Face the Children

FACE the Children History

In recent years the Frontline has been led to establish a permanent ministry base to serve as a center for training and ministry development, with emphasis on leadership, teamwork, evangelism, and church planting. This center has opened up new opportunities for other fixed ministries, such as a fast growing church, a K-12 school, a strong youth ministry, jail and hospital outreach, and now a developing ministry to street children called FACE the Children.

For many years Jeff and Rowena Pessina (directors of Frontline) had a burden to reach out to children roaming and sleeping on the streets of cities around the country. These children, either orphaned or abandoned by parents unable to care for them, go hungry, are usually sick, and are subject to a host of other dangers. Many become addicted to drugs, while others are subject to physical and sexual abuse, including rape and forced prostitution.

Though already swamped with other ministries, the plight of these children became overwhelming, and Frontline took a step of faith to begin raising interest and funds to establish a viable way of making a difference. As funds became available, a daytime drop-in center was established where kids could go to get cleaned up, receive medical attention, have a decent meal, and receive spiritual and academic lessons. After several months it was painfully clear that the children needed not only daytime assistance, but fulltime oversight and care. Though still in its developing stages, FTC now provides these opportunities on a fulltime (24x7) basis.

The vision of FTC is to achieve the capability of saying "yes" to assisting and caring for any child who is abandoned or orphaned, and to provide an excellent program of progressive spiritual and academic care through high school, and possibly college.

The pictures below illustrate how the some of these kids live on the streets.