One of our families serving in Central Asia is friends with a local woman, Dolma, who has an incredible testimony of God’s sovereignty in her life. We wanted to share her story with you in this article, originally written by our workers.

Twenty years ago, in a little village far away from any big town, where the high snowy mountains are worshiped as deities, and the deep river valleys have little oases of terraced fields for growing potatoes and barley; a young girl named Dolma, with one leg and rough-cut crutches hobbles after the goats and yaks she is shepherding. She has no idea that within a few years her rough life as a cripple will be radically transformed.

When she was three, Dolma’s mother set her down to play out on the mountainside where they were watching the animals. A big rock came loose from above, rolled down the mountain, and crushed her leg. Not having many medical options, the most obvious choice was to amputate. Since she would be permanently crippled, her parents thought it would be best for her to become a Tibetan nun, where at least she would be provided for. She learned to spin and weave from her mother who tried to teach her any skill that could be of use to her.

Dolma had never seen a car or a foreigner; and of the latter she surely didn’t want to, for the common belief in her village at the time was that foreigners would steal people, chop them up, and boil them into lard, and she was the perfect candidate—crippled, single, and a little plump.

One day, as she was watching her yaks, a dusty, wild looking white man with a long straggly beard walked into her village looking for a drink of water and a place to spend the night. Everyone else who was able quickly ran into their rammed earth houses, locked the doors, and hid from the dusty, malicious, lard-seeker. But the slow, one-legged, nun, whom on that fate-filled day which everyone thought would be her last, could not escape.

She gave him a drink and he ended up staying the night on her flat roof. She, on the bottom floor of her house, was as far from him as possible, and didn’t sleep a wink. He somehow communicated with her, that he wanted to help her walk again, but she would have to go with him to the big city. The next day, defying all human reason and understanding, she went. As she left the village, many thought she was heading toward her dreadful fate as a bucket of lard and offered her little gifts of money as they “delivered her to death.”

Telling the story now, Dolma still has no reasonable explanation for why she went with that man to the big city. “It was God,” she said, “He made me go.” During her years away, she was fitted with a prosthetic, learned to walk again, and found a community of people who could love and forgive unconditionally. These people were very attractive to Dolma, and after spending four years comparing this faith to the Tibetan Buddhism she grew up knowing, she at last found forgiveness in Jesus Christ.

Now a mature sister, who has experienced much ostracism from her family and village, she sits in our living room and shares her story with joy. “Look at my leg,” she says as she pulls off the prosthesis, “Many people see this as a bad thing. But if I had two good legs, I would never have met Jesus.”

This former Buddhist nun has taught our family so much. Dolma is a true friend who has spent many days with us teaching us language and culture of this region, helping us with our spinning and weaving business, and bringing us much joy as we laugh together, talk to the Father together, and fellowship together in the unity of our faith.

*Names and places have been changed for security purposes.