NCM Magazine/Summer 2017

SEEKING REFUGE STORIES FROM REFUGEES CAUGHT IN CRISIS AND HOW THE CHURCH IS SERVING

SUMMER 2017

E N I Z A G A M

NCM

COMPASSION...

LIVE IT

SOMETIMES, LIVING COMPASSION IS AS SIMPLE AS TELLING A CHILD SHE IS VALUED. Sponsor a child today. ncm.org/sponsor

To sponsor a child, go online to ncm.org/sponsor or simply cut off and mail this form using the prepaid envelope. l I would like to sponsor a child for $30 a month. I would like to sponsor: l Greatest Need I would like to sponsor a child from:

l Greatest Need l Eastern Europe

l Africa l Asia l Latin America

l Boy

l Asia-Pacific l Middle East

l Girl

l Caribbean

Name / Group____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Contact Person (if different)_______________________________________________________________________________________________ Address / City / State / ZIP_______________________________________________________________________________________________ Phone____________________________________________ Email__________________________________________________________________ Church to receive 10% giving credit_______________________________________________________________________________________ You can mail this form to: Nazarene Compassionate Ministries, Child Sponsorship

17001 Prairie Star Parkway, Lenexa, Kansas 66220 No payment is due now. You will receive information by mail about your sponsored child and payment options.

Contents DEPARTMENTS 4 Connection Points 39 Called to Compassion 40 Love in Action 42 Snapshot

NCM Magazine Summer Issue, 2017 NCM Magazine aims to tell the stories of the church living out Christ’s compassion.

Our hope is that all of us would hear the call to compassion as a lifestyle.

Magazine Design: Paul Kinsman Cover Photo: Jon Morton

NCM MAGAZINE IS A MINISTRY OF N A Z A R E N E C O M PA S S I O N AT E M I N I S T R I E S

FEATURES

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Why Compassion?

How do compassion and holiness go hand in hand—and why?

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Seeking Refuge As refugees journey toward safety, the church is reaching out with hope

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Searching for Home Families displaced by violence are making a new home in Odessa, Ukraine.

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Growing Hope in Kosova Greenhouses are helping feed the present and grow a future.

Following the example of Jesus, NCM partners with local Nazarene congregations around the world to clothe, shelter, feed, heal, educate, and live in solidarity with those who suffer under oppression, injustice, violence, poverty, hunger, and disease. NCM exists in and through the Church of the Nazarene to proclaim the gospel to all people in word and deed. n

Nazarene Compassionate Ministries 17001 Prairie Star Pkwy, Lenexa, KS 66220 (800) 310-6362, info@ncm.org n

To sign up for a free subscription, please visit ncm.org/magazine or call (800) 310-6362.

For subscription changes, email info@ncm.org or write to NCM Magazine, 17001 Prairie Star Pkwy, Lenexa, KS 66220.

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The World in Your Kitchen Sponsored children from Syria, Armenia, and Sri Lanka share favorite recipes.

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Breaking Free from Addiction Transformation is the key to freedom at rehabilitation centers in Ukraine.

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Rich in Relationships In a slum in the Philippines, one church sees possibility, not poverty.

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Questions? Comments? Email info@ncm.org. n

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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Connection Points.

OPENING NOTES

“... for I was hungry

The Roots of Migration

and you gave

by Nell Becker Sweeden

me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you

Nell Becker Sweeden, PhD, is director of Nazarene Compassionate Ministries and an ordained elder in the Church of the Nazarene. Prior to her role with NCM, she was assistant professor of theology and Richard B. Parker cochair of Wesleyan theology at George Fox Evangelical Seminary. She is the author of the book Church on the Way: Hospitality and Migration.

welcomed me.”

—Matthew 25:35

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seeking refuge—those who share stories similar to the ones featured in this issue.

May we, the church, pray that those on the move experience God’s presence and protection, and may we also pray for the Christians who will rise up to meet them along the way. May the faith of the church be strong enough to embrace the “stranger” in our midst and share the good news of Jesus.

Will you join me in a prayer that fierce spirituality and tenacious faith would grow and thrive in those who are fleeing for their lives, as well as in us? May we, too, be woven into the branches of God’s glorious tree of faithfulness.

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he roots of migration in the Bible run deep. If we were to think about the story of God as the crafting and weaving of God’s family tree, it is easy to see how a large and glorious tree rises up out of these roots, displaying the faithfulness of God and of those He has called out.

In this image, the story of Abraham is the strong shoot, growing out of the soil that becomes the faithful response of the people of God. In Genesis 12:1, the Lord said to Abram, “Go. Leave your country, your people, and your house. Go to the land I will show you.” He and Sarah were called to leave their safety and security, and they were called to leave their livelihood and systems of support.

The call to “go” was not simply to move to a new town or settle with a new people. It was to go out into the wilderness. Their journey would be dangerous and risky.

Time and time again, the faithfulness of God’s people begins in their following God into unknown territories, circumstances, and ways of life. Such a journey requires faith. Hebrews 11:1 defines faith as requiring trust in what we do not know or see.

Yet such faith is not simply belief. Faith is a conviction that calls us to action. More specifically, to have faith means to follow God, often into the unknown.

Today, the epitome of the “wilderness” and “unknown” can be found in the dangerous circumstances faced by individuals and families who search for a new home because unimaginable danger and fear have forced them to flee their homes, livelihoods, and support systems.

In reference to the harsh circumstances that many migrants face today, theologian Graham Ward parallels how the faith of Abraham and the faith of refugees require a “fierce spirituality.” Their journey requires a deep hope and faith—a deep perseverance to overcome unimaginable obstacles to finding safety. At each turn of their journey this spirituality is tested. Such a journey requires a tenacious faith—indeed, a fierce spirituality.

It is my prayer that faith and hope surround those who are on the move and

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CHILD SPONSORSHIP SPOTLIGHT

A Chance to Meet THE KENDALLS, (COLORADO, USA)

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Doug, Cordelia, and Liz, met for the first time in Nicaragua last summer. Once Liz graduates, they hope to sponsor her younger sister.

Photos courtesy of Doug Kendall

or nearly 40 years, Doug Kendall has been involved with sponsoring children. It started back in the 1970s, when he was in the U.S. Air Force.

“I was a young airman making little money, but I really liked the idea of interacting with people from other countries—and I love kids,” Doug says. “I just had a heart for children, so I started sponsoring back then and have been sponsoring ever since.”

He also met his wife, Cordelia, while he was in the Air Force. After they married, the couple wanted to continue sponsoring children together.

The Kendalls believe strongly in maintaining relationships with the children they sponsor, and they write letters often. They had been writing to Liz*, a girl they sponsor in Nicaragua through Nazarene Compassionate Ministries (NCM). After a few letters, they decided they wanted to meet her in person. They began to wonder if it would be possible.

Around the same time, they joined a Nazarene missions team from Denver going to Nicaragua. It would be Doug’s third trip to Nicaragua, and this time Cordelia would join him. The team would be going near the city where Liz lives. Suddenly, meeting their sponsored child began to seem possibile.

Doug and Cordelia worked with NCM’s child sponsorship team to make arrangements to visit Liz. But then, a few weeks before they were scheduled to leave, the mission trip was postponed.

The Kendalls knew they still wanted to meet Liz, though. They decided to go to Nicaragua anyway.

“My wife loves everything planned out, but this was very little planning,” Doug says. “We planned to see [Liz] and a volcano trip, but I’m telling you: the Lord planned it and worked everything out.”

When the Kendalls were finally in Nicaragua, Liz was able to introduce them to her family and show them around her church and the child development center she is able to attend through her sponsorship. They were also able to join Liz’s family at their home, where they learned that she

had decorated her room with the letters and photos they sent.

“When the Holy Spirit is there, it’s like you’re brothers and sisters in Christ,” Doug says.

Doug and Cordelia learned that Liz’s family had access to water only an hour each day. While a well with a hand pump was available at their church, it was in disrepair. A pump was needed to provide water for community members’ household needs as well as a way for the church to grow crops on its land. The Kendalls saw the need. When they returned home, they pulled some family members together and gathered enough resources to purchase a

replacement pump for the church.

Liz is 16 now and close to high school graduation. Doug and Cordelia are hoping to stay in touch with the family by sponsoring Liz’s younger sister next.

“When God said, ‘Love your neighbors as yourself,’ that means everyone,” Doug says. *Children’s named are changed for their protection.

WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU!

Share your sponsorship story by e-mailing cs@ncm.org.

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Connection Points.

GLOBAL FOCUS: FAMINE

When Hunger Hits: Churches Are Responding Reporting by NCM Africa

Photos courtesy of NCM Africa

Immediate food assistance can help save lives and offer hope for the future.

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arched, cracking ground and withering crops—these have been consistent scenes across parts of Africa over the past couple of years. Because of the worst drought in decades, many millions have been living without the security of knowing what—or if—they will eat.

A year ago, churches in Zimbabwe and Lesotho knew that they needed to step in to serve their neighbors.

The El Niño weather pattern that swept through was intense, keeping rain from falling where it was needed most. Without water, crops didn’t grow, and most people were unable to cope with the sudden shortage of food. In Zimbabwe, all 60 Nazarene districts were affected.

In 2016, volunteers gathered to contact local churches, who were able to put together lists of the most vulnerable individuals and families who would receive food aid. The undertaking was huge—and so was the need.

For three months, volunteers distributed food aid at 56 distribution points across the country. Each basket of food would help supplement up to four people for a month. The churches’ efforts helped to ensure that more

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than 12,300 people had enough to eat.

The severe shortage of rain also led to a shortage of drinking water, and people had resorted to using unsafe sources that can cause waterborne diseases like cholera.

In Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, the Nkulumane Church of the Nazarene was able to drill a borehole well in partnership with Nazarene Compassionate Ministries in Africa. While the well has gone a long way toward making clean water available, others like it are few and far between. Long lines of people waiting their turn stretch out from the well. Still, every drop of water counts.

About a thousand miles south, Lesotho has also been struck by drought and famine.

There, too, churches were able to help their communities by providing food. Church volunteers came together to provide more than 700 families with food aid to get them through a hungry season. Teams were able to get the food to remote areas, including isolated churches deep in the mountains, to make sure that everyone had enough.

In both countries, churches came together to offer a tangible reminder of God’s love and hope for the future.

Africa Disaster Fund When people across Zimbabwe and Lesotho were hungry, local churches responded by providing food. This was possible because other churches around the world had given to the Africa Disaster Fund.

Right now, countries in East Africa are also facing famine, and more than 20 million people are in urgent need of food assistance. In desperation, people are abandoning their homes and farms to seek help in refugee camps. The last time the region experienced famine was in 2011, and nearly 260,000 people died from starvation and malnutrition. Half of them were children under the age of 5.

Through the Africa Disaster Fund, local churches will be ready to respond when disasters like this happen.

By giving to the Africa Disaster Fund, you can help make sure the church is equipped to offer a tangible expression of God’s love when people need it most.

To learn more or to support the church-led disaster response efforts in Africa, visit ncm.org/AfricaDisaster.

CHANGED LIVES

Goats Galore: Breeding Hope for Children in Benin

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So far, 4,000 children have participated in the program and experienced the transforming love of Christ. What’s more, Moise says the program has created unity among the children who participate and their families. When the dry season started in Benin a couple of years ago, the community came together to create

wells to provide water for the animals. This experience embodied the concept of “hands of solidarity” literally, as they worked side by side to dig the wells by hand.

