“Faith is a hope in that which is not seen”
Some of you know that I lived in an orphanage from the age of six until I was almost 11 years old. Everything I knew about a family, I learned from American movies. I didn’t know what it was like to live in a loving family and I didn’t have hope that I would ever belong to one. In my orphanage no one had ever been adopted. So really, there was no reason to think or have faith that I would find a family.
We didn’t go to church each week in the orphanage but we did have Christian missionaries come and teach us about the bible. These same missionaries taught us to pray. The first thing I learned is you get on your knee's, fold your arms and pray and that God will listen to you. I started praying - but not for a family because that seemed so out of reach – I prayed for protection. Protection from the bigger boys in the orphanage.
When I was nine, almost ten I learned that a group of kids from my orphanage would be traveling to the United States and living with host families for a few weeks. I was told this was a vacation. I was so excited to get out of school and the orphanage!
I arrive in the United States October 18th 2008. I had just turned ten that July. I met my host family at the airport. They seemed nice but I had no idea what they were saying to me. My mom thinks I had a lot of faith to just come home with strangers but honestly? Nothing could be much worse than where I came from so I wasn’t really that scared.
I tried to do everything I could as fast as I could. My mom said I looked through every door and cupboard and I would get a toy out spend two minutes and then move to the next toy. I was like the energizer bunny just jumping from one thing to the next. I just wanted to make the most of this vacation. I tried things I had never done before like ride a bike, jump on a trampoline, play video games and I had a ton of fun. I hated going to the group activities with the other orphans. I just wanted to stay with my host family and I never wanted to sleep. I just wanted to soak up every minute. I really wanted to stay there forever but this was just a vacation. Or so I thought.
When we had my orphanage director over for dinner, she was speaking Ukraine to my mom but had a translator so my mom could understand. I heard her talk to my host family about adopting me. I couldn’t believe it! I was so excited. I remember hugging my mom really hard after the director left. Could this be true?
But later, when my mom sat me down and talked to me with Google translate about our family rules, I got very sad. She said I’d have to go to school here in America and I knew I would never be able to learn English. My mom didn’t know why I was so upset and sad and I couldn’t tell her so she called a translator and I told him I couldn’t be adopted because I could never, never learn English and he told my mom for me. My mom hugged me and told me I could that I just had to have faith. That she believed in me and that she would help me.
But later, when my mom sat me down and talked to me with Google translate about our family rules, I got very sad. She said I’d have to go to school here in America and I knew I would never be able to learn English. My mom didn’t know why I was so upset and sad and I couldn’t tell her so she called a translator and I told him I couldn’t be adopted because I could never, never learn English and he told my mom for me. My mom hugged me and told me I could that I just had to have faith. That she believed in me and that she would help me.
I had to return to Ukraine and wait for my parents to get all the paper work done to adopt me. We had no idea how long it would take and that is when I started to pray really hard. I prayed that my mom would come every night. One night I prayed almost all night long.
It took just over four months for my parents to get all the paper work done and arrive in Ukraine and then six more weeks before we could go home.
Learning English was HARD. Really hard. Living in a family was hard too. I hated taking baths, I didn’t have the best manners, I didn’t like the food and everything smelled weird. I didn’t know how to be a son and a brother. I had a really hard time and it didn’t help that we couldn’t understand each other. But with my moms help, I kept praying –and soon in English. My mom recorded one of my prayers after I had been home two months and it went like this:
Father In Heaven
Bless me good boy
Bless me smile
Bless me no cry
Bless me good English
Bless me good brother
Bless me good cousin
Bless me good friend
Thank you all of ‘em
Thank you love my Mom so much and my Dad
In the name….
That prayer was pretty simple but God hears all prayers – even the simple ones as long as you have faith.
I would like to bare my testimony……
In the name of.......
This talk was obviously written by me but it's all taken directly from stories and experiences that Alex shared with me over the past three years. He's giving it this Sunday.
