by: Scott Vair | President/CEO (originally published in 2013)
When World Orphans work began in Iraq in 2008, we envisioned residential care for orphaned and abandoned children through the indigenous church. It quickly became clear that this was not the best solution in this Muslim-dominated culture. The Lord led us to the northeastern corner of the country, Soran, in the Kurdistan region. We soon learned of the Freedom Martyrs’ Quarter—a government housing project made up of approximately 250 homes given to relatives (mostly orphans and widows) of those who lost their lives fighting in the civil war between Kurdish tribes 15 to 20 years ago. The governor implored us to build a community center in this area.
The community center project, “The Refuge,” is an 8,000 square foot, two-story building with multiple classrooms, a café, library, conference room, and a 250-seat meeting hall/multi-purpose room, complete with bathrooms and a kitchen. It sits on an acre of land in the middle of this community with enough land for a soccer field, playground, and garden.
The Kurds are commonly known as the largest people group in the world (close to 40 million) without a country of their own. Most live in eastern Turkey as an oppressed minority of the Turkish government. Just across the border in Northern Iraq, however, is the beginning of a democratic society of five million ruled and run by Kurds. Some have characterized the Kurds as the “Jews of the Muslim world” being constantly mistreated, pinpointed for genocide by Saddam, and forcibly dispersed between the nations of Iraq, Syria, Turkey, and Iran.
The Refuge provides a way to engage families (many with single orphans, having lost a mom or a dad). We provide training for women, including English, sewing, and exercise classes, as a way to improve their quality of life, increase morale, mentor, give increased confidence, and provide a possible means of future income. Other opportunities include health and hygiene, computer training, and finance. The Refuge is a place of support that these families sorely need.
We are building relationships and earning trust by caring for orphans and widows. Consider this short excerpt from the chapter “Building Bridges of Love” from Perspectives on the World Christian Movement workbook by the US Center for World Mission:
“Missionaries can only make their message clear if they are recognized as credible messengers. How can missionaries from foreign cultures be received as trustworthy? Ever since Paul’s day, missionaries have been learning about effective relationships that span the gap between cultures. Forming relationships is essential to conveying the message to other cultures…It is their love that opens the way for their speech. That love becomes the authentication of Christ’s love. The heart of mission work is building bridges of love.”
Mission work provides a bridge of love to Christ so that the veil Paul talks about in 2 Corinthians 3:14 can be lifted: “But their minds were hardened. For to this day, when they read the old covenant that same veil remains unlifted, because only through Christ is it taken away.”
This is a Muslim land. We are outsiders. We are building bridges of love for orphans and widows, so that Christ might remove the veil and they might see his glory, that he might adopt them into his eternal family.
We are also building a soccer field next to the community center. As a “no strings attached” gift to the community, this will be a clear demonstration of love for the Kurdish people and will give us a stronger platform for ministry, enabling us to interact with hundreds more children that might otherwise not be allowed to come to our center.
2023 UPDATE // BY Billy Ray
When we wrote the story of The Refuge in 2013, we had no idea what God had been preparing, or that the building providentially named, The Refuge, would literally become a safe place for those running for their lives.
In 2014, ISIS invaded Iraq and unleashed a massive wave of displacement as nearly two million refugees and internally displaced peoples (IDPs) flooded into the Kurdistan region of Northern Iraq. Going once more to the mayor, we asked, “What can we do to help?” The mayor had just been informed of 20 families that had only escaped the grip of ISIS by one hour being tipped off by a friend in a neighboring village. “Can you help find shelter for these 20 families?” the mayor asked. We said that we could which began a massive week-long effort to build our first micro refugee camp on our property, right next to our community center that we had named, the Refuge.
As the full extent of ISIS’s atrocities came to light, more and more refugees needed temporary shelter and later permanent homes as ISIS dug in while destroying everything in their path. We ended up building five micro camps around the city housing more than 850 refugees and IDPs, but then we realized, “All of these children are going to need to be educated… How are they going to continue their schooling?” After conferring with our leadership, we knew that we had to build a school. So, in the fall of 2016, we opened the first refugee school in our region to assist in the growing humanitarian crisis erupting around us.
A year later, as the situation looked to continue indefinitely, the government asked if we could make many of the homes permanent dwellings and build a medical clinic that would prioritize the refugees’ needs.
What began as a simple vision to help care for vulnerable families, sprung into building over 75 homes for refugees and IDPs, supplying for the children’s education through our refugee school, caring for their medical and dental needs through our medical clinic, and, finally, developing vocational courses that created a true artisan skills training program for a whole host of women desiring to play a part in helping their families survive in these new conditions.
Now, seventeen years into this vision, we have built over 100,000 square feet of infrastructure for the city of Soran allowing for the care of hundreds of refugees and IDPs, giving them a place to call home, creating pathways for towards independent living, displaying our faith through our deeds, and pointing to the gracious hand of our Heavenly Father who gave up his Son for us all. He is our refuge.
This article was originally published in the World Orphans Fall Insight Magazine 2023.