Without further ado…the children

The time has finally arrived when I can show you more photos of the orphans at Yurievets. These aren’t all the orphans, but they are a good majority. Pray for them. Pick one group, pick several, pick all of them. Whatever you do, remember that you are one of very few people praying for these kids.

Your prayers matter! God promises that he hears them all.

Group 1 (Vanya, Oksana, Andrey, Sergey, Kolya)

Group 2 (Misha, Lyosha, Katya, Nastya, Sergey)

Group 3 (Tanya, Sasha, Sasha, Pasha, Oksana)

Group 4 (Anya, Dema, Katya, Maksim, Oksana)

Group 5 (Sasha, Katya, Sasha, Luba, Andrey)

Group 6 (Ksenia, Zhenya, Sergey, Vika, Sasha)

Group 7 (Yulya, Sveta, Luba, Katya, Yana)

Group 8 (Vanya, Dasha, Anzhelika, Katya, Yulya)

Group 9 (Hamzat, Anya, Masha, Sasha, Olya)

Group 10 (Nastya, Golubeva, Olya)

Darkness in Russia: Children, Laughter and Government

Expectations for Yurievets are blurry. The anticipation of making a difference is intoxicating. The reality of Russia’s orphanages is sombering. Just two days ago, NPR released a story about Russia’s orphanages.

In short, the story highlights the Russian government’s recent decision to ban foreign adoption. Allegedly, this is a “temporary measure,” but the Russian Education Ministry has made it known that Russia is uncomfortable with the amount of foreign adoptions taking place. Roughly over half of Russia’s 15,000 annual adoptions come from international agencies.

The article goes on to tell how Russia’s orphans are set up for failure and fail to provide the single most important source of life: love. The irony is that Russia’s government severely–you guessed it–underfunds its orphanages. Without proper funding–as with every social cause–how can Russia sincerely plan on raising her orphans.

The orphanages, including ours, are in poor conditions. Recently, a wall caved in on the only bathroom in one of the primary buildings at the orphanage. To live in these conditions on a daily basis and call it home is reprehensible.

But all the more reason for our team to travel to Russia. God promises to reach into the muck and the mire and save his children. Perhaps that is part of God’s plan in raising a team to go to Russia. We will be his feet, but we need your hands to pray for God to go before us. For God to bring light to a dark 6 acres in Yurievets, Russia.

Meet the Orphans at Yurievets

Part of what makes this trip great for us and you is that we get to know orphans by name. Through your support, we will be able to meet somewhere between 70 and 100 orphans. And we’re excited to meet everyone of them. Soon, we are hoping to pray for them by name, and this makes a huge difference.

Think about how America generally refers to the “forgotten” or marginalized citizens of the world. Generally, we lump them into broad, impersonal categories: orphans, poor, hungry, homeless, Sudanese, etc. But, each of them have real names like Bob, Carrie, or in our case, they have names like Misha, Yury and Sasha.

We invite you to meet Katya and Sasha of the orphans we will be privileged to meet in just 6 weeks. Please support us and them by posting your prayers in the comments section of this blog. Your thoughts will certainly make a world of difference for all of us involved in the trip.