I could hardly wait to get to Friday to tell you all about the morning. I don't know if you are aware of this, but Patty and I spent a couple of weeks getting lesson plans ready to match the Bible lessons the children would get in Hungarian. Then Tina and I made and printed all the visuals and game pieces needed to for all the English lessons. Today the lesson was "I am the Way" so we had planned to work on transportation vocabulary. While I was having my quiet time that morning, God gave me a different plan. Learning to listen to Him speak the FIRST time if very difficult for me so I almost ignored that quiet voice I was hearing.
So instead of transportation, my class worked on listening to and giving directions instead: turn left, turn right, turn around, go straight, and stop-all very important words. So we moved our lesson outside to the shade of the trees and the freshly mowed park surrounding the church. We looked like a little army as we took turns giving directions and having the rest of the class follow our directions. The next step was to play a game with 2 teams. One member was blindfolded and the others had to give directions in order to guide them through an obstacle of 4 chairs. The blindfolded team member had to touch all 4 chairs and then sit in the final 5th chair before the other team made it there. It was very difficult, but the children loved it and were completely engaged.
After every child had a turn at being blindfolded we brought our chairs to a circle and had our game debriefing. We went over our memory verse: "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father but by Me." Sin keeps us from reaching God. What is sin? Each child started telling me different sins. We named each of the 8 chairs: stealing, talking back, telling lies, etc. Sin stops us from reaching God, but Jesus comes along beside us, takes us by the hand and takes us straight to God. We don't have to worry about the obstacles. He is our shepherd and our guide. He is the only way to heaven.
When the lesson was over 5 of the 7 students accepted Christ! And yet to me it seemed so easy that I began wondering if they truly understood what they had just done. But that is the beauty of salvation, isn't it? The work has already be done, the payment already made. All we have to do is accept it. "So easy that even a child can do it" came to my mind. As we were sharing over lunch, we found the same thing happened in 2 other classes: The advanced class and advanced beginner. These were children who came to camp last summer. So the seeds had been planted last summer, cultivated over the year, and harvested this summer. It was amazing to be a part of this!
So out of 45 children, 15 accepted Christ this year. That is 1/3 of the students. Now we need to pray for Barb and the other church leaders that they will be able to properly disciple these children and reach out to their families, most of whom do not attend the church. They have a list of the children who made decisions. I did not write down the complete list, but please pray for these children periodically...maybe when you get HUNGRY you can remember to pray for the children in HUNGARY who accepted Christ this summer as well as those who had seeds planted: Csongor, Kristian, Gergo, Attila, and Sandra. Also pray for Noemi. She was my student last year and accepted Christ this year. She and her mother, Csilla, are unchurched but came to camp last year and this year as well as all the evening events. They are searching.
That evening we were actually "off" until a concert by the Continental Singers, so we had some time to start packing up materials and go to visit Ester’s mom for some tea.
Eszter was my translator last year. She is in Spain this summer at a language school. Anyway, just about a month before camp last summer, she was diagnosed with cancer and had to undergo intensive chemo. At Christmas time this year, her mom was clean, but after the holidays they found it again and she has had to undergo chemo again. She is not a believer and neither is her husband. Barb goes over and spends time with Eszter and her mom, sharing Christ while they bake or practice English and Hungarian with each other. I've been praying for Ester’s mom so long that I feel like I know her personally. As we were walking to Barb's one afternoon, she was outside sweeping and invited us over for tea so we headed for her house Friday afternoon. Eszter’s aunt and uncle were also visiting at the same time so we all sat around a huge table and talked for a while. We had all worn our IM t-shirts since it was the last day of camp so they asked us about our shirts and we were able to talk about camp with them. I was also able to share that we have been praying for her for 2 years now. I hope everything we said and did were witnesses to them. Keep praying for this family as well.
We had to leave after about an hour since the Continental Singers were performing at the church. I thought they would be American Young Adults like the ones I had seen in the states when I was in college. But these were Hungarian children ranging in age from about 8 years old to 18 years old. They were a fantastic little group. During the summer they travel across their continent, mostly Hungary. The children help set up and tear down the stage, including microphones, back drop, special light, dry ice machine, sound boards, etc. Then they stay with people in the church over night before moving on to their next concert location in their tour bus. What a blessing they were. Even though I didn't understand most of the words, I recognized the message: the Love of Christ and caring for each other. A man in the group gave a very clear salvation message at the end (Imre came and translated for me). It's funny how similar his message was to the one Brett gave during sports night the evening before.
Afterwards, we had to say our good-byes to many people. Janos, the blind musician, paid us a very great compliment. He said that groups have come from America many times over the past 10 years to provide various camps. They provide the camp during the day but then they want to go sight-seeing and don't spend any time with the people from the church or helping with other ministries...except for us. We are his favorite group. They are already looking forward to having us next summer. Éndre, the church leader, wants us to consider staying longer than a week. There are so many different ways we can help this only Evangelical church in Kaposvar.
