LIDIA & Yuriy Buchinskiy
Family of Ukrainian believers fights back
Lidia and Yuriy Buchinskiy say goodbye to one another at the Boise Airport this past March. Yuriy was flying to countries surrounding Ukraine to help refugees who were fleeing Russian bombs. (Courtesy photo)
By Gaye Bunderson Editor’s note: This story was written in March. Christian Living Magazine prays for the safety of all the people involved and for the country of Ukraine. To meet Lidia Buchinskiy is to attach a friendly face to a much-televised tragedy. Lidia and her husband Yuriy were both born and raised in Ukraine, but both have been in the U.S. now for more than 20 years and are naturalized American citizens with four American-born children. Lidia is from Odesa but was born in Izmail, on the border with Romania. “I came here as a fiancee,” she said. Her husband’s family left Ukraine and headed for California in 1991, when the Soviet Union collapsed. As a young man, Yuriy attended a church in San Francisco where church leaders started a program to visit Siberian jails to minister to the people there. Yuriy went with them and also visited his homeland, where he met Lidia. She was just 13½ at the time, and Yuriy was 19. They would marry a handful of years later. Yuriy has now returned to the area that has been, and continues to be, wracked by war and waves of refugees. Initially, he was in Romania and Moldova but may be moving about to help where he can with evacuating people and assisting those who’ve already fled. He is not the only member of Lidia’s family to travel to the troubled area to selflessly help their fellow Ukrainians. They are all people of faith. Some of Lidia’s family still lived in Ukraine when the war broke out. Her sister, Katie, was pregnant and had a Caesar-
10 May / June 2022 | Christian Living
ean section just after the war started. Katie’s husband, Sergey, was a pastor at Lutsk, a city in northwestern Ukraine. The couple has three other children besides the newborn and, as of the writing of this article, the family was trying to get to the border of Poland and has likely succeeded, as have many others. Two other sisters, who had been living in California, are now working at the Romania/Ukraine border as interpreters and include Lisa, 32, and Tina, 45. Sister Anna, 40, is serving as a translator at the Poland/Ukraine border. Lidia’s brother, Dennis Serdichenko, is in Odesa and was able to get his children safely into Romania, as well as his and his siblings’ mother. However, he is staying behind (Ukrainian males of specific ages are required to stay to help fight the war), and his wife is remaining with him. Said Lidia: “She is a faithful friend to him and an amazing woman of God.” Lidia is proud of her family’s courage and sacrifice. The faith of her family members started decades back with her father, Pete Serdichenko. He started a Good Samaritan Fund 30 years ago in Ukraine – a program that still continues to help those in need today. The entire family consisted of devout churchgoers; and the Ukrainian church today, though severely tested, has, in Lidia’s words, “become a place of good.” She tells a story of how six people ignored the war-related curfew and the nighttime darkness to go to a church and be baptized. They said ahead of time to the pastor there, “We’re going to come no matter what.” Members of the Good Samaritan Fund program are at bus and train stations, giving out food and Bibles and praying for people. “It’s an opportunity to be light and hope,” Lidia stated.
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