As one African proverb reminds us: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”

Thousands of children in Benin have more educational opportunities thanks to the sheep and goat project.

Photos courtesy of Africa West Field

by Monica Carr, Africa West Field oïse Toumoudagou of Pendjari, Benin, in West Africa was only 7 when his father died. As part of a cultural tradition, his aunt gave him a hen to raise with the help of his mother. In a year, he had about 40 chickens. Many years later, this simple but life-changing gift gave Moïse an idea that he shared with his local church: What if we gave goats to children in need?

“We saw that there were a lot of challenges in the community,” Moïse recalls. “In many families, children didn’t go to school.

Education was not sufficient. There were always requests for financial help.”

The church had a list of 200 children in need. Church members donated enough money for 240 goats. They named the program Hands of Solidarity and chose five children from each village to receive a female goat. In three months, the number of goats had doubled. The new goats went to children in other villages, and the program continued to expand.

In villages where shepherding is part of the culture, children receive a sheep instead of a goat. Female animals provide milk, which offers nutrition and can also be sold for income. The program buys back male animals, providing income for educational needs.

The church seeks out the most vulnerable: children who have lost one or both parents, children of polygamous marriages, and children whose parents left home in search of work in the city. They also help daughters whose mothers have divorced because those girls face cultural discrimination.

Norbert Touboudagou, who helps supervise the program, shares, “Many children come to know God because they see compassion—those who have come with a kind hand to help them, who demonstrate God’s message of love.”

The success of Hands of Solidarity is astounding. Norbert recently visited a boy who had 11 female goats after starting with one three years earlier. He had also returned two males back to the program.

According to Moise, the program “gives the children value, teaches responsibility, and helps them stay in school. … They tend to be some of the best students in the school.”

GOAT OR SHEEP? Separating the sheep from the goats can be surprisingly tricky. With some breeds, it’s easy: goats are the ones with little beards and horns, and sheep are the fluffy, wooly ones. But there are several breeds of sheep that look remarkably goat-like.

It may look like The key to telling the difference? It’s all in the tail. If it points up, it’s a goat. a goat, but this Down, and it’s probably one’s a sheep. a sheep. There are also It may look like subtle differences in ear a goat, but this placement and size, eatone’s a sheep. ing habits (goats browse, sheep graze), and hardiness (sheep are sturdier).

So next time you’re having trouble identifying the ungulate* that crosses your path, sneak a peek at its tail. * An ungulate is an animal with hooves. Now you know.

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Connection Points.

COMPASSION CONNECTION

Special Needs Sponsorships: New ministry serves those with disabilities Reporting by Iryna Galisevych and Lorena Noé

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round the world, a billion people, have some form of physical or cognitive disability. Almost 200 million individuals experience significant disabilities. With disabilities often comes discrimination and stigma, not to mention extremely limited opportunities. Entire families can experience loneliness as well as increased poverty, particularly in countries without support services. Recognizing these needs, Nazarene congregations are reminding individuals with disabilities, and their families, of God’s love for them.

A new special needs sponsorship through Nazarene Compassionate Ministries’ child Flavio found work, learned about Christ, and discovered community because of one church’s outreach in Chile.

sponsorship program is aimed at serving both children and adults with disabilities.

Currently, sponsorships are available to support individuals with disabilities in Ukraine, Chile, and Peru.

UKRAINE When Ira and her mother, Valentina, first came to the five-day camp run by volunteers from a Nazarene church, they hadn’t packed any clothes. Based on past experiences with strangers, they fully expected to go home the same day.

Ira uses a wheelchair and has trouble communicating her thoughts. She was used

to being ridiculed by her peers and had no reason to expect anything different this time. But after the first day of the camp, Valentina asked her husband to bring them clothes because Ira had decided to stay.

In Ukraine, where Ira lives, those who live with disabilities are highly stigmatized and often go without the care they need. Church-led ministries are stepping in to provide care and to say to those with disabilities, “You are valued and loved.”

Along with the summer camp Ira attended, a group of volunteers affiliated with the church of the Nazarene run a Kids’ Club in Chernivtsi, Ukraine, where children and

“To love someone is to show to them their beauty, their worth, and their importance.”

Photos courtesy of NCM SAM and NCM CIS

~Jean Vanier

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TO SPONSOR SOMEONE WITH DISABILITIES,

go to ncm.org/sponsor. Click the “Special Needs” box and hit the “Search Now” button to find individuals waiting for a sponsor.

PRAY WITH US

young adults with disabilities come to experience community and Christ.

Volunteers also help make sure families are supported through home visits and help accessing medication and groceries.

CHILE

Photos courtesy of Jon Morton

In Chile, the Mirada de Amor center creates a space for adults with disabilities to work, learn, and experience community. In the country, government benefits end at age 26 and services are very expensive, so adults with disabilities don’t always have access to the care they need. Mirada de Amor provides therapy and specialists for young adults whose families don’t have the means to pay for those services.

Flavio, 34, has been attending Mirada de Amor for six years. His best friends also go there, and together they do job training, go kayaking, attend cooking workshops, and take part in physical recreation.

“I like being in Mirada de Amor because they help me to work better,” he says. “It is a place where I have friends, and they teach us that Jesus should be the one walking with us always.”

During the week, participants can join a holistic support program that includes Christian education, activities for daily living, cognitive stimulation, financial management, and sheltered employment.

On the weekends, the ministry also serves children and youth with disabilities. All participants have access to vocational training and therapy.

With all of the workshops and activities that Mirada de Amor schedules, the needs of both the body and soul are met. As Flavio explained, he can learn about God there, and he’s encouraged to seek a deeper relationship with God, too.

In English, the phrase mirada de amor translates as “look of love.” It’s an appropriate name. Through the daily care and love provided through this ministry, the church is painting a picture of what Christ-like love looks like.

A PRAYER FOR DISPLACED PEOPLE

And help us to reflect your love.

DEAR GOD, we pray for those who are far

Give us the courage to advocate, to embrace, to love as You love …

from home or have no home anymore.

May they find a home in You and in Your Church.

Lord, we lift up those who are displaced by violence and conflict in this broken world

… without boundaries or fear.

Our Lord and our God, we pray for those who have been displaced.

May they find refuge in You and in Your Church.

Where they have found a clinched fist and a closed door, may they find an open hand and a loving welcome in us.

For [You] will deliver the needy who cry out,

the afflicted who have no one to help.

[You] will take pity on the weak and the needy

and save the needy from death.

[You] will rescue them from oppression and violence,

for precious is their blood in [Your] sight.

(Psalm 72:12-14, NIV)

Help us to see those who have fallen through the cracks.

May it be so. AMEN.

… those displaced by greed … those persecuted and pushed to the margins by violence, oppression, and a fight that isn’t theirs.

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Photo courtesy of Steve Jeter

WHY COMPASSION? HOW HOLINESS AND COMPASSION GO HAND IN HAND, AND WHY.

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ompassion as a lifestyle. That’s the tagline of Nazarene Compassionate Ministries, but

what exactly does it mean? That question could be answered in a lot of ways: loving others, service, empathy, empowerment. The list is familiar and long. It’s also one that has been part of the Church of the Nazarene since its beginning. What else could be true of a church that was planted specifically to serve those who were among the most vulnerable in Los Angeles? It’s at the core of our discipleship: “The Church of the Nazarene believes that Jesus commanded His disciples to have a special relationship to the poor of this world. … Holiness, far from distancing believers from the desperate economic needs of people in our world, motivates us to place our means in the service of alleviating such need and to adjust our wants in accordance with the needs of others” (Nazarene Manual 903.4).

Here, three leaders give three viewpoints on the same thing: why compassion is important and why it’s part of the Church of the Nazarene.

COMPASSION IS IN OUR DNA I

n the earliest days of that first “Church of the Nazarene” in Los Angeles, California, compassion was the fire driven by holy hearts and passionate engagement with the community. The minutes of an early meeting declared that the church was called to minister to “the neglected quarters of the city,” where poverty, addiction, brokenness, and despair were atmospheric. The church felt that the message of holiness demanded engagement, not distance.

Homes for unwed mothers, orphanages, along with fierce and determined opposition to the prevalence of saloons and bars, drew those early Nazarenes into very open and vocal advocacy for the victims of alcoholism, drug use, and prostitution. Those who were outcasts were the focus of their endeavors.

It was that very passion that led Phineas Bresee out of the comfortable and prestigious pulpit at Los Angeles First Methodist Church. He was determined to engage the brokenness and squalor of “Skid Row” and to seek to redeem those who were shunned by the more affluent members of many established churches.

Scripture was the basis for the passion

by Jesse C. Middendorf

of those early Nazarenes. From the pen of the prophets came repeated challenges to the people of Israel that, among other things, injustice and the neglect of the poor and downtrodden brought about the collapse and eventual exile of Israel. (See, for example, Isaiah 10:1-4).

We Nazarenes take seriously the words of Jesus in Matthew 25, when He said, “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me” (Matthew 25:40, NIV).

Compassion is at the very heart of holiness. It is the visible expression of holy love that reaches out in practical, everyday, person-to-person action that authentically expresses its passionate love for Jesus in loving concern for our enemy, our opposite, and “the other” around us. It crosses boundaries, racial divides, cultural differences, and economic gaps with one motive: wholehearted love for God and holy sacrificial love for neighbor, whoever and wherever that neighbor may be.

Dr. Jesse C Middendorf is a general superintendent emeritus in the Church of the Nazarene. He currently directs the Center for Pastoral Leadership at Nazarene Theological Seminary.

“Compassion is at the very heart of holiness. It is the visible expression of holy love that reaches out in practical, everyday, person-to-person action that authentically expresses its passionate love for Jesus in loving concern for our enemy, our opposite, and ‘the other’ around us.”

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THE WAY OF JESUS

by Rebecca Laird

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ost of us want to do the right thing. When disaster or tragedy strikes, we share money and resources. Giving feels good, and it is good to give. How is it, then, that really generous people can, for example, walk by a homeless person sleeping in a dark doorway after enjoying a good meal? I’ve done this myself. Can we do the right thing without compassion—without “suffering with” those nearby who are in need?

COMPASSION GETS PERSONAL. When buildings topple and media blasts the stories of suffering into our lives, it is instinctive to want to help. Thank goodness there are those who are trained, poised, and ready act. But anyone who has been on the front lines can tell you: It’s the eyes of those haunted by sorrow that stay with you after the emergency is over. Suffering unveils human vulnerability. It is easier to run from pain than to sit with it. Henri Nouwen summarizes, “Compassion means full immersion in the condition of being human.”

COMPASSION GETS MESSY. Suffering can’t be charted, regulated, or easily fixed. People in pain may not do or say nice things. The howl of need is hard to hear.

When I was young, the homeless in my urban neighborhood got to me. I disregarded

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the advice of the street-wise and began taking breakfast to some of my new friends.

As I heard their stories, I learned that more than French toast was needed. Carl needed rehab. Eugene needed dental services.

Becky needed to get away from her abusive boyfriend. The veteran who wouldn’t tell me his name needed mental health services for his PTSD. I learned quickly that real compassion takes long-term community commitment, lots of resources, and faith that God can indeed move mountains—often through us—even when each shovelful of need seems overwhelming.

