An abbreviated update from Faithy

Hi dear Paul and [family],

I was just going to write you today. Thank you so much for your prayers. And thank you for asking. Thank God, Joy, the kids and all of us are OK. I'm back in Dnipro. I came on Sunday. We have daily sirens and sometimes we hear explosions, but we're doing OK.

The big news is that Joy got the custody of the three foster kids. She still needs to wait for the official court paper with the decision... So again, it's a new chapter in her life and of course a very big challenge. The kids are Oleksandr (8), Vika (almost 10) and Marusia (12). She was with the kids at a taekwondo camp in the Carpathians for a week. She came back on Wednesday...

For now, I just want to send you some photos from May. I have so many that it's difficult to choose only a few.

We had the end-of-school-year celebration. This year we decided to celebrate with different group ages, so we can plan activities accordingly. The kids performed and had competitions, and everybody enjoyed pizza and juice. All the students got a little present--a pencil case with our logo. It was a day full of fun.

Our local foundation Pomogaem (meaning "We are helping") compiled a list of 51 IDP (internally displaced) families that came to Dnipro from the Donetsk region. Each of these families has either a foster child/children or one of the family members (either a child or an adult) is disabled. For example, a grandmother with her granddaughter because both parents passed away or an elderly couple, where the husband lost his eyesight because of the explosion when a rocket hit their apartment block. We heard so many heart-wrenching stories. These people owned a house or an apartment, and lost everything. Some barely made it alive. Some lost their son or their husband in the war.

Thanks to our friends in Switzerland, we bought hygiene and cleaning products for each family and visited them one by one. (We haven't finished our visits yet.) For children we bought fruit. I was amazed to see how they try to stay positive and keep going in spite of going through such tragedy.

They were very thankful for our help, but I think they were even more thankful for the time we spent with them. We witnessed to them and prayed with them to receive Jesus. It was so inspiring to pray with those families. We also gave them a tract "The Prince of Peace". With no end of war in sight, only Jesus can bring peace into their hearts and lives.

Here's a message I received from a mother of 3 children, after our visit :

Thank you so much!! You really helped us today. Help like this is very rare these days. Your help means so much to our family and is exactly what we needed. Our family was delighted to meet you — you’re such kind and sincere people. The kids are absolutely thrilled with the treats, and Grandma sent her heartfelt thanks as well—may God bless you.  Thank you so much once again 😀 To be honest, it was a pleasure chatting with you, and we didn’t want to let you go. May God bless you, and may everything always go well for you and your loved ones.  We need more people like you. 😚

So that's a little bit of news from us with a lot of thankfulness for your loving support. Thank you for your prayers for us and for peace in Ukraine. May Jesus bless you and give you strength for every day! Have a beautiful day!

Much love,
Faithy