East, West and the miracles in between
OKLAHOMA CITY — When Sawmi Sektak walks down the hall, you know it.
She moves with determined purpose, the chunky heels on her shoes making a distinct “clomp, clomp, clomp” as she rushes to grab a stack of Christian Chronicles to mail to a church or a batch of thank-you letters to send to our generous donors.
For that reason, it struck me as a bit odd, watching her walk in slow, quiet steps down the aisle of the Memorial Road Church of Christ. Clad in a flowing, white gown, she lightly held the arm of her escort, Bill Minsker.
“Who gives this woman to be married?” asked the preacher, Clay Hart.
Dressed in traditional Western wedding attire, Sawmi gets a kiss from her new husband, Ashok.
Bill replied, “Her mother and I — and all of her other mothers and fathers.”
A heavenly host of moms and dads, all under the guidance of our heavenly Father, played a role in Sawmi’s long, unlikely journey from India’s North Eastern Region to The Christian Chronicle, where she serves as special projects manager.
Losing her parents, leaving her village
For Sawmi, 26, even the simple question of when she was born is complicated. April 4 is the day we celebrate in the office, but March 4, 2000 (nearly two full years after her birth), is what some documents say. She’s from the Paite tribe, an Indigenous people who inhabit the hill country of India’s Manipur state, near the foothills of the Himalayas. Her father was one of 12 siblings, and her great uncle was the head of her village, inhabited by more than 200 of her relatives.
Her mother, a businesswoman, died after contracting fever when Sawmi was very young. In the six months that followed, her father languished from loneliness and illness. Sawmi vaguely remembers standing at his deathbed as her relatives urged her to tell him goodbye. She didn’t understand what was happening, so she giggled and ran off.
An older cousin had cared for Sawmi during her father’s illness, so Sawmi’s great uncle asked the cousin and her husband to become Sawmi’s guardians. But the ethnically charged violence that has beset Manipur for decades soon reached their village.
As tribes clashed, Sawmi fled with her cousin and hid in the jungle for at least a week. Eventually, some of the men returned to the village, but they sent the women and children to a refugee camp near Manipur’s capital, Imphal. There, the broken family struggled to survive.
Children stand outside Angels’ Place in India, which houses about 170 children at a time.
About the same time, Jan Swensen made his first visit to India. The Pittsburgh attorney and member of the Holiday Park Church of Christ in Plum, Pa., saw children sleeping in makeshift shelters, near starvation, and wanted to help.
Partnering with Indian Christians including R. Sanga, founder of the Imphal School of Preaching, Swensen launched James Connection, a nonprofit. In 2004, the ministry began construction of Angels’ Place, an orphanage in Churachandpur, 30 miles south of Imphal.
In the past two decades, Angels’ Place has housed and served nearly 1,000 children — including a bright young woman named Sawmi.
She was the 66th child admitted to Angels’ Place, arriving in February 2006, Swensen said. “She applied for admission three times in the year prior,” he added, “before we had space for her.”
‘She was in charge’
Sawmi lived at Angels’ Place for 12 years. Her first sponsors — Dennis and Janna Menear, Steve and Gena Nulter and Alan and Toni Newberry — were known as the “lunch bunch” from the 36th Street Church of Christ in Vienna, W.Va.
Sawmi excelled in school — even skipping ahead a couple of grades — and prepared to study social work at a university in Mumbai.
“But God had other plans,” she said.
Sawmi stands with Bill Minsker, left, and Jan Swensen.
Sanga, impressed with Sawmi’s organizational skills, hoped she would work at Angels’ Place. As a teenager, she helped out with the younger kids and filled in when the staffer in charge of the guest quarters got sick. That’s how she met Bill Minsker, a car dealership owner and supporter of James Connection, when he visited India.
From the moment he met Sawmi, “she was in charge,” Bill said with a chuckle as he spoke at the wedding banquet in our fellowship hall. From organizing the guest house to organizing her nuptials, “she’s pretty good at telling us what to do.”
