While America was celebrating Easter, Ukraine was celebrating Palm Sunday. My team and I took public transportation downtown and walked down a little alley to an unmarked door – it would be our first church experience in this Soviet turned unitary nation.
The room was full when we entered, packed with around a hundred Ukrainians dressed in casual clothing. None of the women wore head-coverings, a departure from the traditional Orthodox norms of the country. The music was done by a classical guitarist and the preaching by a young lawyer-turned-pastor.
Evangelical Christianity in Ukraine is, in a post-Soviet era, legal. But, for many, giving up ones’ Orthodox-roots is, in effect, giving up ones’ national identity.
Their voices filled the room in both Russian and Ukrainian, mixing with the voices of the few English-speaking missionaries. Some of the songs were recognizable and I sang along in English. Others were unfamiliar, most likely written by the guitarist, and, in those moments, I simply stood there, feeling the presence of the Holy Spirit saturating the room.
Some of the believers in the room had been disowned by their families.
Many had been harassed for turning their backs on their country.
They had chosen Jesus over religion; love over condemnation; freedom over tradition.
And now, they are suffering the consequences from a nation unfriendly towards anything that is not Orthodox.
People in Ukraine don’t just call themselves “Christians”. They are “Orthodox” or “Catholic”, but never “Christian”.
“Christian” comes with a label that we take for granted in America. It is a label that brings persecution and suffering; it is the label of an outcast.
Christians in Eastern Europe travel for hours on public transportation to attend a Bible-believing church. We find a new church when the brand of coffee served before the service changes.
I think there is a reason that I stood in that room full of Ukrainians, all of them crying out to a living God, with tears streaming down my face. I think there is a reason why the presence of the Holy Spirit is so powerful in these places.
Jesus isn’t just some good-luck charm to them, some easy way to get to heaven. He is all there is, the only way they survive.
One of the many things I’ve learned over the course of my eight months is this:
Jesus costs everything. Literally, He costs everything.
And that’s how it should be. Because anything less is just that: less Jesus.
And I, for one, want all of Jesus. And absolutely nothing else.
“Whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For His sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in Him.”
– Philippians 4:8-9
