Testimony

We had a wonderful time with the people of the Church of the Open Bible in Pella, Iowa last night. The potluck food was delicious and we had a chance to visit with lots of people. One of the ladies who, with her husband, consistently gives toward our ministry, came up to us and told us she had a testimony to share. Here is some of what she said:

"When you came to our church before you went to Hungary for the first time, I promised the Lord that I would step out in faith and give a little bit toward your ministry every month. And then when other missionaries came through, I promised God the same amount for each of them, too. After a while, I couldn't list all the missionaries I was giving to on the outside of my envelope--I had to enclose a separate sheet inside the envelope when I gave my monthly offering. We have been faithfully giving these past few years, but last year was hard. We had to make some decisions about changing jobs and such, but God was faithful. Our income increased $10,000 last year. Praise the Lord!"

In GPS we trust

When we returned to the US we knew that we would be traveling to parts of the country we had not been to before so we bought a GPS unit for our car, and it has proven to be a very worthwhile purchase. We would simply put in the address of our destination and it would plot our course, tell us in which direction to go, what roads to take and when to turn. We could even find out where the nearest store, motel or Starbucks was located. It is great!

However, there were a few times when it would give us directions and we would wonder if this is really the right way to go. It didn't look like the right road or even the right direction. Sometimes we would chose not to follow its guidance and go our own way. Of course, at those times we would hear that lovely word, "recalculating." But, usually we would follow its directions and, sure enough, we would arrive at our destination.

In fact, this happened today on our way to visit one of Nancy's sisters. Instead of taking the route we found on the map, our GPS led us through some of the back roads of Oklahoma and Kansas. At first we didn't think we were on the right road, and it even looked like we were heading back the direction from which we came, but it ended up being a very beautiful route that took us directly to Nancy's sister's house. And, we saw parts of Oklahoma and Kansas we had not seen before.

As Nancy and I discussed this we said that, in some ways, this is kind of like following the Lord. God has a destination/purpose for our lives that He is leading us to. Sometimes the path may seem clear and obvious, but there may be times we are not sure if we are on the right road, or even heading in the right direction. Of course, we have a choice. We can choose to ignore God's direction and go our own way. (I don't think we'll hear God say, "recalculating" though) But, if we will listen to His voice and trust Him, He will get us where we need to go, and I'm sure it will even be a better path than the one we had planned.

There is a big difference, though. The GPS is NOT infallible. If it has not been updated, it will not always have the correct information and it can make mistakes. God, however, never has to be "updated". He knows all things and never makes mistakes. Therefore, you can ALWAYS put your faith in Him knowing that, as you follow His voice even if the way does not seem clear, He will safely get you to your destination.

INSTE Helping INSTE

Today Nancy (from the Hungarian INSTE office) helped Claudia (from the American INSTE Bible College) with some filing. It was fun being able to work with our counterparts here in the US!

Steps of Faith

We have recently taken two exciting steps of faith. One is buying our tickets back to Hungary. We were able to find a sale on airline tickets and bought tickets from Miami to Budapest for a little over half of what it cost us to come here! Praise the Lord! We bought the tickets even though we are still a little short of what we need for monthly support to return to Hungary, but we are expecting God to meet our needs in time to make this flight in June.

Our second step of faith was to send the first book of Level 2 INSTE to Hungary to be translated! God has provided an excellent translator and funds to begin translation. We do not want to make the Hungarian Level 1 INSTE graduates wait any longer than necessary, so translation has begun! We are still asking for donations for what is needed to have all 24 books translated, but we are expecting God to meet this need also.