This Easter weekend, we urgently ask you to continue to pray for our beloved sister, Basma. If you aren’t familiar with Basma’s incredible life story and faith journey, you can read more about her and her connection to us here.
If you follow us on social media, you may already be aware of Basma’s recent affliction. In February of this year, Basma was formally diagnosed with a malignant stomach cancer after undergoing numerous tests. This was unfolding just weeks after the launch of the Facebook for Gulf Women outreach initiative, of which Basma is a vital team member. Doctors have located four aggressive tumours, and Basma has been undergoing weeks of intensive chemotherapy.
It is impossible for words to do justice to the hardship that such a diagnosis brings upon anyone – yet for Basma, who has already been through so much, we can’t help but cry out to the Lord in desperate plea.
Basma’s attitude towards her diagnosis has astonished and challenged us. Our local teams have remarked on how Basma has more peace about her situation than they do; how she is demonstrating truly remarkable trust in the Lord, and continuing to fulfil her calling to ministry to her maximum ability. A few weeks ago, whilst on her way to the hospital in a taxi for a meeting with her oncologist, Basma was praying with a lady on the phone who had connected via the new women’s Facebook page.
Basma’s prognosis is, in human terms, incredibly poor. Basma truly believes that she will be healed, and that is our ultimate prayer. In the latest update from our local teams, we now know that since beginning chemotherapy, three out of the four tumours have shrunk and become less aggressive. However, the fourth continues to resist the treatment. Basma has to make the difficult decision next to either proceed with more intensive chemotherapy or undergo an operation to remove the stomach entirely, and have a new stomach recreated from tissue elsewhere in the body. Both options are incredibly risky; neither has a high success rate.
Will you cry out to the Lord with us for Basma’s healing?
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We praise God for the faithful woman of God that she is, and for how dedicated she is to serving Him. We are reminded this Eastertime that our God is a God of miracles, of new life, and of the impossible. We ask, if it is the Lord’s will, that Basma would be truly healed in Jesus’ powerful Name.
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We pray for strength, for hope and for peace, not only for Basma, but for her family, her friends and her team.
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We also lift up the Gulf women’s Facebook ministry, which is already producing Kingdom fruit. We pray for more passionate women to come alongside Basma and the team to help continue to run this outreach, and shoulder the load. We pray for this ministry to prosper.
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Whatever may pass, we pray that You would somehow be turning the darkness of this situation into light, to the praise of Your glory.
“Look on me and answer, Lord my God.” – Psalm 13:3
