At 1:30 a.m. on July 26, Sergey Vivchar heard his city’s air-raid siren and jumped out of bed. He knew he had less than three minutes to find a safer location before Russian missiles hit.
He went to the corner of his bathroom, away from the windows, and sat down. He got on his phone and sent a group message to the Baptist youth group he leads. Many of the 30 teenagers were scared.
“These kids carry pain and trauma far beyond their age,” Vivchar told Christianity Today. “Some cry during air raids. Others tremble and hide. Some simply scream in fear.”
This night was particularly long. Vivchar, a pastor at Ark Church, counted 30 explosions that shook the eastern city of Dnipro, Ukraine. The drone and missile attacks continued until 5 a.m.
A 12-year-old girl named Tanya told the group, “I’m afraid! I’m afraid all the time.” Vivchar led them in prayer. He guided the group through breathing exercises. He asked them to repeat the Bible verses they studied during summer camp, from Psalms 58 and 62, where David talks about putting his trust in God even when his life is in danger.
The group continued to send voice memos and texts. Tanya said she felt better, but another explosion made her panic. Vivchar asked the group to pray again.
“Yes, it’s a little bit easier for me now,” said Tanya.
The barrage killed three people and wounded six. Russia has intensified its aerial campaign in recent months, with hundreds of drones firing upon civilian centers nearly every night. The attacks have overwhelmed Ukrainian defense systems.
Last Monday, US president Donald Trump changed his 50-day cease-fire deadline. The new deadline is 10 days. He threatened to enforce “very severe tariffs” on Russia and secondary tariffs on countries buying Russian oil and gas if President Vladimir Putin doesn’t agree to end his war in Ukraine.
“I’m not so interested in talking [to Putin] anymore,” Trump said. “He talks, we have such nice conversations, … and then people die the following night” in a missile strike.
Many Ukrainians question whether Putin will accept a cease-fire, even with US pressure.
Trump announced the new deadline on July 28. That night, Russian missiles and drones rained down in three cities, hitting a hospital and killing at least 22 people, including a 23-year-old pregnant woman.
One of the cities was 20 miles west of Dnipro. “The sounds of the explosions there were so powerful that I heard them in our city,” Vivchar said. “Maybe Putin didn’t hear about Trump’s ultimatum?”
Each day that passes brings more deaths, he added. Vivchar frequently sees social media posts from friends across the country who have lost loved ones, and three deacons from his church have died fighting on the frontlines, including one last month. The soldier, Volodymyr Holer, was a close friend of Vivchar’s and left behind a wife and a five-year-old.
Vivchar is encouraged by one of the last texts he got from Holer, telling him he needed to keep ministering to teenagers.
“If Ukrainians don’t have believers who trust Christ and who follow Christ, we don’t have a Ukraine,” the text said. “I cannot see Ukraine without Christ and without Christians.”
Vivchar, who has worked with teens for 16 years, said God is at work in Ukraine, even as the country faces suffering and grief. When the full-scale war began, 70 percent of Ark Church’s 150 congregants fled. But then the church gained 700 new people, who came to Dnipro from regions Russia occupied. The church’s youth programs have drawn many into the pews on Sundays, and Vivchar has seen a lot of teenagers come to faith in Christ and engage in daily Bible reading and prayer.
But the entire country is feeling the strain of more than three years of war.
Vladyslav Sobolevskyi, adviser to the commander of Ukraine’s 3rd Army Corps, told CT that many soldiers have been fighting since 2022. Approximately 2,000 soldiers have been on the frontlines since 2019. Some have served since the first Russian invasion in 2014, Sobolevskyi noted.
Vivchar said the church is also encountering fatigue.
Many Christians, including pastors, have left the country. Others, like Vivchar, have stayed to help meet the spiritual needs all around them, but sent their families away to keep them safe. Vivchar’s wife and eight-year-old daughter are temporarily living in England alongside a group of Ukrainian orphans and foster families. His wife serves as a translator for the group. Sometimes he misses them desperately.
Vivchar said 90 to 95 percent of Ukrainians have experienced some form of psychological distress from war and displacement. Teenagers have missed out on much of their childhood due to both COVID-19 lockdowns and years of war.
“They sit all the time in a basement because almost every day Russia tries to kill us,” Vivchar said.
A 2024 JAMA Pediatrics study concluded that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has greatly impacted the mental health of Ukrainian adolescents, with those exposed to war “more likely to screen positive for PTSD, depression, anxiety, substance use disorder, and eating disorders.”
Vivchar has taught his youth group the trauma-response techniques he learned during a spring retreat sponsored by The Renewal Initiative. He said one of the most helpful tools involves bringing yourself “back to the present moment through breathing, sensory awareness, and prayer.”
He taught the teenagers how to count their inhales and exhales during a Russian attack and name things they can see, hear, touch, taste, and smell. The tools help, but he says the most important thing the teens have learned is that “Jesus is near, even in the darkest moments. That’s our comfort.”
One of the church youths, 16-year-old Anya Volkova, said Russia has attacked Dnipro approximately ten times this past year, usually on a large scale. She has things she does now on nights when suicide drones are crashing into buildings. She grabs her two cats and runs with her family to the nearest shelter.
Then, as she learned in youth group, she prays.
“I ask God to protect all of the people who are in danger now,” she said. “And as soon as I finish, the anxiety immediately leaves me, and I feel like everything is fine now because I entrusted it to God’s hands.”
