Memory Verse

The rich and the poor have this in common, the Lord is the maker of them all. —Proverbs 22:2

Dear Grandchildren,

I want to describe to you the town of Konstancin, which was both a summer resort and the location for our orphanage. There were many beautiful villas in Konstancin. (A villa was a summer home for rich people.) The people who owned the villas were government officials, car dealers, and many other wealthy folks.

Right across the street from our house there lived a family whose father owned a jewelry store. Some blocks away, the American ambassador to Poland lived in a beautiful villa called “Julia.” He named his villa after his wife who had passed away and left two young daughters for him to raise. Of course, the two girls had nannies to take care of them since he was a busy man himself.

The children of the rich people would never come out of their villas to the streets. They had their chauffeur drive them every place that they went. Sometimes we would see them leaning on their fences and watching us playing games and running around our house. They looked very lonely to us.

A block away from us was a park with beautiful trees, shrubs, and of course, many flowers. Right in the middle of the park was a huge, round flowerbed. Whenever the girls from the orphanage went to the park, we went to have a good time. We would walk slowly on the way there in pairs, holding hands, especially when we had to cross the street, but as soon as we got inside the park’s gate, we were free to run as fast as we could. We had many relays around that flowerbed (or klomba as we called it.) We wore our everyday clothes, which were patched most of the time. We played so hard that our clothes got ripped and torn many times! In this park we would see rich children sitting with their nannies on the benches. The children had to listen to their nannies reading to them or practicing French, while we like a bunch of wild Indians, laughed, screamed, played tag—anything to help us use up our energy. So many times we saw the longing on the faces of the rich boys and girls. They had to be dressed up all the time, or else, how could people distinguish the rich from the poor? Poland was very, very class-conscious in those days.

You might wonder how our orphanage happened to be located in such a rich summer resort. We really were not welcome there at all. When the orphanage building was being built, it was with the idea that it would serve as a hospital. For some reason, they never completed the hospital, and so the building was sold to a group of missionaries from England and Latvia. Mr. Fetler and Mr. Goetze bought this building and opened it up to children whose parents were dead, or only had one very destitute parent, like Olga and me.

Mr. Fetler had eleven children of his own and had adopted two orphans. Mr. Goetze had seven children. He was our director, and he loved children very, very much. He was a minister of the gospel and treated me as though I was one of his own children. He was the one who always called me “my daughter” and I loved him very much!

–Grandma Nadzia

Questions

1. Even though Nadzia had no money, she was still very happy. Why?

2. The rich children had many nice things, but often were still sad. What does the Bible say about true riches?

3. What kind of good things did God provide for Nadzia and Olga?

—Excerpted form a letter by Nadzia Jadwiga McMillan