MWR : Hope for orphans in Ukraine

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Nov. 14, 2011 issue

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Hope for orphans in Ukraine

MB Mission couple help youth see a better future

By Jamie Munday MB Mission

In much of Ukraine, hopelessness among adults has darkened the future of its youth.

Evelyn Wiens embraces two teens in Zaporozhye, Ukraine. Wiens’ church plant, New Hope Church, recently started a training center for orphans to learn marketable skills. — Photo by MB Mission

In the last century, the people of Zaporozhye have experienced tremendous upheaval: occupation and liberation, prosperity and poverty, hope and despair.

In the 1920s, Lenin’s “New Hope” through industrialization was followed by the “Great Terror” of Stalin and famine in the 1930s. The end of World War II in 1945 brought renewed optimism but resulted in food shortages, ethnic conflict and political distrust.

By 1990, the idea of independence rose again. Ukrainians’ spirits were lifted, only to be dashed as they watched their country disintegrate into inflation, corruption and economic collapse.

Orphaned children are in abundance across the country. Barely existing from day to day, many orphans are in prisons, run-down orphanages or trying to survive on the streets.

Maxym and Anya Oliferovski are helping local orphans break the cycle of hopelessness that has been passed down to them.

With the guidance of MB Mission workers John and Evelyn Wiens and volunteers from their church plant, New Hope Church in Zaporozhye, they have started a drop-in center for orphan “graduates” — teenagers who are released from state orphanages with no family, marketable skills or hope for the future.

MB Mission is the global mission agency of the U.S. Conference of Mennonite Brethren Churches and the Canadian Conference of Mennonite Brethren Churches. The Wienses’ home congregation is Gracepoint MB Community Church in Surrey, B.C.

For the past year, New Hope Church has provided vocational training in cooking, woodworking, graphic design, basic home renovating and personal grooming at New Hope Center. As the center continues to develop, Maxym Oliferovski’s vision is to offer more courses that will contribute to transformation of the whole person.

“Beginning with the trade school, we would like to house young adults in group homes where they receive counseling and mentoring in a Christian environment,” he said.

The church has already become a hub of activity during the week, with orphans dropping in for classes, Bible study and social activities. Volunteers also visit many of the orphanages in the region, building relationships so teens will be more likely to visit the center after they’ve graduated.

“The orphans come to the beginning of their adult lives being set for failure,” Oliferovski said. “They do not know it, though. They can just feel it inside — empty and hopeless.”

The training center is an example of holistic ministry: churches meeting deep needs of those who are least likely to find hope in Christ.

Comments

Dear sister,i am rajan from India as i am so happy to see and hear your hard work in ukraine may God bless you,

- rajan (nov 9 at 10:25 p.m.)
You are very correct in pointing out the history of Ukraine, as the basis for hopelessness which exists in the country today. From 1929-32, Stalin forced nine million Ukrainians to starve to death in order to force them to collectivize their farms (see John Conquest's book, "Harvest of Despair.") My father lived in Ukraine at the time of these Stalinist purges. After WWII, western Ukraine, in particular, had been ravaged by war, and many Ukrainians from western Ukraine were sent to labor camps for punishment because they were extremely anti-communist: this was the purge of HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS of Ukrainians, Russians, and other ethnicities - Stalin's genocide against his own people AFTER the war ended. These facts are barely known in the west! In the fifties, with the death of Stalin, it was hoped that a new freedom would come, and it didn't. The nineties, as you pointed out, with the fall of communism, brought Ukraine to the brink of new hope, as free expression was possible in Ukraine for the first time in more than half a century.

With this freedom of expression, came massive political corruption as well as unimagineable inflation and new problems which Ukraine had never before experienced, like sexual trafficking of young girls. And the fall of communism also marked the first time that people could openly speak of religion or political dissent on the streets in 70 years. The privilege of preaching the Gospel openly is the greatest thing to emerge from the end of the communist era; in 1990, at least two generations of Ukrainians had never heard the Gospel or gone to church.

I thank God for people like you who are fulfilling the Great Commission and bringing hope to ravaged Ukraine. I have visited Ukraine and was amazed at the reception for the Gospel, there. These people have suffered tremendously and now welcome the unique hope that our Lord Jesus Christ offers to all who believe in Him and accept Him in faith.

Thanks for your excellent work.

Valerie

- Valerie (dec 30 at 5:38 p.m.)

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