In the last couple weeks I’ve been able to work with many village children and children in a particular orphanage. I’ve also visted a couple other orphanages in Phnom Penh. What’s interesting is the different between all the children.
It’s common for people to talk about how the support of orphanages only perpetuates the need for them. More effort is being made to provide resources to the extended families of orphans so that the orphans can live with them.
There is still hope in orphanage though. At the Center of Peace, the children seem far better off than those children with families in the villages. The children at the orphanage are happier, better educated, well mannered, and socially healthy. Much of the children’s progress has to do with the director of the orphanage. Her name is Bophal Yos. As an orphan herself, she made it through college in a country where the average education level is 5th grade. She has so much love. All 70 something kids call her “mother”. She’s legally adopted two of them because they were abandoned by their families. It’s truly an amazing place to experience. These kids know Jesus. They know Jesus as the one and only God.
Orphan care ultimately isn’t about providing them a good place to live, but an opportunity to embrace the hope of the Gospel. It’s about living out the Gospel with these orphans.
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I am saved by Christ and adopted by God. I am a husband, pastor, social entrepreneur, tech practitioner, and an orphan advocate. 
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
It's wonderful to hear that those children are growing up with more hope than those around them that might have more resources. It's evident that those kids have so much more!
I knew you would love those kids!
I'm one of the members of the other team that was in Cambo from California– We met at the Single Mother's Center
We're having a fundraiser to provide vitamins and uniforms for the COP kids;
$20 provides 2 uniforms and a years worth of vitamins for one child.
If you would like to help, please mail a check to:
Oasis Ministry
13911 Artesia Blvd
Cerritos, CA 90703
and also send me an email (enialemik@gmail.com)
Thank you!
Hey Elaine! Yea, the COP kids were great…it was interesting to see the differences between the village kids and those orphanage kids…it's very unusual to see an orphanage with that much care and love! How's the fundraiser going? We are actually supporting the missionary that is working with the village kids!