COMPASSION CAN CHANGE YOUR INTERNAL COMPASS. Decades ago, I travelled to India to volunteer at Mother Teresa’s home for the dying. It was basic, humble work—cutting toenails, feeding babies, singing to toddlers. The people were so vulnerable— close to death or just barely born. On my way home after a few weeks, I was in an airport wondering how to go back to my corporate office after seeing the world’s great need. Then I saw a quote written on the baggage carousel: “When you don’t know what to do next, think of the person who suffers most and do something to alleviate alienation.” When I have faced big

decisions or gotten lost in business, that quote has returned to me like a compass.

Stay rooted in people work … ministry … service. Look in the eyes of others. Don’t run from vulnerability.

In Matthew 9, Jesus shows us that direct, eye-to-eye involvement is not optional. The big event in the chapter seems to be the calling of Matthew but before, during, and after, Jesus looked into the eyes of real humans in need. He lifted a paralyzed man, raised a girl from her deathbed, healed a shunned woman with blood on her clothes, opened the eyes of the blind, and drove out a demon. Jesus “had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless …” (verse 36). He then looked at the disciples and said the harvest was plentiful. They were being sent to care for the harassed and helpless and would sometimes become the harassed and helpless themselves.

Jesus knew few would respond to a call with that much risk. Still, he sounded the called for them to get personal, accept the messy parts, and be willing to have their plans rerouted. This is Jesus’s way.

Dr. Rebecca Laird is professor of Christian Ministry at Point Loma Nazarene University. She is co-editor of Spiritual Direction, Spiritual Formation, and Discernment, a trilogy of books on the spiritual life

by Henri Nouwen.

READ ON Want to dig deeper? These are books that explore the connection between our faith in Christ and compassionate action: Christlike Justice and the Holiness Tradition by Chanshi Chanda (Prairie Star Publications, 2010) Compassion: A Reflection on the Christian Life by Henri J.M. Nouwen, Donald P. McNeill, and Douglas A. Morrison (Image, 2006) Compassion Evangelism: Meeting Human Needs by Thomas G. Nees (Beacon Hill, 1996) From Brokenness to Community by Jean Vanier (Paulist Press, 1992) The Poverty and Justice Bible (American Bible Society, 2009) Roadmap to Reconciliation: Moving Communities Into Unity, Wholeness, and Justice by Brenda Salter McNeil (IVP Press, 2016) The Very Good Gospel by Lisa Sharon Harper (WaterBrook, 2016)

LOCAL COMPASSION W

by Loysbel Pérez Salazar

e face a world full of inequalities, a world that needs to know the true purpose of God’s kingdom. God has delegated this mission to the church. In this way, compassion becomes a way of life for everyone who knows God. Compassion is related to two biblical principles inherent in every believer: giving and love. We have the responsibility to minister to each person’s spirit, soul, and body. There is so much need in this world that the church cannot stop giving.

God is in the child who has gone to bed without food, who has nothing to wear.

God is in the old man who does not value himself. God is in the woman whose husband abandoned her, leaving her alone with three children. God is in the teenager who does not want to come home and hear his parents fighting again. God is in the prisoner without a family.

What moves the church of Christ to compassion is not a program, a ministry,

or an evangelistic outreach. What moves us is simply the love of Jesus made real in the life of a believer. Compassion is the fulfillment of loving one’s neighbor as oneself. Jesus sat with women, dined with tax collectors, touched lepers, gave dinners for the dispossessed, and restored the dead to life. Jesus pierced the social, economic, and political barriers of His time to teach love. He taught us that compassion is not exclusive.

Local churches are the true agents of transformation in this world. Local churches are able to incarnate the love of God in each community and achieve the powerful advance of the Kingdom. Compassion is not a call for only a few or the responsibility only of a specific ministry. Being part of the church of Christ is enough to make compassion an indissoluble part of life.

Walking With the Poor: Principles and Practices of Transformational Development

by Bryant L. Myers (Orbis, 2011) When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor … and Yourself by Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert (Moody Publishers, 2014)

Rev. Loysbel Pérez Salazar is pastor of Iglesia del Nazareno Alquizar in Artemisa, Cuba. He is a graduate of the Nazarene Theological Seminary of Cuba.

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SEEKING AS REFUGEES JOURNEY TOWARD SAFETY, THE CHURCH IS COMING ALONGSIDE AND OFFERING HOPE. THESE ARE A FEW OF THOSE STORIES.

Photo courtesy of Steve Jeter

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ix years of war in Syria have destroyed communities and torn families apart.

In that time, more than 11 million people have been displaced from their homes due to violence and persecution.

Five million people have gone to other countries, where they are now living as refugees. In nearby countries and around

the world, the global refugee crisis has affected more than 60 million people. There are currently 21 million refugees living outside their home countries and more than 40 million who are displaced. More than half of them are children.

As long as war and violence exist, so too will refugees. It can be easy to turn

REFUGE away from the crisis because those numbers are too big and too hard to face.

But it’s our hope that we can begin to see the refugee crisis through the lens of individuals, each with a story of loss and hope for the future.

Every story is unique. Some people have left jobs as professors or doctors or

lawyers, destined to relinquish professorial status for low-wage work. Others left behind family members, hoping desperately to someday be reunited. Some left in groups; others, alone. Some had time to say goodbye, while others had only minutes to grab what they could and run.

Every story is different, but they all

involve people who have left everything in the hopes of anything. Every story is different, but they all involve children, women, and men who are loved and who are made in God’s image.

These are just a few of their stories and a glimpse into how God is using the church to serve those in search of refuge.

Summer 2017 | 15

SEEKING REFUGE

E Due to increased security concerns, we have removed the image of Mahdi and Amira to protect their safety.

The stories in this issue are true, and the dangers refugees are facing are real. Your partnership is dearly needed. Seriously!

To give and learn how you can further support our church’s ministry to those seeking safety, go online to ncm.org/refugees.

Photos courtesy of Weston Bennett

FROM CRISIS TO COMMUNITY

HOW A YOUNG COUPLE ESCAPED PERSECUTION AND FOUND A NEW HOME IN CROATIA

By Teanna Sunberg 16 | www.ncm.org

ven though Mahdi* was young, experiencing persecution for his faith was nothing new to him. He and Amira* had just married. They were from different countries in the Middle East, but they shared a common faith in Christ.

Mahdi and Amira lived and ministered in her home country of Syria in an area that had originally been relatively safe. Early in 2015, they made a trip to Mahdi’s country to visit family. On the way back the crowded passenger bus they were travelling on was pulled over, and armed men boarded it. It was quickly evident that this was not a random military check. The men were taking control of the bus and kidnapping everyone on board. The driver and passengers were forced to drive for several hours on back roads to a predetermined destination. As they unloaded, the men and women were separated. Mahdi gave one last word of encouragement to his new wife.

Though treated roughly and locked into one small room together, the women were not abused. But throughout the night, they could hear the tortured cries of the men in the next room. The night seemed to have no end, but at some point in the early hours of the next morning, the captors grew tired and the beatings stopped. Amira had no idea if Mahdi was alive or dead. She only knew that she was still alive, and she prayed without ceasing that God would somehow deliver both of them.

Soon after the sun rose, the door of the women’s room scraped open, and a captor called out her name. Would the next moments deliver torture, abuse, or death? With a shaking hand, she acknowledged her name, silently praying for strength and deliverance. Rough hands dragged her through the door and pushed her into the cold morning air. Amira was thrown at ragged feet. When she lifted her head, she looked up into the eyes of her husband.

Mahdi grabbed Amira’s arm, and they began to limp into the landscape toward freedom. She was hardly able to register what was happening as her husband pulled her painfully forward. Although a limp and dried blood made it clear that Mahdi had been beaten throughout the long night, Amira was thankful he was alive. Cold, hungry, and wounded, they walked for hours.

They refused to stop, frightened that at any

moment their captors would come for them.

As the day wore on and the distance grew, they felt a burgeoning sense of safety. Eventually, they stopped in a village, where they asked for help.

JOURNEY TO SAFETY Many months later, Amira told her story while gathered with a group from various nationalities, all sipping tea in a home in Croatia, where she and Mahdi landed after fleeing from Syria. Amira sighed and her shoulders drooped.

“We have no idea what happened to the rest of the passengers on the bus, nor do we know why they let us go,” she said.

The kidnapping was the event that catapulted the couple into escaping Syria in the fall of 2015. Unlike many other refugees who were also beginning the journey to Western Europe to flee violence and persecution, Mahdi and Amira determined to make Croatia their destination. When they arrived, they joined a refugee community being housed in temporary—and often challenging—living situations.

After hearing that a group was offering free English classes in the dormitory where they were staying, both Mahdi and Amira enrolled. It soon became clear to them that their teachers were Christians, and when a worship gathering was planned in the home of a missionary family, both were quick to respond. They also began to find many others within the refugee community who were hungry to know more about Christ. To the surprise of Mahdi and Amira, opportunities

As refugee families like this one come through reception centers in Croatia, Mahdi and Amira are able to share God’s love.

for them to speak about the Lord were suddenly all around them.

MAKING CONNECTIONS Through their English teacher, Amira and Mahdi connected with a local church in their new city. Their story took another exciting turn one Sunday morning when Amira noticed the Nazarene logo being displayed on a video. She was acquainted with a Nazarene pastor back home, and she knew the denomination. Neither she nor Mahdi had realized that the English teacher, the pastor, and the congregation were part of the Church of the Nazarene until that moment.

Soon after, the couple received word that their three-year resident visas had been approved by the Croatian government. That meant that they could call this country, this congregation, and this community home.

With stability for the future settled, Mahdi and Amira approached the church leaders who had been such a long part of their journey to ask if they could volunteer officially to help other refugees the way they had been helped.

Mahdi also indicated a desire to fulfill his call as a pastor through the Church of the Nazarene. Today, Mahdi and Amira are learning the language and culture of their new host country, and Mahdi is working his way toward ordination. They have found community through the church in Croatia. n *Names have been changed for protection and security.

Teanna Sunberg serves as a Nazarene missionary to the Central Europe Field, which includes the country of Croatia.

She and her husband, Jay, live in Budapest, Hungary.

OPEN ARMS IN CROATIA

By NCM Communications

A

couple of years ago, hundreds of thousands of people fleeing violence and persecution began to make their way through the Balkans on their way to Northern Europe. In Croatia, the Church of the Nazarene was present in a transit camp near the Serbian border to provide shoes, food, and other assistance. When Balkan countries began to close their borders, Croatia did the same but allowed people to seek asylum. As the transit camps closed, individuals and families seeking asylum moved west toward Zagreb.

At this point, members of a small Nazarene congregation in Zagreb began reaching out in a couple of reception centers that housed hundreds of people who were seeking asylum. When some of the residents expressed interest in visiting the church, the leadership team had a decision to make. If a large number of people from outside Croatia began attending their services, it could scare off many of the Croatians in their community who were fearful.

Betsy Scott, a Nazarene missionary and church planting pastor, met with the Croatian leadership team. “We made a decision that we would meet people [living as refugees] where they’re at. We would be their spiritual home,” she says.

According to Betsy, the local leaders did not hesitate and collectively said, “We have open arms, and this is what God has given us.”

Today, the church prints worship guides in nine different languages each week to accommodate those who attend their service.

