Chat with Dima

This morning Peter got a call from the orphanage. It was his old friend Dima. Our dear missionary friend has been greatly concerned for his life, as he has run away several times in the last month.

Dima has a congenital hip, I believe, causing him to have a limp, not a very bad one. To me, quite minor, but enough to give him trouble when he plays tag.

The authorities had decided that he needed to be transferred to an invalid home, where many of the children are mentally slow in addition to having various handicaps. Dima has been worried about going there and felt that maybe he could live on the street like another boy they call One-armed Peter. I have met One-armed Peter. He is a sharp kid, quite naughty, and at last report still alive, even on the street for some time.

The street however is not the place for little Dima who is called "good and obedient" by his teachers. Each time they find him he is filthy and has glue in his hair. Yesterday he had head lice and so his hair is now shaved off. The authorities are now thinking maybe he should be transferred to the mental institution, an even worse suggestion than the handicapped school.

I had written to him and he would get the letter this morning telling him there were a least three people in the world who care about if he lives or dies. One, the missionary, two, me, and of course our Peter who prays for him every night. Not only that, Jesus wants to enter his heart if he will let him, and to be his Rescuer and Savior, and bring him into his Father's Big Family forever.

Lela thought maybe a call from his dear buddy would help Dima to straighten out. Peter carried the phone around for an hour this morning until finally the call came. However, to his great dismay he could hardly converse with Dima. His Russian was so rusty. He did however manage to ask him why he ran away. His answer was precisely as I would have expected, "Ya niz nyo," "I don't know."

How could he explain why he was running away? Would a little foundling 12 year old boy who has been in an orphanage for several years be able to put that into words? It will take more than a phone conversation for Dima to tell how the deep hurts in his heart caused him to leave the relative warmth of a dimly lit old brick building where his real friend no longer lives and go onto the snowy streets of Odessa without a proper coat.

Maybe there is someone in this country who has a warm bed and a warm heart for our Dima. Someone who will set aside their busy schedule and give life to a little boy who only wants someone to tuck him in at night and wipe away the tears.