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A Rich Harvest from the Farm
Living together with our members and other kids they work as a team. They raise domestic animals and livestock (sheep, pigs, chickens), grow potatoes, and learn many other practical skills. This gives them good job training and helps them to overcome their negative experiences and wounds from the past. It prepares them to live and work in society. In the first year, the boys on the farm produced 8 pigs, 25 sheep, 12 tons of potatoes, and plenty of eggs for our center in the city. This year we expect those numbers to double.
In Eastern Europe, suicide is the largest cause of death among children. An astonishing 30% of child mortality here is suicide. It is clear that the state system in not working well and thousands of children are longing for a loving family. This is an important reason why we set up our Farm House project. So that at least a handful of these children who have nobody to love and care about them can grow up in a loving environment with a real family atmosphere.
I am happy to share these positive results with you. Yet still there are many more we can share. We want to expand and build more houses to help more children live a good life. All this depends on the generosity of our benefactors. Thank you for your continued help and please share these newsletters with friends and family in hopes to inspire others. We very much need all the help we can get. |
As you already know, one of the great programs of our project here in Eastern Europe is the “Farm House”. We often take groups of boys from the center to the farm for 1 to 3 days at a time in order to help them get off drugs and find a place to go to get out of prostitution rings and organized crime. There they experience a positive change in environment, thus encouraging them in different forms of rehabilitation. And those who are really interested in changing their lives have the opportunity to live and work there in exchange for room, board, and education among other things.
You know the success of a project by its fruits, but not only by livestock and crops, but more importantly in this case, by the lives of people. Andre is one of the young men in our farm program. He has come a long way in a short time. When Andre first came to our center in the city he was very timid, dirty, skinny and most of all hungry. Andre’s parents abandoned him and his brother when they were infants. They both grew up in the state orphanage, a place that doesn’t have much of a family atmosphere and lacks the essential element in a child’s life - love. About 40% of the children from the state orphanages end up as criminals, 30% addicted to drugs or alcohol, and 10% of them commit suicide.
Results usually speak for themselves. Andre’s brother left the orphanage before Andre did. Unfortunately, he never came to our center and ended up stealing and doing criminal activities to obtain money to eat and survive. Now Andre’s brother is in jail and will most likely end up involved in crime for the rest of his life. So what about Andre? Well after six months of living at the Farm House he has made tremendous progress. He has grown to be more honest, responsible, and enthusiastic about doing something positive with his life. And he is headed in that direction. He realizes how much God has helped him through others and very much wants others to know about God and His love and mercy. At the end of this month he will begin a 3-month evangelization course. He will be studying, praying and training how to teach others about God at a nearby Christian school. He is very excited and so are we. It is fulfilling to see God change his life for the better. We are very excited for Andre. His life is on the right track – unlike his brother's – and in great part because of your help.