"The War Scattered Our Church, but a New One Began With Those Who Stayed"

I come from a small town in the Vinnytsia region, but in 2012 I moved to Chernivtsi to study at university, and I have stayed here ever since. I grew up in a non-believing family. Today I serve as a pastor of Oxygen Church in Chernivtsi, which is a relatively young church: it is now in its third year. I am also a third-year student of the Applied Theology Program at UETS.

When I was a university student studying sociology, there were two believers in my group: a young man and a young woman. The young man was always at the center of attention. He made me curious. He did not drink or smoke around us, and he was somehow different. So I started asking questions. He tried to explain what Protestantism is, and honestly, I did not understand much at first. But I asked if I could go somewhere with him. He invited me to a church club that met about once a month. I invited a group of classmates to go along, and we went to this club. We did not stay until the end, not even for the worship, only for the refreshments. But I liked it, and the other believer in this group invited me to a different youth club, in another church, that met every week.

Little by little I began attending home groups, and my lifestyle changed. I believe the Lord touched me. After about a year of youth meetings and home groups, I repented. The church immediately involved me in youth ministry, and a year or two later I got baptized. I stayed in youth ministry and eventually became a youth leader. I have been walking with the Lord since 2014, which already makes twelve years.

The church where I repented still existed when the war began. But then many ministers left for the U.S., including our pastor, and many people scattered to other churches. And so our church ceased to exist.

At that time I had a home group team and a team of youth ministers, and we decided to stay together. We were thinking about which church to join, but meanwhile we gathered at my home every Sunday for breakfast. We wanted to serve teenagers, so we rented a small room just for teen ministry, without even being a church. We were simply looking for a place to belong.

Many non-believing teenagers began to come. We focused our ministry on them. Then I 

met a pastor I had known for about ten years. He belonged to the same church association that we did. But he had left it, and his church had been renamed Oxygen. We chose that name because we were known for our Oxygen camps, which many teenagers attended. That pastor suggested that I try to build not only teen ministry but also do some spiritual work with the people I was already leading in my home group. He believed that it could give a start to a church. He began to mentor me, and almost three years ago we launched Sunday services with a team of five people and some teenagers.

The church started to grow because non-believing teenagers repented. We baptized them and immediately involved them in ministry, so that teenagers served teenagers. For the first two years, that was the only way our church grew. During the last year, people from other churches have started to join us, mostly those who moved to Chernivtsi and found us on Instagram. Since we have many opportunities to serve, some people from other churches also decided to join us.

When I took a step of faith to become a pastor and lead people, I understood that a person who teaches must first of all keep learning. I see a very high need for training among church ministers, and I encourage our people to study. I believe that if you teach all your life, you must learn all your life. And I see the fruit of it. Even my worldview has changed because I started to study at the seminary.

My wife and people in churches notice that my sermons have become more systematic. I preach less on a single topic and more often take a passage of Scripture and work through it. I have also become more structured in my work with people.

I chose UETS because it is interdenominational. Here it does not matter whether you are Pentecostal or from another denomination. And that has influenced me a great deal. I understand people from other churches better now, why they believe what they believe, and that helps me accept them even more. 

Studying at the seminary also teaches you discipline: if you want to learn, you must discipline yourself to read, write, and study. And that is directly connected to the role of discipline in a pastor’s ministry.

That is an ambitious question. After the first year of teen ministry, when we grew because of teenagers, I try not to reveal my ambitions or rely on them, because teenagers are very unstable. I noticed that when I set ambitions, many teenagers came and the church grew, and then at one point many left, back into the world and away from the church. That shook me for a while.

Now everything has stabilized. We have about 20 regular attendees, but we influence more people than that. People come, and I thank God I can serve them. When new people come, we make room, and we serve them. 

I believe I am doing what depends on me: I study, I teach, I serve people. But the result belongs to the Lord. We are focused on non-believing teens and young people, but how many will repent and receive Christ, I do not know. Before each academic year, we write a strategy for the next half year for our youth teams and home groups, but we do not plan in numbers. I thank God that He is using me now. And as for what comes next, we will see.

I cannot say that my approach changed radically; I rather got more rooted in it in the seminary. I feel more confident about the direction I had already chosen, and UETS strengthens me in it. 

My leadership is built on friendship, and that is how I build the team. When I come to study, I build friendships with other pastors and church leaders, and our community grows. Wherever I travel, or whenever someone from another city visits us, we have some contacts, and that is wonderful. We value it a lot. 

Please pray for our local church, Oxygen, in Chernivtsi, and for the growth of our ministry among non-believing teenagers and young people. We would like to reach a wider circle of non-believers, including through sports events and teen clubs. We really hope to reach them with the light of Christ.