5241 Decisions for Christ in the Ukraine
We sent a team to the Ukraine, and this is what they shared:
We have been utterly blown away by what God has done! In total, prior to my flight home, the team had seen 5241 decisions for Christ, working in partnership with local bishops and church leaders, and connecting these people into local churches. To date, this figure is now over 10,000 salvations. Praise God! It is now beyond what we asked him for.
On some occasions we saw entire villages coming to Christ in one moment during aid distributions. (We counted carefully those who made clear decisions for Christ, and exchanged contact details with our team to receive follow up support from local churches.)
We have seen many healings and miracles alongside the preaching of the gospel - including having sent teams to hospitals for those from bombed and invaded areas - who prayed from room to room - and saw miracles such as the paralysed regain movement, those who could not speak begin to talk, and many receive salvation, as well as staff weeping as they were blessed and thanked for their work. We have seen people leave crutches behind, break their glasses that are no longer needed, and many young Ukrainians activated in healing the sick. Praise God!
The team in the last week have also seen food aid packages multiply, seeing multiple villages provided for, that they ‘did not have enough food for’ - every time they checked the van expecting it to be empty, there were just enough food bags left to go to just another village, then when they checked again, they found that miraculously there was again enough for yet another village. Praise God!
One week we saw in the three exact locations where our team had been for ‘high risk’ areas of outreach - the Ukrainian army then pushed back from those three locations and retook thousands of square kilometres of land from the Russians, on the day we were there and the days immediately following, in something of a miraculous way, that no experts expected. This felt significant to us, and not a coincidence, and very like Joshua 1:3 ‘I will give you every place where you set your foot.’
We (CFAN, in partnership with another German ministry) ran a week long young evangelists training in Kyiv at the start, for a total of around 100 people (including team, it was around 65 Ukrainian young adults), and then took around 40 away on mission to the east closer to the frontlines for the beginning for two weeks. Some team have felt to stay, and are still ministering, preaching the gospel and giving out food aid in recently liberated villages.
Seeing the young Ukrainian evangelists trained and released was stunning - seeing them encountering Holy Spirit, and be set on fire for his presence, for worship, and for their own land and people is something I find hard to describe in words. It was something heavenly and deep and very powerful. Some have stayed and now become full-time evangelists (! Praise gdo!), and many have also gone home across Ukraine and are now preaching the gospel in the streets and training and equipping their friends in the same things all around the country. Some of these are young women who were not allowed to speak in their churches, required to wear headscarves and long skirts at church, and their pastors have released them to minister and blessed them to go - this is a miracle!
We were also able to - in partnership with Awakening Europe - run a first pastors gathering in a city in the east of Ukraine - we saw pastors gathered from the Catholic, orthodox, lutheran, baptist, conservative pentecostal and charismatic churches coming together. It is hard to articulate what a miracle this is - many of these pastors have spent ten years trying to steal and sabotage each others ministries - but they gathered together, around testimonies of Jesus being preached and stood holding hands together and praying for Ukraine. (Even whilst cracking jokes about their theological differences, which seemed no longer to be a barrier, but something to smile about - quite extraordinary in the context). This was done in partnership with Awakening Europe who had a team in the same area for a week and had the idea, and joined with us with funding so we could bless these pastors with an exceptional three course meal together. We have also been able to send teams to minister in 10-15 churches weekly, to encourage local believers and invite them to join us in outreach preaching the gospel in their areas.
One of our team ran into the Ukrainian winner of Eurovision Song Contest during an outreach in central Kyiv, and was able to share about Jesus live to his thousands of tik Tok followers! I was also privileged to be invited with another evangelist to share testimonies and preach the gospel on the largest Christian radio station in the country, which by some miracle is the only station still broadcasting behind enemy lines. So we were able to share Jesus with many of those under occupation, as well as military personal on both sides of this horrible war. What a great honour.
Small teams have been going to places of high risk, close to rocket and bomb fire, but have been reaching those who have not been reached for a long time, in recently liberated areas, as well as ministering to those hiding in shelters and basements. We have also partnered with another ministry and helped with evacuations from high risk areas on a few occasions. Praise God we have stayed safe, and despite some close circumstances (including tyres going in areas of high risk and buildings just three buildings away from our team being hit), Jesus always has a solution and all our team are fine and continuing to preach! We also anticipated we may have problems as there is technically a ban on any gatherings, but even in the centre of Kyiv in ‘Independence Day’ week - we had great understanding from Police and very little opposition. Where we expected problems we saw police and military personal give their lives to Christ. Seeing people get healed and saved next to bombed out tanks is something I won't forget for a long time!
It is hard to summarise the great fruit - the nation is wide open for the gospel and truly, the harvest is ripe. Some of the team have given up jobs and businesses to continue the work, the labourers are few, but the harvest is really ready!
Thank you for being such a significant part of this move of salvation in Ukraine and investing in young Ukrainian evangelists, learning how to ‘go’ … which I know they will continue to do for many years to come.
To God be the Glory!
Join World Changers today, and be an integral part of changing the world!
Now is the time.
