From the September-December 2010 Issue
HEZEKIAH, ME, AND THE YEARS OF GRACE
Pal and Anna Borzasi
By God’s grace I am back in the ministry again. It was because of concussion following a fall that I had to stop for a year to recover. Praise God, I am better and now, together with my dear wife Anna and our three wonderful children, I am in a new place called Luna de Sus. I think of King Hezekiah, who after being ill and being told to put his house in order because he would die, prayed, recovered and was given fifteen more years to live. I was also near to death (according to the doctors), but praise God, I recovered. I do not know how many more years I have been given, but I would like to use them wisely and to the full in His service.
OUR NEW SITUATION
The majority in the Hungarian Baptist Church of Luna de Sus are Hungarian, but we also have three Romanian members. However they can speak Hungarian well. The language is not a barrier to them; they can join in the service in every aspect and can understand the sermon well. This is a blessing for me; otherwise I would have to preach in the Romanian language as well.
There is also a daughter church in the village of Mera, where there are about ten people attending the meetings and fifteen gypsy children. The children are recent participants. We started a children’s ministry and designed it in such a way as to run it just before the weekly church service, so that we may be able to encourage them to stay on and attend the main service as well. It worked well and now we have a noisier, younger, and 150% larger congregation! Our hope is that these children may come to faith as they listen to the gospel and so join the church. However, it seems that there is still a long way to go to that stage. But the Lord is on our side and we go ahead with them.
Returning to Luna de Sus, for the Sunday services we have about 80 people present, while at a weekday service about 55-60.
There are about ten young people who attend the youth meetings and with them we are planning to go to a camp this summer. Young people will join us also from another two churches, which is good. Praise God, there are two ladies in the church who are willing to come and cook for them for ten days.
As far as the midweek services are concerned, it is good to see how many of the church people are interested in being prepared for other activities as well. After each weekly service we organize in turn different meetings: first, I teach the lay preachers in the church how to interpret the Scriptures and prepare sermons to preach in my absence, both in Luna and in Mera; second, I organize meetings for married couples to discuss marriage-related topics; third, Anna is leading a ladies’ meeting during which they search the Scriptures and discuss possibilities for social service and visiting the sick, both in the church and in the village.
Our only hope, prayer and confidence is that our work is not in vain in the Lord (1 Corinthians 15:58)