We need to begin praying now how God can use us next summer: a week of sports camp for the teens; a week of English camp; the adults and teens want English lessons as well; the ladies want us to come again for more meetings; a drama team could easily come and minister; the men could use a leadership meeting of some sort. The church is now going into a 3rd year with no pastor after a pretty serious split. They are rebuilding within the church as well as within the community. If the church goes under, the only churches in the area are Catholic. Kaposvar would be lost.
I guess you can see my heart for these people. Keep our church family at Békevar Church (meaning Peace) in Kaposvar in your prayers. You can see they are on their way up a great mountain. Pray that their light will grow stronger as they continue to shine in their community.
The rest of the story is about touring Budapest and traveling home. But those things are not important compared to everything else that happened this week, so I'm signing off now in my journal of Kaposvar. Hope it blesses you the way the whole experienced touched me.
Saturday, July 19, 2008
Thursday, July 10
This may be the last installment of our trip. Thursday and Friday were the mountain top experiences.
Oh, Tuesday night as Tracy was in her introduction at the Ladies' meeting Barb's phone began to ring. The one missing bag had arrived and the delivery man was trying to get in at the front door of the church. The bag had our materials for class on Wednesday as well as the rest of the New Testaments.
Thursday's teaching theme for the children was "I am the Light of the World." In my class I was still finishing Tuesday and Wednesday lessons. I had advanced beginner so we were spending more time ensuring that grammar/sentence structures were more accurate. They already had a lot of vocabulary (nouns and verbs) but needed more help with sentence structure. Our structure and their structures are completely different so this is quite difficult. All of the children in my group attended camp last year except for two, Sandra and Kristof. Gergo and Attila were both in my group last year and had remembered many of the lessons from last summer.
Thursday afternoon we had decided to take the youth helping with sport night that evening to lunch over near Barb's house. It is a little over a mile from Barb's house to the church, so round trip is close to 3 miles. We made this trip everyday and some days we made it more than once. By Thursday I had a huge blister on my foot, so when they went to lunch I stayed and took a nap. It felt so good to lay still for an hour. Did I tell you it really HOT in Hungary? Thursday - Saturday had temperatures in the 90's with the same kind of humidity as Georgia...only no air conditioning. Everyone leaves the insides of the buildings - houses, flats, churches, etc - to sit outside under the shade trees to stay cool, or sit near the fountain in the square, have an ice cream, etc. Naps are usually done outside too. It got quite toasty upstairs in the heat, but I was too tired to care.
Brett and the Youth managed to get everything semi-planned, rehearsed and ready to go so we walked across the street around 5:45pm to have the Sport Night. Ideally it was meant for teens but the children from camp began arriving. Barb and Brett went around the school play areas inviting others inside. Some of the younger kids stayed but the older boys went back outside when they say how young the children were. About 25 participated in the game time, not counting the youth and adult volunteers. There may have been about 35 of us all together. So every team ended up "winning" some event and getting Red, White, and Blue winner medallions that we brought with us.
Then we sat down for a skit and a message. Abby and the youth had prepared another non-verbal skit depicting a girl being created by God and choosing to pursue things like greed, alcohol, drugs, popularity and attempt at suicide - all the while Christ was off to the side trying to call to her and pull her to Him. Finally He breaks through and conquerors all of these things to rescue the girl and they walk off together. It was powerful. I forgot what Christian song they had playing in the background, but the music was loud and it brought in the older kids from outside. They sat down and stayed for Brett's message about the Good Life: We think all of these things are the "good life" but God is waiting and calling to us trying to give us His "Good Life." The youth sat completely still. They were hooked. The children, however, were another story. Later as we were sharing at the end of the day, every one of us not speaking were praying that God would either settle the children in front or blind the eyes of the others from the distractions. It was obvious that they were blind from the distractions. Later we found out that one of the older "boys" that came in was actually a new recruit for the Hungarian professional basketball team. They called it the first team.
Every night we were there, the basketball courts and soccer courts were full of children. You could see and hear them every evening from the apartment above the church. There is a whole mission field right across the street from the church. They could literally hold an event each night and have plenty of children and teens attend the meeting. Perhaps this is an area God could use some of our people in next year? Pray for the youth at Békevar Baptist Church. They also see the opportunity. They appear to have a strong core group of about 10-15 kids. On their own, they saw the need to convert the garage/basement area of the church into a youth meeting place like we have upstairs at our church. While we were there this week, they were finishing painting one room and gutting and painting another room. One side will be for games and things, the other for meetings and movies. Pray for the youth as they attempt to reach their community as well. If the church has nothing to offer, the youth in the area "hang out" in a parking lot near McDonalds or end up in the dance club in town. These teens have a burden to reach other teens in Kaposvar. Brett has the remaining "team money" from our trip. He was staying on another week and is going to see what he can help purchase for their room that will help with this ministry. I'm excited to find out what they decided upon.
