The Conversion of Lyudmila

What happens when a beautiful, vibrant woman learns she has a terminal illness like ALS? How are mother-daughter relationships affected when the mother becomes seriously ill, with a life-threatening disease? How does a Christian woman live with ALS? The women in the Novosibirsk Christian Church have gained some precious life experience as they have faced these questions during the Coronavirus pandemic.

By Lena Kim, Novosibirsk, Russia

Everything began with Yulia, Lyudmila’s daughter, who had likely never given a thought to Christianity until only very recently. Yulia lives in a foreign country. She flew home to Novosibirsk to support her mother, whose health was poor. She needed Yulia’s help to accomplish the sale of a piece of property she owned. The buyer turned out to be our sister in Christ from the church in Novosibirsk – Tanya. They became acquainted through the sale of this property and quickly became friends. Tanya shared about her life, about church, about the relationships she has in the church. Yulia was surprised by what she was hearing.

No cure

Yulia herself was in shock from the moment she laid eyes on her mother, seeing the extent to which Lyudmila’s illness had changed her in the last year. Only recently she had been a strong, beautiful, fit, socially active woman. The diagnosis was ALS*. This was frightening; her disease is rare. Currently there is no cure. Her doctors were helpless to heal her and she was given a prognosis of only two to three more months of life. Yulia asked Tanya if it would be possible to introduce her mother to one of the older women in the church. About a month after this, Lyudmila came to a Bible discussion group and met several more women from church. On January 30^th, 2021, Lyudmila was baptized into Christ!

In Lyudmila’s words, had she not been diagnosed with a terminal illness, she would have continued on with the punishing pace of life she had been keeping up to that point. We thank God that this diagnosis moved her daughter to want to introduce her to sisters in the church, who loved her, helped her study the Bible, and who are continuing to care for her and encourage her.

Not home yet, but on the way

     “I don’t think that I can yet say that I’ve come home to God. It would be truer for me to say, I am coming home to God. When my illness progresses and I feel much worse – truthfully, I feel so awful that I think, this is it, it’s over, I’m dying; but at the same time, I feel that I am not alone. God is within me! And the sisters are with me – Lena, Ira, Sveta, Tanya, and many others along with them, they all together begin to pray, and I feel immediately better. The seizure passes! Hurray! I am still alive! Halleluia!”

“And now I know, that in the midst of all my daily concerns and problems it’s important for me to remember that at the center of everything – is Jesus Christ. I remember what my salvation cost. What conclusions have I come to, in the face of all this? We need to live as if every day were the last, as if any minute the Lord could come and call us home to him. Save us, Lord!”

In our medical history there are two famous cases of ALS when the fatal process of decaying nerve cells in the body inexplicably stopped, the disease halted its progress, and these patients continued living on for years and years in the state at which the disease left them. Lyudmila, like a good soldier, continues to fight for life. She has already slammed through the negative predictions of her doctors in Novosibirsk. All they can do is shrug their shoulders. We ask everyone who reads this to please pray with us for a miracle. We know that God is able to arrest the development of Lyudmila’s disease and give her the gift of more years of life! May all the glory go to Him, our God!

Lyudmila’s daughter, Yulia, is relocating to Ireland. During the time that she was caring for her mother in Novosibirsk, she came several times to church and began to study the Bible. We pray that when she has settled in Ireland she will also decide to be baptized and become our sister!

* Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis or ALS, is a progressive nervous system disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord, causing loss of muscle control. ALS is often called Lou Gehrig's disease, after the baseball player who was diagnosed with it.

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/amyotrophic-lateral-sclerosis/symptoms-causes/syc-20354022, accessed June 20, 2021.