“After losing my home to the wildfire, I found myself in a very distressing situation."

Carolina, 43, was devastated by the fires that raged through Chile during the first week of February, 2024, following days of extreme heat.

“I felt like I had lost everything and didn't know how to move on," she shared.

More than 160 fires burned at once, and the disaster left Carolina and at least 1,600 other people homeless in and near the city of Viña del Mar. A total of 130 people lost their lives in the blazes that have now been linked to arson.

When wildfires devastated parts of the island of Maui, Hawaii, Nazarene churches were there to provide hope and healing. Now that the initial relief work is done, the focus of these congregations is shifting to providing long-term, sustainable compassionate ministry in their community. Learn more in the video below.

On February 6, 2023, at 4:17 a.m., the people of Aleppo, Syria, were fast asleep. Heavy rain and hail were rattling against the houses.

Pastor Oswald, a local Nazarene pastor, has been particularly thankful for the safety of his house lately. It has been a tough decade for the residents of Aleppo. Since March 2011, Syria has been in the throes of a violent civil war. More often than not, for Oswald and his family, sleep has been interrupted by the sounds of war.

Across the world, food insecurity is an ongoing struggle that has been exacerbate

In March of 2023, Cyclone Yaku caused devastation across northern Peru, with rains causing rivers to overflow and landslides adding to the loss of lives, homes, businesses, and schools. At least 71 people died, and more than 131,000 people were impacted. As the summer of 2023 continued, heavy rains continued to plague the country. By August, the Government reported 839,760 people needing humanitarian aid since the start of the rainy season in January. Of this group, 123,691 people have been rendered homeless, and 48,903 houses are reported destroyed or uninhabitable.

This summer’s rainy season in Nepal brought heavy rainfall, causing severe landslides in several districts. Villagers in the small town of Mehele were especially impacted from rains and slides at the beginning of July. More than 50 families were displaced from their homes and most crops were damaged or destroyed. Nazarene Compassionate Ministries in Nepal distributed food relief packs to almost all the families impacted in the area. Contents included essentials like rice, lentils, oil, and salt. Other distributions included tarps for shelter and soap.

VAPNIARKA, UKRAINE

“We had no clue what was going on and what we will do.”

With that simple statement, Tolik Galagan sums up the deep feelings of Ukrainians who were stunned when war broke out in their nation. It was February 24, 2022, and in Vapniarka, where Galagan leads the local Church of the Nazarene, confusion soon turned to fear and grief.

“The church was very panicked,” said Galagan. “Everybody was sad that tragedy came to our country.”

Marsha* is a sponsored 17-year-old girl in the Philippines. She’s overcome many challenges across the years, including her family losing their home when Super Typhoon Rai hit the nation at the end of 2021. The storm damaged or destroyed millions of houses, at least 16,000 schools, and 330 health clinics, eventually impacting close to 10 million people.

In Przemyśl, Poland, the global Church of the Nazarene has been responding since the onset of war in Ukraine.

When the war broke out, the first Nazarene responder at the Polish-Ukrainian border was a Syrian pastor, seeking ways to serve. Soon after, a team formed, putting out the call for volunteers to come and physically provide resources to the hundreds of thousands of people fleeing their homes.

On the outermost edge of Indonesia sits an island called Nias, a land that has suffered various blows from many natural disasters.