After camp, we were invited to a cook out at church member's home in Kaposvar. Anoka and Elizabeth were the ladies, but I can't remember Anoka’s husband's name. This was literally a mountain top experience since their house was on a small hillside outside the city. When we walked into the backyard, we had a beautiful view of the city. The sun was just starting to go down and by the time dinner was done, the half moon and the stars were out. You just couldn't help but sing. Again, we sang in English and they in Hungarian. It was beautiful. I think we sang How Great Thou Art. When we finished, it was silent as each person reflected on how great God is. I sat there wondering again, will we all speak one language in heaven, perhaps a special language? Or will we all speak our own language but understand each other anyway? Between Abby and I, we were able to communicate quite well with the Hungarians. I knew enough nouns and she knew enough verbs that we could put them together and make simple sentences. I almost hope we keep all the languages God created. They are so beautiful. Hungarian is difficult but it is so beautiful to listen to.
We finally had to say good-bye and get home. They had work in the morning and we had camp, yet it was 11:00pm before we left, and no one wanted to say good-bye. All the way down the mountain we sang songs. Our favorite on the drive was It is Well. Tina, Tracy and I had learned the chorus in Hungarian before we left. What a joy to sing with Imre and Babi!
Well, this email is too long already so I guess you will get Friday's installment later...this is the best one!
Oh, Tuesday night as Tracy was in her introduction at the Ladies' meeting Barb's phone began to ring. The one missing bag had arrived and the delivery man was trying to get in at the front door of the church. The bag had our materials for class on Wednesday as well as the rest of the New Testaments.
Thursday's teaching theme for the children was "I am the Light of the World." In my class I was still finishing Tuesday and Wednesday lessons. I had advanced beginner so we were spending more time ensuring that grammar/sentence structures were more accurate. They already had a lot of vocabulary (nouns and verbs) but needed more help with sentence structure. Our structure and their structures are completely different so this is quite difficult. All of the children in my group attended camp last year except for two, Sandra and Kristof. Gergo and Attila were both in my group last year and had remembered many of the lessons from last summer.
Thursday afternoon we had decided to take the youth helping with sport night that evening to lunch over near Barb's house. It is a little over a mile from Barb's house to the church, so round trip is close to 3 miles. We made this trip everyday and some days we made it more than once. By Thursday I had a huge blister on my foot, so when they went to lunch I stayed and took a nap. It felt so good to lay still for an hour. Did I tell you it really HOT in Hungary? Thursday - Saturday had temperatures in the 90's with the same kind of humidity as Georgia...only no air conditioning. Everyone leaves the insides of the buildings - houses, flats, churches, etc - to sit outside under the shade trees to stay cool, or sit near the fountain in the square, have an ice cream, etc. Naps are usually done outside too. It got quite toasty upstairs in the heat, but I was too tired to care.
Brett and the Youth managed to get everything semi-planned, rehearsed and ready to go so we walked across the street around 5:45pm to have the Sport Night. Ideally it was meant for teens but the children from camp began arriving. Barb and Brett went around the school play areas inviting others inside. Some of the younger kids stayed but the older boys went back outside when they say how young the children were. About 25 participated in the game time, not counting the youth and adult volunteers. There may have been about 35 of us all together. So every team ended up "winning" some event and getting Red, White, and Blue winner medallions that we brought with us.
Then we sat down for a skit and a message. Abby and the youth had prepared another non-verbal skit depicting a girl being created by God and choosing to pursue things like greed, alcohol, drugs, popularity and attempt at suicide - all the while Christ was off to the side trying to call to her and pull her to Him. Finally He breaks through and conquerors all of these things to rescue the girl and they walk off together. It was powerful. I forgot what Christian song they had playing in the background, but the music was loud and it brought in the older kids from outside. They sat down and stayed for Brett's message about the Good Life: We think all of these things are the "good life" but God is waiting and calling to us trying to give us His "Good Life." The youth sat completely still. They were hooked. The children, however, were another story. Later as we were sharing at the end of the day, every one of us not speaking were praying that God would either settle the children in front or blind the eyes of the others from the distractions. It was obvious that they were blind from the distractions. Later we found out that one of the older "boys" that came in was actually a new recruit for the Hungarian professional basketball team. They called it the first team.
