Hungary for more Prayer!

As many of you know, God has been raising up a group of prayer warriors to daily battle on their knees specifically for God’s work here in Hungary. Since October, part of my work has been to mail out weekly prayer requests for the field to this group of dedicated warriors. I cannot tell you how much of a blessing this has become for me, as well as for the whole team. While everyone knows that prayer is important, God has really been hammering the point home. More and more I believe that God’s work here in Hungary will not move forward even an inch, except by prayer. And just as Jesus Himself claimed that He was unable to do many miracles in His hometown, due to unbelief, we are praying specifically against our unbelief here in Hungary. And the most amazing thing is, that our wonderful God is answering! Each week as we see our prayers answered, our faith is growing. And as God grows our faith, more prayers are answered! Praise God that He is working, stirring up His people, giving us a burden to pray, and to believe Him in this place!  If you feel that God is enlisting you into this particular battle, please do let me know! We would be honoured to have you kneeling alongside us each day!

The very picture of Health!

 I am writing this letter with a heart of joy! This morning we took Lili to see the kidney specialist yet again, but this time it was for her very last check-up! It’s been a year since her kidney infection, and every month since we have visited the doctor, after painstakingly collecting a urine sample from a little girl still in diapers! For a year Lili was not supposed to go swimming, or to have a bath with her brother. Today she got the all clear! The doctor told me that her kidneys look absolutely normal, and that while kidney problems can recur, most often it will happen within the first year, so Lili will not likely have any further problems! What an awesome God we serve! Recently He challenged me with the thought that we so often steal His glory when He does something miraculous! It may be tempting to think that this is simply what happens to any little girl who has a kidney infection and receives good medical care. However, I have resolved not to give credit to anyone else for what He alone has done! And I am convinced that God Himself has healed our little Lili! He may have chosen to do it through the medical system, but that does not change the fact that only God Himself can truly heal us. And I for one want more than ever to give Him the glory!

Praise God she's well!

I just got back from the hospital visiting my mom and she's well, she's jolly, she's still in bed, but probably tomorrow she will be able to get up! She asked me to thank everyone for praying for her, she's so happy to be through with it! She says her doctors and the nurses are really great, they are very caring and kind. She has a long cut going all the way to her armpit because the doctor removed all the lymph nodes he could find, so that part hurts her quite a bit but she knows it's to prevent the cancer from coming back.
Thank you again for praying God was faithful again and showed his great love to us!

Operation

This one is just a quick note and a prayer request: my mom (Norbi's mom Maria that is) is getting her operation done on Monday. She was diagnosed with breast cancer about 8 months ago so she went through the chemotherapy phase - and she was perfectly well throughout the whole thing, and now they are preparing to remove whatever is still left in her. Every prayer you lift up would be greatly appreciated! She is coming to Budapest on Sunday and her operation is on Monday in the morning. Unfortunately we can’t even meet her before the operation because she really has to be careful not to get sick or catch a cold and our family is down with a pretty bad case of flu. I will let you know how the operation went as soon as we find out.

Work, Work and Bible studies

Budapest Police HQ main building

Just recently two of my bosses were fired out of the three - the head of the department and his deputy. They briefed us in the morning and gave out jobs for us to be done by the time they were back from the HQ. When they came back they called the whole staff together and announced that the supreme court found one of their actions during the Budapest riots unconstitutional so they were immediately relieved from their duties and we should be expecting the new leadership to arrive momentarily. This was very uncomfortable situation for them and for the staff as well because in most cases a new boss would bring their own trusted staff with him. As the new boss didn't arrive for 3 more days, tension and rumours grew among us... the uncertainty was unbearable.
This hard time really made me think about a lot of things. How things we take for granted can disappear in virtually minutes, and when they do we find out how much we actually relied on them. A company can go bankrupt in an hour due to an accident, a leader can be fired in a minute, one can lose their life in a second. What is out there that is certain, that will not change, that I can hold onto? I was on my bike on the way home going through the park when I was thinking about this, and all of a sudden I just had to smile, stop and get off. Of course. It's God. He will never change. He won't be fired. He won't have and accident. Him I can hold on to, an anchor for my soul. In the following days I had more than a few people asking me how I can be so calm when everyone is distressed. This is how, by holding onto the 'Right Stuff'.

The first 5 of the batch. 14 more to go!

Another work-story to share - skipping ahead 1 month in time to... this week. I got a huge job from the new boss. Had to fix 5 mini computers in a day that never worked and it was extremely important the they were done in time. Riding to work - on the bike again - I remember asking God: 'I know it's a bit specific but you think you could help me configure the APN and program the Active Directory for remote authentication?' I had to smile at my own request but guess what. He did help. I was able to fix the 5 that day and by Wednesday our team - God and I that is - fixed a total of 19 computers, and a bunch of those were brought here from other police units because no one else knew how to get them to work. So yeah God knows about computers alright.

Now for a praise and a prayer request: at church we started a Bible study about a month ago - and it's been fantastic! It's a small group of 5 people, but the conversations are exponentially deep, and several of them have said at the end of some studies that 'This was the best Bible study I've ever been to' - Praise God for that! We are just done with Galatians and getting into Ephesians and looking forward to another great study. And this is the request part: I have talked to several other people at church and some that used to come to church but they don't any more, and they all said that having heard about it would like to join us. I talked to Sanyi (the pastor) and we decided to start up new groups instead of expanding the existing one. Right now the current study is at church before the service, and we're planning on starting one at our house for college guys on Friday before the Long's Youth Group, and another one on Wednesday for adults and possibly a third one for younger people if there is interest for that. So far we have some 'Yes' and a few 'Maybe' people and we would like to ask you to pray for us as we are starting these groups that people would have a hunger for God's word, that we would have wisdom leading / facilitating the studies and that everyone would be faithful in coming and we would grow in depth knowing God and His will for us. This is a big project we are getting into but we are confident in God's leading but also a little unsure about some details. According to our plans I will be leading Sunday's and Friday's studies, and Sanyi will be leading Wednesday's and the young guys' group.