This is the first in our series of "God Stories."  Each month we will bring you another chapter from the ever evolving story of God's work among His people around the world.

Our church has had a long history of resettling refugees, stretching back to the 1980s with refugees from Bosnia, one of whom is now the church's Nursery Director.  The most recent family arrived in late 2008 from Iraq.  We had been given to understand that they were Muslims, and one of our members had a prayer rug from a military tour in Iraq.  He brought it to the airport when we went to meet the family of four, but the mother quickly informed us that they were Christians. As we helped them get settled, we discovered that they had been a family of five, but their 14 year old daughter had been kidnapped.  After exhausting their resources to pay the ransom, the terrorists had killed her.  Soon afterwards, their church was burned, and they fled to Syria.  Two years later, the UN brought them to the US.

Despite the loss of their daughter, and displacement to the US, the family remained strong in their faith, and God blessed their trust.  The husband found a good job assembling cryogenic systems (he had been a plumber) and the wife became a hotel maid (she's now a supervisor).  Muslim Iraqi refugees who had arrived about the same time began to take note of their faith and the ways in which God continued to bless them.  One of them even asked that they pray to "their God" that he might find an affordable car - the next day he found one!  Another, a believer in John the Baptist of the Mandean sect, who was blind and embittered, discovered an Egyptian Christian Preacher on the internet whose programs were in Arabic.  Within a year, he had accepted Christ. When he became ill in 2011, he called the Iraqi Christian family to make them promise that if he should die, they would teach his children about Jesus!

One church member helped the family find a serviceable sedan that they could afford.  Another had a friend who wanted to donate a van to charity, and suggested that he sell it to them for $500.  Most recently, the family decided that they had saved enough money to buy a house, and a realtor from the church agreed to serve as their agent.  They soon found a small home for sale by the original owners of 50 some years, and offered $10,000 below asking with $7,500 in closing costs.  The owners accepted!  Did I forget to mention that this 1,100 square foot home had 4 bedrooms (A Grandmother is expected to join them soon), 1 1/2 baths, a whole house generator, two outside storage buildings, a brand new HVAC unit, and a $30,000 sunroom addition?  God provides more than we can possibly imagine!

The rest of this God story is that the real estate agent, after hearing how God richly had blessed this family's faith throughout  their trials, allowed as how he needed to become more involved in the church and start building his own faith!