Vissza

Vége van a nyárnak, és Balázs ma ment vissza az iskolába. Egész pontosan, ma kezdte a középiskolát. Hajrá Balázs!
Most már ő is azt mondhatja amit a mi hitbeli apánk, Ábrahám, is mondott olyan sokszor: HátIzsák, hol van?
Hátizsákokról beszélve, nyomjuk egy kis Demjén Ferit:

Tito and other Yugoslav graffiti

I wrote this post after our last trip to former-Yugoslavia, about Tito, and how in every former-Yugoslav country it seems there are many people who love Tito, and miss the Tito era, when the Yugoslav nations lived in peace and relative prosperity.
I found this poster in Zagreb:

 

It seems that in Croatia even punks love Tito!

I really like looking at graffiti wherever I'm at in Europe; I think its interesting to read what people think is worth writing on walls for everyone to see. Sometimes the ones written in English are really funny, especially when they are misspelled, or phrased wrong. One of my favorites in the main square in Debrecen said: Let us go to steal.In Croatia there was a lot of interesting graffiti - I especially liked this one I found in Zadar:

 

I'm not really sure what they mean by saying that Zagreb=Belgrade, but I'm guessing its negative, and this person from Dalmatia doesn't like either of these cities very much.
Anyone have more insight into this?

Croatia pt. 1 - Zagreb and Plitvice

We have less money this year than in years past. Because of the financial crisis we have less money coming in, plus Nate is getting bigger and eats more, and we now have Balázs as part of our family and he needs food, clothing, bus passes, memory cards, etc...
Because of these things, we thought we wouldn't be able to afford a family vacation this summer. We were planning to go to Slovakia for just 2 nights, but had a hard time finding accommodation on short notice.
I happened to write on Facebook that I was frustrated about not being able to find a place to stay in SK, and someone left me a comment, saying: Why don't you just get some tents and go camping? My first response was that I wanted to write him back and say, That's easy for you to say - but I have a baby and a pregnant wife! Then I started thinking about it, and realized that we could actually save a lot of money by camping, and maybe we could even go to the seaside, as Rosemary had asked me earlier in the year to take her to the coast.
So, I mentioned the idea to Rosemary, and figured out that if we bought a bigger tent, then we could fit Nathaniel's bed and Rosemary and I into it, and Balázs could sleep in our other tent with our friend Dani from church, who happened to be off from work that week.
So, on Monday, at 1am we left Eger for Zagreb, spent some time there, and then drove down to Plitvice Lakes National Park, about 2 hrs south.

We got to Zagreb at about 6am, and had breakfast there, and let Nate run around a bit. He slept most of the way in the car, although he was pretty excited and knew something was going on, that we would get him out of bed in the middle of the night to go somewhere.
Rosemary and I had been to Zagreb before, so we knew our way around, which made being there really enjoyable. Its a much smaller city than Budapest, but very nice, clean, and has a lot of parks.

We then drove down to Plitvice Lakes, where we camped the first night.

 

Croatian food is great, and we ate a lot of Ćevapčići and Ražnjići, but we were on a budget, so we also heated up canned food we brought from Hungary over a fire. Nate liked being in the tent - and it was funny waking up every morning with him standing and watching us, waiting for us to wake up.

Here are pictures from Zagreb:
And here are some from Plitvice:

