Slavic Gospel Association
The information on this page was last updated 1/26/2026. If you see errors or omissions, please email: [email protected]
Summary
From our founding in 1934 through today, SGA has been working with churches in Russia, the former Soviet countries of Eastern Europe, and Central Asia to share the Gospel, help train leaders for the church, and to help the hurting and forgotten in the name of Jesus.
Contact information
Mailing address:
Slavic Gospel Association
6151 Commonwealth Dr.
Loves Park, IL 61111
Website: www.sga.org
Phone: (815) 282-8900
Email: [email protected]
Organization details
EIN: 362428314
CEO/President: Michael Johnson
Chairman: Dr. Rick Goertzen
Board size: 12
Founder: Rev. Peter Deyneka
Ruling year: 1950
Tax deductible: Yes
Fiscal year end: 06/30
Member of ECFA: Yes
Member of ECFA since: 1980
Purpose
Sharing the Gospel - SGA connects North American Christians - like you - with individual Russian church-planting missionaries, and helps to send them out to live, work, and proclaim the Gospel. You can have an exciting part in this life-changing fulfillment of the Great Commission!
Equipping the Church - Preparing faithful pastors, teachers, youth leaders, and children's workers for lifetimes of ministry is vital for evangelical churches across Russia and her neighboring countries. Our schools provide doctrinally sound, biblical training in pastoral ministry, evangelism, and Christian education.
Helping the Forgotten - Across the lands of Russia, more than 700,000 children living in state-run orphanages or children's homes. Their physical and spiritual needs are enormous. Most of these kids will never be adopted into a loving family. Without Christ, they face a dismal future.
Mission statement
SGA serves evangelical churches in Russia and the former Soviet republics, by helping national pastors and their congregations reach their own people with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Statement of faith
We believe in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments as verbally inspired by God and inerrant in the original writings, and that they are of supreme and final authority in faith and life. (Luke 24:27,44; 2 Timothy 3:16; 2 Peter 1:21)
We believe in one God, eternally existing in three persons -- Father, Son and Holy Spirit. (Matthew 28:18-19; Mark 12:29; 2 Corinthians 13:14; Hebrews 1:1-3; Acts 5:3-4)
We believe that Jesus Christ was begotten by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary, and is true God and true man. (Luke 1:26-38; John 1:14; 14:6-11; Hebrews 1:1-8)
We believe that man was created in the image of God; that he sinned, and thereby incurred not only physical death, but also spiritual death which is separation from God; and that all human beings are born with a sinful nature and, in the case of those who reach moral responsibility, become sinners in thought, word and deed. (Romans 3:10-26; 1 Thessalonians 1:7-9: Jeremiah 17:9)
We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures, as a representative and substitutionary sacrifice; and that all who believe in Him are justified on the grounds of His shed blood. (1 Corinthians 15:1-10; 1 John 1:7; 2:1-2; 1 Peter 3:18; Romans 3:24-25)
We believe in the resurrection of the crucified body of our Lord, in His ascension into Heaven, and His present life there for us as High Priest and Advocate. (1 Corinthians 15:1-10; Hebrew 10:12-22; 1 John 2:1-2)
We believe in that blessed hope, the personal, premillennial and imminent return of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. (Hebrews 9:28; Revelation 1:5-8; Acts 1:8-12; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18)
We believe that all who receive by faith the Lord Jesus Christ are born again of the Holy Spirit, thereby receiving eternal life and thus becoming children of God. (John 1:12; 3:3-16; Ephesians 2:8-9; Titus 3:5; John 10:27-29)
We believe in the bodily resurrection of the just and unjust, the everlasting blessedness of the saved, and the everlasting, conscious punishment of the lost. (Matthew 25:46; Daniel 12:2-3; Revelation 20:4-6, 10-15)
We believe in the spreading of the gospel as Jesus said... Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature. (Mark 16:15; Luke 24:46-48; Acts 1:8; 2 Corinthians 5:20)
Articles
Donor confidence score
This organization does not file a Form 990.
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Transparency grade
C
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Financial efficiency ratings
Sector: Foreign Missions
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Financial ratios
Financial ratios for this ministry have not been calculated.
Financials
Financials for this ministry have not been collected.
Compensation
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Response from ministry
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The information below was provided to MinistryWatch by the ministry itself. It was last updated 1/26/2026. To update the information below, please email: [email protected]
History
Slavic Gospel Association traces its founders vision and history to the 1920s and 30s and the city of Chicago, where we were founded by Rev. Peter Deyneka, a refugee from Belarus (now an independent nation, but then a part of the Soviet Union). In the 1920s Peter traveled throughout the Soviet Union to share the gospel and encourage Bible-believing churches.
When Soviet dictator Josef Stalin intensified persecution of the churches in the early 1930s, it prevented Peter from traveling to his homeland to share the Gospel. Convinced that there were ways to help the churches from here, he and a small group of Chicago-area businessmen met in the back of Hedstrom's Shoe Store and founded the Russian Gospel Association in 1934. It was later renamed the Slavic Gospel Association (SGA).
For many decades, SGA covertly distributed millions of Bibles and Christian books under the Iron Curtain into the hands of believers throughout the Soviet Union, while producing and broadcasting thousands of Christian radio programs over the Iron Curtain.
The first Russian language Bible institutes in the world were established to train the Russian immigrants in Toronto, Canada, Temperley, Argentina, and other parts of the world. The mission also had an extensive ministry to Russian-speaking refugees and immigrants living in various countries throughout the world.
Then, in 1989 - just two years after his passing - the Lord answered Rev. Deyneka's lifetime prayers and brought the Iron Curtain crashing down - surprising the entire world. SGA leaders and missionaries immediately began to seize the unprecedented new opportunities for reaching the people of the former Soviet Union for the glory of Christ.
SGA has grown to become an international ministry with autonomous offices in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and England.
Today, our mission works primarily in the former Soviet nations of Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, and Armenia. In addition, we sponsor Bible training for Russian churches in Israel, and assist there with training initiatives, conferences, and Russian-language publications.
We provide Russian-language Bibles and Christian literature, provision of solid Bible training for pastors, church planters and church workers, sponsorship of church-planting missionaries, and sponsorship of youth and children's ministries including outreach to orphans. SGA partners also help provide funds to help churches purchase occasional humanitarian aid on an as-needed basis.
Today we continue to faithfully share the Gospel, equip the church, and help the forgotten in Jesus' name.
Rev. Peter Deyneka, our visionary founder, came to the United States from the former Soviet republic of Belarus at the age of 15. A few years later, Peter repented of his sins and trusted in Christ as Savior during a worship service at Chicago's historic Moody Church during the pastorate of Dr. Paul Rader.
After his salvation and graduation from St. Paul Bible School in Minnesota, Peter returned to Chicago with an overwhelming burden to see his people won to Christ. In 1925, he went back to his homeland and began a lifetime of extensive ministry travels, sharing the Good News of salvation through Jesus Christ.
Throughout the Cold War era, Peter Deyneka traveled the globe holding prayer meetings, often overnight, encouraging the Lord's people to pray for the opening of the Soviet Union for the preaching of the Gospel. His motto became, "Much prayer, much power. Little prayer, little power. No prayer, no power!"
It's easy to understand why Rev. Deyneka's powerful preaching earned him the nickname, "Peter Dynamite."
Having poured out his life in service to the Lord, Peter Deyneka was called to his heavenly reward in 1987.
Program accomplishments
SGA's ministry reaches across 8.5 million square miles to bring the light of the Gospel to millions of people of all ages and economic conditions.