This month’s ministry is full of a plethora of different opportunities, not one day looks the same. Some days we might be holding abandoned babies at a pediatric hospital, other days we might drive for an hour and a half to an orphanage to play and be silly with toddlers, letting them climb all over us and stomping around like monsters. We’re also doing a lot of college outreach, English clubs, and fellowship groups to reach the young adult community here.
I’m really loving this place and the people here have such a heart for Jesus! Last night, during our fellowship group, we learned that our host, who is the orphan coordinator here for International Teams, is working on raising money/goods to put together gift boxes for the orphans within the community. I’m sure all of y’all are familiar with Operation Christmas Child gift boxes; I remember how much fun it was putting those boxes together back in elementary at LCS.
When I used to put together shoe boxes for Operation Christmas Child, I would always put my school picture in the box along with a little letter and my contact information, hoping that one day I would meet them and they would recognize me. Now here I am, in month 11 of the Race, having first hand experiences with these actual orphan children, and I’m here face to face with them and I want to help. These kids have nothing, they have no families, no one to come home and love them everyday; just seeing the joy and light in their faces each day we get to see them is such a humbling experience and it’s truly been a blessing to be a small part of these children’s lives.
There are about 30 orphanages in the area and right now we are working on preparing a gift box for each child at at least three of the orphanages. A rough estimate on how much one box would cost, I would say about $5 per box. There are three orphanages we are hoping to supply gifts to and each orphanage has about 100 children. So that would be 300 gift boxes at $5 a box so our goal is to raise about $1,500 so that these children will have a gift to open on Christmas day.
Please let me know as soon as possible if any of y’all are interested in supporting this cause. We are only here in Uzhhorod for one and a half more weeks and I would like to try and help with this as much as I can before I leave. Every little bit helps! Thanks y’all!
If you’d like to help you can contact me via email: [email protected]
