Spared at a wall in 1990, a Lebanese Baptist learned to serve those she feared

In October 1990, on the last day of Lebanon's civil war, armed Syrian soldiers ordered Rosette Mansour's family out of their car and against a wall, she told Baptist Press. She was pregnant and holding her nine-month-old son. A Lebanese tank fired on the soldiers, and the family was spared.

For years she struggled to forgive, praying and fasting every Friday. During the Syrian war she began serving refugees in Beirut, visiting families including a Syrian widow's household. "Go, serve, and then the healing will come along," she said.

Her son later hosted a Bible study attended by Syrian neighbours. Mansour now works with Middle East Bible Outreach in Massachusetts. "By serving my enemies, there are no more enemies," she told reporter Diana Chandler.

Her story is a reminder of the Gospel's hardest command, and of how Lebanese Christians have lived it through decades of suffering.