This is the big update! So Eurocon was beyond words. It was so life transforming. God just abundantly graced the whole week. He gave me peace to get on a plane and cross the Atlantic, He quickened me beyond my lack of sleep, He opened my capacity when I usually would get doctrined out, He even gave me a personal time of fellowship with Him even when I was surrounded by people all week long, and He gave me new friends and a revelation of the Body of Christ through the incredible faith field that was around that conference. I felt so hid in the Body everywhere I went because of the Holy Spirit among us.
It was the first time I could call myself a foreigner. I want to go again. I want to go back. I'm already saving up for next year. I want to go on the mission field but not before God's grace sends me. I know sometime soon, I'm going to have to spend some time in another country for my missions major during summer time, but I don't know where or when. Not this summer, I don't think. But I'd like to go somewhere established, and Budapest is definitely an option. But anyway, it was my first time on a plane, first time in Europe, first time eating something without preservatives ;), first time on a metro (subway system), and the first time I stepped foot in a Catholic church (will explain). I greatly enjoyed it. It felt like I was there for a month. I just soaked every moment in. Not to mention I took hundreds of pictures so that I could show you all what happened.
Here is dad and I fresh out of the airplane walking down a familiar sidewalk to anyone who has ever been to the church in Budapest. To us it's about 4 am. We didn't get to bed until about 5 pm our time. That was another first. The first time I stayed up for two days straight. I had to do it to get acclimated to jet lag. The church building itself is huge, and beautiful. We arrived Tuesday, and we spent the day at the church. We hung out with friends, and just rested. We also sat in on ABD which was Pastor Schaller's message from the prior Sunday morning service.
This is the chapel hall of the church where services are held.
Pastor Matti at a lunch rap. This picture was actually taken on Wednesday for the lunch rap. After the lunch rap, I went with Eevi Aaltonen (Below, right. It's not the most flattering picture of her, she's really a very joyful person.), Laety Allier (Below, left), and Susan Joseph (Below, middle) to the hill where the church's old school used to be. It was over on the Buda side of the city.
What in the world happened to this picture? It's pink... Anyhow, we rode 10 minutes up hill by bus, and then we walked 20 minutes to this chair lift that we were going to ride down the mountain. But the chair lift closed 5 minutes before we arrived. So we had to do plan B, which was walking down the mountain. Now, mind you, Eevi was the only person who knew her way around because she lived there for a while, and she is also a Finnish. So she doesn't just walk, but she walks a speed between speed walking, and jogging. Now we went 20 minutes up hill, and then 15 minutes back, and another 30 or so minutes down the hill. Not on streets, but on mountain trails.
Yeah... I was dead. I did more walking that day than I planned on doing this month. Man I'm such an American.
So we walked down the mountain and just barely caught the bus. We were like a football field away from the nearest bus stop and we saw someone running for the bus stop, so we realized that the bus was stopped there. If we were going to make it back on time, we had to catch that bus. So after an hour of speed walking, we sprinted to the bus, and was able to make it before the bus pulled away.
I SURVIVED! See, all Americans aren't lazy bums.
Here's Pastor Scibelli getting fired up, and firing us up. If I remember rignt, this is the next morning. That day after the rap, I went with the teens to Margaret Island. Along with the teens were some people from Baltimore: Eevi, Kyle Benoit, Phillip Dubay, and Kyle Schaller. Also Steve Scibelli who's a missionary to Baku was there.
Here's the group of the teens here. Actually it's more then just the Budapest teens. There are fins, Americans, and Brits in there as far as I can remember. It was a beautiful day, and the park itself is a wonderful place.
Breakfast in the Gloria was great. The food there was always fresh and great. I loved the whole set up of meats, cheeses, and bread, with a variety of fruit and vegetables, and fruit juices. I felt like I was eating so healthy. Though I never really did get a good night's sleep there.
I just liked this picture. This is the day after the trip to Margaret Island. Now this day, I took a tour of the city, and took hundreds of pictures of all the classical buildings there, but we stopped at four landmarks: Hero Square
St. Stephen's Basilica. We went inside and saw all the wonderful Roman Catholic idolatry (sorry if that offends you, just calling it what it is), and even saw the hand of the dead guy (St. Stephen, who is actually not the Stephen of the Bible, but the first king of Hungary). You can't use flash when taking a picture of the hand, and you can't laugh in the presence of the hand of the dead guy. I couldn't believe the altars, and the statues. They were beautiful, but the first thing that popped into my mind was, "look at all this idolatry."
Then I went to the Statue of Liberty in Hungary. Here I am on the hill where the statue is. 
Then we went to the Castle District.
Here's a friend of mine, Rike Steffani, who is from our Austrian church. She sang "Heroes of faith" and it was so beautiful, God was really upon her when she sang.
The next day we went to Szentendre, which is a cool little town outside of Budapest. It's a great tourist destination and place to buy souveniers.
But speaking of Heroes of faith, here are a bunch up on stage.
And here's Pastor Schaller on the last night of the Conference. It's probably my best picture of him.
Here's a beautiful family in Budapest. I know a few of them personally, and everyone that I know are amazing people. They are the Szabo's. This is roughly half their family. They have two more daughters and three more sons, one of them being Andras here in Baltimore.
This was the last night Pastor Schaller was in Budapest, and this is "The" Turkish Restaurant. For some reason, Turkish food and I just didn't mix well. My mouth found it acceptable, but my stomach didn't. Luckily my friends there in the church helped me by getting me some medicine.
This was Sunday, my final day there. It was the great period at the end of the week. It was so beautiful. After the Sunday morning service we went on this river cruise on the Danube river. It was so beautiful. It was so beautlful. We went on the Pest-Buda. After we ate on the lower level, we sat on the front of the boat there where those chairs are.
It was so worth the $40 I spent to go. I had food I've never had before, and it was all so delicious. They had a deli platter, a seafood platter, a poultry platter, a fruit platter, a desert platter, and the main course was this chicken dish and also meat wrapped in cabbage leaves with sauerkraut.
It was cool and breezy, but not cold. We were on the eastern side of the Danube, and we rode around Margaret Island, and then down to the southern side of the city to the last bridge, and then we went back up the river. The sun came out when we reached southern Budapest and it really got beautiful. Here's dad and I while we were riding by the Parliament.
Here's a great picture of Pastor Stan Collins, missionary to Lima, Peru.
Well that's it for my trip to Eurocon. It was so much more than what I showed you. God really put Budapest in my heart, especially the church there. It was so much fun, and it was so blessed. I knew God wanted me to be at that conference. The whole tiem was covered by His grace. The only downside of the whole trip was when we came back to America and we tried to leave Dulles. That airport is about as efficient as a dull knife. Anyhow, I hope you enjoyed the pictures!
Just a little side note. Please pray for Pastor Steve Muerrillo, he's a pastor who when he came back from Africa developed congestive heart failure, which I think is only curable with a heart transplant. He's in the hospital, and we're all praying for him.
Also my dog is fine. He had an x-ray and the calcuim deposit that was pinching his nerve was on the outside of the spine which means no need for surgery, and thousands of dollars. So they're injecting him with some medicine that will desolve the calcium deposit and hopefully we'll be picking him up tomorrow from the vets. Thanks for your prayers! Also my dad is feeling better, but he's still going to work even though he's still sick. Oi... God bless you all!
In Christ,
Josh |
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