Tea Time

He has a big mango tree in the middle of his courtyard, and it provides the shade we need to enjoy a cup of hot tea on a hot afternoon. He is wearing his traditional Muslim garb, and he leans forward in his chair to pour the tea back and forth between the small pot and the even smaller shot glass. This allows the sugar to mix and the tea to cool a little at the same time. 

Tea time is an important symbol of friendship here in Burkina Faso. It takes place in the late afternoon, and it serves as a time to gather and talk about life while waiting for tea to brew. I’m all for the Keurig machine, but I’ve officially decided I will never own one. For I’m really learning to appreciate the time it takes for tea to properly brew in the traditional sense. There is such value in what takes place in the time it takes to make, for that’s when you sit down and look each other in the eyes and make conversation matter. 

Since this tea tradition is often shared between men, I’m honored to be considered worthy of a cup of tea with my Muslim friend. It reminds me how unique and privileged this relationship is. 

He has been a friend of Christian missionaries since they first arrive, providing tea and language studies and friendship. He has heard the gospel and he knows of Jesus, but as far as we know, he has not yet converted for fear of his devout Muslim family. He is very dear to me also and I want so badly for him to know the Lord, yet I have to be sensitive and careful. One reason is because he is a respectable older man and I am young female, and in this culture, I don’t have the right to speak boldly at all. We also find ourselves in a “shame culture”, meaning that making someone feel ashamed is a very high offense. It is better and more honorable to lie or mask the truth than to make someone feel shame. Therefore, in talking to this man about faith matters, to make him feel as though he should change or has been doing something wrong would be the worst possible thing because it would bring him shame. 

Yet I so badly want him to talk to him about Jesus. So I pray before I go.

The last time I saw him was actually at the dedication of the Dagara New Testament, so we started there. A perfect conversation starter. 

“Did you know I was not informed of the event?” he said, and I was shocked. 

“Then how did you end up there?” I asked. 

He said he woke up that Saturday morning and realized that he hadn’t seen my teammate (who is an even dearer friend) since his arrival. So he went to his house looking for him, knocking on the door in vain. “Perhaps he is up on the hill,” he said to himself, since he knows that we have a big project going on up there. It’s also where the church is. Where the dedication ceremony was taking place. The very reason why my teammate was not at his house. 

So he climbed up the hill looking for my teammate, when Lo and behold, he found himself right on time for the beginning of the dedication ceremony of the Dagara New Testament.

Talk about a God thing. 

“That was God!” I couldn’t help myself. And he agreed, for Muslims have no problem talking about God. “God wanted you there, and it was him who drew you up the mountain that day.” 

I wonder what passage he heard. Oh, I wonder if something turned in his heart as he listened to the worship and the testimonies and the reading of the Word of God. I started to tell him gently about my own life and my experience with the life-giving Word of Jesus Christ. I encouraged him to get a New Testament, knowing that if only he would hear it, that the Word in and of itself has the power to convince and save. 

As we sipped tea, I offered him the gift that I picked out for him from the States -a simple blue mug which he loved. As he turned it in his hand and admired it, he noticed where I had written the reference Philippians 1:6 on the handle. So I explained. And there, in his Muslim courtyard with his Muslim family around him, I pulled out my New Testament and read, “The God who began a good work in you will  carry it to completion the day of Christ Jesus.” As gently and lovingly and boldly as I could, I told him that I believe God began a work in him the day that he heard of Jesus, and I pray that he will bring this work to completion in him and his family. He was silent at first, but he nodded his head in acceptance, and then sincerely expressed gratitude for the gift. 

We went back to drinking tea and talking about other things, and when I departed, he shook my hand warmly and thanked me for the visit and again for the gift. As I left, I thanked God for the work of planting seeds and weaving gospel threads in ever so soft, but never unnoticed ways. 

May God give us the courage and passion, sincerity and boldness, all rooted in love, to share Jesus with the people he puts in front of us today. And may he multiply our feeble efforts to do what only he can do - open spiritually blind eyes, resurrect hearts deadened by sin, bring people to believe in Jesus as Savior and Lord, and produce the kingdom fruit of faith that is pleasing to him. 

I believe what I read in Philippians 1:6, that God is not done with this friend of mine. Nor is he finished with yours, and it is ultimately God himself that will draw them and save them.