Every night we were there, the basketball courts and soccer courts were full of children. You could see and hear them every evening from the apartment above the church. There is a whole mission field right across the street from the church. They could literally hold an event each night and have plenty of children and teens attend the meeting. Perhaps this is an area God could use some of our people in next year? Pray for the youth at Békevar Baptist Church. They also see the opportunity. They appear to have a strong core group of about 10-15 kids. On their own, they saw the need to convert the garage/basement area of the church into a youth meeting place like we have upstairs at our church. While we were there this week, they were finishing painting one room and gutting and painting another room. One side will be for games and things, the other for meetings and movies. Pray for the youth as they attempt to reach their community as well. If the church has nothing to offer, the youth in the area "hang out" in a parking lot near McDonalds or end up in the dance club in town. These teens have a burden to reach other teens in Kaposvar. Brett has the remaining "team money" from our trip. He was staying on another week and is going to see what he can help purchase for their room that will help with this ministry. I'm excited to find out what they decided upon.
After camp, we were invited to a cook out at church member's home in Kaposvar. Anoka and Elizabeth were the ladies, but I can't remember Anoka’s husband's name. This was literally a mountain top experience since their house was on a small hillside outside the city. When we walked into the backyard, we had a beautiful view of the city. The sun was just starting to go down and by the time dinner was done, the half moon and the stars were out. You just couldn't help but sing. Again, we sang in English and they in Hungarian. It was beautiful. I think we sang How Great Thou Art. When we finished, it was silent as each person reflected on how great God is. I sat there wondering again, will we all speak one language in heaven, perhaps a special language? Or will we all speak our own language but understand each other anyway? Between Abby and I, we were able to communicate quite well with the Hungarians. I knew enough nouns and she knew enough verbs that we could put them together and make simple sentences. I almost hope we keep all the languages God created. They are so beautiful. Hungarian is difficult but it is so beautiful to listen to.
We finally had to say good-bye and get home. They had work in the morning and we had camp, yet it was 11:00pm before we left, and no one wanted to say good-bye. All the way down the mountain we sang songs. Our favorite on the drive was It is Well. Tina, Tracy and I had learned the chorus in Hungarian before we left. What a joy to sing with Imre and Babi!
Well, this email is too long already so I guess you will get Friday's installment later...this is the best one!
Monday & Tuesday, July 8-9
We are actually home now, but due to where we were staying, I was unable to email daily like I did last year, so I will have to reflect on some of the events that took place.
In the last email, I told you all where we would be standing at 1:30pm your time. We were able to call home and talk to our families while we waved to them from the square below. That was a time of tears and laughter as our families tried to pick out each of us from the camera. While talking to my sister, she was pointing out each of us from home and said someone had come up behind us that she didn't know. Apparently, we were having such a good time waving at the clock tower, that a Hungarian teenage wanted to join the fun. That made everyone in the square laugh.
Camp went well on Tuesday with "I am the Bread of Life" theme. The children really enjoy the lessons and activities we had planned. We found that we were actually over planned this year, but that was a great blessing for us. In the evenings we would decide which activities we didn't get to on one day could be moved to the next and which activities would not work with the different groups. I can't remember if I told you all this, but Patty (our Kindergarten teacher) made it possible to open a class for young beginners, ages 5-7. We didn't offer this last year. She had 7 students and was the perfect teacher for this group.
The big event for Tuesday was the Ladies' Meeting. Again, we were so well planned that it only took an hour to set up and decide upon which events to leave in our original ideas and which to change once we met with Barb and Abby. Abby started the program with a short, non-verbal skill about being busy and not taking time to remember who God is; Tracy followed with a message about the "stones of remembrance" that the children of Israel stacked on the shore after crossing the Red Sea. Remember that God is Great and He is Lord through all our circumstances past, present and future; Tina shared a few of her own personal stones of remembrance; I lead us in a song at the end, How Great Thou Art. We sang it in English and they sang in Hungarian. How sweet the sound! Afterwards we spent time getting to know some of the ladies. Noemi (a student from last year) and her mother, Csilla, came again this year. Neither of them go to church, but she has been coming to camp and the evening activities for 2 summers now. It was great to see them again and to try to communicate with them. Noemi continued her English studies and could understand and speak quite a bit of English.
We met Evette's mother. Evette was translating for Patty this week. Her mother looked so much like ours that Tracy and I got a little homesick. Just don't tell my mom! She let us call her mama the rest of the week. Later I found out that she is our music leader's mother. That is Jonas, the blind man that leads us. I know that Jimmy sent Jonas some CD's and someone else bought a couple of CD's that we used for gifts. These were great hits on Friday when we were thanking everyone for helping in camp. This is how Jonas learns new music.
