Chaplains at the frontlines — Jacek’s Story
This summer, FAIR Director Norton Lages travelled throughout Poland and Ukraine with Fellowship International missionary Ben Taylor to meet with local church leaders serving the needs of Ukrainians affected by the war. While in Poland, they met with Jacek and interviewed him about his experiences serving residents and soldiers on the frontlines as a chaplain. This is an excerpt from their interview.
Norton: Okay, so Jacek, why don’t you start with your name, where you are from, and why you got involved with this ministry?
Jacek: My name is Jacek and I’m from Wrocław, Poland. I got involved because I care. At the beginning of the war, I went to the border for four days like a lot of people were doing. Only up to the border because that’s all I allowed myself—for my wife.
On the eleventh day of the war, I was on the phone with my wife. I realized that the people who were able to escape were people who had resources, money, friends, connections. Those who had nothing at all were stuck, and we needed to reach them. My wife gave her blessing for me to cross the border and help those people.
It’s all about the people for me.
Ben: Jacek’s history is that he used to be a drug addict.
Jacek: I know what gangs are, I know what poverty is, I know what hunger is. Because of all this, I was shaped by my upbringing at home. And I think it makes it easier for me to understand the hungry or the lost. I realized the criminal aspect that could come up, and that people could take advantage.
Once I crossed the border, I saw that the needs on the border with Poland were different from the needs further into Ukraine. In a lot of places in Western Ukraine, people were just tired and hungry and needed a safe place to sleep. I knew that we wanted to get as far as possible into Donbas, where the fighting was happening, which meant we wouldn’t stop in Western Ukraine, even though it is suffering.
And God led us to reach Donbas in the end. We were actually very close to the Russian positions. This first trip was focused on working with soldiers. While we were there, we met children, stuck 30 kilometres from the frontlines where the active fighting is happening. A little later we found a group of older people about 20 kilometres from the fighting. As we were trying to decide how to help them, we met with Valery who’s a Ukrainian believer working to rehabilitate drug addicts, who stayed to help the elderly and the children.
So, we started working with three different groups — soldiers, the elderly, and children — in the Donbas region where there was intense fighting.
There are children who can’t escape because their parents drink or are addicted to drugs.
Ben: If you watch CNN from Bakhmut, Avdiivka, Toretsk, Vuhledar each of these places is like hell on earth, right? Big cities that were in Donbas region.
They were on the news because of the intense fighting that was there in these places. They were completely destroyed. The cities were leveled, completely destroyed by the fighting.
Jacek: 100,000 people lived in the city, and the city disappeared.
Norton: No buildings?
Ben: No. Nothing left standing.
Norton: No electricity, no water, no nothing?
Jacek: Nothing. Now it’s under Russian control.
Norton: Jacek, you mentioned old people and children. Where do they go?
Jacek: Nowhere—they’re stuck.
Norton: In this region?
Jacek: Yeah. Because they don’t have money, they don’t have connections. Their parents are addicted.
Ben: They have addicted parents. The poverty is so deep that they can’t imagine ever having a better life, or having a better condition. Maybe they have this mud concrete house and it’s very basic but that’s what they have, and they can’t leave—they're afraid to leave because then they won’t even have that.
Norton: Are they there right now?
Jacek: Yeah, they live in Donbas.
Jacek: Now the Russians have taken the area there isn’t free movement and there’s no communication with those places anymore.
Very often, the addicted parents are just waiting for the Russians to come. There’s a sense of “oh, well, there’s fighting now but when the Russians get here there won’t be any more fighting and the Russians will fix everything”. There’s a myth that the cities have already been rebuilt by the Russians. But there’s no proof. We see no cities being rebuilt.
For the kids, we put together packages with food, toys, and sweets. Medicines for the soldiers. Packages for the older people as well.
Mostly it’s made up of the things that I would have needed when I was a poor addict. I remember those moments of handing out the packages. Even if it was just a one-time thing, it stays with people and shows them that the world isn’t so bad. It covers those basic needs for them.
Ben: They try to reach people who are in such situations and at least cover their basic needs, the essentials.
Norton: Food; basics.
Jacek: Yeah. They don’t have clean water, or it’s polluted so it’s not good. The kids don’t have electricity. Very often there are no doctors or access to medical care.
Once we organized a meeting in winter, we cared for about 60 children. We were meeting with them and they all smelled like homeless people because they don’t have access to water to wash themselves.
Norton: In situations like these, I imagine that they would just sleep and look for their next meal?
