Fleeing from the recent war in Nagorno Karabakh and unable to return home, an English teacher with a heart for children and teenagers experiences God’s love through OM relief workers.
Fleeing from the recent war in Nagorno Karabakh and unable to return home, an English teacher with a heart for children and teenagers experiences God’s love through OM relief workers.
Waiting for war
"We always expected the war,” says Marine, 33, a refugee from Nagorno Karabakh who fled a fresh outbreak of a decades-long conflict in September 2020, along with over 90,000 other displaced people.
“I always waited for the sounds of war – it was in my ears and I expected to hear it. On the 27th of September when we woke up to this sound, we saw drones everywhere... we saw fires where they dropped bombs.”
On the opening day of hostilities an army point near Marine’s house was targeted. Marine and her husband were forced to flee to Armenia with their 4-year-old daughter. They are now sheltering in a sparsely furnished and dimly lit hotel in an Armenian mountain valley, with 180 other refugees, crowded into small rooms with their few belongings. This is their third temporary accommodation arrangement in five months, and a situation replicated across Armenia.
No hope of return
Back home in Nagorno Karabakh, Marine was an English teacher, but she likes to describe her work differently: “I don't like to say I am a teacher... I am a friend for them. Even now, we have contact with each other. They call me and ask for help with their homework!”
“My mission is working with children and teenagers,” she says. “I taught in Sunday schools; I taught the Bible. I helped them to accept Christ in their life as [their] Saviour.”
Marine’s village now lies within territory handed over to Azerbaijan in a recent treaty, making return impossible for her. An estimated 23,000 people taking refuge in Armenia do not have viable options to go home.
Holding back tears, Marine says “My biggest dream is to enter my school, my village, with the same group of people… it is unbearable, when you think about the place you were born, and can't return.”
He cares for me
Despite the upheaval of war, and with no home to return to, Marine can see God’s hand amidst the present insecurity of life. “Yesterday when I was reading the New Testament… I started to think that God is with me, He cares for me, because He put Christian people on my way.”
Marine describes the Jesus followers she has met along her journey: an Armenian woman who welcomed in 15 refugees to her home, the daughter of a pastor who helped them find their current accommodation, and the OM workers who have brought urgently needed winter clothes for her daughter and other refugee children. “It was a big encouragement for me, because when He puts brothers and sisters beside me I think it is like He is beside me.”
OM has distributed children’s winter clothes in this mountain valley location, made possible through the willingness of local workers to practically demonstrate God’s love to those in need, supported by the expertise of OM’s International Disaster Response team. This emergency relief has allowed children to play outside and attend school in the depths of winter, when temperatures are well below zero and the snow lies deep.
Marine talks of her gratitude for OM’s support, and the moment when she was told that a coat and boots could be provided for her daughter. “I was so happy, I think that it is God’s plan.”
Marine’s biggest desire is for a future for her daughter, a future that is free from danger and fear.
“I have a hope in God, I trust in God. I trust Him to prepare for us... good days.”