Wednesday's theme was "I am the Resurrection." The children were fascinated with the story of Lazarus during the worship session. But everyone had some behavioral issues as they began to get comfortable with us, but nothing major. It was just odd that we each had an incident on the same day to share while we ate lunch that afternoon. Lunch has been provided from the lady who cooks meals for the Women's center. Babi and Imre have organized this for us. We have been tasting true Hungarian cuisine. It's been interesting to say the least.
Wednesday night was the family picnic. All the families of the students were invited for a time of food, games, and fellowship. They played "Hungarian kick ball" again this year. This time Tracy played. I was so afraid she was going to twist and ankle or break a bone, but she didn't. However, one of the older children, Ben, broke his arm. Pray for quick healing. I don't think I saw him the rest of camp. We had a few minutes of sharing also: Patty and Abby gave a quick 5 minute introduction. Then Brett gave his testimony. The teens and the men were most attentive to what he was sharing. When Éndre, the church leader, asked one of us to share a testimony he asked for someone who didn't grow up in church. Brett was the only one and what a great testimony he had to share. It was perfect for the audience he was sharing with: he has been involved with everything from drugs, to alcohol, to witchcraft. But God pulled him out of all that as a young man and now he is faithfully serving God.
Well, the time zone has caught up with me again so I think I will go take a little nap. After a 2 hour delay again at JFK, we finally arrived at the airport at 11:40pm last night and made it home around 1:45am this morning. For us, that was 24 hours of being awake.
I'll catch you up on more details later. The best 2 days are next. I can hardly wait to share it with you.
In the last email, I told you all where we would be standing at 1:30pm your time. We were able to call home and talk to our families while we waved to them from the square below. That was a time of tears and laughter as our families tried to pick out each of us from the camera. While talking to my sister, she was pointing out each of us from home and said someone had come up behind us that she didn't know. Apparently, we were having such a good time waving at the clock tower, that a Hungarian teenage wanted to join the fun. That made everyone in the square laugh.
Camp went well on Tuesday with "I am the Bread of Life" theme. The children really enjoy the lessons and activities we had planned. We found that we were actually over planned this year, but that was a great blessing for us. In the evenings we would decide which activities we didn't get to on one day could be moved to the next and which activities would not work with the different groups. I can't remember if I told you all this, but Patty (our Kindergarten teacher) made it possible to open a class for young beginners, ages 5-7. We didn't offer this last year. She had 7 students and was the perfect teacher for this group.
The big event for Tuesday was the Ladies' Meeting. Again, we were so well planned that it only took an hour to set up and decide upon which events to leave in our original ideas and which to change once we met with Barb and Abby. Abby started the program with a short, non-verbal skill about being busy and not taking time to remember who God is; Tracy followed with a message about the "stones of remembrance" that the children of Israel stacked on the shore after crossing the Red Sea. Remember that God is Great and He is Lord through all our circumstances past, present and future; Tina shared a few of her own personal stones of remembrance; I lead us in a song at the end, How Great Thou Art. We sang it in English and they sang in Hungarian. How sweet the sound! Afterwards we spent time getting to know some of the ladies. Noemi (a student from last year) and her mother, Csilla, came again this year. Neither of them go to church, but she has been coming to camp and the evening activities for 2 summers now. It was great to see them again and to try to communicate with them. Noemi continued her English studies and could understand and speak quite a bit of English.
We met Evette's mother. Evette was translating for Patty this week. Her mother looked so much like ours that Tracy and I got a little homesick. Just don't tell my mom! She let us call her mama the rest of the week. Later I found out that she is our music leader's mother. That is Jonas, the blind man that leads us. I know that Jimmy sent Jonas some CD's and someone else bought a couple of CD's that we used for gifts. These were great hits on Friday when we were thanking everyone for helping in camp. This is how Jonas learns new music.
Wednesday's theme was "I am the Resurrection." The children were fascinated with the story of Lazarus during the worship session. But everyone had some behavioral issues as they began to get comfortable with us, but nothing major. It was just odd that we each had an incident on the same day to share while we ate lunch that afternoon. Lunch has been provided from the lady who cooks meals for the Women's center. Babi and Imre have organized this for us. We have been tasting true Hungarian cuisine. It's been interesting to say the least.
Wednesday night was the family picnic. All the families of the students were invited for a time of food, games, and fellowship. They played "Hungarian kick ball" again this year. This time Tracy played. I was so afraid she was going to twist and ankle or break a bone, but she didn't. However, one of the older children, Ben, broke his arm. Pray for quick healing. I don't think I saw him the rest of camp. We had a few minutes of sharing also: Patty and Abby gave a quick 5 minute introduction. Then Brett gave his testimony. The teens and the men were most attentive to what he was sharing. When Éndre, the church leader, asked one of us to share a testimony he asked for someone who didn't grow up in church. Brett was the only one and what a great testimony he had to share. It was perfect for the audience he was sharing with: he has been involved with everything from drugs, to alcohol, to witchcraft. But God pulled him out of all that as a young man and now he is faithfully serving God.