Denied

Last week, on August 20, the President of Hungary, Sólyom László was refused entry into Slovakia.
The president was going on a private visit to a town in southern Slovakia with a majority ethnic Hungarian population to unveil a statue of St. Stephen, the first king of Hungary.
The reason the Slovak government gave for refusing entry to the Hungarian president was the day he chose to come on. The Slovak government told Sólyom László that he could come on any other day, just not August 20th. When he came anyway, he was turned away at the bridge where he tried to cross into Slovakia.
This is the complication - because whereas for Hungarians August 20th is Saint Stephen's day - one of their most important holidays, when they remember the founding of the Hungarian kingdom, which used to include the territory of modern Slovakia and Transylvania - in Slovakia August 20th is the anniversary of the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, in which the Hungarian army also invaded Czechoslovakia to shut down the "Prague Spring" - an attempt by Czechoslovakia to move away from communism and Soviet domination.
The problem is that Hungary and Slovakia are both EU members, and Slovakia's denial of entry to the Hungarian president is contrary to EU law which permits freedom of movement between countries.
This isn't even the first time this kind of thing has happened to Sólyom László. On March 15, he went to Romania, to celebrate Hungary's national day with Transylvanian Hungarians, and while his plane was in the air, he was refused landing permission, and ended up having to come into Transylvania by car. Pretty embarrassing for a president...
Both Romania and Slovakia are sensitive to Hungarian territorial claims to their land, and view moves like these by the president as challenging their territorial sovereignty.
I can personally understand why Slovakia and Romania are concerned about Hungarian claims to their land. I can also understand the Hungarians, who don't want to lose touch with fellow Hungarians who were separated from Hungary not by their own choice.

What do you think? Was Slovakia justified in doing this? Is the president of Hungary challenging the sovereignty of these nations by his visits there?

BBC on Ukraine

Interesting video from the BBC about Ukraine, and the foreign leasing of land and farming in Western Ukraine:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/8218081.stm

More Money

Probably everyone who doesn't live in a cave in North Korea is sick of hearing about the global financial crisis, and even those who do live in caves in North Korea have been effected by it.
We have certainly felt it here; we have less income from both work and support than we did last year, and more costs. People in our church have been effected by it as well.
But there are some signs this week that this crisis could come to an end sooner than later.

This week Germany and France announced that they have come out of recession.
That's good news for Hungary too, since many of the major employers here are multinational companies from Western Europe. Recession there means less orders in the factories here, less production, and people laid of. Hopefully the end of the recession in Germany and France will mean more work and job opportunities here, so people don't have to leave places like Eger to find work by going abroad or getting sucked into Hungary's 'black hole': Budapest.

Colorado is actually considering lowering the state minimum wage, because prices have gone down as a result of the financial crisis, but some good news is that the housing market is starting to recover. Forbes magazine rated Denver as the 7th best for housing recovery in the US.

This financial crisis is no fun. Hopefully it will be over soon...

Surprised

I don't like country music. But I was blown away by this performance by Kevin Skinner on America's Got Talent. He comes across like a total hillbilly bumpkin, but he's seriously good.
Check it out:

Superheroes VS Lenin

Lenin. Moscow. Superheroes. The USA.
All these are on the list of my favorite things. Exactly why this glorious video by the Hungarian electronica band Neo is worth watching over and over.
Check it out:

Animals

Nate loves watching videos. Especially animal videos.
Most of his first words were animal names and animal noises and he gets excited whenever he sees animals of any kind. He's always up for a pop quiz on his animal noises. Just say the animal name, and he will give you the noise :)

We're planning to take him to the zoo in Nyíregyháza for his birthday. We're curious how he will react to seeing some of his favorite animals in real life.

Searching youtube today with Nate for some good animal videos, I ran across these two, which were worthy of passing on. Enjoy.

Recharging

After a few weeks, or actually months, of conferences and camps and events and visitors, we are taking it easy this week.
All in all our summer has been blessed and fruitful. There is always more to be done, and things will pick up again soon, but for this week we are recharging our batteries - which is especially needed for Rosemary and little 2.0.

Here are some random bullet points:

• Our church's English Camp this year went GREAT. This was probably our best camp yet. There was great planning beforehand, we had a great group of helpers, and God moved in a great way. Praise the Lord for that.
• There have been a series of attacks against Christians in Pakistan. Over the weekend 8 people were killed - mostly burned alive - as Muslim mobs attacked the Christian minority, setting their houses on fire, and even shooting them with guns, because of a vague and unverified claim that some Christians somewhere had desecrated the Quran.
  This "religion of peace" teaches that anyone who desecrates the Quran should be killed. And of course, what qualifies as "desecration" is open for interpretation...
  So, with this unverified claim, Muslim mobs attacked not one Christian - but the whole Christian community.
  Articles about it: Here and here.
  The Bible says that we should 'Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.' (Hebrews 13:3) We should remember to pray for our Christian brothers and sisters who are suffering persecution in Pakistan.
  
