December Update

In the words of Phil Metzger, Calvary Chapel Hungary’s overseer, we have now entered the “Isaac era.” In previous times, Calvary was more like Abraham;we left our homelands, followed God to a new land, and broke new ground for the Lord. Now most of the Calvary Chapels in Hungary are no longer pioneers but settlers, seeking to dig deeper, grow stronger, and dwell in the land to reap the harvest. Unfortunately, while it is our “promised land,” remaining in it is not so easyas we might like. Wells that we dug are being filled in, a famine is upon the land, and enemies seek to harm the progress of the work. However, this is where God has called us to be and this is where we will stay.
Recently, the government began considering a law to limit church status to those they deem as “acceptable.” The requirements are a membership over 50,000 or over 100 years of existence in the country. Unfortunately, Calvary falls outside this group as we have only been here 20 yearsand our membership, while large for such a young church, is still well below 5,000. Meetings with the government have revealed that we are a bit of a problem for them. They don’t want to remove our status, but they need to cut off groups taking advantage of the current laws. In fact, many government officialsthat we have met with mentioned a relative or friend they knew who attend a Calvary! Unfortunately, the implications are huge. The loss of recognized church status, would result in things like the loss of our non-profit status, the loss of accreditation for the bible college, and the loss of all funding for social outreach programs. While this is not so good, we are trying to trust in the Lord, continue spreading the word, and walking according to faith. Should we loose our status, we know that He will show us how to continue, even without a recognized church status.

On the good side, the church here in Szolnok is growing well. We’ve seen a lot of families coming and usually see more than 5 people show up every meeting and many are already growing visibly in their walks with the Lord. However, we’ve hit a roadblock in that we are in need of a children’s ministry! Most of the people who are coming now have families with young children, ages 3 months to 6 years. Right now, Marianna and I are involved in the teaching and translating of the study so there are no other helpers yet to begin a Biblical children’s ministry. We are praying God would provide someone so that the families that have children would feel able to come and fellowship. To help a bit with this we will move the study to Sunday afternoon starting in January. That way, it will at least be easier to find someone to watch the children until we can find a volunteer to lead a children’s ministry.

Our relationship with the Methodist church has continued to show fruit. I met with the leadership recently and they expressed their support for our work and excitement about how God is working in our fellowship. We have been really blessed to use their building for a good price and it gives us a lot of room to grow. All in all, it seems to be a good connection and a blessing for us both. Praise the Lord! I pray it continues to be so and also that it would witness to the community that the body of Christ is not so divided as they might think. We are also planning a joint Christmas service for the 26th of December!

One of our members, Barnabas, has really been a help and encouragement to me over the past few months. He moved to Szolnok recently from Budapest where he accepted Christ at the Calvary there. He has a strong heart for the Lord and is interested in worship and evangelism. I am praying God will give me wisdom to help Barnabas find his calling from God and enable him to follow it. On a side note, it’s great to me that his name means “son of encouragement” because he really is an encouragement to me. He is engaged to a wonderful woman named Zsuzsi and they both are great with Emily.
We also held our “first” outreach on December 6th to celebrate Mikulas Nap (Santa day). In Hungary, they celebrate Santa on a day other than Christmas. On this day, Santa comes and brings all the kids candy or chocolate. To help make connections, we handed out packages of candy with an evangelism tract to anyone who would accept. We decided to start small with only 100 packages but they went quickly and we were done in a half hour! The most common question we were asked was “what do I have to pay?” When we responded nothing, almost everyone walked away happy and with the Gospel in their hands. We are now praying about doing more outreaches like this soon, maybe even before Christmas!
In November, we held a dedication ceremony for Emily. Since most of Marianna’s family didn’t understand the idea of a dedication, we wanted to host a special event where we could explain the meaning of it as well as our hearts for the Lord. My good friend Tamas Gemes, the pastor of Calvary Chapel Vác, was kind enough to MC the event for us and I was able to play a few songs. It all went very well and most of the family was able to come. Tamas was even able to share not only why we do a dedication and what it means, but also the Gospel. All in all, it was more a ceremony for the family than us, but I believe it was invaluable all the same.
On the personal side, we undertook a major project this past 3 months to replace the windows in our flat. We were able to make everything work, even building a wall to help give Emily her own room. However it has left all our savings and credit sources empty. Unfortunately, we have seen a few surprise reductions in our income since then. Marianna’s income from the state has been cut by 25%, our support has been down, and the cost of things like heating, fuel, and electricity are all rising with the dropping weather and rising oil prices. I have been working ¼ time for about three years to help cover our costs but even that is not enough now. I am praying and looking into more work to make ends meet. I’m not sure exactly what to do, but I am considering some freelance graphics design or maybe applying at the local college to do some English tutoring or conversational classes. All in all, we trust God and His calling, even in this time of famine, but we also know we should share our needs and ask people to pray for us.
Emily has really grown a lot in the past three months! No longer content to sit and watch things happen around her, she is determined to be mobile now and is extremely active. She has truly lived up to her name (Emily means industrious!) She has learned to crawl, stand, and is now attempting to walk between the couches in our living room. Unfortunately, she tends to fall a lot and she doesn’t like that, neither do we for that matter, but she is very brave and keeps trying. In general, she is a very happy baby, enjoying life and the new experiences Marianna tries to share with her each day. She already has shown a strong preference for being around others, eating meat and bread, being startled and playing with things like hair and wires. We are super blessed by her and are enjoying every moment. We have all been fighting a cold for the past two weeks, but we are slowly recovering and are in good spirits in general.

Our Future Goals:
• Moving the Bible study through John to Sundays at 4:00pm in January.
• Finding a translator for the Bible study or someone to watch the children while Marianna translates.
• Finding more work or support.
• Wrapping up ties to the ministry work in Eger.
• Looking into mission trips to Moldova or Ukraine

Thank you once again from the bottom of our hearts for your prayers and support. God is truly working and blessing us and we couldn’t be doing what we are doing without you all. May God richly bless your faithfulness!