Miracle at the Clubhouse

At first, Rachel* didn’t bother to accompany her husband, Jonah, when he went to the clubhouse. As Christar workers in the United Kingdom, they both were looking for opportunities to befriend people from the Muslim country where the two of them previously served. But this community center was typically a male-dominated space, so Jonah went alone.

He wasn’t expecting to meet a Muslim woman in her 70s. But there was Meryem, a widow willing to talk and interested in meeting his wife. Jonah promised her he’d bring Rachel the next time he visited.

Rachel didn’t expect to have a three-hour conversation. The following week, as promised, Jonah and Rachel went to the clubhouse together. There, Rachel heard Meryem’s story of mistreatment and pain. “As a young bride of 16, Meryem was promised the world by her husband as she moved from her family in the Middle East to the U.K., and instead lived a life filled with abuse and heartbreak in a foreign country where she still does not understand the language,” Rachel shares.

Meryem’s account was sadly familiar. Rachel had often heard stories like hers from women during her time in the Middle East. And those years of service in another place, a continent away, had prepared her to minister with compassion and share the gospel as good news for a woman who’d experienced great brokenness and loss.

But God hadn’t only equipped Rachel to share. He’d prepared Meryem to hear. As Rachel excitedly recalls, “After understanding God's view of sin, how He Himself has become the propitiation for our sin in order to reconcile us to God, she joyfully renounced Islam and embraced Jesus Christ as her Savior and Lord.”

Jonah and Rachel definitely didn’t expect that. They knew from their years of ministry in Muslim communities that this work is typically a long process. Those who come to Christ from Islamic backgrounds often hear the gospel many times before they believe and must wrestle with the cost of following Jesus before professing their faith in Him. “God is so good and kind to have allowed us to witness this miracle,” Rachel says.

That miracle was an answer to prayer.

“In the same manner which Moses beseeched the Lord in Psalm 90, we too seek Him,” Jonah shares. He cites verses 16-17:

“Let your work be shown to your servants,
    and your glorious power to their children.
Let the favor of the Lord our God be upon us,
    and establish the work of our hands upon us;
    yes, establish the work of our hands!” (Psalm 90:16-17 ESV)

The Lord established the work of their hands in the Middle East, and He continues to do so as they minister in the U.K., as Rachel continues to meet with Meryem and disciple her in her newfound faith. Meryem has excitedly been reading the Bible Rachel gave her and is asking good questions as she studies it.

“Please pray that she would press on and grow deep roots,” Jonah asks. He adds, “May the Lord's glory be seen and known throughout this borough and may we be used in His mighty hand as instruments to draw souls to Himself.”