Brother Anatoly Kosyanchuk has played key roles in multiple churches in Ukraine. He was largely responsible for planting two churches in the neighboring towns of Borivka and Komarivka. Each of those communities now has a church building and ongoing services. Meanwhile, Anatoly has accepted leadership for the first Baptist church in Bilogorodka. With God’s help, and thanks in part to Anatoly’s vision for church planting, yet another church has been planted on the opposite side of that town! So, although Anatoly still oversees and participates in the ministries in Borivka and Komarivka, others now minister weekly in those churches, and the Lord has expanded the Kosyanchuks’ labors to include other ministries for adults and children in Bilogorodka.
Yura and Violetta Levtseniuk
Yura, Violetta, Aaron, Benjamin, and Elizabeth Levtseniuk have been called into ministry in the city of Lvov in western Ukraine, where Yura pastors Salvation Baptist Church. In the excerpt below, Yura shares the story of how God called him and his wife into ministry.
“Before telling about the ministry in Lvov, I’ll share how the Lord called us here. God called me to serious ministry to unbelievers, to people seeking God, and to church members. I began with ministry to children and teens, then to youth and adults. I’ve been serving thus for some years already. I’d recognized my great need for understanding theology and practical disciplines. I saw my lack of knowledge of the Bible despite the fact that I’d been reading and studying it since childhood.
For these specific reasons, I enrolled in Bible college. Praise God, for the theological education I received. As a family, we were invited to join a short-term mission trip to the Far East of Russia, with the goal of revitalizing a church that had sunk into spiritual weakness. God granted us success in that mission, for which we are very thankful to Him. As a result of that, we felt God’s calling to establish a new church for Christ.
The members and deacons of a small congregation named “Salvation” invited us to Lvov. We began to pray concerning this ministry. As a family, we traveled from Dubno, Ukraine, to Lvov to hold a service. This church invited us to come, and this is where we have been ministering for the past three months. The Lord has blessed us with new people, who have received Jesus Christ into their hearts and are now preparing for baptism. This is a great joy for us.”
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Sasha and Ira Petrenko
The Petrenkos serve as church planters in Goncharovsk, Ukraine, a town that is known primarily for the nearby military base. Their ministry includes various ways of meeting others and getting involved in the local community, such as Bible studies, cooking classes, and organizing a local floor hockey team. In the summertime, they team up with church planters in other cities and together they run summer camps for children and teens. Brother Peterenko, along with a couple other nearby BIEM church planters, is starting a new church in the nearby town of Smolen. This will be the fourth church planted by BIEM in the Chernihiv region.
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Sergei and Vika Skripnik
For some years, Sergei and Vika Skripnik have served as church planters among villages in western Ukraine. In addition, Vika has organized and led children’s Sunday school classes and Bible classes for public school children. Both have been involved as leaders in Christian summer camps, both in their own area and in other regions of Ukraine. Gospel ministry in villages, where local religious traditions are strong, is not always easy. But the Skripniks have been blessed of God to see souls come to Christ and lives changed for His glory. Brother Sergei also plays an important role in the training of BIEM national church planters and workers. He serves as the assistant director of Kiev Theological Seminary, the school that BIEM operates in partnership with the Brotherhood of Independent Baptist Churches of Ukraine.
For more information on the Skripniks and their ministry, please contact our office.
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Mikhail and Natalia Titarenko
The Titarenkos relocated from the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, to the town of Fedorivka. This town had experienced a sudden population increase when some people who were evacuated from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986 were resettled here. But because there was no Gospel witness in Fedorivka, the Titarenkos went there to plant a new church.
For more information about the Titarenkos and their ministry, please contact our office.
Pavel and Alla Usach
Pavel Usach is a dedicated Ukrainian believer whose ministry particularly focuses on evangelistic outreaches for children and youth. In addition to ministering in their own church in the town of Zdolbuniv, Ukraine, he and his wife minister in local orphanages and summer camp ministries. Also, he is the originator and main coordinator of an annual competition called Bible Quest, which draws teams of Christian teens and young adults from churches all over Ukraine. The teams competing in the Bible Quest prepare by studying a given book of the Bible in advance and in intricate detail. Then, during the Quest, teams make their way to different stations scattered throughout a forest and must apply this Bible knowledge to fulfill various challenges. Over and over, these Bible Quests have served to deep youths’ knowledge of the Scriptures, to provide a chance to meet and fellowship with other Christian young people, and ultimately to deepen their Christian walk.
For more information about the Usachs and their ministry, please contact our office.
Vitaly and Olena Yurchenko
Vitaly Yurchenko was working on a nearby roof when he witnessed the explosion at Chernobyl. A fortunate survivor of this nuclear catastrophe, Vitaly is a graduate of the Kyiv Theological Seminary, and he gave up a lucrative private business to become a church planter with BIEM. When Vitaly first visited Chervona Sloboda, Ukraine, there was not so much as one church of any kind, and he felt the Lord urging him to start one. Beginning by renting the village club and holding evangelistic meetings, he has been blessed by God as souls have turned to Christ as Savior. Vitaly now leads a congregation (called Grace Baptist Church), which purchased a house to remodel and expand as their own meeting place. Despite open hostility from two community leaders (the school principal and the manager of the liquor distillery), Vitaly steadfastly persevered in proclaiming the Gospel, and the Lord is blessing his faithfulness.