Mission and service in Hungary
A parish Exodus Team from Holy Trinity Ballylesson recently returned from an eleven- day mission service project in Miskolc, Hungary. The team of six young ladies was led by community, youth, and families pastor Ryan, and his wife Sarah. The team began meeting for weekly ‘family dinners’ on Sunday evenings back in February to look at the Gospel of Matthew together and consider what it means to love God and love neighbour.
After fundraisers, gatherings, commissioning services, and loads of prayer and support from friends and family, the group headed to Hungary to help with a Children’s Bible camp put on by Tirek-ifi, a youth church organization of the Reformed Church in Hungary. Before arriving in Miskolc, they took part in the infamous ‘bush camp’ that is a team building, faith encouraging, unplug, unwind, digital detox, with a few of the other Exodus Teams from Northern Ireland that were also serving placements in Hungary and Slovakia.
From Monday-Friday, the team helped run a Bible camp alongside teachers and other Hungarian youth volunteers for sixty-four kids. The theme of the week was ‘Superheroes in the Service of God’ while also considering Sola Gratia, Sola Scriptura, Sola Fide, Sola Christus, and Soli Deo Gloria. They played games, taught songs, did crafts, did Bible work with the kids in small groups after the lessons, and even took the kids on a field trip to two important historical villages that were part of the Hungarian reformation in the 1500’s! The group also took part in two different Sunday services with churches that were supporters of the camp. The Hungarian hosts took exceptionally great care of them with generous hospitality and making sure they were well fed and experienced as many cultural things as they could fit in the schedule after the long days of Bible Camp. The team even managed to walk seven miles in Budapest, seeing all that was possible on the night before travel back to Belfast.
Each morning the team would gather for breakfast and begin with the prayer, ‘the night has passed and the day lies open before us, let us pray with one heart and one mind, as we rejoice in the gift of this new day, so may the light of your presence, O God, set our hearts on fire with love for you; now and for ever.’ After each full day, they would gather for team meeting before bedtime and talk through the highs and lows of the day, asking what gave joy, or what took joy away. Thankfully, the joy giving far outweighed things that took joy away. Through the heat, language differences, sixty-four brilliant and bouncing children, new foods, and missing home, each night ended with the Lord’s Prayer as an act of hope; a manifesto reminding and calling them to love God and love neighbour.
With thanks to Ryan Hawk