Anna and Olexander Chubenko’s daughter, Polina, is 8 years old. They live in a village in the Cherkasy region of Ukraine. Polina was 4 years old when she began to experience a lot of pain with severe swelling. Finally it was discovered she was in the early stages of sarcoma and had to begin a very difficult, long and painful series of treatments. Several times a year the family had to visit the Cherkasy Oncology Centre for chemotherapy, each visit about 1-2 months. They had to go through this again and again. The father, watching his daughter suffer, was tempted to divorce and began to drink alcohol periodically. Nevertheless, he did not leave his family.
Two years ago, a representative of the Ukraine Bible Society, Zulfiya and her daughter Dominika, visited the children’s department of the Oncology Centre, and gave each family a beautiful illustrated Children’s Bible. (Eurovision helps sponsor this Bible.) Such special gifts give hope and encouragement to desperate parents. Zulfiya and Dominika regularly visit the Centre with sweets, gifts and some entertainment programmes. But that time, in addition to the usual gifts, each child received a copy of a Children’s Bible. Zulfiya, a member of the local Evangelical Christian Church in Cherkasy, had lost her own husband to cancer, and had decided to dedicate herself to serving people also suffering from this disease.
A few weeks after the children were given their Bibles, little Polina’s most painful phase of treatment began. At night when she was in a lot of pain, she woke her mother, and crying, asked her to read the Bible. As Her mother read, Polina felt better and fell asleep. This went on for several days. It was then that Polina really fell in love with this wonderful Book, which took her on amazing biblical journeys. Anna, her mother called Zulfiya and said: “Finally, we have hope that everything will be fine…”
There were times of despair and times of hope. But the family always have the Children’s Bible with them, Polina is trying to read it for herself now. Polina is very friendly. When she was still undergoing treatment, if she was not in pain, she would try to cheer up all the children and parents in her ward, and even the medical staff too. Polina even said, “When I grow up, I want to volunteer to help all the sick children and I will give them Bibles too.”
Polina is gradually recovering and has started back at school. She tries to live a normal life. Her parents are actively helping her in this. She hasn’t forgotten her desire one day to become a volunteer. And she never forgets her special Children’s Bible, which became their family Bible.