Jacek: Pretty much, that’s more or less how it looks. They have very little education because there was no school because of COVID and then the war broke out. They have had four or five years with no education. They’re alive, but that’s it. They’re stuck in the streets, they fight.
Norton: Are there pastors in the area?
Jacek: Yes, but not now (where the children are), because when the frontlines move everyone gets scared and escapes.
Ben: We have many stories of pastors being arrested and taken to Russia and they disappear. We don’t know what happens to them. They’re taken because of their connection with the West.
Jacek: There are a group of us military chaplains. We go to the kids and spend time with them. That’s the main focus. But because we’re near the front we also visit the soldiers to pray with them, and bring basic medical supplies like bandages. We teach them how to save a life if their buddy gets shot. There are no regular hospitals. Where there are hospitals, they’re shot up constantly. We also go to hospices where there are old people waiting to die. We witness to them and meet the needs there.
Norton: Am I right that you have opportunity to spend time with wounded soldiers who haven’t been removed yet?
Jacek: There are several posts for medics where the injured will go for stabilization. They then go to special hospitals for the wounded. Those hospitals aren’t marked because they are a target for attacks. We have access to the stabilization point before they travel out. That’s where we meet them and share the Gospel with them in an important time where they may not recover. We’re trying to give them every opportunity to know their Lord and Saviour.
This is a Ukrainian ministry. My friend Valery organizes it and we just join them and help them expand their capabilities.
Norton: How do you feel in these situations?
Jacek: I don’t feel anything.
Norton: Nothing?
Jacek: Nothing. Only when I come back here—then I feel it. When you’re in it, with the children, you just focus on working. You can’t think about the injustice. When I come back, I start thinking a lot.
We don’t preach about God; this isn’t about pushing the Gospel, saying, “Jesus loves you,” because it’s very hard to tell someone living in hell that Jesus loves them. It’s very hard to hear that. That’s why we talk about God [in a way that draws people in so] they ask, “Why are you doing this?” We then can start to talk about God [in a deeper way]. But about the God who is within us. I also don’t like forcing people to think a certain way, and I’ve seen things like, “Now listen to the Gospel, and then we’ll feed you,” or, “You’ll only get food if you pray with us.” We don’t do any of that. Helping is the priority; showing people that they’re not alone. And only when they start asking us, “But why are you doing this?” do we begin to talk about it; that we do it because of God.
Norton: Because Jesus did this for us.
Jacek: Exactly!
But you can’t talk about Jesus’ love for people who are in hell. They see the death, they see the destruction. In Bakhmut where we were working, in fourteen months, 300,000 people died. Young people—our age—dead.
Norton: What’s the light of the Gospel in the midst of so much darkness? How does the Gospel shine? What is one story that keeps you going in these dark places?
Jacek: I got saved 25 years ago. I was an addict and part of a gang. I was a criminal. I got saved; God rescued me. And I’ve clung to God ever since. I know I did really bad things, but God rescued me. I just want the same for others. Right now, there is a war, but people still need the Gospel. They need the hope of the Gospel.
I’m tired, I’m lonely, I don’t have the money or the training but God keeps providing so I keep serving. There’s a fire inside me that keeps me going.
Norton: You’re at risk there. Every day. But you’re not thinking about it, are you?
Jacek: My past is a gift in this situation, from when I was living without God.
Ben: He lived a dangerous life before.
Jacek: Now, it’s a blessing.
It’s not a great big thing that I do, but it’s a piece. We maintain relationships with people; we don’t just open up the car and pass out food and move on. We meet the kids, we meet the older people and soldiers, we try to understand what’s going on with them and what their needs are. There are some really great Ukrainian guys that I work with.
Norton: Brotherhood happens in dark places. That’s a gift from God.
One of the things that I wanted to say is, “thank you,” and that we will be supporting you as long as we have the funds to do so. As long as Ben is telling us to continue, we will keep supporting you. We want also to be praying for you.
Jacek: I need the prayers more than I need money.
Norton: Yeah! So, if you need prayers more than money, can you tell us: how can we pray for you? What are two or three things we can pray for you and two or three requests for the ministry?
Jacek: The first is for my home. Pray that I don’t bring back the darkness to my wife and daughter after being exposed to the realities at the frontlines.
Pray for the people that I help.
Pray for wisdom about when and where to go. Prayer works, and I want to continue to do the ministry well.
This is an expensive ministry, what we do, with the travel and bringing supplies. God continues to provide, but pray for the funds to arrive.
Pray for me to return home safe and healthy.
Norton: We will pray for you.