Today I visited a transition home for girls that have come out of the orphanage. I went with a young girl Alla that had lived there herself for a few years.
The home is run by a woman named Mariana and her husband. She has such a heart for these girls. When I had a chance to ask her what her story was and how The Lord had put helping these girls on her heart she was more than willing to sit with me Lauren and Laura (our new friend, American missionary and our translator for the day) over a cup of tea and cookies and share with us. Early on in her marriage her husband was constantly taking in orphans to stay with them, saying that they couldn't afford a place to stay and would end up in the streets if someone didn't help them. So along with their own two sons they usually had 2-4 more kids living with them.
The statistics here for youth that come out of the are 90% of them end up either committing suicide or into drinking and drug use. She didn't understand her husbands heart, but decided to press into what he was doing and listen to The Lord. They started visiting orphanages, taking the kids things thy needed like clothes and soap. But it never made a difference, a couple days later when they went back to visit the kids were always in the same condition that they had been when they had first visited. Still dirty, still poorly cared for. She recalled one time that she went into an orphanage and there was a child that was wearing high heels, and she began talking to her as she would talk to a little girl, the child looked at her and said, "why are you talking to me like that? I am a boy." She was so taken aback and asked him why he was wearing high heels if he was a boy, he responded,"I wear these shoes because they are the only ones that I have." She said she would never forget that moment, her heart felt like it was cut when she heard his response. From that moment on she felt the need to do more for the children of Ukraine than just visit them in an orphanage that only provided for their most basic needs. She began to tell everyone that she met about her vision for the orphans of Uzhgorod. She dedicated her time to prayer that The Lord would provide everything that they needed to be able to build such a place. The heard of a place in Romania similar to what she wanted to build just outside of her own city. Her husband, their pastor, a couple of other people and herself booked train tickets and went to Romania to visit this home and see what it was like. She had such high expectations, she thought she would get there and they would be greeted with open arms, that people would be waiting for them and would welcome them into the home, that they would encounter love and warmth. When they arrived there was noone there to greet them. They found a woman and asked her about it and she said that the children were away but that she could take then to the building for them to take a look around. What came next crushed her. They were shown through a dank building, the kitchen was a disgusting mess, not the bright warm place where people gather together for food and conversation. The washrooms were foul, and there were no toilets at all, only holes in the ground, kind of like a squatty potty (something that is actually quite common in Ukraine). The rooms where the girls slept were dark, and the bedding was filthy. She was so disappointed, she went home with her dreams were crushed, her hopes of there being a place like the one The Lord had placed in her heart shattered. She didn't want anything to do with creating a place like the one that she had visited and decided that instead of building a place she would just continue to visit the orphans where they were and that that was all that she could do.
Her husband heard of another transition home in Kiev and decided to go, she said she didn't want anything to do with it. Her expectations reflected what she had already seen in Romania and she wanted nothing to do with it. Her husband had other plans and told her that he was going anyways and that she could stay home by herself if that's how she felt. Well, she said that there was no way she was staying at home alone for a week, so she joined him. And this is where all of the expectations that she had held onto so tightly the last time came true. It was a beautiful model of what could be. There was a warm atmosphere, the girls were taken care of and well fed, they had clean clothes and a clean place to sleep, as well as loving people running the home. This is what she wanted to create. This was her dream.
Over the next couple of years with the help of an American and the support of several churches they were able to purchase the property that Paulo resides on. It has gone through much construction to get it to where it is right now. It is a big beautiful home has the capacity for 15, but currently houses 14 girls.
There is a guest apartment that has houses many different missionaries over the years. It is a working farm, complete with cows, pigs, goats, chickens, turkeys, ducks, two greenhouses, multiple fruit trees, and gardens. All of the food that is grown at Paolo is harvested by the girls, in fact I spent my first afternoon perched at the top of a cherry tree with 6 of the girls that live there picking cherries, and singing and laughing.
God this home to bring life and healing to many young women, as well as teach them to do life. It was such an incredible blessing to be able to be a part of this ministry that brings hope to so many broken women in Ukraine.
