Snowy March

Nancy walked through the park to meet her conversation partner this week.

 It has continued to snow almost every day since the big snowstorm two weeks ago.  This much snow in March is almost unheard of in Hungary.  Last year this time we were planting radishes and carrots in our garden.  The snow is beautiful, but we are ready for spring.

Visiting Village Churches

This past weekend was a busy one for us.  Saturday afternoon we traveled to Gávavencsellő and Sunday afternoon we went to Ibrány.  Mike preached in both villages at the regular services of the Open Bible Churches there and Misha Tovtin came with us to translate. We were, as always, treated with love and honor by our brothers and sisters in these Gypsy congregations. In both services we experienced the wonderful presence of the Lord and lives were impacted for the Kingdom of God.  Each of the services had something extra, too.

The service in Gávavencsellő included a wedding ceremony for an older couple who had been married for several years but had never had a church wedding.  Mike preached a short message on marriage and then the pastor led the couple in their vows.  The Baloghs appeared to be quite nervous during the ceremony, but were all smiles afterward.  They offered sandwiches to everyone after the service in honor of the occasion.

In Ibrány, the children gave their annual Easter presentation with prayers, memorized scriptures, skits and songs. It was especially thrilling to hear some of the teenagers pray the Lord's prayer in the Gypsy language. The children are all part of INSTE graduate Mária Toth's religion classes in the local school.  She put a lot of work into the production, but gives all the glory to God.  It is very important to her that the children learn the Word of God and get to know Jesus. 

Both of these villages are in the area hardest hit by the ice storm of last week.  Some of those at church, including Mária Toth and the Gávavencsellő pastors, still have no electricity at home. They explained that saturated ground combined with continued high winds have prevented new electrical towers from being erected.  Thankfully, they can use wood for heat, but really miss their electricity!

Weather Woes

Last weekend was an exciting one, weather-wise.  As this week progressed, we learned more about the seriousness and the impact of the storm.

It started for us in eastern Hungary last Thursday with wind and rain during the day.  That evening, the rain turned to freezing rain.  When we left our home group meeting, Mike had to scrape ice from the car windows.  We were glad we were able to take three others home who were also at the meeting.  It would not have been fun to walk or wait for a bus in that nasty weather.  When we arrived home, Mike had to blow into the lock on the gate to free it from ice so we could open it.  We just stayed home the next two days in the bad weather.  Having lived many years in Minnesota, we were accustomed to waiting out a storm. But Hungarians are not.  Spring begins in March here; in fact, our temperatures the week before had been in the 50's.

We started hearing reports of how bad things were other places.  Tammy Swailes was in Budapest, arriving as the storm hit.  She made it safely, but many others did not.  Two main highways west of Budapest were jammed.  Accidents had stopped traffic and no one could leave their cars in the cold, blowing snow.  Hundreds were trapped for up to 20 hours, waiting to be rescued.  The Minister of the Interior sent text messages to every Hungarian cell phone saying, "Remain in your car.  If your gas runs out, move to another car and wait there."  We even received the message on our phones, but it was the best way to contact all those in trouble on the highway. The army resorted to using tanks to rescue as many people as possible.

The effects of the storm were worsened because it was a national holiday on Friday the 15th.  Many people took to the roads on the long weekend, ignoring the weather forecasts.  March 15 is the day Hungarians celebrate their short-lived independence from the Austrian Hapsburg monarchy in 1848.  Due to the storm, however, hundreds of commemorations and special celebrations were cancelled around the country.  We had been invited to a cook-out on that day, but of course, that was cancelled, too.  One interesting note:  the Austrians sent help to those stranded on Hungarian highways.  That was rather ironic, since Hungary was celebrating a revolt against Austria that weekend.

We received about 8 inches of snow with much higher snowdrifts.  On Sunday, the eldest grandma in church commented that she had never in her 80-plus years seen such a storm.  About an hour north of us, thousands of people were without electricity, some for several days because of the damage the ice caused to power lines.  Some of our Open Bible people in the area were affected, but thankfully, most of them heat with wood, so they were not left in the cold.  And we thank the Lord that not one person lost their life due to the storm.

Looks like we're expecting more cold weather this weekend and a little more snow, but the forecast is not nearly as serious as last week's was.  We thank God for his protection, and we are looking forward to spring!

Church Wedding

Dezső and Annamária listening to the pastor speak about marriage

There was a wedding during church yesterday.  Dezső and Annamária declared their love for each other and vowed to remain faithful to each other and to God in front of the entire congregation.  Dezső and Annamária, two of our INSTE students from the Tomor area, were married twelve years ago in a civil ceremony, but never had a church ceremony.  Civil ceremonies are required in Hungary, but church ceremonies are not.  Most Christian couples wish to make their vows before God, but even then they must go to the city hall and be legally married there either before or after their church ceremony.  When Pastor Gulyás asked Dezső why they wanted to be married in the church after so many years, he said that they wanted to do all they could to be right with God before they begin the ministry God is calling them to.  May God continue to bless this beautiful couple, their marriage and their family.

Legal Legwork

This week has been filled with tracking down the board members of the new Hungarian INSTE association in order to get their signatures on documents for the current step in obtaining official papers for INSTE to operate independently in Hungary. We are thankful for our lawyer, Mirjam Gulyas, who has done the major portion of the work for us.  God gave her to us.

We are learning some things about legal processes in Hungary.  Legal matters are difficult in every country, but especially when one is unfamiliar with local customs.  Anyway, the papers we submitted last month were returned by the court with several small changes requested and one large one--the name.  They did not like that the name included both "extension" and "institute" since there is no physical "institute" to "extend" from.  Okay, so we chose a simpler name--Hungarian Association for Biblical Training.  Since the name was changed, every document had to be changed and all the new papers signed by all ten association members.  Hopefully, we will be able to finish gathering signatures this evening and get the papers turned in to the court on Monday, right before the deadline.

Please keep praying for favor from the courts for Hungarian INSTE.

Level 2 Pilot Group Begins!

Celebrate with us an historic moment.  The pilot groups for Level 2 INSTE in Hungarian started Tuesday evening.  The two groups met together here in Debrecen with great excitement and anticipation to receive their books, an introduction to Level 2, and some encouragement and instruction from their leaders.  Each of the students is a leader in their church and eager to become better equipped to serve.  May the Lord bless each one as they begin this new adventure.

Trip to Budapest

Sunday we made the more than two-hour drive to Budapest where Mike preached at the Örömhir Misszió.  We enjoyed being with our friends that we had not seen in over a year.  The service was awesome, too. Our friend and co-worker Misha went with us to translate for Mike.  We were happy that Misha's 8-year-old daughter Anastasia was able to go with us, too.  Misha's mom attends the church in Budapest and was very happy to see Misha and Anastasia.  She, like all grandmas, had some special gifts for each of them and for the rest of the family. Anastasia was a good traveler, entertaining herself with her music, book and her grandmother's gifts.  God blessed us all with a wonderful day.