They still reach out in reception centers, including Hotel Porin near the church. Mahdi and Amira*, who are themselves seeking asylum in Croatia, have become part of the Nazarene congregation and are now leading those outreach efforts. They have received permission to host gatherings in the hotel where people can ask questions about Jesus and the Bible in a safe setting. The hope is it will also become a place where people can share their stories and begin to heal from the trauma they’ve experienced.

As the church works to create community, they try not to use the word refugee. “We don’t use that word because people have names,” Betsy explains. “They’re our friends, and we get to know their stories.” *Names have been changed for protection and security.

Summer 2017 | 17

SEEKING REFUGE

I

n February 2017, I visited Greece, Croatia, and Serbia to see and share about the Church of the Nazarene’s work in response to the refugee crisis. With each person I met who is living as a refugee, there was a common theme of being stuck. People are waiting for an asylum interview, waiting to reunite with family, waiting to cross a border—waiting for what’s next but unable to go back.

Through a ministry of presence, the Nazarene response teams in Greece, Serbia, and Croatia are living out the love of Christ among people seeking refuge. A year ago, the church’s work was primarily in long-term and transit camps. Today, some of that work remains in Greece, but the camps in Croatia and Serbia are gone. In Croatia, ministry now takes place through relationship-building in apartment buildings and hotels that have become centers for refugees and asylum seekers. In Serbia, a ministry of presence takes place in abandoned buildings where those living as refugees are stuck with few options.

These are the stories of two young men who are connected with the church’s ministry in Belgrade, Serbia:

RUNNING FROM WAR: JAVID’S STORY

AT THE BARRACKS OF BELGRADE

A MINISTRY OF PRESENCE OFFERS LIGHT IN THE DARK Words by Jasmine Hiland 18 | www.ncm.org

Photos by Stephens Hiland

“Come in, come in!” Javid* said. “Sit down, sit down.”

He ushered in the group I was with, and we sat on red mats and gray blankets on the ground. The room was dim but warmed by a makeshift stove .

As we drank tea, Javid talked about how his mom frequently calls to tell him about a new girl she’s found for him to marry. When asked if he was interested in getting married, he replied, “In my culture, people usually get married between 17 and 25. I will wait till I’m settled at 25.”

The idea of being settled feels uncertain, though. At 17, Javid had to flee from his home in Afghanistan and is now living as a refugee in an abandoned building near the train station in Belgrade, Serbia. He shares space with more than a thousand others, mostly other young men from Afghanistan and Pakistan, in a series of crumbling warehouses.

Back home, when members of an extremist militant group approached Javid with just one option—join or die—the teenager ran.

His journey with others across mountains and through forests led him to Belgrade.

“I hate war,” he said. “I want no part of it.”

The warehouses and surrounding area, known as the Barracks, look post-apocalyptic. On the ground there are no trees or grass, only mud and trash. There are no bathrooms, just a large trench in the ground used as a toilet. Showers consist of metal barrels of water warmed over a fire outside.

It’s winter, and the area is clouded with black smoke from fires providing warmth. Javid was lucky enough to find a room in an abandoned train switch house, farther from the smoke and stench.

Javid and the others get one meal a day from a Serbian nonprofit organization. They could join a formal refugee camp, but they fear they’ll be deported this way. So they choose to “sleep rough” in the warehouses, even though the conditions are severe.

Javid’s family does not know where he is or what it’s like. “It would hurt them too much,” he said.

There is no chance for resettlement in Serbia, so Javid hopes to reach a Northern European country where he can seek asylum.

Crossing the borders to get out of Serbia is incredibly dangerous, though. Javid has scars on his face and arms from attacks by police dogs during attempts at border crossing.

Javid continues to try to move on not only for himself, but also for his family.

Even though he does not tell them about his circumstances, he keeps up with them. He knows that bombs regularly go off around his home village, and his brother was kidnapped by the same militant group who approached him. His family was able to pay a ransom, but his brother will never be safe there.

“I want to build a better future for my

WHEN MEMBERS OF AN EXTREMIST MILITANT GROUP APPROACHED JAVID WITH JUST ONE OPTION— JOIN OR DIE— THE TEENAGER RAN. HIS JOURNEY WITH OTHERS ACROSS MOUNTAINS AND THROUGH FORESTS LED HIM TO BELGRADE.

family,” he said.

For now, Javid is still in Belgrade attempting to cross a border so he can reach a country where he can seek refuge.

As long as there are those seeking refuge, representatives of the Church of the Nazarene will continue to reach out with the love of Christ.

RUNNING FOR HIS LIFE: FAHAD’S STORY He looked me in the eyes and asked, “What do you think about our conditions?” gesturing to the smoke-filled space.

“It’s not human,” I replied. His eyes softened, and he nodded.

Fahad* could easily pass for 35, so I was shocked to learn he was 20. He explained that the journey had aged him. He opened up his Facebook account on his phone and said, “This is what I used to look like.” The contrast was drastic.

Fahad had been in Belgrade eight months.

He is one of nine children from a family in Pakistan. He had been working as a translator for an American NGO in his hometown when extremist militants told him he could either join them or be killed. He knew they would follow through on their threat.

Fahad lived in an abandoned warehouse in Belgrade for months before making the dangerous journey to Austria.

Javid asked to have his face shadowed. His family does not know about the severe conditions he lives in, and he wants to protect them.

Summer 2017 | 19

SEEKING REFUGE “It’s very easy for them to kill you over there,” he said.

So Fahad ran. Several friends in similar situations also ran with him. None of them knew whether they would actually live to reach their destination.

“My mom … hugged me and kissed me on my face and was crying, and I kissed her on the face and left for my journey,” he said. “It was a nightmare.”

Fahad and his friends first crossed from Afghanistan into Iran. Smugglers put them into the trunks of cars in groups of four.

It was hot and they had no water. After

several hours they reached Iran, but one of the friends died in that trip.

“We tried our best to rescue him, but unfortunately he would not move,” Fahad said. “His brother hugged me, crying [and] saying, ‘What will I answer my mom if she asks about him?’”

They continued their journey by foot to the border of Turkey, and then through Bulgaria and into Serbia. “We heard … that if you manage to enter Serbia, it means you reach Europe,” Fahad said. “But our joy was for a very short time. When we reached Belgrade and saw the situation of refugees, it

At the Barracks, where more than 1,000 live, there are no toilets and showers consist of using fire to heat water in a barrel.

was almost -6 [degrees] Celsius and we had nothing to wear. Straightaway, I went inside to the warehouse, and I started crying.”

Fahad and his friends wound up in the Barracks, the name for a group of abandoned train yard warehouses. “There is nothing here for life,” he said.

In winter, frostbite is common. People burn railroad ties soaked in oil and tar to stay warm. The result is toxic air to breathe.

When Fahad invited us into the warehouse for tea, the black smoke made it difficult to see. We sat on blankets around a stove made from an old gas barrel.

Fahad shared about his attempts to cross the borders from Serbia into Hungary and Croatia. The inhumane treatment at the borders is well known. He also shared about his hopes for the future.

Since I met Fahad, he has managed to get across the border into Hungary, then Romania, and finally into Austria. The trip was long and dangerous.

“The hardest journey of my life just ended,” he told me.

In Austria, young adults who have sought asylum can attend university. Fahad hopes to go to school to become a journalist. He hopes to work hard and build a better future for his family. I hope he continues to experience God’s love through others.

He told me to keep the photo from Belgrade when he was black from the smoke, as a reminder of the contrast.

“Now, I am a new Fahad,” he said. n *Names have been changed for protection and security.

Jasmine Hiland is a graduate of Trevecca Nazarene University. She now serves as a coordinator for the university’s Six8 Fellowship and J.V. Morsch Center for Social Justice.

Many fled extremist groups who threatened their lives. Yet for many, their journeys have not brought them to safety.

Stephens Hiland is a graduate of Trevecca Nazarene University. He is a photographer and videographer and also serves as a digital graphic designer at Trevecca.

As the refugee crisis goes on, children, youth, and families continue to flee their homes in search of safety and refuge.

The Church of the Nazarene continues to offer the love of Christ to those on the journey. Together, we are the church.

Together, we can make a difference.

To learn more or to support the Nazarene refugee response, visit

ncm.org/refugees.

20 | www.ncm.org

A

lthough news coverage of the Syrian refugee crisis has come in waves, the exodus of Syrians fleeing their country has not slowed since a vicious civil war began in 2011. While we often hear of those exiting to Europe, 2.3 million children and their families are living in countries that share borders with Syria. Lebanon and Jordan currently host more refugees in comparison to their overall populations than any other countries in the world, according to the U.N. Refugee Agency (UNHCR).

For more than five years, Nazarene churches in Jordan and Lebanon have been providing ongoing food aid and household supplies to thousands of refugees, in addition to offering medical care, English classes, and friendship. In addition to immediate needs, churches are focusing on the future by providing education for children. Scholarships are available so that children living as refugees can attend accredited Nazarene schools.

Many children in Syria have missed out on years of education during the war; in fact, a third of schools there have been rendered unusable because of violence. In neighboring countries, refugee families who once had stable lives have been plunged into poverty, making the cost of tuition for schooling out of the question. In fact, children living as refugees are five times more likely to be out of school than other than children, says UNHCR. Without school, children have limited ways to adapt to new countries, regain stability, and heal from trauma. Without education, a child’s future is limited and dreams start to wither, but with education, hope thrives.

These are a few stories of children who have been displaced by war and how Nazarene schools are helping them find hope again.

A CHANCE TO DREAM AGAIN

NAZARENE SCHOOLS ARE GIVING HOPE TO CHILDREN CAUGHT IN THE REFUGEE CRISIS

By NCM Communications

REGAINING STABILITY: SAMI’S STORY “Three years ago, my life changed forever,” says Sami, age 11.

That’s when Sami, his parents, and his four brothers left their home in Aleppo, Syria. His parents worried about the constant bombing and feared for the lives of their sons, so they fled to Jordan.

Even though Sami’s father had family in Jordan, they struggled to cross the border.

For several days, they waited in a camp. Once, they were forced to leave the border temporarily because the fighting drew too close to Summer 2017 | 21

SEEKING REFUGE

Sami

Rasha

Halil

“I AM SO INCREDIBLY GRATEFUL FOR THIS CHANCE TO DREAM AGAIN.”

“I THANK GOD FOR EVERYTHING, FOR THE DIFFICULT AND THE BEAUTIFUL THINGS THAT HAPPENED IN MY LIFE.”

“THE NAZARENE SCHOOL ALWAYS ENCOURAGES US AND GIVES US HOPE TO CONTINUE.”

the area. Finally, his father was able to make contact with family members, and Sami and his family crossed into their new home.

But Sami’s life had started to come undone before they even left Syria. His friends were leaving daily, and he was lonely. He couldn’t attend school regularly because of the war.

“When something as simple as stability is absent in your life, it can have negative affects elsewhere,” he says.

But in Jordan, Sami started attending a Nazarene school every day. The friends he made stayed in school, too. He has found stability, and now he dreams of becoming a doctor one day.

“Learning and gaining progress in my studies has made me hopeful for my future,” he says. “Based on how my life has been up until this point, I am so incredibly grateful for this chance to dream again.”

supposed to meet her father there, but when they arrived, he left for Turkey. They haven’t heard from him since.

Although her two brothers are working to help their mother with household expenses, money is scarce. Thankfully, Rasha received a scholarship to attend the Nazarene school nearby.

