Dear
Praying, Helping Friends:
We
are rejoicing in the progress of our work in Central & Eastern Europe,
particularly where Hungarian people make up most of the population.
This includes
Hungary
and parts of
Romania
,
Ukraine
,
Slovakia
, and
Northern Serbia
. In the early 1900’s, all this
land belonged to
Hungary
(as part of Austro-Hungary). All this changed at the end of WW1 when
Hungary
lost 2/3rds of its land, leaving many Hungarians as beleaguered minorities in
foreign lands. After that came WW2,
then 45 years of Communist tyranny. In
1990, God lifted the Iron Curtain and sent us there to preach the Word and build
new congregations true to the Scriptures, the Reformed faith, and the Great
Commission. Today we have 24 small
but growing congregations in this region and four preaching points.
How did all this happen?
It was not the result of
anything in the Hungarian Reformed Church, for it was already drifting from the
faith by the early 1900’s. Indeed,
WW1 and WW2 and Communism were
judgments for this. True, God had a
remnant in those dark days. But no
church was preaching the Word soundly, exercising church discipline, or
ministering the sacraments faithfully. How,
then, could we start a new work? The
answer : Train young Hungarian men to take God’s Word to their fellow
Hungarians and organize faithful congre-gations.
In the Book of Acts, we see Paul, on his 1st missionary
journey, planting churches wherever he could.
Then, on his 2nd journey, he went a step further.
He spent most of his time in one place (
Corinth
), teaching and training nationals to do this.
He used the same method on his 3rd journey, spending most of
his time in
Ephesus
teaching believers to do this in
Asia Minor
. This was how we began.
Before arriving in
Hungary
in 1990, I knew what we needed – a school of theology and missions to teach
and train young Hungarian men to preach the Word and apply it by discipling
people and organizing congregations. We
opened our school in 1992 and called it Karolyi Gaspar Institute of Theology and
Missions.
Something similar to this happened in young
America
. Immigrants from
Europe
were coming, but for almost a century there were few trained ministers here
because there were no schools of theology. Then
some began to see the need for such schools.
Harvard and Yale were started, but neither of these had the vision of the
one founded by the Presbyterian minister, Rev. William Tennent, Sr.
This man understood the basic elements of a good school, namely 1) a few
excellent teachers 2) some earnest students and 3) good administration.
This most excellent of schools, derisively called the “Log College”
by its enemies because it had just one log structure 18 x 20 feet, had these
three vital elements. (It lay in Neshaminy, north of
Philadelphia
, later became the
College
of
New Jersey
, then
Princeton
University
.)
When we began our school in
Hungary
in 1992, my job was threefold: 1) find a few excellent teachers 2) find some
worthy students 3) provide a sound administration for the whole process. Of
course, this cost money, but every year, as our program expanded, the Lord
raised up more churches and people to help..
Today we have 16 fine Hungarian men who are missionaries to their own
people. In fact, each one com-bines
the four offices of evangelist, pastor, church planter, and missionary.
So the training we give them must be very deep and very broad.
And since they are so young, they need a lot of help in Christian living
and the ability to deal with pastoral situations with a wisdom that youth
usually does not have. Isn’t the
Lord good to have given us (I say “us” because we are a team) such an
amazing opportunity to advance the glory of God and build a church worthy of the
name of Christ in the very heart of
Europe
? That con-tinent which was the land
of our spiritual fathers, yet is so backslidden today that it now has a history
of more wars on its soil than any heathen region its size ever had.
In
Hungary
, all our congregations are growing well. Miskloc,
pastored by Imre Szoke, has a combination of mature saints, younger saints who
are growing in the Word and service, and new and interested people who can see a
body which is full of life. Gyula
Bagoly has two dynamic congregations in
South Hungary with these same elements - some who are mature in the faith,
others who are finding how glorious the Christian faith and life can be, and new
and interested people who never saw such people as these.
In
Budapest
, Mihaly Siko is handing his congregation over to Peter Szabo and hopes to be in
Debrecen
, Hun-gary’s second largest city, by April.
This is possible because Peter recently graduated from our school and now
can take over our work in
Budapest
. Even as I write, Peter is buying a
home there (we will continue to use our mission property for our congregation.
And “Misi” (Mihaly Siko) is looking intensively (every week) with his
wife, Zita, to find a suitable place for themselves in
Debrecen
.
In
Romania
, as in
Ukraine
and
Hungary
, our men again distributed thousands of Scripture calendars and hundreds of
Bibles this year – thanks to the help of the Free Presbyterian Church of
Scotland. This same church, a few
years ago, graciously helped us print the Westminster Confession of Faith and
the Shorter and Larger Catechisms in Hungarian.
Generally, we are seeing growth in every congregation.
The most exciting development is happening in the city of
Csikszereda
where Sandor Tamas and his young bride, Biborka, are pioneering a new work with
a small group the Lord graciously has given us.
Several weeks ago, the pastor of the only HRC church there attacked us in
the newspaper as being a new and dangerous sect.
But the Lord used this for good, for when we contacted the editor, he
graciously gave us space to say a little about ourselves, along with Sandor’s
name, address, and telephone number.
In
Ukraine
, we are also seeing growth. Our men
have a new system of personal discipling by which we 1) make a sharp difference
between believers and unbelievers 2) give unbelievers (especially religious
ones) nothing but gospel basics 3) assume believers can do Romans 12:1-2 and we
can guide them in the whole counsel of God - leaving their apostate church,
tithing, family and job responsibilities, and many other things
unbelievers cannot do, but believers must do in order to follow Christ 4) keep
good records of each visit 5) have a specific theme for each visit.
In a few words, we must show unbelievers the way to Christ and believers
how to follow Christ. This has
really helped our men work effectively with people. Lately,
in one town where we have a congregation, a man who is both director of the
school (where three of our newly interested men work) and a high official in the
HRC – this man threatened to fire all three men if they did not stop attending
our services. The men, naturally,
are wavering because they are not yet strong in the faith.
But it is a good development because it underscores how precious the
faith is when corrupt persons like this, led by the devil, so hate what we
preach and teach. Mark my word.
This will result in great glory for Christ and the progress of His work.
A word on our plan to have the
entire
Hungary
work self-supporting and self-governing. We
hope this will happen in three to five years.
Remember that none of our congregations yet has a local session (an
ordained minister and at least one ruling elder) or enough giving to support its
pastor and own programs. We might soon be able to do this in two or three
congregations where these conditions are close at hand, but we cannot do even
this without first creating a presbytery for these organized congregations.
One of these presbyteries would be
Romania
, and one would be Hungary/Ukraine. As
soon as one of them has enough congregations which have enough extra giving to
cover the other congregations which do not have enough for themselves, we can do
this. The
Mission
would then end all support for that region save big-ticket items which, though
not essential to the work, would help it. In
a few words, all our congregations are mission congregations at this time,
helped either directly or indirectly by us.
Pray that the Lord will give us wisdom at every step in this process.
Finally, we are praising God
for His help with a condition Clara has had for over a year.
This condition, best described as severe, debilitating lower pelvic pain,
baffled five specialists here in
Lancaster
County
and all the tests they ordered. The
Lord then opened the way for Clara to enter the Hershey Medical system.
Hershey is
Penn
State
University
’s teaching hospital. It seems
they recently discovered the cause, then last Thursday, Clara had a special
surgical procedure which seemed to “hit the nail on the head.”
The next day Clara woke up for the first time in a year without this
pain. It could return, but we are
cautiously optimistic at this time.
Yours
in His faithfulness,
Bob
and Clara