Well, the time zone has caught up with me again so I think I will go take a little nap. After a 2 hour delay again at JFK, we finally arrived at the airport at 11:40pm last night and made it home around 1:45am this morning. For us, that was 24 hours of being awake.
I'll catch you up on more details later. The best 2 days are next. I can hardly wait to share it with you.
Saturday - Monday, July 5-7
Wow, what an amazing couple of days we have had since I last wrote you. It is about 6:15pm in Kaposvar on Monday night. We will be leaving Barb's around 7:30pm to walk back to the church. Along the way is the live camera in Kaposvar Kossuth Square. We will stop and wave at the camera to anyone who wants to log on. It is not a very clear shot, but you should be able to see 4 American women in a group waving up at the camera. Here is the link.
http://www.kaposvar.hu:8080/snapframe.jpg
Saturday started off as a day of greeting some of the children and giving them an English test. We were able to test most of the children, paint faces and arms, and meet the translators. None of the girls would let us paint their nails since they are not allowed to wear polish in school.
Afterwards, we began sorting through the 8 bags of luggage...well 7 bags, and setting up our classrooms. Then we all went over to Barb's for dinner and fellowship. During this time you could see "the body of Christ" being lived out: some of us sorted lesson materials, some organized the supply room, others prepared the rooms with tables and chairs, and others set up the main activity room. And we all finished at the same time. What an object lesson to participate in. It was wonderful to share our testimonies with each other and get to know the other 2 members of our team.Sunday was even more special.
The church, Békevar, did not have a service in the morning because they have been holding special Evangelism meetings in Nagyatád about 45 minutes away. Tracy, Barb, Brett, and Abby had been approved to go to the jail to hold services. So many men signed up to come that they could not hold the service in the regular room and had to actually hold the service on the cell block floor, right in the middle. So even though the others did not sign up to come, all the men on the block heard the singing, testimonies, and message from Brett. The activity coordinator for the prison came as well. Barb has never even met her before Sunday. It was an amazing time.
We were invited over to Imre and Babi's house for lunch on Sunday and to the services in Nagyatád that evening. Dinner was actually very similar to what we would eat: baked chicken, smashed potatoes with herbs and butter, some kind of pork loaf, Greek salad, rice, and a wonderful cherry yogurt gelatin for dessert. Before we ate dinner we had to take about 20 photos. Everyone wanted pictures. When dinner was over we were all able to sit and share testimonies of how God is working around the world. I
will bring my card reader over to Barb's next time and include a photo or two. The trip to the service was filled with ohhh"s and ahhh"s as we past field after field of sunflowers in full bloom. The service that night included a singing group from Pécs and a Russian magician. Several people accepted Christ at the invitation, including one of the children Tina has in her English class.
Afterwards, there was a hospitality/mission bus outside the church providing tables, snacks and drinks for anyone from the church or the city. The man driving the bus was from Sweden and he was with a mission group called OM. The people from the church would ask us if we were from IM or OM. All the way home to Kaposvar we sang hymns and praise songs in the van in English with Imre and Babi joining in to sing the ones they knew in Hungarian, or just to hum along.
Monday at last: The big day had arrived. Our classes were set up, our lessons were ready and the children were tested...except the 14 that showed up that morning. All together we had 43-45 children on the first day. Because Patty had joined us, Barb allowed a 5 year old and a 6 year old to begin. So I guess you could say we have a young beginner class, 2 other beginner classes, 2 advanced beginner classes, and an advanced class. The morning seemed to fly by as we went through the Bible studies and English lessons. I was able to tell by responses to questions that there are at least 4 children out of the 8 in my room who know nothing about Christ. The other 4 could answer the questions, but I don't know about their salvation yet. Pray for them each this week: Mark, Mathew, Csongor, Gergő, Attila, Kristian, Sandra, and Kristof, as well as the other children in camp.
When parents came to pick up the children at the end of the day, there was standing room only in our meeting room. If we grow like this next summer, we will have to meet in the main sanctuary!
Tonight we are meeting with some of the children who have gone through English camps and should be able to get to bed at the first descent time since we arrived. We are looking forward to a good night's rest. You can actually become "spent for the Lord" here...or like the Steve Green song, “used up for thee."
Tomorrow is day 2 of camp and the Ladies' Tea in the evening. Pray for this meeting. Oh, and the suitcase has been located and should be delivered tomorrow. They tried to deliver it Sunday but we weren't in town. We need these supplies for Wednesday. Pray that these are delivered tomorrow. We can really see the effects of all your prayers here, so don't stop.
