“Dima from Mariupol” – this is the nickname of 35-year-old Dima who is known to all residents of our campsite in Zalissya near Rivne, where people, who lost their homes as a result of the war, have been living for more than half a year.

Dima is a very skilled worker who has a talent from God to do various jobs: from construction, work with glass, and carpentry to repairing household appliances and computers – basically, he is considered a go-to guy. Every day, a lot of people come up to him with dozens of requests to fix, polish, test, install, and download something, and it can have to do with both personal needs and general issues. As a person of gentle disposition, he does not refuse to help anyone. Dima is also responsible for the tech support of daily morning and evening prayer meetings, the selection of soundtracks for worship, preparation, and broadcasting of online services, and films. He does all this with great responsibility, very diligently and selflessly, and always quickly. It was not for nothing that Dima became the winner of the “Worker of the Year” competition at the furniture enterprise where he worked before the war…

Dima often buys various parts for basic needs, paying his own money. And it is worth mentioning that he does not receive any salary, except for monthly refugee payments from the state in the amount of UAH 2,200. He is sincerely satisfied with what he has and is grateful to God and the people who take care of his stay in Zalissya.

Recently, Dima came to know the Lord Jesus Christ as his personal Savior and is currently attending baptism classes at the Community of the Good Shepherd church in Rivne.

 

At the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Dima lived in Mariupol in his own apartment on the first floor of a five-story building with his older sister and two nephews. Due to artillery shelling and bombing attacks on all major areas of the city, the sister moved with her children to a bomb shelter, from where they were later exiled by occupiers to the territory of the Russian Federation.

Dima was basically left alone in the apartment without electricity, water, and heating, so he had to rough it. He cooked food over a fire pit that was built of paving stones. The daily diet consisted of liquid porridge for breakfast and one baked potato for dinner. At lunch, he was just happy to have a hot tea because, at this point, it turned very cold to a degree that it was very hard to put up with it. Minus 8⁰C outside, plus 3⁰C inside the apartment. They had to be careful with the food since the city was already under siege.

Dima daydreamed about food so often that he could not relax and forget about his hunger even when he slept. At the same time, the boy tried to help his neighbors, as he walked several kilometers under shelling to the natural spring to get water for the elderly in the building. Dima also sheltered an old friend of his whose home was destroyed by a missile.

Oftentimes, young people would go to the center of the city to find out some news, where they saw the devastation, panic, and rampant looting… And all this was against the background of incessant shelling, fires, and corpses of civilians in the open air, who were buried right next to buildings or in mass graves on the sides of the streets. Sometimes when you walk past a building you could see people sitting around a fire trying to get warm, and after a few minutes when you go back, you would see only ruins and scattered mutilated bodies.

Young people were forced to flee from Mariupol as one situation occurred. It all happened about a month after the outbreak of the war. In the neighboring apartment lived persons who had set up storage for things looted from abandoned apartments. These people died during the shelling, and their apartment was robbed by their accomplices. They distributed part of the things to the residents of the building and disappeared with the rest of the spoil. After a while, some armed men broke into Dima’s apartment and forced them to load up the remains of the neighbor’s “storage” into their car, threatening them with machine guns. They promised that they would return the next day and shoot their legs if everything that their accomplices had stolen was not found. There was no way out, so at night Dima and his friend gathered their belongings and left the building.

During the curfew, the military patrol could have shot them without further ado, but God saved them. They managed to leave the city, where a grueling march through a minefield awaited them. It was frosty, and from the sea blew wet and gusty wind… At some point, Dima tripped over some tangled barbed wire. It took a great deal of effort to free him with the numbed hands.

It was dawn when the young people hit the highway. At the bus stop – a miracle took place! – They found the remains of a smoldering fire. After blowing the flames, the boys warmed up a little and had a snack. Then they spotted an abandoned shopping cart on the side of the highway, and now they didn’t have to carry heavy bags of canned goods on their backs. During the night, the escapees traveled about 55 kilometers…

A little later, a volunteer bus picked them up. How happy they were to be able to just kick back on the seat of the bus, to relax their worn-out bodies! Our travelers did not linger in Mangush, they sought to get out of the occupied territories as soon as possible. God manifested His grace to them: an unfamiliar elderly couple invited the boys to their home, where they ate the only hot food during the whole day. Then, they traveled to the Zaporizhzhia region. In a small settlement, at night, when the buses were no longer running and the friends were getting ready to spend the night at the bus stop, one large family invited them to stay overnight.

There were Russian checkpoints along the highway throughout the Zaporizhzhia region. But they managed to pass most of them without any problems. However, at the last one, Dima and his friend were thrown out of the car, the driver was let go, and they were taken to a corner, ordered to put down their bags, get all their things out of their pockets and leave. When machine guns were pointed at them, Dima prepared for death. But the commander of thugs suddenly noticed a wad of money among the prisoners’ belongings. Suddenly, he let the boys go as he was excited about the money.

In the city of Dnipro, by the grace of God, the boys found themselves in the volunteer center at the Ark Evangelical Church, where the refugees were provided with food, bed linen, and could take a shower. In two days, a bus was leaving Dnipro for Rivne with 2 available seats, which were offered to Dima and his friend. That’s how they ended up at the Zalissya campsite.

Both guys had to go through these harsh trials. Dima has serious health issues, and he still sees in his dreams the horrors of what he experienced. But he is grateful to God and people for rescuing him and he tries to express his gratefulness by word and deed.

Larisa Polukarova