On August 13, 2019, the appeals court in the city of Kirov ruled to release 26-year-old Brother Andrey Suvorkov from house arrest. Although Brother Suvorkov has been given greater freedom, the criminal case against him remains open.

As previously reported, Brother Suvorkov was arrested, along with his stepfather and three other brothers, when local police and masked special forces raided 19 homes in Kirov on October 9, 2018.

Thinking back to when his home was searched, Brother Suvorkov states: “Many of our valuable items were confiscated. But my wife and I didn’t worry about it, since we always tried to keep our life simple and not get too attached to material things. The counsel from Matthew 6:21, ‘for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also,’ helped us remain calm.”

Following the raids, criminal cases were opened against Brother Suvorkov, his stepfather, and the three other brothers for singing Kingdom songs, studying religious literature, and possessing a copy of the Russian New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures. They were all detained in a temporary holding facility as they waited for a court to decide either to release them or place them in pretrial detention.

Brother Suvorkov describes his experience: “I spent two nights in a temporary holding facility. In the beginning, I did not stop praying. I was sure that Jehovah heard me and would give me support. I recalled melodies from the Kingdom songs and sang them. Later, I recalled more than 50 melodies with lyrics.”

The court decided to place Brother Suvorkov and the others in pretrial detention. During his first week in detention, Brother Suvorkov focused on helping others. He recalls: “I decided to mention brothers by name in my prayers and write encouraging letters to those whose addresses I remembered. This brought me joy.”—Acts 20:35.

As the months went by, all the brothers were eventually transferred to house arrest, except for Brother Andrzej Oniszczuk. Brother Suvorkov is the first of the brothers from Kirov to be released from house arrest.

“Looking back,” states Brother Suvorkov, “I’m very glad that I had such an experience in prison. . . . I don’t know what the future holds or if I will be imprisoned again. I now have confidence that I will receive the support of Jehovah and his organization, even if I am in prison. What I don’t have is the fear of being imprisoned.”