• Colorado Man Fights Lion with Chainsaw - Article here.
  A true Coloradan - this guy was cutting wood, when he got attacked by a mountain lion. The Colorado man fought the lion with the chainsaw and won.
  I just hope that the next time I get attacked by a mountain lion, I have my chainsaw on me too. That really turns the tables on 'em.
  

Dr. Habis László

Az egyik unokatestvérem, Tess, meglátogatott minket a múlt héten, szerdától szombatig. Ő most utazik Európában, és az első állomása Eger volt. Örültünk, hogy itt volt, és jól eset, hogy egy család tagunk látogatott minket itt Egerben.
Elvittem mountain bike-ozni Bélapátfalván, elmentünk vacsorázni Egerszalókon, és elmentünk az egri strandra.

Tess-nek van egy plüss majom, és egy fényképet akar készíteni róla minden városban, ahol jár. Pénteken, elmentünk vacsorázni Egerben, és Tess le próbálta fényképezni a majmot az étteremben, ahol voltunk. Rosemary észre vette, hogy ezt a melettünk lévő asztálnál ülő férfiak aranyosnak találták, és mondta nekem, hogy kérdezzem meg tőlük, hogy keszíthet-e Tess egy fényképet róluk, amiben ők tartják a majmot.
Oda mentem és megkérdeztem, és az egyik úgy felelt meg, hogy 'Szeretnél, hogy a város polgármestere megtartsa a majmot a képben?' És akkor leeset, hogy azzal akivel beszéltem, az Dr. Habis László volt - Eger polgármestere!
Itt vannak a majmos képek:

My cousin Tess came and visited us last week, from Wednesday to Saturday. She is on a tour of Europe, and Eger was her first stop. We had a good time together, and were glad to have some family visit us here in Eger.
I took her mountain biking in Bélapátfalva, took her out to eat in Egerszalók, and took her to the outdoor bath in Eger.

Tess has a stuffed monkey that she wants to take a picture of in each city she visits. So Friday, we went out to dinner in Eger, and she was trying to take a picture with the monkey at the restaurant we were at. Rosemary noticed that some men sitting at the table next to us were amused by this, so Rosemary suggested we ask them if we can take a picture of them holding the monkey. So, I went over and started talking to them, asking if they would be willing to let Tess take their picture with the monkey, and they asked me, 'would you like the mayor of Eger to hold the monkey in the picture?' It turns out the man I was talking to was the mayor - Dr. Habis László!
Here he is holding the monkey:

Adios Paula

Apparently, Paula Abdul will no longer be a judge on American Idol, as she hasn't been offered a contract to continue with the show.
Article here.

Paula had her ups and downs, did some crazy stuff off-screen, and was obviously on prescription drugs, but I think we're all going to miss hearing her say every week: 'You're a bright and shining star' and 'I love you' to almost every contestant.

We actually liked Paula being on the show - she usually had something nice to say when they other judges didn't - and you always knew that if there was a performance that even Paula couldn't say something nice about, then it must have been really bad!
Here's Paula on AI - an example of why she might not have been invited back...

Glacier

'A glacier is a large mass of ice moving slowly over some land surface or down a valley, formed over long periods from the accumulation of snow in areas where the amount of snow that falls exceeds the amount that melts. Glacier ice is the largest reservoir of fresh water on Earth. Glaciers are found in mountain ranges of every continent except Australia' (Souce: Wikipedia)

On Monday I took Andy, Kim, and Balázs to the High Tatras. Andy and Kim came to help with our English Camps, and since there is a one week break between the 2 camps, they wanted to see some cool stuff in the area.
Every now and then I have to go get my mountain fix up in Slovakia - it kind of reminds me of home.

We went to Tatranská Lomnica, and took the lift up to Skalnaté Pleso - a lake which collects the water from the glaciers near the peak. I've been up there quite a few times, but had never actually seen the lake, since its frozen and covered with snow in the winter. It was beautiful.
From the lake we could see the glaciers, probably about 700 meters up the mountain, so we decided to hike up to them. Kim had never seen glaciers before, so we figured we might as well go see it from up close.
Up on the top of the mountain we saw some deer and a fox. I caught a frog.

