When God calls you to move, you just obey.
That’s the story of Rev. Adel, an Egyptian pastor who now serves a Presbyterian Church in Dohuk, Iraq.
In early 2024, Rev. Adel and his wife, Dr. Fayrouz, felt a call from God to pastor a new congregation in Iraq. They took that leap of faith and moved, with their two kids, to Iraq in August 2024.
They were called to the Dohuk Church, a new Presbyterian church that was started in 2023. Located in northern Iraq’s Kurdistan region, near the Turkish and Syrian borders, Dohuk is a traditional city with a large Muslim population. Prior to 2023, there was no Presbyterian church in Dohuk. The nearest was almost 300 miles away in Baghdad.
Rev. Adel remembers that first year as challenging. It was hard for the kids to settle in. It was hard for his wife, who had given up her career as a doctor, to move to Iraq. The region was unstable, even then.
And yet, amid the challenges, God has been faithful to Rev. Adel and his family. Today, just over two years later, the Dohuk church is growing! They welcome around 45 people to worship each Sunday, bringing together people from multiple backgrounds, cultures, and languages. Despite the differences, they worship together and then gather for a time of joyful fellowship.
Rev. Adel and his family are starting to feel more settled and now consider Dohuk home, or at least their home away from home. The feeling was solidified this fall, when the Dohuk Church gathered for an all-church conference that brought together children, youth, and adults for joyful and energetic worship and teaching.
But God wasn’t finished calling Rev. Adel to something new. One day a small group of the displaced Yazidi people came to the church to visit Rev. Adel. They lived at the Khanke Camp just 20 miles from Dohuk. It is home to more than 2,000 displaced Yazidi families. The group began to explain the challenging situation at the camp and wondered if the church could do anything to help.
The Yazidi people are an ethnoreligious minority indigenous to northern Iraq, particularly the region west of Dohuk. For generations, they have faced religious discrimination, persecution, and repeated attempts to force them from their ancestral homeland. But the most devastating recent chapter in their history began in August 2014 when the Islamic State (ISIS) launched a systematic campaign of violence against Yazidi communities in northern Iraq. The results were devastating. Thousands of Yazidi men were executed, thousands of women and children were captured, young boys were taken from their families, and tens of thousands were forced to flee. They faced starvation and dehydration before humanitarian assistance and military intervention helped them escape. Homes, villages, religious sites, and cultural landmarks were destroyed. Entire communities were uprooted.
In 2015, Kurdish forces retook the area from ISIS; it did not mean the end of the Yazidi crisis. Many are still displaced, including those who live at the Khanke Camp. Thousands are still unaccounted for. Survivors continue to live with the psychological and emotional effects. Sinjar, their ancestral home, remains severely damaged and without basic infrastructure.
Hearing their story, the seed of a new vision was planted in Rev. Adel’s heart and mind. That seed became the plans for the New Life Center, a community-based initiative of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Dohuk, at the Khanke Camp. The center aims to provide a safe and welcoming space where children, young people, and families can receive practical support and have opportunities to learn, grow, develop new skills, and build meaningful relationships.
With that vision in mind, Rev. Adel and the leaders of the Dohuk Church approached the authorities and requested approval to establish the New Life Center. The authorities welcomed the initiative and approved the establishment of the center, making this ministry the only one accepted by the government to operate in Khanke Camp under the name of a church.
And in a story that only God can write, opening the center also opened the door for Rev. Adel’s wife, Fayrouz, to use her skills and experience as a doctor. Right now, the Khanke Camp has no female doctor, but the New Life Center will establish a basic clinic to provide healthcare services. That clinic will be staffed by Dr. Fayrouz.
Through the activities of the New Life Center, the Dohuk Church seeks to be present in the community and respond to genuine needs through practical service. It will provide long-term opportunities to build trust, develop meaningful relationships, and walk alongside individuals and families. At the same time, the church hopes to reflect the love of Christ through the way it serves the community, simultaneously creating opportunities for people to encounter the Christian faith through practical care, compassion, and genuine relationships.
THE OPPORTUNITY
The Presbyterian Church in Iraq is growing! Today our Presbyterian family in Iraq is represented by faithful congregations in Dohuk, Kirkuk, Baghdad, Basrah, Mosul, and Erbil. These congregations provide a spiritual home for their communities, emergency relief, and other community services, including schools and refugee camps. Amid difficult circumstances, these churches serve with love and integrity in witness to the Good News.
The Outreach Foundation is seeking gifts to support the mission and ministry of the Iraq Partnership. All gifts of any size are welcomed to assist the Presbyterian Churches of Iraq in their ministries, which are not sustainable by the small congregations alone.
You may make a gift by sending a check to the address below with the partner name Iraq Partnership in the memo, or you can donate on our website: www.theoutreachfoundation.org.
