Salam Abdelmassih, freshman finance major from Egypt, falling asleep while studying the Bible.

Five times. That is how many times Salam Abdelmassih read through the Bible in nine months while attending a School of Biblical Studies in Hawaii.

The freshman finance major said the experience gave him more than a deeper knowledge of Scripture. It gave him a foundation for understanding his faith and helped shape the direction he wants his life to take.

Abdelmassih, who is Egyptian, was born in Jordan and spent the first six years of his life there while his parents did ministry work. His family then moved to Iraq for 12 years.

He has since lived in Cambodia, Thailand and Hawaii, giving him experience in six countries throughout his life.

Abdelmassih poses for a picture in Egypt.

Abdelmassih grew up as a missionary kid, which he said came with challenges, as his parents relied on support from individuals and churches, making it difficult to fund their work in the Middle East.

“You’re kind of on your own,” Abdelmassih said. “You’re trying to fundraise by meeting people and connections and whatnot.”

Abdelmassih also attended a high school where many of his classmates came from wealthy government families. While his friends could afford to go out every week, he often could not.

“So it was hard growing up,” he said. ‘Like, I compared myself to a lot of people.”

But his upbringing also gave him an early understanding of faith. His parents taught him Scripture from a young age, and he said knowing his parents shared his faith was a blessing.

His family’s ministry also exposed him to people facing circumstances far different from his own.

When they moved to Iraq around 2012, his parents worked with refugees fleeing the Islamic State war. They helped provide medicine, clothing and other necessities to refugees living in camps. His mother also taught English.

Ministry in the Middle East required his family to be careful about how they shared their faith.

“You can’t really preach openly because you end up in jail,” Abdelmassih said.

Instead, relationships became an important part of his family’s ministry.

“You invite people to your house to make dinner and you just talk,” he said.

Abdelmassih holding a 500-year-old Pentateuch scroll in Hebrew.

Abdelmassih experienced the challenges of being a Christian in the Middle East personally. He said he was the only Christian at his high school, and his classmates often asked him questions about his beliefs.

At the time, Abdelmassih said he did not always know how to answer.

“I never struggled with the truth,” he said. “I knew Jesus was the truth, and I wanted to seek him.”

He said he had not read the Bible thoroughly and wanted to learn more about his faith.

After graduating high school, Abdelmassih attended a Discipleship Training School in Cambodia, where he spent three months doing outreach in Thailand.

He later attended the School of Biblical Studies in Hawaii. The program required him to read through the Bible five times in nine months and study the historical and cultural context behind each book.

Instead of asking only what a passage meant to him personally, Abdelmassih learned to consider who originally wrote it, who received it and what was happening in the surrounding culture.

Growing up as a missionary kid, Abdelmassih said he once thought serving God meant becoming a missionary himself.

“I grew up like, ‘Oh, it’s either this or God,’” he said.

But while attending the Discipleship Training School in Cambodia, he began to feel drawn toward business.

“I felt really heavily that God is calling me into the area of business and that he wants me to support missionaries with whatever I’m doing,” Abdelmassih said.

Now, as a finance major, Abdelmassih does not have a specific career picked out, but he sees business as a possible way to support missionaries and ministry work.

After spending much of his life moving between countries and cultures, Abdelmassih said he has also learned that serving others requires understanding their culture first.

“Every place is a different culture,” he said. “Stuff you can do here can mean horrible things in different cultures.”

Now, as he begins his first year at ACU, Abdelmassih is adding another place to his journey in Abilene. He hopes to continue connecting his faith, business interests and passion for international ministry.

Although he does not know exactly where finance will take him, he said he hopes to use it to serve others.

“I always had a heart for business growing up,” Abdelmassih said.

Now he hopes that passion can become a way to serve something bigger than himself.