We miss you all and can hardly wait to see you again and share with you live what is going on here.
http://www.kaposvar.hu:8080/snapframe.jpg
Saturday started off as a day of greeting some of the children and giving them an English test. We were able to test most of the children, paint faces and arms, and meet the translators. None of the girls would let us paint their nails since they are not allowed to wear polish in school.
Afterwards, we began sorting through the 8 bags of luggage...well 7 bags, and setting up our classrooms. Then we all went over to Barb's for dinner and fellowship. During this time you could see "the body of Christ" being lived out: some of us sorted lesson materials, some organized the supply room, others prepared the rooms with tables and chairs, and others set up the main activity room. And we all finished at the same time. What an object lesson to participate in. It was wonderful to share our testimonies with each other and get to know the other 2 members of our team.Sunday was even more special.
The church, Békevar, did not have a service in the morning because they have been holding special Evangelism meetings in Nagyatád about 45 minutes away. Tracy, Barb, Brett, and Abby had been approved to go to the jail to hold services. So many men signed up to come that they could not hold the service in the regular room and had to actually hold the service on the cell block floor, right in the middle. So even though the others did not sign up to come, all the men on the block heard the singing, testimonies, and message from Brett. The activity coordinator for the prison came as well. Barb has never even met her before Sunday. It was an amazing time.
We were invited over to Imre and Babi's house for lunch on Sunday and to the services in Nagyatád that evening. Dinner was actually very similar to what we would eat: baked chicken, smashed potatoes with herbs and butter, some kind of pork loaf, Greek salad, rice, and a wonderful cherry yogurt gelatin for dessert. Before we ate dinner we had to take about 20 photos. Everyone wanted pictures. When dinner was over we were all able to sit and share testimonies of how God is working around the world. I
will bring my card reader over to Barb's next time and include a photo or two. The trip to the service was filled with ohhh"s and ahhh"s as we past field after field of sunflowers in full bloom. The service that night included a singing group from Pécs and a Russian magician. Several people accepted Christ at the invitation, including one of the children Tina has in her English class.
Afterwards, there was a hospitality/mission bus outside the church providing tables, snacks and drinks for anyone from the church or the city. The man driving the bus was from Sweden and he was with a mission group called OM. The people from the church would ask us if we were from IM or OM. All the way home to Kaposvar we sang hymns and praise songs in the van in English with Imre and Babi joining in to sing the ones they knew in Hungarian, or just to hum along.
Monday at last: The big day had arrived. Our classes were set up, our lessons were ready and the children were tested...except the 14 that showed up that morning. All together we had 43-45 children on the first day. Because Patty had joined us, Barb allowed a 5 year old and a 6 year old to begin. So I guess you could say we have a young beginner class, 2 other beginner classes, 2 advanced beginner classes, and an advanced class. The morning seemed to fly by as we went through the Bible studies and English lessons. I was able to tell by responses to questions that there are at least 4 children out of the 8 in my room who know nothing about Christ. The other 4 could answer the questions, but I don't know about their salvation yet. Pray for them each this week: Mark, Mathew, Csongor, Gergő, Attila, Kristian, Sandra, and Kristof, as well as the other children in camp.
When parents came to pick up the children at the end of the day, there was standing room only in our meeting room. If we grow like this next summer, we will have to meet in the main sanctuary!
Tonight we are meeting with some of the children who have gone through English camps and should be able to get to bed at the first descent time since we arrived. We are looking forward to a good night's rest. You can actually become "spent for the Lord" here...or like the Steve Green song, “used up for thee."
Tomorrow is day 2 of camp and the Ladies' Tea in the evening. Pray for this meeting. Oh, and the suitcase has been located and should be delivered tomorrow. They tried to deliver it Sunday but we weren't in town. We need these supplies for Wednesday. Pray that these are delivered tomorrow. We can really see the effects of all your prayers here, so don't stop.
We miss you all and can hardly wait to see you again and share with you live what is going on here.
Thursday & Friday, July 3-4
It is now 9:45 pm in Kaposvar on 4th of July. I hope you all had a wonderful day of celebration. We spent most of ours in transit having left Atlanta on Thursday morning at 8:00 am. Getting through the Atlanta airport was unusually easy.
JFK was crazy, but we relaxed, played cards and let God work out all the details. I will never say anything bad about the Atlanta airport again. It may be chaos there, but it is organized chaos. JFK is just chaos. Just before boarding, they announced 2 flights to begin boarding and they were not going to call by sections, so "just come on." You can imagine 350 people scrambling to get in line to take the shuttle out to the plane...well, minus the 4 of us who sat calmly playing cards. Then we sat on the tarmac for 2 hours for various reasons.
