Ben Lee
Our Mission to Each Other
It’s all too easy, too instinctual, and sometimes strangely satisfying to create divisions that separate me from you, this from that, here from there, and us from them. Especially in recent years, one of those divisions has been the Muslim population.
About 50 years ago, Ralph S. Watts, then Vice President of the General Conference, wrote the following in Ministry Magazine:
“If we are to reach Muslims we must be divested of our settled prejudices and preconceived erroneous concepts and take a different look at Islam as a religion. We must…strive to establish more firmly the points of agreement between our religions, and thus avoid making prominent the points on which we differ.
[…] We must show them that they are to be equally benefited with us in accepting salvation in Christ” – Ministry Magazine, June 1964
Watts urges us to set aside our predispositions, and to do so for the sake of the gospel. We believe this in theory, but how often do we truly live day to day without thinking about the differences between ourselves and every person we cross paths with? And how much more would this happen in a country so far away, and especially among such a displaced and typecast people group?
When AMEN and about 70 volunteers flew to Greece this past November 2016, we went with the intention of providing dental, optical, and medical relief to Afghan, Syrian, Pakistani, Iraqi, and Iranian refugees living in refugee camps in Greece.
We didn’t go with the urgency felt in Watts’ words. We didn’t expect to find brothers and sisters among the refugees. They were “the others”, the people who needed our help. We didn’t expect to fly home with hearts deeply touched by those who we’d traveled so far to serve.
We were met with surprise.
But first, a little background on the clinic. AMEN was invited by Adventist Help, a project of ASI Europe, to hold a clinic at Oinofyta refugee camp, a small ex-factory in an industrial area of Greece, about an hour from Athens. The clinic was set up anywhere possible: registration in the warehouse, dental in the sewing room, vision in a spare room towards the back of the camp.
On day one of the clinic, every department of the clinic (vision, dental, medical, registration, crowd control, etc.) met their team of translators who were resident refugees. As the week progressed with hundreds of men, women, and children passing through their turn in the dental chair or vision exam, we found ourselves developing meaningful relationships with the translators. How did this occur? Simple: it happened with the realization that they’re just like us.
Before having to escape their homes due to one unspeakably tragic story after another, they weren’t known by the umbrella label: “the refugees”. Rather, they were referred to by titles similar to ours: doctor, professor, engineer, business owner, student, father, mother, son, and daughter. They loved their country for the most part and were happy there.
Realizing where we resemble one another in life and goals is where it all changed. That’s where the story became different and the mission to them became our mission to each other.
I decided to join the AMEN team in Greece just a few weeks prior to the trip. Promised only a couch to sleep on in the AMEN clinic team’s rented house, I took the plunge and flew the long hours to arrive in the Athens airport. At the camp, I was introduced to my translator and partner for the week: a 25-year old former graphic designer by the name of Salim*.
From the get-go, Salim was clearly the leader of the group of translators in the dental area, as he was always joking and laughing with them from across the room. The room, loud and intimidating to patients with so many drills and medical equipment, was lightened considerably due to his cheerfulness. Being the affable type myself, he and I got along immediately.
On the evening of the third clinic day, I shared the following story with a few members of the AMEN team over dinner:
That day during lunch, I had asked Salim how he had come to Greece. Salim shared his story with me, explaining how he and his family were captured twice on their way to Greece before finally arriving on a tiny boat that carried 69 people from Turkey to Greece.
I also shared with Salim how I had ended up in Greece. We were both there at that time and place for a reason, and God had planned it to happen in this way. You see, God had to change my heart in order for me to come to Greece. My old heart wouldn’t have given this kind of unpaid work a chance.
I explained to Salim about what I believe: the fall of man, Satan’s dominion over the world, why God allows Satan to exist, God’s plan for salvation—all of it. Salim listened because by that point, we had become brothers.
