Turkish Tea

     So a couple days ago a few of us AFCOE-Europe students (Natalie, Anna, & Christoph) went to visit a man, Herr (Mr.) Omek, who is Turkish. When we got to this man's house he invited us in and had us sit down to talk. The others speak German fluently and so they were able to freely converse with the man, and for a bit I had no idea what they were talking about. But thankfully Christoph started to whisper translate to me what the man was saying.
     
      To start Herr Omek was talking about his family, and about how his son had stolen money from him, and how he had been cheated many times, and lied to, ect.. And basically he had a distrust in people, and thought that all they wanted was to get money from him. Then he told us about how he had some health issues which caused him not to be able to eat fruit, sugar, and some vegetables, and basically the only thing he ate, even from a young age, was meat. But then he continued to tell of his misfortunes, and how he had unfair bosses, and had to quit a few jobs. Then he told us that he was a butcher, and he explained how he would cut the meat, and prepare it, and season it. (This was all being translated to me by Christoph and Natalie, although I could pick out a few words and hand motions)

      It was quite funny whenever he started talking about meat to a bunch of Adventists, and just going into detail about it all. And there was even one point where he said that he just loves meat, and has it for breakfast, and lunch, and dinner, and sometimes even late at night!

      During this time he brought us out some cold bottled water and continued talking as if he hadn't talked to someone in years. Then he brought us out some Turkish tea. It was black tea (which yes, had caffeine) and it tasted horrible.

Then somehow the conversation turned to more of a religious topic (this is actually what we were praying for) and the Herr Omek started talking about his religion (Islam) and how he prays, and how the mosque wanted him to pay too much money. Then He starts telling the story of how Abraham was about to sacrifice Issac on Mt. Moriah. And he told this story with such emotion that he almost started crying at the part when Abraham was about to bring the knife down on Issac.

    Right after this story we told Herr Omek that we needed to get going because we had already spent quite some time there. And Christoph felt really impressed to ask Herr Omek if we could bring a Bible next time and read about the stories of Abraham. Amazingly (to me of such little faith) he said that he would like to hear some of these stories from the Bible.

     But meeting with this man really again reminded me that people just want someone to listen to them, to be a friend to them, to spend time with them. Please pray for Herr Omek that God will soften his heart with the reading of the Bible, and with our friendship with him.