By JOHN KEREZY, eyeoncleveland.com founder (facts here have sources listed at the end of the article) COVER PHOTO — Family killed in an indiscriminate Russian mortar attack in a suburb of the capital, Kyiv. CNN photo/video

BROADVIEW HEIGHTS, Feb. 23, 2024 – It’s been two years since an internationally-branded war criminal, Russia’s Vladimir Putin, began a brutal campaign to conquer and exterminate Ukraine. World opinion was revulsed this past week when Putin ordered the murder of his imprisoned rival Alexei Navalny. But it shouldn’t be surprising. After all, under a lie of “de-Nazifying” and an extensive global propaganda campaign against Ukraine, Russia has also:

• Forced eight million Ukrainians to flee for their lives to safe havens in Poland, Eastern Europe, and other locations such as the U.S. More than four million homes in Ukraine have been destroyed. Families such as the Malieievs (Bob and Sasha and their children Emma and Platon, now safely living in Westlake) saw their house destroyed in a Russian attack.
• Captured as many as 700,000 Ukrainian children, ripping them away from homes and families, and deporting them to Russia. (The exact number is unknown)
• Massacred more than 450 innocent men, women, and children in the town of Bucha, including nearly 420 murdered by shooting and/or torture.
• Killed more than 10,000 civilians, and injured another 18,500-plus, in indiscriminate Russian attacks, many through bombs and missiles intentionally aimed at the civilian population.

Russia’s intentions are crystal clear: Genocide.

HOW CHURCHES HAVE RESPONDED

Slavic Full Gospel Church on Wallings Road in Broadview Heights immediately felt God’s call to help their brothers and sisters in Ukraine. About 90 percent of the church’s population, including all of its pastors and elders, came to the United States from Ukraine. This church launched a multi-pronged effort to help its bleeding and dying Ukrainians. So far SFGC has shipped 39 shipping containers (the 40-foot long trailers we see on the highways), completely filled with humanitarian and relief supplies, across the Atlantic Ocean to Poland and then overland into Ukraine. The estimated value of this relief is more than $1.5 million.

Here is a link to a brief video showing a shipping container being loaded with relief supplies:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LV-2fKCfJPc

“When the war began… we weren’t certain what Ukraine would do in response to Russia’s brute force attempt to wipe our homeland away,” Roman Skalsky of Broadview Heights, deacon at SFGC, says. “When President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his government chose to fight for the nation’s survival, our church and its members dedicated themselves to doing all we could to assist our relatives and friends in their hour of need.”

Just two months after the war’s onset, a nine-person team from SFGC flew into harms’ way, traveling by commercial air to Poland and then overland to Ukraine. They distributed hundreds of first-aid kits and body armor to soldiers on the front lines of the way. They helped provide food and clothing to dozens of refuges centers which sprung up in churches in Western Ukraine.

At the same time, members of SFLG sponsored hundreds of Ukrainian war refugees arriving in Northeast Ohio. One of the first was Kateryna Krasnorutska and her son Yaroslav. A Russian sniper fired a bullet into the head of Kateryna’s husband Maxim at the family’s home near Kharkiv.  Maxim died in his wife’s arms. Today, nearly two years later, their son Yaroslav – who’s also safe here in NE Ohio – still has nightmares from the PTSD he experienced that fateful day.

Here is a link to a video with Kateryna’s story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsYJSfOH0_8&t=228s

Once here, SFGC has helped hundreds of Ukrainians. They have partnered with the non-profit group Rise in Love to find housing for dozens of families. It has accepted the donation of more than a dozen automobiles which have found their way to poor Ukrainian immigrants. The church is also running English as a Second Language (ESL) classes and providing other assistance (furniture, clothing, job help) as well.

What makes SFGC’s deeds both notable and remarkable is that the church has no paid staff. Its pastor, Peter Trokhimenko, Deacon Roman Skalsky, and other church officials are bi-vocational. They hold down full-time jobs while also caring for their church and its members. Skalsky and his wife Diana have personally sponsored many refugee families. Roman himself has also made eight trips from Cleveland to New York City with his large pick-up truck to bring refugee families home after they’ve arrived at JFK Airport in the U.S. from Europe. But nearly all SFGC members have a relative or close friend in Ukraine who’s been killed, wounded, or made homeless as Russia attempts to exterminate its southern neighbor.

A church next to SFGC, Cuyahoga Valley Church (CVC), also reached out its arms and hands to assist.  CVC provided some financial support and also volunteers to assist with some of Slavic Full Gospel’s humanitarian efforts (see more below). It stands steadfast with Slavic Full Gospel and peace-loving people everywhere against Russia’s brutal and inhumane efforts to extinguish Ukraine.