All in all, it was a great time. The only thing missing was Rosemary...:(
Here are the photos:

Heaps

We have an Australian couple, Andy and Kim, staying in Eger right now for a few weeks to serve with us in our English Camps.
We've really enjoyed having them here - they are great people - and we have learned a lot about Australia:

• We ate our first Vegemite sandwiches
• Watched some Australian films: Australia and The Castle
• Finally figured out how Australian Rules Football works
• Learned about Aboriginals, 'The Stolen Generations', Marsupials, and Australian Country Music

Australian culture has a lot of British influences, but it also seems to have a lot in common with the western United States. They have cowboys - called 'drovers', they have country music, they have surf culture and wear flip flops and board shorts, they are laid-back, etc...

According to Andy and Kim, Australians make fun of you if they like you. They certainly make fun of me a lot, which must mean one of 3 things:

1. They do it because they like me
2. They do it because they don't like me
3. They don't actually like me, but they want me to think that they do...

I'm not sure yet; I'm still working on this one.
While I'm busy doing that, here's a video:

First Semester Finished

I've finished my first semester of school, and I'm really enjoying it.
In light of this past semester, here are a few of my reflections on studying theology:

• I would recommend it for anyone who has the means to do it.
• I think you can be properly equipped to be a pastor or Christian leader without formal theological education, but I think it is a good for 'rounding out' one's theology and method of studying the Bible.
• I enjoyed spending a lot of time in the Word, and I feel that it gave me a better overall grasp of the big picture of the areas I studied this semester (The Gospels and the Pentateuch).
• I haven't really encountered anything super new, but it has been good to be exposed to views different from my own. I think that is really important for everyone who really believes something.
  If we just read books and listen to people who believe exactly what we do, and say only things which we agree with our particular tradition, that does not strengthen our faith, it does not make us question and rethink our positions. Its just like, "Oh, hey, this guy agrees with me too!", and that doesn't help us develope discernment, which is so important for Christians these days, with all the aberant teaching that goes around.
  After all - our goal is not to hold to or affirm one position or another, it is to seek God and to seek truth. And if our positions are correct, then they will be affirmed through this process anyway, and if they are not correct, then its better to be disillusioned than to believe something unbiblical!
  A good case in point is Thomas Schreiner, a prominent theologian, author and pastor, who recently changed his long-held view of amillenialism to premillenialism, because he was convinced by the text to do so. That's a great example of someone committed to the truth and not to defending his particular tradition. Here's an article about it.
  

Books and websites which have been most helpful to me:

• Google Books
  I found so many usefull resources here for writing papers - mostly excerpts from books. This was really helpful since I don't have access here to an English library with theology books.
  
• Online Synopsis
• The New Testament Gateway
  
• Bible Dictionaries
  I love Bible dictionaries, and my favorite is the New Bible Dictionary. I use this all the time.
  
• ESV Study Bible
  This was Rosemary's gift to me for Christmas, and I LOVE it. I use it a lot for devotional reading, preparing for sermons, and as a reference. It is full of good articles, charts and maps. With purchase of it, you also get access to the ESV Study Bible Online, which has everything the paper version has, and gives the opportunity to writes notes on the column and highlight in different colors, which are all be saved and can be accessed online from anywhere. Its a great tool.

Something I Don't Understand cont.

A while back I wrote this post about how I don't understand why people use the Playboy bunny on their clothes and on products - especially how I see in Hungary that people put Playboy bunny clothes on their pre-teen girls.
Today, I had a case in point.
We've had an English camp this week for school aged kids, and today one of the little girls - 10 years old - came to camp with a Hooters shirt on.
A few thoughts on this:

• This little girl probably has no idea what this shirt means.
• Her parents probably know full well what it means, and sent her out to church camp today wearing a Hooters shirt, thinking it was all well and good - perhaps even cute - to see their little girl wearing a shirt like this.
• Do they hope that one day she will grow up to be a Hooters girl? What a great ambition to have for your little girl: that some day she will grow up and have men ogle at her while she brings them beer and hot wings while wearing skimpy clothes...
• How wrong is it that Hooters even makes clothing in sizes for little girls?
  