At first, she had a hard time fitting in. She didn’t know English, which is the language taught at the school, and she even struggled to understand her Lebanese classmates. But her teachers and a new friend encouraged her to continue with her studies. Now, she also dreams of becoming a doctor and wants to help people in Syria.

“The Nazarene school gave me hope and confidence to fight for a better tomorrow,” she says.

Although Rasha initially struggled in school, she is now at the top of her class in eighth grade.

“I thank God for everything, for the difficult and the beautiful things that happened in my life,” she says. “I believe that God is always with us and He will never abandon us.

This is my hope in life.”

HOPE TO CONTINUE: HALIL’S STORY

MY HOPE IN LIFE: RASHA STORY “We left our country, Syria, because of the current situation,” says Rasha*, 13, with a quiet, sad voice.

Four years ago, she came to Lebanon with her mother and four siblings. They were 22 | www.ncm.org

After his father was kidnapped in Syria, Halil* and his mother and brother fled to Lebanon.

“I love my father and I am missing him every day,” says Halil, age 14. “If he exists our lives will be easier and more beautiful. I love my mom. She sacrificed so much for us.”

Today, Halil attends a Nazarene school, where he is working hard to catch up after missing many years of formal education. He says the school has helped him make huge progress in his education. He holds on to the hope that he will be able to achieve his dreams and help improve life for his family.

“The Nazarene school always encourages us and gives us hope to continue,” he says. “They are like a family to me and they help me move forward and evolve in life,” he says.

Halil has also found hope in his newfound faith. “My spiritual life is great,” he says. “I know Jesus, and I took Him as a personal savior.” *Children’s names are changed for their protection.

Hearts Stirred for Service

HOW A CHURCH IN GLASGOW IS SERVING ASYLUM SEEKERS

By Callie Stevens, NCM Communications

O

Photos courtesy of Dave White

n any given night when a football (soccer) game is on TV, you might find 40 to 50 men watching together at Parkhead Church of the Nazarene in the east end of Glasgow, Scotland. Some are Scottish. Others are living as refugees from countries including Syria and Sudan.

“For the East Enders of Glasgow to meet football-mad Syrians and Sudanese—that’s a foretaste of heaven for us,” says Dave White, a pastor at the church.

Individuals living as refugees in Glasgow typically find the church through its English as a Second Language ministry. Out of that, relationships grow. While the men play or watch football, women get together to relax. One woman at the church has even partnered with other groups to provide swimming lessons—something the women wouldn’t feel comfortable doing in mixed-gender groups.

The church is located in a working-class neighborhood with few people who aren’t from there. East End locals may normally not have interacted with the “other,” but the church itself is being transformed by its ministry.

LONGING FOR FAMILY Hassan* came to Scotland from Sudan about a year ago. At only 23, he has already had to run from people wielding AK-47s. He crossed into Europe in a boat that was nowhere near safe, surviving a steady stream of hardships degrading his humanity.

After landing, Hassan made his way to England, where he claimed asylum before being sent to Glasgow, the only city in Scotland welcoming refugees at the time. There, he got connected with the Parkhead church.

Hassan longs for a family of his own while also grieving those he has lost. His father was killed as he watched in Sudan, and he recently learned that a younger brother was also killed while Hassan was gone. His mother and younger siblings are still in Sudan, far away and in constant danger.

The church is embracing Hassan as one of their own. There, he can receive prayer and care, play football, and share food.

Someday, he hopes to be able to provide more for his mother and siblings. For now, he is learning what it means to be a part of God’s family, too.

“My deep prayer,” Pastor Dave says, “is that [Hassan] will understand the real love of God from the Christians who love and show grace.”

A SPIRIT OF HOSPITALITY Sometimes, refugees and asylum seekers are moved to other areas of the city. The strength of the church community is shown by the fact that many will travel 30, 40, or even 50 minutes to return regularly.

The church’s goal is simple: To sow seeds of welcome. Those living as refugees have been through terrible ordeals before they arrive, and they arrive with nothing. The church is becoming a place where refugees know they can find people who want to welcome them.

“It’s beautiful to see how hearts have been stirred to serve,” Pastor Dave says. “It’s lovely.” *His name has been changed for protection and security.

Summer 2017 | 23

SEARCHING FOR

HOME

IN ODESSA, UKRAINE, A CHURCH WELCOMES FAMILIES DISPLACED BY VIOLENCE

Words and photos by Brandon Sipes

24 | www.ncm.org

I

f you have driven through the flat plains of the Midwest in the United States, you can understand why so many people call this “flyover country.” There is often not much to see, especially during the winter months.

During the summer, it’s hot and the fields are full of tall cornstalks, but as the months go by, November hardens into December.

Then the ground starts to freeze and crack, and those of us who live here see miles of harvested corn fields as we drive by. It seems bleak, all those shattered remains of stalks.

This is why it seemed familiar to me to be in Ukraine in late October of last year: the landscape, the climate, and the layering of clothes to insulate against the cold. I traveled with others toward Odessa, a major city on the Black Sea (which in Greek and Latin means “the sea that welcomes strangers”). We wanted to visit the Nazarene church in Odessa and see their work with people who had been displaced by conflict in eastern Ukraine.

DISPLACED BY CONFLICT

In Odessa, I met the pastor of the local Nazarene church there, Nabil Babbeisi, his wife, Natasha, and their ebullient 2-year-old daughter. Their home felt warm and inviting, and their hospitality shone. Nabil is a transplant from Syria, having arrived in Ukraine 20 years ago. He spoke for some time about his home country, the current war there, and how his heart breaks for those who have suffered so much. He later laughed as he told the story of how he became a Christian “at an outdoor revival meeting where the preacher came off the stage, cornered me against the wall, and asked if I wanted to know Jesus.”

Natasha’s story is also one of distance traveled and hardships overcome. Her parents died when she was 9, and she was placed in foster care while being considered for an orphanage.

Normally, orphanages don’t take in children approaching teenage years because it’s hard to find adoptive families for older children.

However, the staff knew that Natasha would very likely become a victim of human trafficking if they did not take her in.

A few years later, Natasha asked to be sent “as far away as possible” from the place she knew, which is how she ended up in Odessa.

There, she became a Christian and moved into the home of a couple whose son had recently died. The one time she became overwhelmed with emotion while recounting her story was as she told of the pain those parents felt over the loss of their son. Stopping to collect herself, she said, “I know God placed me with them to comfort them.”

It must be this comforting presence that draws their congregation to Natasha and Nabil and allows them to have such impact on the lives of others who have also traveled far and suffered much.

Sasha and Ira’s story is similar to those they serve: all fleeing violence and persecution, feeling danger at their heels as they grab what little they can from their homes.

The historical origins of the conflict are long and complex, but within the past several years, Ukraine has seen a great deal of violent conflict, primarily with Russia. In late 2013, an internal political crisis led to a revolution in Ukraine. Dozens of citizens were killed, and the impact reverberated eastward, toward Russia. Tensions between the two countries continued to rise, and military operations escalated until violence had overcome the eastern Ukrainian provinces of Donetsk and Luhansk.

Fast forward two years, and the ongoing violence and conflict continues to cause grief and suffering for the millions caught in these regions. Thousands have been killed, tens of thousands have been injured, and more than 2 million have been displaced from their homes. Many of those who are considered internally displaced persons (IDPs) have landed in Odessa.

SERVING FROM COMMON GROUND Another couple at the church, Sasha and Ira, lead a ministry to people who are displaced Summer 2017 | 25

Pastor Nabil Babbeisi, his wife, Sasha, and their 2-year-old daughter live in Odessa, where they minister to those displaced by violence.

Sasha and Ira fled violence in their hometown and now lead a ministry for other internally displaced people.

in Odessa. The pair are, themselves, in Odessa because they were displaced from Luhansk. Sasha, a former Ukrainian soldier, says he had been admitted to a hospital for surgery when it came under attack. Doctors fled, and nurses moved patients into hallways for more safety. When Ira got to the hospital, she helped Sasha into the car while he was still staggering under the effects of anesthesia. She started driving southwest.

Sasha says he woke up in Odessa.

Sasha and Ira’s story is similar to those they serve: all fleeing violence and 26 | www.ncm.org

persecution, feeling danger at their heels as they grab what little they can from their homes. They arrive in an unfamiliar place, where in many cases they are not welcomed with open arms. To add to the depth of their struggle, most of the displaced people Sasha and Ira serve have at least one family member with profound intellectual or physical disabilities. Many are in need of medications or medical equipment, such as wheelchairs, which are often out of reach.

Sasha and Ira arrange transportation and help with visits to medical facilities. They act

as social workers, helping people navigate the bureaucracy required to receive assistance or even legal papers, which sometimes requires a 10-hour round trip drive to Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital city. They deliver food, medicines, blankets, and household supplies. They drive to several housing sites each day to check on families, praying with them and offering comfort.

Nabil, Sasha, and Ira introduced me to a young woman named Tanya and her 10-yearold daughter, Darina*. They have been in Odessa since March 2016. Darina has a severe case of cerebral palsy and experiences epileptic seizures. She has very little control over her muscles and is unable to sit upright or roll onto her side. Darina spends most of her days lying in bed. Tanya explains that in part it’s because “I cannot let her legs hang below her midsection because of a circulation issue.”

Darina’s eyes dance, though, when she looks out the window or follows along with the books her mom reads to her. Tanya wishes she could afford the medications Darina needs. She wishes she could get an appropriate wheelchair so her daughter could travel outside and keep her legs elevated properly.

“The cost is too much,” she says.

The stipend from the United Nations that she receives as an internally displaced person barely covers her rent and utility expenses. She would like to work, but employment is hard to find for those who aren’t openly welcome in the first place. Plus, who would watch her daughter while she goes to work? Some of this would be easier if Darina’s father were around. He left a long time ago, succumbing to the pressure of having a daughter with disabilities. The associated social stigma in Ukraine is pervasive, creating a disturbing level of discrimination and exclusion for individuals living with disabilities.

The buildings I visited were neglected badly and many had no heat, despite the fact that the displaced people living there are paying rent to a landlord. In mid-October it was already very cold inside. Another building, an orphanage abandoned for 30 years, lacked water and electricity as well.

When Sasha and Ira got to Odessa, they moved into a Soviet-style block building and slept on an air mattress for 86 days. “We have been here [in Odessa] three years, but it feels like ten,” Sasha says.

Sasha and Ira now live in a home that

Pastor Nabil owns. Sasha talks about his past crimes and sins and how he didn’t know how lost he was until he saw the truth. He looks Nabil in the eye and thanks him for showing what God’s love can do in a person’s life.

“I have many degrees,” Sasha says to his pastor, “but in your teaching I finally learned something new.”

God’s love has given Sasha and Ira the desire to work with others who have been displaced.

VIOLENCE IN EASTERN UKRAINE has displaced more than 2 million people to other parts of the country.

Although they are still in Ukraine, they are not home and are living much like refugees in their own country. In Odessa, the Church of the Nazarene is ministering to hundreds of displaced children and adults, many with disabilities and other specific needs. To learn more or support the ministry, go to ncm.org/Odessa.

AFFIRMING DIGNITY People who are displaced almost always want to go home. They want to go back to the life they knew, to the jobs they had, and to the family and friends they left behind. But for many the road is literally blocked, and across the eastern regions of Ukraine, the violence prevents people from returning. An often unrecognized hardship of being displaced is the loss of dignity and contribution people felt through their vocation and the disconnection they feel apart from family, friends, and community. Those who are displaced suffer not only because they have lost so much, but also because they have so much to give and almost no way to give it.

