Ashley Lamason, from the US, was in Moldova for two months to take part in outreach with Operation Mobilisation.
It was there that she decided to try out the novel idea of combining her lifelong love of hairstyling with helping others to find God.
“When you go to the hair salon, you end up talking to the hairdresser for about 30 minutes,” she explains.
“So I wondered if I could spend that half an hour talking to people about Jesus?”
In the two months she was there, the trained beautician gave over 250 haircuts, using these as an opportunity to share her faith.
And despite some obstacles - like the language barrier - her efforts paid off.
“I hadn’t heard of anyone else doing hairdressing as missionary work, so I was unsure what to expect when I got there. It was definitely challenging and the conditions were completely different from working in a salon - my back hurt a lot because the chairs were so low!
"But nevertheless, people came and were thankful they could get a haircut. Maybe some of them wouldn’t have been able to afford one otherwise, so I was glad to serve them in some small way,” she reports.
“When the language barrier made it hard for me to witness, the other OM team members I was with shared the Gospel with those waiting in line – when you are the only hairdresser, people generally need to wait a little!
"On one occasion I gave three sisters haircuts. One of them was so fussy that her sister heard the Gospel and accepted Christ into her life before I was done!”
Lamason used her skills during evangelistic holiday camps for Moldova’s children and through OM’s Bus4life ministry which makes Christian literature available to remote East European communities.
“I’m hoping to come back to Moldova for a longer time,” she says about her future plans.
“My vision is to open a hair salon where people can have haircuts, drink tea and browse the Bible.”
