A significant contact

“I planted, Apollo watered, but God was causing the growth.”
1 Corinthians 3:6 (NASB)

Research shows that it takes seven to 12 significant contacts for anyone, especially a Muslim, to become a Christian. I was blessed to be one in the life of a Middle Eastern lady whom I call Star. 

Others working in my country of service had earlier met and baptized Star. She had been a successful hairdresser in her homeland. Her husband, a university professor, asked to store some boxes of test papers in her salon. When the police arrived for those boxes, she discovered they really contained antigovernment documents. Her husband fled. She was arrested, imprisoned, beaten and raped before the police declared her innocent. She and her 6-month-old daughter escaped by donkey over the mountains. They sought official refugee status in the country where we met.

Star would often come to my home for a Bible study, a meal or just to get away from the refugee center. Every time she heard domestic violence in the center, she relived the horrors of those beatings. She and her daughter frequently ended up staying two or three nights with me. She began to mature in her faith as she read her Bible, prayed, led a friend to Christ and sent Bibles to her home country. I am grateful that I could be one of the significant contacts in Star’s life. I am even more grateful that she has become one of the seven to 12 Christian contacts in the lives of others.

Are you a “significant contact” in the life of another?

— Margaret, Western Europe

Thank You, Lord Jesus, for saving Star's life, in so many ways. Thank You that You ask us to simply sow or water … and that You are the One who gives the increase. Make me sensitive to the ways that I can be a “significant contact” in the lives of others. Amen.

Text exerpt from Voices of the Faithful. Order your own copy from the
International Mission Board Resource Center