Rev. Rick Duncan, founding pastor of CVC, is in the middle of delivering messages at his church on the Ten Commandments as part of a sermon series on the book of Exodus. He cites what’s happening in Ukraine as clearly violating God’s law, specifically the sixth commandment which states, “You shall not murder.”

“The evidence certainly points to the fact that the Russian aggression toward not only male Ukrainian civilians, but against Ukrainian women, children, and the elderly. This is genocide,” Duncan says.

“The violence is tragic, unconscionable, and a clear violation of the Law of God,” he adds. “In my church message, I said, ‘We should seek to use our influence to help our government stand against any form of genocide.’ May the Lord bring about a stop to the aggression of Russia against the people of Ukraine.”

Many other Northeast Ohio churches are also providing humanitarian relief, helping bring refugees to safety, and fervently praying for Ukraine. There are 10 local Ukrainian-based faith communities who will be coming together in a prayer service for Ukraine on Saturday, February 24, beginning at 6 p.m. at St. John’s Cathedral, 1007 Superior Avenue, in downtown Cleveland.  Details are here: https://saintjohncathedral.com/events/prayer-vigil-for-the-ukraine

HOW THIS WAR BECAME PERSONAL

Some of you reading this may know that three years ago, I was diagnosed with Stage 3 bladder cancer and Stage 3A renal failure. God reassured me and comforted me throughout my treatment. I felt a powerful and omnipotent sense, one which could only come from the Holy Spirit, that I would be treated and healed.  As that happened, I changed my pray life quite a bit by asking a simple question: Why. Why, Lord, had you preserved my life?

I believe I received that answer shortly after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began.  The founding pastor, Rick Duncan, and the senior pastor, Chad Allen, of my church – CVC – asked me if I could be of assistance to Slavic Full Gospel Church.  Over the course of the next several months, my wife Kathy and I got to know many members of SFGC. I helped the church by publicizing its fund raising and relief efforts. I have used this web site to tell many stories about the hardships of the refugees, and the sacrifices which SFGC members were making on behalf of others.  Below are links to a few of these stories.

Assistance was by no means a solo effort. Dozens of other members of Cuyahoga Valley Church also leaped to aid and to made donations to help SFGC. Two who were especially helpful were Rick Eimers (now with Heritage Classic Academy) and Sam Lupica. Rick and Sam provided help and assistance through CVC members’ donations of time and talents time and time again. Additionally, Cuyahoga Valley Church sent its own mission team to Poland and helped present a “Three Countries” vacation bible school camp for Ukrainian refuges as well as Polish residents near Warsaw in the summer of 2022.

After months of assisting, I was no longer a detached person writing about and/or publicizing on behalf of SLFG and Ukraine and its refugees. As I got to know some of the refugees and their life stories, I felt compelled to do what we could to assist them. I also receive a lot of support from Cuyahoga Community College and its West Faculty Senate, which made supporting Ukrainian refugees one of the Service & Collegiality Committee’s top activities in the Fall 2022 academic semester. Last year Kathy and I donated a car to a recently-arrived Ukrainian refugee family to help provide them with transportation.

HOW YOU CAN HELP

Putin and his ruthless military murderers don’t care if you are a Democrat, independent, or a Republican. Many of them are oblivious to political divisions in the U.S. This isn’t about military assistance: What SFGC and those who are helping the church are connecting at the heart-to-heart level with the very same type of people that Jesus Christ described in Matthew 25: Those without food, clothing, or a place to lay their heads.

If you’ve read this far, would you take just one more minute, reach into your pocketbook or checkbook, and make a contribution to assist the vital – Lifesaving – activities of Slavic Full Gospel Church?  A full 100 percent of funds donated will go to humanitarian relief to those destitute in Ukraine or those refuges in great need here in the U.S. Here is the link:

God Bless You.

https://sfgchurch.churchcenter.com/giving/to/ukraine-aid

SOURCES

The International Criminal Court ruled on March 17, 2023, that Putin is responsible for the war crime of unlawful deportation of population (children) from the occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation. It issued a warrant for Putin’s arrest.  Retrieved from  https://www.icc-cpi.int/news/situation-ukraine-icc-judges-issue-arrest-warrants-against-vladimir-vladimirovich-putin-and

https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-children-taken-ukraine/32527298.html

https://ukraine.un.org/en/253322-civilian-deaths-ukraine-war-top-10000-un-says