Salim told me that he and his family were planning to leave the camp soon to look for other opportunities in a different country, as Greece is extremely cash-poor and has minimal opportunities for its own citizens, much less the refugee population.
I asked if I could pray for Salim and his family’s safe travels. Salim said yes, and we bowed our heads and prayed right there in the lunchroom.
Later that afternoon, Salim brought his brother to me for dental treatment. His brother has Down Syndrome and recently developed cataracts for an unknown reason. He needed multiple fillings and was somewhat difficult to handle, but I did the best that I could.
When the treatment was finished, Salim and his father stopped me and told me “thank you” for helping their brother/son. Salim’s father had heard from Salim that I was a doctor who cared and tried hard to take care of my patients.
Salim’s father went on to share that he and his entire family were well educated and had well-to-do jobs, from civil engineer to biology professor. In Afghanistan, their life had seemed blissful until it was all stripped away by the wars in their country. I listened, hoping Salim would remember what I told him about God’s perfect plan–even in bringing them to the refugee camp.
After the conversation, I went back to my dental station, where Salim told me thank you, again and again. He told me that the prayer we’d shared during lunch was special to him. And then he told me something I’ll never forget: he said, “my opinion of who Christians are has now changed forever.”
On the last day of the clinic, the AMEN team filmed an interview with Salim for a future video project. One question that was asked was, “If you could tell the world one truth about the situation in Afghanistan, what would it be?”
His answer was tear-jerking. It was so simple:
“I loved my country. I loved my job. I didn’t want to leave. I didn’t want my wife to give birth to our son inside of a canvas tent in Greece with winter fast approaching. I didn’t want this, but it is what I had to do for my family. Look at me. I am only 25 years old, but I already look like an old man. I smile and make jokes because, what else can I do? I wasn’t always a refugee. I was like you.
The only thing I can ask from you is this: Remember that I am a human too, please, think kindly of us.”
The experience I had with Salim is only one of several stories of divinely touched hearts inside that refugee camp, moments we’d never even expected because of, in Watts’ words, our initial “preconceived erroneous concepts” that separated us in the beginning. And it’s due to the kindness that Salim called for—true, God-led kindness shared with our new brothers and sisters, that caused doors to swing open, changing hearts for eternity.
Yes, hearts were changed in that refugee camp! That is to be expected if it’s true that, “love to Christ will be the spring of action.” – Steps to Christ p. 45
The AMEN team and I weren’t there just to provide medical and dental care. We were there to pray with patients and share the Bible and Spirit of Prophecy in simple, practical ways.
Every morning before we opened the clinic, we all gathered in a large room in the camp to share a worship thought and prayer. A few days in, we added songs to the agenda. By Thursday and Friday, this is what we—all of us—experienced:
90 or so people (doctors, dentists, students, and refugees) who had so quickly become a family standing in a circle, singing the following words in unison:
Amazing grace, how sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost, but now am found
Was blind, but now I see.
Through many dangers, toils and snares,
I have already come;
’Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,
And grace will lead me home…
Our family has widened to include these precious people in Greece. May we unite in praying that the grace we experienced will bring us all home one day soon.
*Name has been changed to protect the privacy of the individual.
Postscript: In November of 2016, AMEN took their mobile clinic overseas to serve the refugees who fled their homes because of the wars that had forced them out. Within five days, AMEN treated refugees from three different camps: 315 dental patients and 206 vision patients, resulting in more than 1,100 procedures in all (most patients required multiple procedures, as they hadn’t received treatment in years). One of the camp directors told the team that the amount of medical care that was provided in one day was more than what the hospital could have done in over 4 months. AMEN seeks to go beyond providing temporary care, so two dental stations remained at the camp for other aid groups and local dentists to be able to provide further treatment to the residents. For more information and/or to volunteer at upcoming AMEN clinics, go to amensda.org.
1 https://www.ministrymagazine.org/archive/1964/06/the-attitude-of-seventh-day-adventists-toward-islam
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