Christian Refugees Fund
			Followers of Jesus in numerous nations have become refugees due to war and ethnic strife.

Christian Refugees

The photo above is of a 70-year-old refugee who lives in Western Kenya named Jane. She has lived in the same village all her life. In January of 2008, after what appeared to have been a rigged national election, she and her husband found themselves in the middle of political/tribal attack on her village. Jane's husband was ill, and the attackers burnt his house down with him inside as she watched. Then they took Jane about a mile away and raped her. The reason? She was born into the Kamba tribe, the same tribe as the newly-appointed vice-president of Kenya.

Heaven's Family representatives found Jane sleeping with five hundred other refugees in an abandoned Catholic school. They gave her a sleeping mat, a blanket, clothes and some food. She has lost not only her husband of many years, but everything she owned. So she'll be starting over.

The wives of those two Heaven's Family representatives spent several hours with Jane, counseling her through her grief, trauma, and shame. And they shared the gospel. In the end, she received the Lord Jesus. They report: "She is so happy to know that her sins are forgiven." Our representatives also wrote that "she has also forgiven those who raped her."

Using funds from the Christian Refugees Fund, they have rented a home for Jane and given her a $200 grant to start a small grocery business. Her business has already made her self-sufficient. The fruit of Jane's new faith is showing. She's invited three refugee families to live with her in her house!

But there is more. A church has been started in Jane's house. Our representative in Kenya wrote,

After we led her to Christ, she asked us to recommend to her a church to go to. We told her we would bring a church closer to her! The fellowship in her house and among these refugees is wonderful.

All over the world there are Christian refugees who have been displaced from their homes and countries because of war, natural disasters, and persecution. These refugees struggle to rebuild their lives with the little they are able to take with them. I Was Hungry has served not only Kenyan refugees, but Sri Lankan refugees, persecuted believers in India, and Iraqi refugees living in Turkey. (Click on the "slideshow" link above for a few other stories.)

When we help fellow believers who are suffering as refugees, we are helping Jesus, who will one day say, "I was hungry...I was thirsty...I was naked...I was sick...and you loved Me."