When Bill asked Sawmi if she’d consider coming to the U.S., “I thought he was kidding,” she recalled. It was an amazing opportunity, but not an easy choice, not something she’d planned. Sawmi prayed fervently and talked to her house parents. She made up her mind to go. As Bill was walking to his car to head to the airport, Sanga’s wife asked Sawmi if she had told him. She hadn’t.
“So I found myself running to him,” she said. “I gave him a big hug and said, ‘I’m coming. OK?’”
Bill and his wife, Mary Kay, became another set of parents for Sawmi. The Minskers married after their first spouses died, and both have children from their first marriages. “Sawmi’s the only child we’ve had together,” Bill said, “and she has been such a joy in our lives.”
From West Virginia to Oklahoma
Sawmi studied at Ohio Valley University in Vienna, W.Va. She was one of the final students to graduate before the university closed in 2021. She enrolled at Oklahoma Christian University, which owns the Chronicle, and earned a Master of Business Administration degree.
Jeff Dimick, an instructor at OC, recommended her for a position with the Chronicle. During her interview, I learned about her time at Angels’ Place — a ministry I’ve covered for nearly two decades. I was thrilled to add a product of that ministry to our Chronicle family.
Sawmi Sektak (in glasses) poses with fellow students at Angels’ Place.
Sawmi is an active part of our international ministry at the Memorial Road church. She was one of many students to spend time at “the Harts’ Happy Haven,” as Clay Hart, our international minister, calls his home. Sawmi lived there for a time with Clay and his wife, Cherry — yet more adoptive parents.
Sawmi seems a bit like a parent herself these days. She’s always willing to help international students as they adjust to life in the U.S. I remember walking by her office one day as a young Indian student sat on her couch, beaming. He had just gotten his U.S. driver’s license in the mail and had to show her.
A bittersweet celebration
She met her future husband, Ashok, at an event for international students. Ashok, who’s also from India, works for an agency that helps international students, much in the same way Sawmi does. The agency catered the event and a mutual friend — plus Ashok and his brothers — insisted that Sawmi stay after and eat with them.
A few months later, Ashok, who’s a bit shy, asked Sawmi if she could help him — like she’d helped so many others — with a problem. There was a girl he liked, but he didn’t know how to tell her.
Dressed in traditional Indian attire, Sawmi and Ashok get cheers and applause after their Oklahoma wedding.
Sawmi agreed to help, and then learned that she was the girl.
Their wedding was a true mix of East and West, complete with bridesmaids, groomsmen, a couple of wardrobe changes and samosas. Bill and Mary Kay participated in a gift-giving ceremony with Ashok’s parents, who flew in from India.
Clay Hart officiated the ceremony. Sadly, we lost Cherry Hart to cancer last May. They were married for 43 years. Together, they wrote a song about marriage that they never got to sing. Clay read the lyrics. Through tears, I tried to jot them down:
Together, we face a brand new day.
Hand in hand we view the way before us.
We gaze into each other’s eyes,
and we are made to realize just who painted our new rainbow for us.
“My prayer is for the two of you to be soulmates and best friends for a lifetime,” Clay told the newlyweds. “Be willing to serve each other.”
“My prayer is for the two of you to be soulmates and best friends for a lifetime. Be willing to serve each other.”
Two of Sawmi’s first sponsors, the Menears and the Nulters, made it to Oklahoma for the wedding. So did Jan Swensen and his wife, Leslie.
Jan talked about how hard it is to be a Christian in India. He asked for prayers in the country’s northeast, which has endured new waves of violence in the past year. The Imphal School of Preaching was burned to the ground.
He’s seen sorrow aplenty, Jan said, “but I’ve also seen many miracles.”
Sawmi is one of them.
“I’m so proud of this girl,” he said, “who’s now a beautiful woman.”
Sawmi and Ashok
ERIK TRYGGESTAD is President and CEO of The Christian Chronicle. Contact [email protected]. Follow him on X @eriktryggestad.
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