The Nazarene church in Odessa is focused

not only on meeting needs, but also on providing opportunities for displaced individuals to contribute to others and regain a sense of purpose and dignity. The plan for the home where Sasha and Ira live is to turn empty spaces into housing for other displaced families and to create a welding and iron workshop, where people can learn or hone skills and build a legitimate business.

The space in the building is rough and will probably remain so as they transition it into use for welding. It will take financial resources from the church, the efforts and resources

of those who are displaced, and sacrifices all around to make the workshop a reality. But as I stood in that dark space, the light filtering in through the gaps in the boards and my breath rolling out into clouds, I could begin to imagine the sparks flying off the welding torch and how much warmth might actually fill that space. n *Children’s names are changed for their protection.

Brandon Sipes is a program coordinator for Nazarene Compassionate Ministries, Inc., focusing on youth mentoring, conflict mediation, and refugee support. He and his wife, an ordained Nazarene elder and pastor, live in Ohio with their two children.

MEET DENY. Deny is 9 years old and lives in Odessa, Ukraine. His family moved there when violence forced them out of their hometown. He likes going to the Kids’ Club hosted by a Nazarene church in Odessa, and he hopes to become a teacher when he grows up. Right now, his family is struggling to give Deny everything he needs.

For $30 a month, you can provide Deny with education, life skills, nutrition, and an understanding of God’s deep love for him. Through NCM child sponsorship, you aren’t just giving the gift of much needed resources—you’re giving the gift of a future.

Will you help Deny learn what he needs to become a teacher—and to hold onto hope?

To inquire about sponsoring Deny or another child in Odessa, email cs@ncm.org or call 800.310.6362. To sponsor another child from anywhere in the world, go to ncm.org/sponsor.

Summer 2017 | 23

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GROWING

HOPE IN KOSOVA

How a church is embodying the good news through greenhouses

A GOD-GIVEN VISION

by Teanna Sunberg

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he interior of the newly erected greenhouse is foggy. The mist creates a hazy view, but if you look closely, you can see signs of new hope. Alban and Shqipe* are the owners of this greenhouse, which is helping to produce a new future.

“It seems like I am cursed,” Alban says.

“Everything that I have tried has always ended in disaster.”

Indeed, the couple, who lives in Sukareka, Kosova, has endured more than their share of heartbreak and broken dreams. Long years of poverty and hardship produced hopelessness and feelings of inadequacy. Yet much like green shoots pushing up through the ground, glimmers of hope are appearing.

Alban and Shqipe felt like no one really helped them before, and they are grateful to have meaningful work to engage in. They believe the greenhouse will give them a chance not only to generate income and be blessed themselves, but also to bless others.

This greenhouse, and others like it, are a ministry of the local Nazarene church in the community where Alban and Shqipe live. As the church works with families, they are also sowing an inspiring vision for the church.

Pastor Selim Kolgeci, 31, leads the Sukareka Church of the Nazarene. The church’s vision to build greenhouses began three years ago.

Kolgeci was praying about how the local congregation could embody the good news of Christ with both actions and words.

In this Balkan country, Christianity is a minority religion with a tattered recent history. The church must be intentional in its witness. The country is still suffering the effects of Communism, a violent conflict in the late 1990s, and a struggle for independence.

There are 60,000 people living in Sukareka and the surrounding villages, and the needs are great. Kosova is one of the poorest countries in Europe, and employment opportunities are few and far between.

Kolgeci began to pray that God would give the church a vision for a way to minister to families. In June 2015, he received the idea of greenhouses, and he approached Sarah Thibault, a Nazarene specialized assignment missionary serving in Kosova. Together, they created a plan to build nine greenhouses over the span of three years. The church specifically wanted to help widowed women, orphaned children, and people living with

Photos courtesy of Teanna Sunberg and Sarah Thibault

illness—those who are significantly vulnerable in the society.

Kolgeci and Thibault also wanted a way to avoid creating ongoing financial dependency on the church as well as generate income to keep the project going. The current model achieves those goals through a signed agreement between a recipient family and the church. The church provides building supplies and technical support. Each family agrees to donate 25 percent of their crops to feed others in need, and they agree to give 15 percent of the income to buy materials to build more greenhouses. Each family also commits labor and time toward the construction of the next greenhouse. At the end of three productive years, the greenhouse becomes the full property of the family.

This family received the second greenhouse in a project helping families in Kosova grow food to alleviate hunger.

Hope restored and bridges built through this greenhouse project carve deep paths in Kolgeci’s heart. Eighteen years ago, he was ROOTED IN COMPASSION The format is yielding wide participation and a teenager who narrowly escaped Suhareka unexpected successes. Part of the project’s alive during the violence of war in Kosova in 1989. After returning home, he budget provides for an agricultural came to know Christ and later expert who provides ongoing accepted God’s call to pastor consultation, as well as a within a non-Christian project manager. The ad“Everybody culture. ministration of the In 2000, Nazarene who benefits project falls to a group missionaries were consisting of a greenfrom or becomes in the area to help house team, church involved in the people rebuild their members, and the project knows that homes following the municipal governthis is from the war. The official church ment, all of whom are started when a group of church.” invited to help decide youth, including Kolgeci, which family receives began meeting regularly with the next greenhouse. The rethose missionaries. There are now sult is a supportive network that about 20 active members who are part of the crosses faith and social boundaries.

“We’re connecting greenhouse families congregation.

Kolgeci says that today, the greenhouse with church families in tangible and life-givexperience is continuing to sow a broader ing ways,” Kolgeci says.

The team also discovered that their bud- understanding of compassion within their get could actually accommodate five green- congregation.

“Everybody who benefits from or behouses per year because business owners in the community offered to sell construction comes involved in the project knows that supplies at lower prices when they found this is from the church,” he says. “I give all out it was helping people. Four greenhous- the praise to Jesus.”

As Kosova continues to face poverty and es were constructed by the end of 2016, and the first two families had donated 100 kilo- the after-effects of Communism and war, the grams of food to others. A fifth greenhouse church in this Balkan land is literally plantwas constructed in the spring of 2017, and ing the seeds of hope for the future. n another is already in process.

“I believe that at the completion of three *Names have been changed to protect privacy. years, we will have 15 greenhouses instead of Teanna Sunberg serves as a Nazarene missionary to the nine and that our network will have grown Central Europe Field, which includes the country of Kosova. much wider,” Kolgeci explains.

THE GREENHOUSE PROJECT IN KOSOVA

I

n Kosova, 45 percent of people struggle to put food on the table. In response, Nazarene churches in Suhareka and Prishtina are helping families build greenhouses as a way to provide nutrition, food security, and income. The project provides building materials to families who are in need and can sustain a greenhouse operation.

This project addresses many aspects of poverty. It addresses material poverty by providing nutrition and economic development opportunities. It also addresses spiritual poverty. Many in Kosova feel purposeless and hopeless due to lack of employment opportunities. This project gives individuals a way to provide for their families with dignity. It also addresses spiritual needs by connecting community members to the church through relationships.

To learn more about how you can partner with families in Kosova to cultivate hope, go to ncm.org/greenhouse.

Summer 2017 | 29

The World in Your Kitchen R E C I P E S F RO M S P O N S O R E D C H I L D R E N

By Stefanie Phelps, NCM Child Sponsorship

Photos by Aaron Phelps

At most Nazarene child development centers around the world, children get to share meals together regularly. But we rarely talk about what kinds of foods the children enjoy eating with their families. Here, sponsored children from three countries—Syria, Armenia, and Sri Lanka—share about their families and favorite recipes you can make in your own home. So break out a cutting board and get started!

Hummus

Hummus is common throughout the Middle East and is well loved in both Syria, where ELIAS* was born, and Lebanon, where he and his family now live as refugees. The 13-year-old says he was happy in his home country. He used to have a big house, many toys, and many friends. In Lebanon, his family lives in a very small house. But, he says, “it’s not important to have a big house. … I am really grateful because Jesus is answering my prayers and my needs.”

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(SYRIA)

INGREDIENTS:

PREPARATION:

2 cups (475 ml) drained, well-cooked chickpeas (reserve cooking water if possible), or about 2 cans of chickpeas, rinsed

1. If using canned chickpeas, rinse well and remove skins. (This is an important step to make sure your hummus is smooth.)

½ cup (120 ml) tahini (be sure to mix it well before using; use extra if you want creamier hummus)

2. Put the chickpeas, tahini, extra virgin olive oil, garlic and lemon juice in a food processor or blender.

¼ cup (60 ml) extra virgin olive oil, plus a little extra for garnish

3. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and blend, slowly adding chickpea cooking water to produce a smooth purée.

2 cloves garlic, peeled Juice of 1 lemon ¼ cup (60 ml) of water (or reserved cooking water from chickpeas) ¼ tsp. (1.23 ml) salt and ¼ tsp.

(1.23 ml) freshly ground black pepper 1 tsp. (5ml) ground cumin 1-2 tsp. (5-10ml) paprika for garnish

4. Add more salt, pepper, or lemon juice to taste.

5. Drizzle with remaining olive oil and sprinkle on paprika and parsley.

6. Serve with traditional pita or with veggies, pita chips, crackers, etc. *Children’s named are changed for their protection.

Shish Kebab INGREDIENTS:

and parsley. Toss lamb or beef with marinade until evenly combined, then pour into a re-sealable plastic bag and marinate in refrigerator at least 24 hours.

1 leg of lamb, cubed or 1-2 lb.

(450-900 g) cubed steak

2. Position oven rack in the middle and set oven to broil.

1 onion, roughly chopped

3. Remove meat from marinade and thread onto metal skewers, but keep the marinade. Thread remaining vegetables onto separate metal skewers and brush with reserved marinade.

(ARMENIA)

1 zucchini cut in ½ in rounds 1 cup or small container of small cherry tomatoes 1 green pepper roughly cut into wedges 6 mushrooms, stems removed 2 Tbs. (60 ml) coriander 1 Tbs. (30 ml) freshly ground pepper 1Tbs. (30 ml) minced garlic IRINA* lives in Russia with her brother, parents, and grandparents. “Most of my time I spend with my granny because my mum is busy at work,” she says.

Sometimes they cook together. Shish kebab is Irina’s favorite dish. In Armenia, where her mother and grandmother were born, they call it horovats. They like to cook it for special occasions. “It’s our national dish,” Irina says.

32 | www.ncm.org

¼ cup (5 g) chopped fresh parsley 1/8 tsp. salt 1/8 tsp. dried rosemary ½ cup (120 ml) extra virgin olive oil

4. Broil the skewers on a broiler pan, turning frequently. Cook onions for 12 minutes, meat for 10 minutes, green pepper for 7 minutes, and the mushrooms for 3 minutes. Remove from oven, and allow to cool slightly.* 5. Remove skewers from ingredients and set aside. Reassemble skewers, alternating lamb/beef, green peppers, onions, zucchini, mushrooms, and tomatoes. Place onto broiler pan and brush again with marinade. Discard remaining marinade.

PREPARATION:

6. Broil skewers again to finish cooking, turning frequently until the lamb or beef are medium to medium well (cooked to your liking) and the vegetables begin to blacken in spots, about 5 to 7 minutes.

