Hello, friends,

My name is Iryna Brooks. My family has been residents of Seymour, TN since 2008. We have been involved in the community helping and serving. My husband, Hunter, is the Food Rescue Driver at Second Harvest Food Bank, and I am an upper school teacher at The King’s Academy, a small Christian school.

As many of you know, I am Ukrainian by birth – I lived there till the age of 19 when I immigrated to the US by myself. My entire family is still in Ukraine and, unfortunately, has been living under occupation since 2014.

Since the war started, I have been blessed to be able to go over to Romania and Ukraine multiple times, volunteering at the refugee centers, taking care of refugees, and delivering humanitarian aid to the internally displaced people in several areas of Ukraine. I speak the language, I understand the culture, I have family there so it is easy to establish rapport with the ones who lost hope and ability to trust. Many of you have heard me share about these trips, and a lot of you have played a huge role in making them a reality through prayer and support.

My daughter and I spent 5 weeks in Ukraine last summer volunteering. My son and I were going back in October. Unfortunately, my boy went home to be with Jesus just 3 weeks after we returned from Ukraine. He had a heart for people. He wanted to see this world turn to his Jesus. He had gone to Romania and Ukraine before and wanted to go minister again. But we are going in his stead. In May, all 3 of us will be making a trip to love on the ones who have no one left. We will play with kids, sing with them, read to them, dress them, and feed them. For so many kids, the ability to have their own bottle of Cola and their own Snickers bar is the ultimate dream. And we are going to give these kids that dream. We will serve in 3 different areas of Ukraine: in the Carpathian Mountains near the border with Hungary, Ternopil, and Lviv. We truly believe that this is where we are supposed to spend our summer loving others and carrying on our son’s legacy: transforming lives for Christ.

This is a big trip and a lot of things still need to work out and doors opened. I would covet your support on this mission. How can you help? First and foremost, please pray: pray for doors to open, pray for the love of God to be witnessed by the people of Ukraine who have been going through the unimaginable for the last 4 years, pray for safety (it is a country in the midst of war), pray for finances to become available – this trip is expensive and in the natural, we cannot afford it. However, we serve a God who is a God of the impossible. And please, pray for God to provide all the necessary finances for the tickets, lodging, and food in Ukraine and travel across the country.

Since this horrible war started, my family has lost 12 people. One of them was my dad, and unfortunately, I was denied the opportunity to tell him goodbye or go bury him. This is an opportunity to be able to go share the love of Jesus with my people, people who did not ask for this war but are staying there and fighting. I have talked to hundreds of refugees in the last 4 years, and one thing is evident – these people are hurt, they have lost most of their possessions, lost family members and friends, and lost their way of life. But we have an opportunity to work together and bring a little bit of hope to these precious people.

Thank you for being my village and for your unwavering support. We CANNOT do it without you and your support.

On our past trips, this is what we were involved with: doing laundry, cooking, loading vans with supplies to take to Ukraine, cleaning, playing with kids, building a playground and trampoline, weed-eating, clearing brush, putting a net around a volleyball court, putting bunk beds together, laying mattresses for refugees to sleep on, distributing bags of food in frigid cold in Ukraine, playing with kids, feeding hungry bellies, spreading love. Just trying to give these people some sense of normality. We have the opportunity to help again.