Friday, February 18, 2011

Urgent Help Needed!

I received an urgent email from our good friend Natasha at Father's House Christian Orphanage in Green Forest, Ukraine. They are in dire need of help to feed the children there and pay the heating bill.

I'll try to give you as much info as i can and try to stay as brief as possible.

Father's House was started by Grigoriy Zinchenko, a survivor of Buchenwald. He wrote a book "Escape from Buchenwald" and used the proceeds to open this Orphanage. When Grigoriy was younger he traveled the United States speaking at Churchs and raising support for the Orphanage. He is now is his 80's and cannot travel. Many of the supporters that he had built up have fallen off. When we were there last October the Director told us she is keeping the place running on about $500 a month from the donors that are left. She didn't know how they were going to make it through the winter but she has faith that God will provide. We gave them what we could when we were there and told them to keep us informed of how everything was going.

This Orphanage has been under attack in a past few years by some unscrouplulous businessmen that are taking advantage of the fact that they don't have much money. When the land was first purchased there was nothing around. But now it has become a very nice area with larger homes. These people, although so far unsuccessful, are trying to swindal the orphanage out of it's land. One of the tactics they use is to pay off officials to come down on the orphanage with code violations. They are being required to install a fire sprickler system even though the government owned school across the street doesn't have one.

I want to say that these people work hard at raising these children in a Christian loving atmosfere. Diana and I fell in love the these children the moment we met them. When there is something this good and God honoring in the world, we have to dig hard a fight for it. It is what Jesus expects of us!

They were able to put the Sprinckler system off but are required to immediately change all the Interior doors. They don't have money for this and are asking our help. The government isn't giving them a break on the heating bill either so they were forced to start heating with wood. The government also requires them to feed the children a certain diet and they are required to show receipts for the food they purchase.

They humbly asked us to help them raise $2000. This is what they need to scrap by for the next two months. If we can raise more it would be fantastic and would allow the Orphanage nurse to buy medicine for the children. When we looked at her inventory in October there was only a few bandages. We brought her some supplies from the states on our second trip but not enough for what she really needs.

Natasha the Nurse. She is shy and quiet and a very sweet soul.

A couple of the girls wanted to show their artwork.

The old guy (Me) playing Ping Pong with the boys.

Please do whatever you can to help! If not us, then who?

Out of gratitude for your caring support we will be giving away a hand painted 5 piece Nesting Doll set that we purchased from a very well known Artist in Kharkiv. Each $5 donation gets an entry in the drawing.

If you have any questions you can email me at momentum133@gmail.com

With much Gratitude!
Shane Lewis

If you prefer to send help directly to the Orphanage this is their address:
English: Ukraine 62460Kharkovskaya oblast, village Vusoky, str. Octyabrskaya, 50 Children's House "Father's House" Director Khorolskay Y.Y.

Russian: УКРАИНА 62460Харьковская обл., пос.Высокийул.Октябрьская, 50Детский дом "Отчий дом"директор Хорольская Ю.Ю.

16 comments:

  1. Good luck with this Shane.
    Can you email me directly the details of this orphanage please.
    regards
    Simon @ Kharkov Luxury Apartments.
    email ; kharkov.for.rent@gmail.com

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  2. I'll email you Natasha's phone number and maybe Luda can call her directly. They had a website but i think because of finances it was shut down. Thanks Simon! We are talking about coming in the spring. If the plan comes together we'll get in touch with you for sure.

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  3. Wow! Two days and we are almost at $200. That is Great and we are on track to meeting and hopefully exceeding our goal!

    Thank You Kim for your donation today!

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  4. Good luck! Are there any supplies we can send?

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  5. I'm sure they would love that! We just went to Walgreens and purchased a bunch of cold fighting supplies and took them when we went.

    I'll get the Orphanage address if you'd like?

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  6. This is the address for the Orphanage:

    Ukraine 62460
    Kharkovskaya oblast, village Vusoky, str. Octyabrskaya, 50
    Children's House "Father's House"
    Director Khorolskay Y.Y.

    УКРАИНА 62460
    Харьковская обл., пос.Высокий
    ул.Октябрьская, 50
    Детский дом "Отчий дом"
    директор Хорольская Ю.Ю.

    It would probably be best to write the address in english and russian. Thanks for helping!

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  7. I was going to make a contribution, but when I entered the amount I wanted to donate an additional shipping charge of $10 came up. Why am I charged a shipping charge? sorry, I really wanted to contribute to the orphanage but I don't think I should be charged a shipping charge for my donation...something's not right

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  8. Lea, I am not sure why it does that, i believe it is a default in the program. I also believe that you can overwrite the shipping fee to zero. If i knew how to make it not do that i would fix it.

    I assure you that we are very honest in what we are doing. We understand that there are people out there that are dishonest so we are often on our guard. Please, if you don't feel comfortable i would encourage you to follow you feelings.

    Thank you very much for letting your heart lead you to this cause in the first place.

    Blessings!
    Shane

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  9. UPDATE: Today we sent a wire transfer of the $300 we collected so far. Thanks again to everyone for caring for the children of Father's House!

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  10. Tomorrow morning i'm heading to the bank to wire $2000 more to Father's House! God had a plan and it was bigger than i could imagine! Thanks to everyone that helped!

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  11. Hi- I'm on my way to Zeleniy Guy to adopt a little boy in the next 2 weeks...I'm thinking that this is the same orphanage OR its close to it? Do you have any updated info, or someone who could be a contact for us when we get there? Email me lmaddex@gmail.com if you can help- I'd love to find out what exactly they need as far as donations go right now so I can bring the right things. Thank you!

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  12. Hi Shane,
    my name is Luba Stefoglo, and I'm daughter of Mikhail Scherbinin, president of the Charitable Fund Children Assistance Center "Otchiy Dom". Juliana Khorolskaya, orphanage's director, asked me contact you. She said that you visited "Father's Home" and even wanted to adopt few children, and know about their difficult situation.

    As you may know, in previous years the orphanage was mostly sponsored by few private people (me, my siblings, and few other relatives), and now we’re experiencing big financial difficulties and had to stop our support. So Father’s Home is being forced to shut down and send the kids to government owned orphanages. That’s an absolute catastrophe for the children as they love and are used to loving, accepting and encouraging Christian atmosphere, as well as enormous heartbreak for everybody who works there because they have been building this for years, love the kids and want them to grow into happy, God honoring people. Well, I don't think I have to tell you what a wonderful place Father's Home is, and that every one on their staff truly has a heart for serving the Lord and orphans. In order to stay open, they need somebody to provide for their operating expenses.

    Juliana forwarded to me your letter where you say that there is an orphanage ministry organization willing to help "Father's Home". The urgent and pressing problem now is that Dept. of Education is demanding an answer on whether they close or not in two days since they need time to place children in other orphanages before September 1, so Juliana needs to know now if they can really count on your support. So could you please contact me ASAP so we can talk about it? I will try to answer whatever questions you might have, or help you get in contact with Juliana or my father.

    My phone: (509) 979-4176 (I live in Spokane, WA)
    E-mail: stefoglo@yahoo.com
    I also have a Facebook account as Luba Stefoglo, and my Skype name is: stefoglo6

    Both Juliana and my dad are devastated and anxious to know the answer, so I'm praying and hoping to hear from you today.
    Thank you very much, and God bless you for everything you do for His children.

    P.S. Your four girls are just adorable, I read some of your blogs today :)

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