Critical Need and a Matching Gift
Jan 16, 2023
- Jacob Tornga with Tom Albinson
Some of our oldest partnerships are with refugee churches in Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya, and Dzaleka Refugee Camp in Malawi. These relationships stretch back for more than 10 years, and involve shared experiences of joy and loss, praise and lament, laughter and tears.
Need: Refugee Church Buildings
Our role in these partnerships is to listen to what God has put on the hearts of our refugee friends in terms of their assessment of their needs and their vision for what God is calling them to do in their communities.
While visiting them this past fall, our brothers and sisters highlighted again that helping them with constructing and refurbishing refugee church buildings is a critical need.
Need: Places where refugees can make a meaningful contribution
Innocent Magambi, founder of There Is Hope Malawi, was a refugee in Africa for more than 27 years. He often talks about how churches, through their daily activities, give refugees a place to make a meaningful contribution to their communities. Churches provide a place where they can use their gifts, talents, and passions to bless others.
Refugee churches change the message
Life in refugee camps is lived in dependency on humanitarian agencies. While helping the people survive, this endless dependency strips people of their dignity and dehumanizes them. It communicates to them that they are simply people in need and that they have nothing valuable to offer society.
But refugee churches change the message. They are communities in which everyone contributes and has something valuable to offer.
Let's invest in the refugee church!
Between now and the end of this month, you can take advantage of a matching gift to help provide refugee churches with building materials. Thanks to a generous financial partner, all donations to IAFR's Refugee Church Building project will be matched up to $5,000.
Time is running out to take advantage of this matching gift!
CLICK HERE to help refugee churches today!
CLICK HERE to learn more about our Refugee Church Building Project.