Your gifts make a difference now, later . . . and forever

From Orphans Reborn in St Petersburg, Russia

Sasha’s parents left him in an orphanage when he was a baby. He was raised in the orphanage, yet had a great dream of one day having a family of his own. When he reached young adulthood and had to leave the orphanage, Sasha enrolled in a technical school to receive an education in the specialty of pastry chef. After graduation, he worked in his profession. Sasha eventually married a girl who was also an orphanage graduate. 

At the time, he thought he had achieved everything of which he had dreamed. The couple had a child who is now six years old. Then a sorrowful event hit Sasha hard. He ended up divorcing his wife because she had left him for another man.

After such a betrayal, Sasha experienced intense anxiety. In despair, he moved to St. Petersburg to work there and began drinking to alleviate the pain of not being able to see his daughter. But that did not help him at all. Worse still, he had several suicide attempts and was admitted to a psychiatric hospital. After leaving the hospital, Sasha tried to cope with the emptiness inside him. 

Then he remembered that when he was a student at the orphanage, some kind men who turned out to be believers came to visit, and he saw the light of Christ in them. 

Sasha decided to try to find these believers who had been such an example to him. He contacted a Christian girl from Belarus on the internet who might be able to help him. She gave him the contact information for Viktor, our Orphans Reborn coordinator for the region. After meeting with Viktor and speaking with him, Alexander wanted to live again. He had already made up his mind to commit suicide, but at that meeting, they talked a lot about God, about new life in Christ, about hope and freedom from the past, about eternal life, and the love of God! 

Sasha wept like a baby, and already at that moment he felt a change inside, even though he did not understand what was happening to him.

Christians offered Sasha a job and a place to live. He was frightened at such a drastic change in his life, but God had used the attention and care shown to him by his new Christian friends to lead him to Christ. Today, Sasha has repented and has become a child of God. He has also begun to prepare for water baptism. He prays and believes that God will restore his family or give him a new one, but only in the Lord!