we could help them, and it opened their eyes. 'Why are you doing this? You are Christians and we are Muslims,' they said, with wonder in their voices, 'We do it out of love for you and because we love God and God loves you,' and so they changed their attitude towards us and now they love us very much.
So God broke down their resistance and hardness of heart through our acts of love," smiles Amina.
So how are you serving God today Amina, I ask.
A servant heart of Jesus!
"As Christians, we have the servant heart of Jesus! I serve God in my everyday life by being a witness to others, by the light of Jesus shining through me because I live with Jesus. But I also tell those who don't know Isa about salvation.
I have always helped in the church, especially serving among the women, but at the moment I am also working as an interpreter translating theological material for a pastor training program for convert Christians." (The pastor training is supported by the Danish European Mission's donors, ed.).
