Kyiv and back….
Monday, June 26, 2006
Kyiv and back….
The spiritual and physical needs of many in our world are staggering. Very often in the ‘West’ we are sheltered from what are the harsh realities of every day life for so many people on this planet.
On Thursday and Friday last week, I was in Kyiv (or Kiev) in Ukraine. Myself and Brian Jose, another UK pastor, were visiting a man named Pavel who works among street children in the city. These children have no parents and have no homes either. Many break into the basements of buildings and live in there until such time as they are discovered and forced to move on. It can be very difficult for some of them to access help because they have nothing to identify them. They cannot prove who they are. Certain ones can successfully be placed in orphanages, but for others that is too much to cope with and they run away again.
We visited an orphanage/rehab centre called ‘the Ark’ and met Maks and Ivana, two of the children Pavel has been helping. They have settled happily into the Ark and are getting on well. Their father is in prison and their mother, who was a prostitute, committed suicide some time ago. Maks was addicted to glue before he was ten years old. And yet, as Pavel has shown the selfless love of Christ in reaching out to those who noone else cared for, these children now have a hope and a future. Barbara and the others at the Ark feed them, clothe them, love them and educate them, until they are able to stand on their own two feet as adults in their society. We met others, now older teenagers, who have had contact with Pavel over many years, and are now Christians themselves. These boys now help Pavel in running his summer camps - camps which have had such a positive effect over the years in the lives of these children.
Brian and I were visiting on behalf of Radstock in order to understand more of what Pavel is doing, support him in his work, and encourage interest and support among churches out there. We met a Presbyterian Minister from Kyiv whose church also has an interest in reaching street children. They have a family in the church that has fostered some children already, and they would like to expand this further. They want to place children into the secure nurturing context of loving Christian homes. It was good to be able to introduce Ivan and Pavel to one other and we pray their ministries will complement one another.
The need is huge. The people of God must work together. We want to encourage churches to link together to support this work. That means churches in Ukraine itself, but it also means churches in other places getting involved too. It would be great to have a few churches in the UK or the US who would make this work something they were specifically committed to - in terms of prayer, finance, and where possible, going!
‘Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: To look after orphans and widows in their distress…’
