Helping Each Other

 |  November 10, 2020

Ninety-year-old Ganna has grown used to loneliness. It’s all she’s ever known.

As a child, the Nazis came to Ganna’s village in Ukraine, taking all of the Jews to their deaths. But Ganna’s Jewish family survived; the Nazis didn’t know they were Jewish.

But World War II still took so much from Ganna. “My father was taken to the Red Army and never came back. He was wounded and died from his wounds. I never saw him again.”

At this, Ganna begins to cry. The Holocaust and the war left her with so much pain – and all alone. “My mother was left with five little children. We had nothing to eat. I remember starving for days, for weeks. We were terrified that the Nazis would realize we were the only Jewish family left and come for us.”

But despite the Jewish family’s struggles, they still helped those less fortunate than themselves. During the war, a Jewish soldier came by. All the family had to offer was a cup of hot water and their love. But they gave what they could.

World War II killed many millions of men in Eastern Europe, so like many women of her generation, Ganna never married. She never had children. She had no one. And still had no one… until Fellowship friends came along.

This precious Holocaust survivor suffered a stroke and now lays in her small cottage, completely bedridden. Hungry and alone, especially as the holidays approach, Ganna once thought, “I prefer at this stage of my life to go and meet my Creator.”

But when The Fellowship arrived with food and love from friends around the world, this woman of faith declared, “Being Jewish to me is helping each other. It means being together, helping one another in a time of need.”

As the holidays approach, you can help a lonely Holocaust survivor like Ganna in her time of need.