IO, Jakarta – Abandoning her established life in Australia Kangaroo Country and deciding to go back to the homeland to build the Tangan Pengharapan, Henny Kristianus’s desire to help others made her unperturbed by problems facing him. Even so, this Jakarta-born woman remains firm in her stance. She passed the steep road.
Henny told about the beginnings of building the Hope Hand. “So in 2006, my husband and I had vacation to Jakarta, bringing our twins, Chloe and Zoe who were only 4.5 months old. Her heart intentions wanted to rest because she had given birth to her twin daughters, “said Henny.
Save Generation
Well then in Indonesia, there are a lot of street children especially in the red lights, more than when Henny was still living in Indonesia in 1996. “One day I seemed to hear a whisper in my heart, ‘Henny save your generation’. At that time I did not understand what it meant. When my husband came to pick me up, I said to my husband, ‘ Do you want to live in Indonesia?’, the husband replied, ‘ what for, because we have a business, get a house, have two cars. we have what any young man would want in Australia’. At that time my husband asked, ‘ What are we going to do in Indonesia?’. I continue to say, ‘ let’s pray. if this is God’s way for us, would you want to move there?.’ Somehow, my husband suddenly got an offer to work in Indonesia’ , she explained.
Despite having found her life’s call, it is not easy to make it happen. Henny acknowledged that after deciding to live in Indonesia life was indeed very difficult. “We began to experience the difficulty of life after leaving Australia because our business was forced to close, businesses that could not be moved away, then we were forced to sell our assets in Australia, forced to sell cars so that we could live in Indonesia. The difficulty we experienced because we sold the house for quite a long time, about 10 months. To cover the monthly installments we were forced to use all the funds we had, including the sales of cars. When the house is sold, our savings were running low. The decision to stay in Indonesia brought us into suffering. During that time we had to keep paying the mortgage in Indonesia with zero income. So we live just from our savings in Australia’, she added.
Henny explained that choosing to live in Indonesia is one of the most difficult phases of his life. “Honestly, after I decided to stay in Indonesia that I was very stressed. we have twins, initially forced to ride at my mother’s house. Husband suddenly has no income, which was from every week we could be 2 thousand dollars Australia before. Suddenly we could not get money at all. Our assets were all gone, all we could do is pray. What I did then, I said to God, I was created for what?. And I asked day and night. What God wants with my life. And I received the answer in Bandung in late 2006. That I have to help the poor’, she said.
A year in Bandung, Henny and her family returned to Jakarta in July 2007. “The employers who gave husband jobs in Bandung, asked my husband to go back to Sidney, there are other jobs, with a larger salary, home facilities and so forth. We refused because we know our heart call is in Indonesia. We wanted to be a blessing for children in Indonesia, “he explained.
Once in Jakarta, Jojo, her husband, got a call to be speakers in Sidney for 1 month. “Well when in Sidney, he got a job in Indonesia to take care of TV program from Joyce Meyer Ministry. We handle production. Well Joyce Meyer Ministry had anNGO, Hand of Hope which takes care of food because they know my passion is to help the children, they support for the food. I started to explore Jakarta at that time, there are 8 points that help street children in providing nutritious food and free tutoring. One of them is in Jembatan Tiga, West Jakarta. Anyway all is on the railroad tracks. So at that time I set up a communal kitchen at one point, giving it at 8 points. So the teachers are at every point. At that time there were 1028 children we helped. It was a new donor Joyce Meyer Ministry, “Henny said.
Unfortunately the provision of nutritious food in Jakarta was discontinued in 2008 because Henny felt friends who are invited are dishonest. Although the project in Jakarta stopped, the desire to help others never went off in Henny’s heart. “We started to enter the hamlet Pepe, Gedong Jati, Grobongan Central Java. This village is dry, on a hill, it’s hard to walk. From Pepe Village, then we went to North Halmahera, “he said.
Then next, Henny went to East Nusa Tenggara. At that time, support came not only from Joyce Meyer Ministry, but friends who began to hear their work began to provide financial support. Therefore, Henny decided to create a foundation called Tangan Pengharapan.
5 Thousand Children
Now the reach of the Hope Hand service is widespread. In the beginning only 3 areas with 435 children, now more than 5 thousand children who have helped Hope Hand. There are 64 points of Hope Hand, ranging from Mentawai, Papua, West Kalimantan, Sumba, East Nusa Tenggara, Jakarta, Central Java, Bali, Timor, North Halmahera and North Sulawesi. “The most is in NTT. In Papua the largest after that, “he said.
Winning a child as much as that, certainly requires not small cost. Moreover the Hope Hand does not have a permanent donor. Even so, the belief in God’s help that never late makes Henny strong.
(Dessy Aipipidely)
