ISIS got my money - no regrets

What does it take to pack up your life, your wife, and three children, the youngest just nine weeks old and move to a war zone?

For Tim Buxton, it wasn't recklessness. It was calling.

Born in the jungles of Papua to missionary parents, Tim was wired from his first breath for a life most people would never dare. In 2014, on the exact day ISIS swept across the border and two million refugees fled into Iraq's Kurdistan region, Tim's family landed at Erbil airport — wide-eyed, oblivious, and exactly where they needed to be.

What followed were three and a half years of one of the most raw, costly, and profoundly human experiences you'll ever hear described. Building micro-villages for Yazidi genocide survivors. Sitting with fathers whose daughters had been sold into slavery. Midnight escapes through ISIS-held territory in a car with no air conditioning and a smuggler's stash of contraband. The weight of two million stories pressing down on one man who had no money, no government backing, and no roadmap only purpose.

But this episode isn't just about war zones. It's about what happens when you come home.

It's about compassion fatigue and PTSD. About depression and driving Uber at 2am. About the moment Tim realised that the refugees he'd served in Iraq had followed him to Toowoomba, Australia — and what he did when they knocked on his doorstep.

It's about his organisation You Belong (youbelong.org.au), which has spent a decade turning displaced strangers into neighbours, and volunteers into people who matter.

And ultimately, it's about the one question that underpins everything Tim has ever done:

Do you believe a stranger is just a friend you haven't met yet?

This is one of the most moving, perspective-shattering conversations we've ever had on Tomorrow Is Not Today. Stay for the whole thing. You'll leave different.

Chapters

00:00 I Find Peace in Chaos