Editor’s note: This is the testimony of Max Malyuga, a 25-year-old church leader in Ukraine. While English is not his first language, he shares the story of his faith establishment as he has come to understand his role in God’s plan and His Church.
Max Malyuga’s Story
“I was raised in the church. Back in 1992, one woman met my aunt on the street and invited her to church, and then my aunt invited my grandmother and my mother. Even though my aunt didn't stay in the church, my mother and my grandmother gave their lives to Jesus. I was born in 2000, and I was part of the church right away. As my mom would become single in a couple of years, she relied on church big time to help with raising up my sister and me. My father was a non-believer and stayed like that until his death, so the church was there for me instead of my father.
I met my wife, Sophia, at some Christian camp back when we were both kids, but we didn't know each other at the time. We met each other again when studying in the seminary, though there was no spark until the full-scale war started in 2022, and we got married on October 1, 2022. Our son, Orest, was born on February 14, 2025. He turned 6 months today.
As I was raised in the church, I would go to Christian camps for kids from the age of 6. Imagine how many dozen times I was able to raise my hand and give my life to Jesus at the end of a camp at a bonfire. I think I was conscious about that decision for about the first 10 times, and then I started feeling that there was something wrong about that. I was too young to realize what was wrong, though it didn't stop the inner conflict from growing: I knew I had faith in God, and I knew the Gospel (or at least thought so), but I couldn't live by it. I stopped going to Sunday School as soon as I was able to go against my mother's making me. Shifting into my teenage years, my mother offered me to go to our church's teenage camp. So I did and then joined our teenage ministry. My participation grew: I'd serve as a counselor for kids in camps, I'd play drums at the service, etc. It would lead me to getting baptized in June 2015 (I was 14).
I can say that at the time the strongest image of the kerygmatic community I had was at the Bible study for boys. Brothers Anton and Andrii Kaluzhnyy led it at their home for teenage boys like me. Later Anton would be the one to teach FP [The First Principles] and open TWCA [the way of Christ and His Apostles] to me.
When I turned 17, I went abroad to study and got in another cycle of that inner conflict I mentioned earlier: I knew that I was a believer, but I didn't have enough sound convictions to help me be whole and not like "the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind" (James 1:6). This led to me being "a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways (James 1:8)."
I thought going to the seminary would help me build strong convictions, but it only threw me into the next cycle of turbulence caused by that inner conflict I told you 2 times now.
At the same time I started going through FP when I was a freshman in a seminary. This helped me to filter all the theory from classes and apply it in real life, as FP are created in a way where one could observe himself and look at the core instead of drowning in secondary traditions. With all confidence I can state that FP allowed me to finally start building my convictions systematically. By convictions, I don't mean something like "God will never leave me" or "I know that the Lord is my father" (which is not wrong), but deeper ideas such as:
- God has a plan for His creation, and the church is in the heart of this plan, and I know my place in this plan.
- My life isn't simply about fighting with the sin after I repent and get baptized. It is participating in God's recreation of peace between heaven and earth by bringing His kingdom closer and closer to the whole creation.
And many more.
So it's been more than 5 years since I was introduced to TWCA, and I can list some turning points along the way. With each turning point I realized more and more was opened to me. Following are the degrees of that gradual development:
1 - FP put in order everything I've been fed since I was a kid; I was on the hook right from going through Becoming a Disciple. Finally I was provided with the understanding of how everything is tied together and leads to the next. Little by little the inner conflict would start shrinking from me being able to categorize (put in places) everything I knew about God, the Bible, the Gospel, and faith overall.
2 - Going through Acts suddenly showed me that there is way more. Way more of the church on Sunday, of the sharing of the Gospel, and just bringing people to church... Way more of everything.
3 - The Story was the final touch on grasping the big picture of how God will renew peace between heaven and earth and all nations will bow to Him. I'm still processing it even though it's been couple of years since I've done it :)
My role in the church, as Michael Vos once said, is being it rather than doing it. I do whatever I'm gifted in and whatever God shows me that's important to do at the moment. I've been in music ministry a long time, and I lead a team that serves our teens. Music is not worship, and like all other gifts, its main goal is to edify and teach kerygma and didache via music to the body, not to feel the Spirit moving on Sunday service.
I also lead at least one FP cohort on a regular basis and occasionally more.
Anton, I and a couple of other guys are heavily investing in the next gen. Those young leaders will definitely change our church and will become future house church leaders.
I think my role won't change dramatically in the future; it will simply become broader in the same perspective. God showed me that there is always more, but only if I stay obedient, fear Him, and live according to His word.
War surely pushed me harder towards obtaining a skill on how to biblically think through the different issues, especially complex moral and ethical issues. And I know I won't be able to learn that without systematic teaching, which I was gifted in BILD.
War clearly shows how little time we have and how crucial it is not to postpone anything of value, as you might not get to live to do that otherwise.
War bluntly opens eyes to what is true and what is false. It gives you an opportunity to become as honest as it is possible: with yourself, with God, and with the others. The way people react and then act shows who they really are.
War and any other injustice is the time for the church to shine and show itself to the world. I remember the first couple of months when the full-scale invasion started, and suddenly I, Anton, and others would spend days evacuating people out of town and bringing food back to those who couldn't or wouldn't leave.
War stresses and shakes the church, but it also allows for the right people to stand up and take action. I want to compare it to Paul's cycle after he would preach and teach in some town for a while, leave, and then come back to appoint leaders in the new churches. And one of the requirements for those leaders was that they were supposed to naturally show themselves in that community.
Modern churches in Ukraine (same as in the West) became very comfortable very fast. Especially when everything is tied to the Sunday gathering. But war brings communities back to actual reality, back to living side-by-side, back to being the church instead of doing the church.
My life was built around the church before the war, but now for me there is no life without the church, without our family of families.
TWCA is a worldview, and BILD is a tool to build it. There could be other tools, but I was raised in the church, and I've tried things over the years. There is no substitute for BILD yet. Many are skeptical, but they will see the truth by the fruits.”