Over the past three years it has been a privilege
to minister into six orphanages the Odessa region of
Ukraine. They are located around the city as well as
way out in the country in remote areas. These precious
children have come from situations where parents have
died, single mothers have been unable to support the
children and simply abandoned them, or parents have
been at risk as a result of drug or alcohol abuse,
or being HIV positive. Many of the children left home
at a young age ( 8 years of age some of them) because
their mothers were running a brothel from home (many
children didn’t know who their fathers were)
and the  visiting men were paying their mothers
more to rape and molest the children. These street
kids found it more bearable to live on the streets,
in abandoned stinking tenement buildings, or in the
drains under the city. Some have been brought into
orphanages but many have chosen to live on the streets
or under them.
A young man, Oleg Vasilchuk, who was
my interpreter in the Ukrainian and Russian churches
in Sacramento, California many years go, moved back
to Odessa to start a ministry called “Lend a Hand” to
help these children. I have made a commitment to help
Oleg and help these needy children. Through the donations
of concerned people we’ve been able to provide bedding,
food, medicines, fruit, school requisites, uniforms
and books, heating for the very cold winter months,
as well as toys for their enjoyment – they’ve had very
little of that in their short, tragic lifetime. One
young man named Victor needed treatment for a serious
heart complaint. We paid for that at once to prevent
a life threatening situation.
We are concerned also
with the spiritual well being of these needy children
and provide Bibles and Christian literature for them
to grow in their faith. It has been a joy to lead many
of them to Christ personally, with Oleg’s help as interpreter.
He regularly leads a team to minister the Word of God
to the orphans.
Very often the buildings that house
and school them need repair, and we have endeavoured
to renovate the buildings and even replace flooring
that has rotted. Just recently I visited an old disused
building in Odessa that Oleg found to house the 45
street kids. We paid the first month’s
rent, but it needs a huge amount to clean and renovate this accommodation for
these valuable young lives. Please stand with us in this vital venture. |
