House of Grace and Hope

 

The Vision

House - family
Grace - favor
Hope - feeling that events will turn out for the best

House of Grace and Hope is a family home extended to accommodate orphans ranging in age from 15 to 23. Russian law requires orphaned youth to leave orphanages when they complete high school. In the house, the Harrisons aim to meet the emotional, physical and spiritual needs of some of the orphaned youth who are cast adrift into a new world without adequate preparation.

The team running the house at the moment consists of Peter and Tracy. Others come to help for periods of time ranging from two weeks to 12 months. The aim is to have a ratio of no more then five children to every team member in order to maintain the feel of a family environment. They see this as an important factor to create a level of intimacy and build relationships with the kids. This approach encourages the kids to come to team members with problems so they can talk issues through. The result is something many have never experienced before - a living example that people care for them just as God cares for them!

Medium Term

The next step is to expand from their current house to larger premises. They dream that in the future they will have a House of Grace and Hope Center offering a wider range of services including music lessons, an English learning center, youth programs and sports facilities. See the exciting update to the progress of the vision.

This next phase would require more live-in team members (both long and short term). Some of these future team members may actually be kids who previously lived in the House of Grace and Hope themselves. Others might be people from overseas who have a heart to help kids in these particular circumstances.

Long term

In the longer term, the Harrisons would like to see more houses for more orphan teenagers to live in. They envision that each house would specialize in different areas such as drug and alcohol rehabilitation, child and teenage prostitution recovery, and life skills education - all aimed at a better quality of life.

In the big picture, the House of Grace and Hope would be an organization attracting international help with Russians working alongside people from many different nations. Each team member would contribute their own personal gifts and abilities to change the destiny of thousands of Russian orphaned youth.

orphanshouse.org