The Woven

If you missed Part One in this series of Stories of the Redeemed, click here.

Last week you heard Cecilia Sakatira’s story of how the Master Weaver gave her a new vision and purpose out of a time of darkness and suffering. She is the founder and director of Creative Hands, a ministry that empowers women on the refugee highway in Greece to find gainful employment and learn about the Messiah. This week, read with me as she shares the story of one woman at Creative Hands whose unraveled life is being woven into something new and wonderful.

 

 

 

For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.

Psalm 139:13-16

By Cecilia Sakatira with Audrey Frank

Aisha is a refugee from Syria. War and displacement brought her to my small village in Greece.

Her name, Aisha, comes from the root word in Arabic for life. Aisha means “alive” or “happily living.” Staying alive has not always been easy for Aisha, and the life she has managed to live has rarely been happy. But there is One who formed her inward parts, One who knitted her together in her mother’s womb, a Master Weaver who wove her beautifully and with purpose. He is gathering the threads of her brokenness and creating something stronger, more powerful than even she fully realizes.

Aisha is 32 years old and is the mother of seven. Women from her culture marry young and start having children right away. Her oldest is 20, so she must have married at 12 years of age. Her youngest is 3. Five children were born while she still lived in Syria. In those early years, her life was relatively normal as she cared for her family in a small village.

Everything changed when her husband got on the wrong side of the law with Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s government. They arrested her husband and put him in prison where he later died. In the meantime, the war raged on and Aisha fled to Turkey with her mother and five children. Aisha reports that in Turkey, men harassed her and threatened to abuse her and her children. She lived in terror. 

One day, a Syrian man reached out to her. He already had one wife but asked Aisha to marry him and become his second wife, which is permissible in Islam. He promised to take care of her and her five children. She married him, and a short time later they left for Greece, arriving at the refugee camp in 2018. Her two youngest children were born in the camp.

Initially when I met her, I assumed she was lazy and did not want to learn. Sometimes extreme need and trauma look like that. 

The traumatized are often so emotionally, mentally, physically, and spiritually devastated that they appear completely altered from the person they once were. We need to ask God to show us the person He sees. The person who was woven… Share on X

God truly opened my eyes to see Aisha. He filled me with compassion and love for her and gave me a desire to see her and her children’s lives transformed.

With gentle persuasion and practical assistance, Aisha has found the courage and motivation to come to the Creative Hands center to learn to weave. This month, March, I will hire her as a Creative Hands employee. 

I am so grateful God opened my eyes to see a woman who is hurting and is looking for someone to be patient and gracious with her. I love her and her children.

As it turns out, Aisha and I are both being woven into something more than we were alone.

The journey continues, and I know more women will come through our doors. We will gladly welcome them.