1. Stir together olive oil, lemon juice, pomegranate juice and garlic; season with salt, pepper, coriander, dried rosemary,

*If you would like to cook these on a grill, turn and check them every 5-10 minutes.

2 cups (475 ml) pomegranate juice 1 Tbs. (15 ml) fresh squeezed lemon juice

Palagaaram

(SRI LANKA)

INGREDIENTS:

cardamom, shredded coconut, and water.

Blend till smooth.

2. Heat the coconut oil in a deep frying pan. Once hot, drop 1 Tbs. (15 ml) of

the batter into the oil. Cook each side 1-2 minutes or until golden brown on each side.

3. Serve warm, plain, or with butter.

1 cup (140 g) rice flour 1 ripe plantain ½ cup (100 g) sugar or 3/4 cup jaggery ½ tsp. (2.5 ml) cardamom or 3 pods ground finely with a mortar and pestle ½ cup (30 g) shredded coconut (sweetened or unsweetened) 1 Tbs. (15 ml) water 2-3 Tbs. (30 ml-45 ml) coconut oil

PREPARATION: 1. In a food processor or blender, mix together rice flour, plantain, sugar,

Palagaaram is usually made only for special occasions, which may be why GIHAN* and his brother love them so much. His mother makes the deep fried cookies during the month of November. Sometimes, Gihan is able to convince his mother and older sister to make them so he can share them with his friends at the child development center he attends. “I would eat five to eight palagaaram at a time!” he says.

BREAKING FREE FROM ADDICTION REHABILITATION CENTERS IN UKRAINE ARE TRANSFORMING LIVES Reporting by Andriy Tahktay, NCM CIS

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ergey’s hope had run dry when he entered the Nazarene rehabilitation center in Vapniarka, a small town in Ukraine, near the Moldovan border. Sergey, now 42, felt he had nowhere else to go, and this was his last resort.

A group of Christians Sergey met while he was in prison pointed him in the direction of the center.

“After release from prison, I tried to have the same lifestyle as before,” he remembers, “but I had neither the strength nor the health, nor the desire to return back to prison. I thought of the believers that I met in prison before and decided to attend their church service. They advised me to [go to] the rehabilitation center.”

Sergey had spent much of his life feeling alone. His father also spent most of his time in and out of prison, and his mother died when he was just 3 years old. While he was technically being raised by his grandparents, he spent much of his time on the streets.

He stole things, started drinking and using drugs, and joined a local gang. At 15, Sergey went to prison for the first time.

Frustrated with life, Sergey thought that perhaps starting a family would inspire him to live a sober life. But once again, his choices landed him in prison, and his new family crumbled. His health deteriorated, and he nearly had to have a leg amputated.

“I [had] lost everything,” Sergey says. “I had no home, no family, no money for living.

All I [had] left was prison and emptiness in my heart.”

Sergey’s story fully changed trajectory during his time in the rehab center. While there, he put his faith in Christ and was baptized after completing his program. Today, he continues to serve in the Vapniarka Church of the Nazarene.

“Thank the Lord for His love, care, and kindness that does not leave me!” Sergey says.

FREEDOM AND TRANSFORMATION There are many whose stories are like Sergey’s. Most find it difficult, if not impossible, to break free from addiction and old habits on their own. The instability of going in and out of prison doesn’t help. But in Nazarene rehabilitation centers across Ukraine, those experiencing addiction are finding freedom and transformation.

In the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), made of 11 former Soviet 34 | www.ncm.org

republics, including Ukraine, chronic alcoholism is a decades-long battle. In the CIS region, one in five deaths is related to alcohol. Local churches in Ukraine began to recognize the need for rehab centers that didn’t care for physical problems only. It seemed clear that souls needed careful care, too, in order to help people overcome addiction.

With transformation as the goal, the Nazarene centers focus on helping people facing addiction understand that they have value and purpose as children of God. Vladimir, 46, says his alcohol addiction began while serving in the military. “At first, I had a good family, good and steady job, but the passion for alcohol destroyed everything,” he says.

His participation in rehab took place in fits and starts, but Vladimir says once he decided to fully trust God with his life, “God delivered me from addictions here [at the Vapniarka rehab center].”

“MY LIFE BEGAN TO COME TO AN END BEFORE IT EVEN BEGAN. ... I JUST WAILED TO GOD AND ASKED HIM TO AND CHANGE MY LIFE. GOD HEARD MY PRAYERS.” Currently, 10 men live full-time at the men’s rehab center in Vapniarka. Its model combines counseling and therapy with productive work.

The model is the same at a Nazarene rehabilitation center for women’s in Selysche, Ukraine. Since it opened, more than 200 women, ranging in age from 18 to 60 years old, have benefited from the programming.

Many of the current staff also participated in the program, including the current director.

There are six Nazarene rehab centers in Ukraine. Since the first one opened in 2002, thousands of men and women have gone through the program.

LEAVING THE OLD BEHIND Alla, 45, came to the women’s center when she heard God urging her to go and sin no more. As a child, Alla was sent to boarding school when her mother, her sole support, got sick. She and her brother were left to themselves.

“Our education was entrusted to our country and the street,” Alla says. “Such freedom led me to smoke and drugs. My life began to come to an end before it even began.”

Many times, Alla tried to quit and change the way she was living. Nothing ever stuck, and she was in and out of jail. Like Sergey, she thought having a family might help her get on track, but her husband was also using drugs. Eventually, she was arrested for drug trafficking and sentenced to seven years in prison.

“Then I just wailed to God and asked Him to do something with me and change my life,” she says. “God heard my prayers.”

When she went to her next hearing, the judge announced that the charges had been dropped. So Alla sought out the center, where she now serves other women who are doing the hard work that leads to transformation.

At the center, Alla says, “I found a new family. I saw that my life was important to them.”

The women in the program go through group and work therapy, among other interventions. Residents plant, grow, and harvest

At the rehab center in Vapniarka, Ukraine, Sergey found hope in Christ and freedom from addiction.

Photos courtesy of NCM CIS

DO SOMETHING WITH ME

At the rehab center, Alla (front right) says,” I found a new family. I saw that my life was important to them.”

crops that help support the center. They also run small businesses. These commercial projects, which include making and selling frozen meals and clothing, not only provide for the center, but they also help develop marketable job skills for a smoother transition after the program is complete.

“Now I serve at the rehabilitation center,” Alla says. “I have peace in my heart that only God can give.” n

To learn more about or to support the CIS rehabilitation ministry, visit

ncm.org/RehabCenters.

Summer 2017 | 35

Photos courtesy of Enoch Tee and Aisling Zweigle

RICH IN RELATIONSHIPS In a Philippines community where others see only poverty, a local church sees potential

by Aisling Zweigle

36 | www.ncm.org

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he roosters begin to crow at 4 in the morning in Rowenas, a slum area in Manila, Philippines. Minutes ago Filipino ballads were being sung with gusto on a karaoke microphone. It is nearly dawn and some community members are just now going to sleep, while others rise to begin their day. Mothers prepare a small breakfast or purchase a small portion of rice and meat at an outdoor carinderia, a food stall with wooden benches. Some families can afford three meals a day every day; some can eat three meals a couple of days a week; some can never afford three meals.

Many families enlist the help of their children to put food on the table. Young ones can be found in filthy creeks and city streets spending hours scavenging for plastics and metals to add to their large, empty rice bags.

They’ll sell their finds for very little money to a recycler. Those who are able to attend school gather in uniforms to catch an early ride from a tricycle driver.

Millions of people live in Metro-Manila, and hundreds of marginalized communities like this one dot the city. The shanty homes are built in precarious places. The Rowenas

In Rowenas, an impoverished community in Mainila, women participate in livelihoods training and small business development.

Pastor Billy’s life was transformed through the mentorship he received through a Nazarene congregation.

community has built up along the ledge of a large creek. Daily, the water collects garbage from farther upstream. During rainy season, the waters, which are often filled with toxic contaminates, threaten to overflow. But here, there is life, too, and this creek also connects homes and lives.

Jackson Natividad pastors a Nazarene church called River of Life Community Fellowship, alongside the same creek and has tirelessly advocated for this community for four years now. This is where he, his wife, and their two daughters call home. Together with the local government, Asia-Pacific Nazarene Theological Seminary, and a network of supporters, the church is investing in the community.

RELATIONSHIPS LEAD TO CHANGE Without a holistic approach that meets needs and empowers long-lasting change, bellies do not stay full and families do not experience transformation. This is why the River of Life church makes an incredible effort to touch every facet of life in the community.

They understand that there’s no such thing as a quick fix for poverty and that relationships are the foundation for real change.

In the past, the church building was a place where gambling, cock-fighting, drinking, and drug use took place. Now that has changed.

Some of those battling addiction in the past now attend the church. One such youth, Billy, has been mentored and now serves as a pastor himself, leading ministries both inside Rowenas and in other communities.

When asked what life was like before the church shared the hope of Christ with him, Pastor Billy says, “My perception about the church is a place where religious and insane people gathered together. … I always tell myself and even my friends, ‘We will never become one of them!’ … I never thought that the Lord will use the church to transform my life.”

Before Billy encountered Jesus, he says, he was living without purpose. That changed when people from the Nazarene church in Rowenas mentored him and invested in his life.

“God used certain people in the church for me to understand the real meaning of life,” Billy says. “I came to realize that life must be lived to the fullest and must not be squandered.”

Billy set goals for himself. Eventually,

he also accepted God’s call to pastoral ministry, something he had never considered on his own. Today, he ministers to and mentors others who remind him of his old self.

EMPOWERED TO LEAD While the church’s focus in Rowenas is on whole-community transformation, the starting point is a sincere investment in the development of children. A Saturday feeding program nourishes bodies, and a Nazarene child development center housed in the church building provides education, emotional and relational support, and spiritual development for children and youth of various ages. A separate tutoring program is made possible through a partnership with students from the nearby Asia Pacific Nazarene Theological Seminary.

River of Life Community Fellowship has also started what they call KIDS Gen (short for Kids Intentionally Discipled for Salvation) in places where old churches were dying. At least 30 or 40 children enthusiastically participate in each local site. In Rowenas, it is more like 50 to 300 children, depending on the event.

Summer 2017 | 37

KIDS Gen also helps develop leadership potential as the youth get older. Many of the KIDS Gen and community outreach leaders are young adults Pastor Jackson and his co-leaders have mentored over the years in Rowenas and similar communities nearby.

Rose Ann is 18 years old. She is a great dancer with a bright, confident smile. She can often be found in choreography practice with children and youth. She has been leading the KIDS Gen ministry for two years and is being encouraged and equipped to use Jackson Natividad her gifts to teach, manage, and lead. Not too (center) pastors long ago, Rose Ann was a shy young girl, nev- River of Life er comfortable leaving her home. Now, she Community mentors children in the same way she was Church, where he focuses mentored. Inspired by Billy, she is hoping to on mentoring attend Bible college soon. and youth The changes in Rowenas are both deep leadership and wide. The transformation of individuals development. is actually moving toward the transformation of an entire community. One mom says she remembers when Rowenas was more the ideal solution. Instead, the church and dangerous; she had to pull the kids in and community worked with the government to lock the doors when a fight broke out with access water lines. weapons. Today, she points Michelle, a young teachto the growing peace. er who was also mentored “If you have three or four through the River of Life “If you have people in a community that church, remembers life bethree or four are really changed by Christ, fore there was safe water in then it is really powerful,” Rowenas. “We are so thankpeople in a Pastor Jackson says. ful that the clean water is community now in Rowenas,” she says.

