"M"--From Refugee to Missionary

Called and Sent out by the Lord of the Harvest

"M" is a remarkable young man who until several years ago owned a restaurant and enjoyed a prosperous life in Iran. By 2003 he had become so discouraged by the political and economic situation in his homeland that he and his wife of eleven months set out on the “refugee highway” in search of freedom and a better life.

"M" and his bride traveled together to Turkey but were unable to find a smuggler who could take them any further. The young disillusioned Muslim found it necessary to send his wife back to Iran to live with her family until he could find a way to emigrate to Canada. They agreed that as soon as he was settled and able to buy an airplane ticket for his wife, she would join him in the west.

"M" eventually crossed the mountainous border between Turkey and Greece on foot during the night. After his arrival in Athens, he intended to hire a smuggler to sneak him into Norway and then on to the “promised land” of Canada. But God had other plans for his life. . . .

After spending three months in a refugee camp, "M" found his way to the Athens Refugee Center where he received a Bible and heard the gospel for the first time in his life.  He began coming to the Persian Christian Fellowship where he heard messages about the Son of God who died for his sins, and he experienced the love of Christ in the lives of believers he met there. After several months of seeking and examining the Good News that he had been taught all his life to reject, "M" received Jesus Christ as his Savior.

            Over the months, this young believer remained amazingly cheerful and solid in his faith in spite of a series of agonizing trials. In the early part of 2004, he underwent surgery to remove a cyst from his tailbone. During the ensuing months, he suffered a number of complications and infections. A year after the surgery, the cyst seems to be growing back, and was very painful for him to sit in class or on the bus. Partway through the time-consuming and patience-demanding process of applying for a visa to emigrate to Canada, "M" ’s wife informed him that she had decided to divorce him and never wanted to see him again because he had become a Christian!

            In spite of these and other heartbreaking setbacks, "M" completed the six-month Athens Intensive Ministry School and graduated from the Greek Bible Institute in June, 2006. He served as the founding pastor of the Persian Christian Community, where more than 50 former Muslims came to faith in Jesus Christ in the first year.  "M" has shared that even after losing everything that he had valued in his life in Iran, he is convinced that when he came to know Jesus Christ he gained something infinitely greater than marriage, home, business and family.

           Both staff from International Teams and the BEE International staff in Greece had the incredible joy of teaching the Scriptures and sharing their lives with "M", who has truly “counted the cost of discipleship” and who is currently raising support (along with his new Canadian wife--a pastor's kid) to leave Canada and minister to refugees in a Muslim land.