Putin’s attempt to murder 20 Evangelical pastors backfired

At the end of last September, I traveled to Ukraine for my third aid convoy, bringing medical supplies in from Poland for Ukraine’s first responders. When I visit Kyiv, I always attend the same Evangelical church. It’s vibrant and growing, their cafe is amazing, they are intent on helping their neighbors with aid. The singing always makes me cry, even though I don’t understand the words.

The weekend of September 27 was a big occasion for that church. They were celebrating 32 years of ministry, hosting a pastors' conference, and dedicating a brand new 4,500-person worship hall built in the midst of the war.

Early that Sunday morning, Russia attacked the area with multiple Iranian-designed "Shahed" drones. The timing of the attack does not appear to have been a coincidence, as there are no military installations nearby.

Miraculously, one of the drones missed the building where 20 pastors were sleeping by mere feet and detonated in the parking lot instead. Another landed in the church park. No one was injured. Another miracle occurred nearby. A parishioner named Svitlana saw a Shahed missile hit the building right beside hers, but inexplicably, it didn’t explode.

In America, we cancel service if it snows or if the power goes out. In Ukraine, they don’t cancel church for anything. By 11 a.m., thousands poured in to worship and to dedicate the new building. During the service, over 200 people came forward to be baptized.

I worshipped there the following weekend, and another 50 came forward. It was one of the most powerful worship services I’ve ever been a part of. A senior pastor handed me a piece of sharp metal. It was a piece of shrapnel from the Shaded drone that had lodged in the new worship hall. Russia packs their suicide drones with small pieces of sharp metal so when they explode, the maximum number of people will be killed or injured. 

Putin's regime seems to be dedicated to destroying both the faith and the will of the Ukrainian people. What happened to that church and to Svitlana is only a glimpse of a wider campaign. But the response of these believers is the real story here. 

Since 2022, Russian forces have murdered at least 52 Ukrainian Christian leaders and damaged or destroyed 650 churches. Whole denominations have been banned. In occupied areas, believers have been killed, tortured, and driven underground.

I've seen Putin's brutality firsthand. While filming our documentary A Faith Under Siege: Russia’s Hidden War on Ukraine’s Christians, we met Svitlana’s husband Viktor, a Ukrainian Evangelical who was kept in a basement for 25 days by Russian forces. He was beaten with fists, feet, and baseball bats, and repeatedly shocked with a taser. During his imprisonment, a Russian Orthodox Priest tried to “cast demons” from him simply because he was a Protestant Christian. We’ve documented Viktor’s story here.

But here's what Putin didn't count on: his campaign of violence against faith is backfiring spectacularly.

The growing church in Kyiv isn't an anomaly; it's emblematic of a broader spiritual awakening across Ukraine. Almost a third of Ukrainians say their religious faith has grown since the war began. Putin's bombs aren't breaking spirits; they're driving people to prayer, lifting them up as believers.

Every missile that falls without killing becomes a testimony. Every church service held under threat becomes an act of defiance. Every new baptism represents Putin's failure. The attacks designed to crush hope are instead igniting it. Putin wanted to create fear. He's creating faith instead. The same attack on my favorite church in Kyiv destroyed Pastor Mark Sergeev’s home, where his wife and children were sleeping. They survived and were worshipping with their neighbors in the rubble just hours later. 

As Russia continues its unjust war against Ukraine, it is forging believers who will never waver in their faith or their resistance to Putin’s attempt to subjugate them. Each act of persecution plants seeds that bloom into conviction. Putin's war on Ukrainian Christianity isn't just failing, it's producing the very thing he sought to destroy: an unshakeable faith that persecution cannot extinguish.