DEVELOPING A “It sustains us and provides who are truly COMMUNITY for our daily needs.” changed by The church also helps care Community members for the health of the entire are also encouraged to focus Christ then community. They run a small on the future through ecoit is really health clinic that serves mostnomic development and lively pregnant women. They conlihoods. In 2015, the church powerful.” nect to local and government board initiated a savings resources as well as private system that helps people support for the provision of medicine. The use small loans to create small businesses. clinic also offers vaccinations, first aid and Participants start by saving 20 pesos a week preventive health care training, and parent- (about 40 cents USD). Out of the combined ing classes. They see 15 to 20 people each day. savings, individuals can take out loans, The church is also coming alongside the which they pay back through the businesses community as they work to access safe water they start. and hygiene education—basics for health.

Mrs. Fe, a mother of two young children, The initiative teaches community members was an early participant who started a cellto be leaders on issues related to their need phone data loading station with the help of for clean, potable water, as well as communi- the group. Now, she is able to support her cable disease prevention. family financially while still caring for young Because the creek that flows through children at home.

Rowenas is polluted, water wells were not The church also has created opportunities 38 | www.ncm.org

for women to participate in collective businesses. They have sold everything from ice to chickens and eggs, and they have started three sari-sari stores—small shops selling snacks and everyday items. The church also has three sewing machines that seamstresses can use.

Women can also paint and design small trinkets to be purchased and sold during seasonal holidays in department stores abroad.

“In times of need, these mothers are helping the church [too],” Pastor Jackson notes. With the income they earn, many are also contributing toward the ministries that have made a difference in their own children’s lives.

From the outside looking in, it would be easy to see only poverty and a lack of resources in Rowenas. But the church sees something different: the community’s potential for growth and development. They look at young people who have been written off by others, and they see future leaders.

They see individuals, young and old, who are each loved by a Savior and are able to share that good news with others.

“We are rich in relationships,” Pastor Jackson says. n Aisling “Ashling” Zweigle has served with her husband, Dr. Grant Zweigle, in pastoral ministry in the U.S. and Canada.

She is passionate about child advocacy and the church’s outreach to children-at-risk. Aisling has been serving as Nazarene Mission Corps volunteers in the Asia-Pacific Region.

This summer, she and her family will move to Nampa, Idaho (USA), where Aisling will serve as children’s pastor at Nampa First Church of the Nazarene.

Called to Compassion.

Where the Grass Is Green

God turns our little into a lot

by David Busic

T

Photos courtesy of Bethany First Church of the Nazarene

here’s a wonderful story in the Gospel of Mark. It’s the story of Jesus feeding the five thousand. The disciples are exhausted, and they’re overwhelmed with the needs of the people. They realize the crowd has nothing to eat, so they go to Jesus and say, “Please send them away so they can get something to eat.”

But Jesus said, “What do you have?

You feed them.”

They found five loaves of bread and two fish, and they gave them to Jesus.

He broke the bread and multiplied it, but before that He said something very interesting. He said, “Seat the people on the patches of green grass.”

That phrase has always struck me.

Why the green grass? What is the significance?

Throughout Scripture, green grass, whether it’s in Isaiah or Psalm 23,

A group from Bethany First Church gathered to pray over a community garden they helped build.

symbolizes the in-breaking kingdom of that water well and prayed, “God we’re God. bringing you what little we have. Please The green grass got me thinking do something extraordinary here.” about my first visit to Swaziland. Our Fred went home and designed a sochurch group was there to work with a lar-panel water well system. He said we health clinic, a church, and a school. We could make this for $25,000. We raised went to a mission site in an area called the money and went back and installed Sitsatsaweni in one of the most remote the very first solar-panel water well in parts of Swaziland.

Swaziland.

They were in a drought, and there was A year later, I went back to see what God no water for a community of 12,000 peo- had done in Sitsatsaweni. I couldn’t believe ple. Their fields were dry. They had no my eyes. There was green in all of the fields. crops. Their livestock were All of the pastures were dying. And we were there full of crops. The livestock “Then he ordered trying to do what we could were back. The children them to get all and to offer what we had. were running and laughing A man with us by the and playing. the people to sit name of Fred Evans said, As I looked at what down in groups “Pastor, I see a water well that fresh water had on the green across the way. Can I go done in that place that grass. … Taking look at that?” That well was so broken and the five loaves had not worked for years, so dry, I saw new life. but he came back and There, by the nurse’s and the two said, “I believe there’s wastation at the clinic, was fish, he looked ter there.” green grass. God’s kingup to heaven, As a group, we held dom was breaking in. and blessed and hands and stood around The Coca Cola Founbroke the loaves, dation found out about it and said they wanted to and gave them Left: Dr. Busic buy the design to build to his disciples met Rev. Pato, more. They had a milpastor of the to set before the lion dollars, and we said, Sitsatsawani people; and he Church of the “We want you to start Nazarene in divided the two with the seven Nazarene 2008. health clinics.” Now, fish among them there are thousands all. And all ate more people with water. and were filled.”

That happened be— Mark 6:39-42 cause a man named Fred at a Nazarene church in Oklahoma said, “Lord, I give you what I have. If you’ll take what I have and multiply it in Your hands, a miracle can happen.”

When we offer what we have, God will turn our little into a lot.

David A. Busic was elected general superintendent in the Church of the Nazarene in June 2013. At the time of his election, he had been president of Nazarene Theological Seminary since 2011. As pastor of Bethany First Church of the Nazarene, he helped found the Swaziland Partnership in 2007. He and his wife, Christi, live in Edmond, Oklahoma. They have three grown children and five grandchildren.

Summer 2017 | 27 39

Love in Action.

Prison Letters God’s Work Through Paper and Stamps

by Callie Stevens, NCM Communications

T

ed Warner never thought he would be sending out as many letters as he does—300 a week and sometimes more.

Certainly, he didn’t expect to be sending those letters to 43 prisons in seven states.

But each week, that’s exactly what he does.

About a decade ago, Ted started working as a corrections officer in the county jail in his hometown of St. Joseph, Missouri (USA). One day, an inmate named Joe asked to speak to him. He would like a

LETTER FOR LETTER “There was a time when I was handwriting letters and looking stuff up in the Bible for the guys, and then it got bigger and bigger and bigger,” Ted says. “Now, nine years later, it almost scares me sometimes because I know how important these letters are to the guys.”

“I thought I was overwhelmed with 40 [men to write to], and now I write to over 40 guys in two of the prisons,” he contin-

“It almost scares me sometimes because I know how important these letters are ...”

Bible, he told Ted. So the next day, Ted arrived at work with a simple Bible in hand.

About a week later Joe wanted to speak with Ted again. The Bible was great, he said, but could he get a study Bible?

“I told him the Bible was not special in itself unless it was read and its message applied,” Ted says.

Joe explained that he was leading a small Bible study during the inmates’ free time every day. So Ted brought him a study Bible. When Joe was transferred to prison, he asked if he could write to Ted. It would be the first of many letters they sent. Joe and Ted wrote each other regularly, and Joe started spreading the word. Soon, more and more men in the prison wanted to write Ted, too.

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Photos courtesy of Ted Warner

Above: Ted Warner Ted has turned an empty office at Turning Point Church of the Nazarene in St. Joseph, Missouri, into the base for a ministry sending hundreds of letters each week to men who are in prison.

ues. “You kind of grow with it. I’ve grown in my faith with these guys, too.”

Ted sends out a weekly five-page newsletter—the maximum most prisons allow— with Bible studies, crosswords, encouragement, and Scripture passages. When anyone writes back, he replies individually.

“They know me by first name at the post office,” Ted laughs.

Ted bases his ministry out of an unused office in his church, Turning Point Church of the Nazarene in St. Joseph. There, he has filing cabinets full of ideas for future letters and archives of past ones. He encourages recipients to go to chapel and get involved in a Bible study.

“Whatever you do,” he writes, “get involved and tell your story to someone.”

Sometimes content stands out in the pages of his archives, and he knows it’s what he should include that week.

“Every week,” Ted says, “I get personal letters—three to five a day—of people saying, ‘Thank you so much for what you sent, and you don’t know, but I’ve had this question for years and something you wrote answered it for me.’”

LOVED, NOT FORSAKEN Usually, Ted sends letters to men he’s never met and probably never will. A few of the relationships are a different, though. Several years ago, Ted got connected with Eddie, who at the time was wading through serious depression. No one had written Eddie since his mother died seven years prior, and another inmate who was receiving Ted’s letters noticed he was struggling. The man wrote to Ted and asked him to reach out to Eddie.

Eddie replied to Ted’s letter immediately. The letter was meant to warn him away: No one should want to be friends with a man like him, Eddie wrote.

“And I thought, ‘Man, here’s somebody who really, really needs God in a special way,’” Ted says.

The two men wrote each other for years and have met in person in the prison

several times. While one slowly encouraged, the other slowly accepted that God could love him. Now, Eddie reads the Bible all the way through twice a year and shares it with other inmates.

Recently, Eddie learned that he lost his appeal for parole and would spend the rest of his life in prison. Ted asked how he felt. Eddie replied that he found Jesus in

the costs of the ministry—he spend close to $400 USD a month on postage alone— but for the most part, he funds the ministry himself. He has been working past retirement in order to sustain this work he feels called to do.

“Regardless of age or ability, everyone should be doing something to touch the world for good and for God.”

“Everyone should be doing something to touch the world for good and for God.” prison, so it is all right because he knows what he has to look forward to. According to Ted, Eddie is a completely different man than he was four years ago.

“He’s my brother in Christ,” Ted says.

Many of the men Ted writes are in places similar to where Eddie was spiritually and emotionally. Some have been forsaken by relatives and others drove their friends and families away. Every week, Ted makes sure to remind the men reading his letters that they aren’t forsaken, but loved by God. “It just seems to work,” he says. “And it works because God is directing it.”

Occasionally, Ted receives unrequested financial contributions to help cover

Anyone who wants to write Ted from prison can do so by emailing a letter to teda7157@yahoo or mailing a letter to P.O. Box 8981, St. Joseph, MO 64508.

WHAT’S YOUR STORY? We want to hear your stories! How are you or others you know living compassion as a lifestyle? How is your church living compassion in your community? And how have you seen compassion change lives?

Let us know at ncm.org/story.

Summer 2017 | 41

Snapshot.

These children both had to flee the ongoing violence in Syria with their families. They wound up in Jordan, where they have found a safe place at a Nazarene school. Through scholarships, children living as refugees are able to attend the school, where they can heal from their trauma and hold on to hope for the future.

To read stories of children and families affected by the refugee crisis, turn to page 14.

To learn more about the Church of the Nazarene’s refugee response work, go online to ncm.org/refugees.

42 | www.ncm.org

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change a life.

Through Workplace Giving, you can make a difference for children and families around the world.

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workplacegiving@ncmi.org

NAZARENE COMPASSIONATE MINISTRIES Church of the Nazarene 17001 Prairie Star Pkwy Lenexa, KS 66220 (800) 310-6362 info@ncm.org

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For more information, contact the Church of the Nazarene Foundation at 866-273-2549 • info@nazarenefoundation.org • www.NazareneFoundation.org.