• Doesn't this encourage pedophilia somehow?

Needless to say, I was disturbed...

Tokyo Robot

I've never been to Japan, but I get the impression from what I see on the internet that Japanese people are cool, in a strange and nerdy way.
Here's an example: This robot was built in Tokyo, just for fun.

Its 18 meters (59 feet) high - about as high as a 6 story building - and lights up at night.
More pictures here.
Crazy Japanese...

Ukraine

I have wanted to go to Ukraine for literally years.
My mom's family moved from North America from Ukraine, and I've been interested in the country, and wanted to visit it for quite some time.
When I first moved to Hungary, my plan was actually to stay in Hungary for a short time, and then move to Ukraine. Obviously, the Lord had different plans, but Ukraine has always had a place in my heart, and has been a place I pray for and read about.

Well, the time finally came for me to go to Ukraine. A few weeks ago during the Foundations Conference in Vajta, I went with one of my pastors to Ukraine - to Zakarpatska Oblast, the part closest to Hungary, which at one time belonged to Hungary.
Both Pete and I have Ukrainian family background, and have both had a heart for the country for a long time. We went there to check things out, pray for God's leading in future ministry opportunities in Ukraine, and hopefully make some contacts.

We had a little difficulty at the border - I had a document to take the car across the border since it is in Rosemary's name, but it wasn't notarized, which isn't necessary in Hungary, but is in Ukraine. So, after spending 2 hrs at the border, we walked across and took a taxi to Mukachevo (Munkács in Hungarian). There we took some pictures, prayed, and ate some bad Ukrainian food.
After the food, we went to the local Hungarian Reformed church, hoping to be able to talk to someone there and ask about the spiritual life of the city, and the church situation there. The Lord really blessed this meeting; the reformed pastor there is young, and we actually have a lot of common acquaintances in Hungary, including a few people in Eger. He took us around in his car, showed us the various churches, told us a lot about the Spiritual situation in the area, and even drove us back to the border! It was a big blessing.
Funny thing was, that as we crossed the border again, the Ukrainian guard - an ethnic Hungarian - who knew we had been turned back when we tried to enter with our car asked how we had gotten around, and when I told her that we had gotten a ride from the Reformed pastor she got very excited, because she was also Reformed. When I then told her that I was a pastor too, she came out of her booth and gave me kisses on the cheek and asked why I hadn't told her that before!

We are still praying about the next step, and what God would have us do, but it was a good trip. Here are the pictures:

The Rose

This has been on the internet for a while, and I'm sure that a lot of people have already seen it - but in case you haven't, here's Matt Chandler speaking at a Desiring God conference. Check it out:

Joy

I got to baptize Balázs on Friday in Vajta.

On Thursday he came to me and told me that he wanted to be baptized, and when I asked him why, he said, "Because I want to commit my life to God." That is such a beautiful thing, and it was such a joy to me to get to baptize Balázs, and see him make the choice on his own initiative to make a statement of his faith and his commitment to following Jesus by being baptized.

Congratulations Balázs! May God strengthen your faith and bless you, so that you truly do follow Jesus all of your days!

Lehetőségem volt Balázst bemeríteni pénteken Vajtán.

Csütörtökön odajött hozzám, és azt mondta, hogy be szeretne merítkezni. Amikor megkérdeztem tőle, hogy miért, azt mondta, "Mert Istennek akarom elkötelezni az életemet." Az egy anyira szép dolog, és nagyon nagy öröm volt a számomra, hogy Balázst bemeríthettem, és láthattam azt, hogy saját döntést hozott arról, hogy ily módon bizonyságot tesz az ő hitéről és arról, hogy arra kötelezi magát, hogy Jézust kövesse.

Gratula Balázs! Isten erősítse meg a hitedet és áldjon meg téged, hogy tényleg kövesd Jézust az életed utolsó napjáig!