When we finally took off, there was a great cheer throughout the plane.Sitting among us all was a little girl named Melinda and her mother. They both speak 5 languages including Hungarian and English so they were able to give us free Hungarian lessons throughout the long plane ride, when we weren't sleeping. We were also able to share with them why we were coming to Kaposvar. We exchanged phone and email so we will see what becomes of that.
Arriving in Kaposvar was easy...and at first all of our bags appeared to have arrived. However, one of the supply bags did not make it. These contain about 25 of the Bibles needed for camp on Monday. Pray that it is found and delivered to Barb's house tomorrow. The other 7 arrived with no problems. When we met the rest of the group on the other side of customs, we found out Abby (our team member from Washington) was missing her bag. Pray that this one is also found and delivered.A wonderful man named Imre drove us all to Kaposvar.
One good thing about the missing bags is we were all able to fit in the van including all of our luggage so we didn't have to stand around and wait for 2 more hours waiting for Csilla to see if her husband got on his flight (he was stand by). We have a terrific apartment in the church building. Imre and his wife, Babi, took us all for a quick bite to eat and to the grocery store to fill the refrigerator with breakfast items. They have not let us use any money yet. I think the church has provided all this so far. We have seen Jonas and his wife, and Éndre and his wife briefly as they stopped by before going to an evangelic meeting in another local town.
Tomorrow we will meet many of the children coming to camp. They are coming to the church to have a language test so we can decide what class to place them in. We will have a clown (Abby), face painting (Tina and I), and fingernail paintings (Tracy and Patty), and Brett will have frisbees or something. Pray for this time with the children. We didn't this opportunity last year so the children were as afraid of us as we were of them.
The church service is not being held at this church on Sunday due to the Evangelical meeting in the other town, Nagyatad. However, Tracy, Barb, Abby, Brett and Barb are going to provide a service at the jail. We had to turn in all of our information a week ago in order to be cleared, so Patty, Tina and I are trying to decide what to do about worship on Sunday. We have the whole church to ourselves so it may be a church meeting of 3 ladies on Sunday.
Well, I'm going to go join the others in Barb's living room. I think they actually made a pan of brownies will I was typing. Yummy!
JFK was crazy, but we relaxed, played cards and let God work out all the details. I will never say anything bad about the Atlanta airport again. It may be chaos there, but it is organized chaos. JFK is just chaos. Just before boarding, they announced 2 flights to begin boarding and they were not going to call by sections, so "just come on." You can imagine 350 people scrambling to get in line to take the shuttle out to the plane...well, minus the 4 of us who sat calmly playing cards. Then we sat on the tarmac for 2 hours for various reasons.
When we finally took off, there was a great cheer throughout the plane.Sitting among us all was a little girl named Melinda and her mother. They both speak 5 languages including Hungarian and English so they were able to give us free Hungarian lessons throughout the long plane ride, when we weren't sleeping. We were also able to share with them why we were coming to Kaposvar. We exchanged phone and email so we will see what becomes of that.
Arriving in Kaposvar was easy...and at first all of our bags appeared to have arrived. However, one of the supply bags did not make it. These contain about 25 of the Bibles needed for camp on Monday. Pray that it is found and delivered to Barb's house tomorrow. The other 7 arrived with no problems. When we met the rest of the group on the other side of customs, we found out Abby (our team member from Washington) was missing her bag. Pray that this one is also found and delivered.A wonderful man named Imre drove us all to Kaposvar.
One good thing about the missing bags is we were all able to fit in the van including all of our luggage so we didn't have to stand around and wait for 2 more hours waiting for Csilla to see if her husband got on his flight (he was stand by). We have a terrific apartment in the church building. Imre and his wife, Babi, took us all for a quick bite to eat and to the grocery store to fill the refrigerator with breakfast items. They have not let us use any money yet. I think the church has provided all this so far. We have seen Jonas and his wife, and Éndre and his wife briefly as they stopped by before going to an evangelic meeting in another local town.
Tomorrow we will meet many of the children coming to camp. They are coming to the church to have a language test so we can decide what class to place them in. We will have a clown (Abby), face painting (Tina and I), and fingernail paintings (Tracy and Patty), and Brett will have frisbees or something. Pray for this time with the children. We didn't this opportunity last year so the children were as afraid of us as we were of them.
The church service is not being held at this church on Sunday due to the Evangelical meeting in the other town, Nagyatad. However, Tracy, Barb, Abby, Brett and Barb are going to provide a service at the jail. We had to turn in all of our information a week ago in order to be cleared, so Patty, Tina and I are trying to decide what to do about worship on Sunday. We have the whole church to ourselves so it may be a church meeting of 3 ladies on Sunday.
Well, I'm going to go join the others in Barb's living room. I think they actually made a pan of brownies will I was typing. Yummy!
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