Can never judge a book by it's cover...

We've been studying with Philley for a while. As mentioned before he works in a phone shop and we study when he has no customers. He's a half Sarawakian (east Malaysian native) half German young man with a great love for God. He treasures his New World Translation and it goes with him everywhere and he loves the fact that the JW library app means he can read the bible anytime of the day or night.

He's doing really well, after reading the magazine on smoking he's given that habit up. He really loves what he's learning...
He seemed like a fairly simple kind of guy, with only regular education. One day he opened up to us.

He told us he might have to join the army which he doesn't want to do, we think he means he's being conscripted for the first time....but no...as a dual German/Malaysia citizen he has already done two tours of duty with the German Army. Once to Israel and once to Iraq in the Bin Laden era. He's seen his best friend die in his arms, and he's been shot in the shoulder. As a sniper he's also taken numerous lives himself.
We were just stunned at what this meek and mild mannered young man was telling us.
No wonder he has trouble sleeping...

After reading Jehovah's view of war, he at once sees what he must do...for him it's time to beat his sword into a plowshare. Thankfully for him Germany allows conscientious objectors.

Today at our study he was happy to announce that he'd had an email to let him know he's excused from further army service. He was so happy...so were we...and so is our heavenly father.

This seed lay dormant for 30 years!

We're studying with a young man named Philley, in a phone shop, normally about 1pm it's very quiet, but today quite a few customers come in one in particular with a problem that's seems like it will take a while to solve.

We start chatting to a South African couple who also come into the shop...nope they don't want any magazines...so the magazines just sat on the table while we waited.

Philley finished with his customer but before the customer leaves he asks us "are you JW's?" We of course answer "yes, how could you tell" he recognized the magazines and he overheard us discussing the bible.

He's from Singapore where he's met our people before. He had a visit from an elderly bro who could barely walk 30years ago that really impressed him, he was spoken to respectfully and shown scripture to answer questions. The brother visited him 3 weeks in a row but then never heard from him again, he thought maybe he had died, but he always remembered him as it was so different compared to when a pastor visited him, he stayed 10mins and then left because he couldn't handle the Buddhist idols in his house and told him he would burn in hell because of them. He could see how hypocritical this was as there were so many idols in the church.

His question for us amongst others were "why do Christians condemn other religions to hell, why not be kind and maybe we would listen?"

We had a nice conversation again we were able to answer him from the bible which he really appreciated.

In Singapore he worked for the military and he would see our young men being put into detention for refusing military service and this furthered his admiration for the witnesses.

We left him our details and look forward to another chat soon.

Was a great reminder that we never know the impact our Christian personality has in our ministry, even 30 years later.