Fall in Budapest – November 2019

Friends! It has been a crazy, but great fall here in Budapest. In my last Journey in Missions Update (you can watch/read it here if you missed it) I officially announced that I will be extending my time here and will conclude my term in June instead of January 2020. I am so excited about what God is doing here in Budapest and look forward to seeing what God has in store for the 2019-20  school year. So much has happened over the last few months, but I am going to try my best to summarize as much as I can, so here we go!

Near the end of July, I attended the Students for Christ Connect Conference near Cologne, Germany. Students for Christ is a network of groups that are reaching university students and young adults across Europe. It was a great time of training, community and preparation for the Fall semester at Riverside Exit.

We celebrated King St. Stephen’s Day on August 20th by hammocking and playing games in the park while we waited for the fireworks show over the Danube River. Holidays like this are great opportunities to invite new friends into community and to create lasting memories.

This year, when preparing for summer, I felt it was important to continue to provide opportunities to build community and grow spiritually for those who would still be in Budapest. So, in August I hosted a small group at my apartment using a video series called Adulting. It was a great way to end the summer and build the deeper connections that come from a smaller group setting.

In September, I celebrated my twenty-fifth birthday by spending time together eating food and seeing a bit more of the city. I am so thankful for the friends I have here in Budapest and for the opportunity to celebrate 25 with them in this city. Also, I am so thankful for those of you who gave a one-time donation in celebration of my birthday.

During the SFC Connect conference, I was really praying about the Exit leadership team. I had this group of great people that I loved and appreciated, but as we neared the end of spring semester we just weren’t working well as a team and I knew that something had to change. So at Connect I prayed, and prayed some more, asking God to either reignite our team’s passion or, if it was time, to move some of them on to the next chapter of their lives and ministries. Well, he answered. Quickly. Often, I think, when we pray these kind of prayers, what we really expect is to keep pressing forward and working hard and to change things on our own. This time, however, God answered in no uncertain terms. Within two weeks, three of my primary team members, knowing nothing of my own prayers, let me know that they felt like God was leading them to another chapter in their lives. I’d like to say that I had complete faith in what God was doing, but I may have panicked a little. I’m still trying to figure out what God is doing in this season, but I believe that he is using it to grow our group, to raise up new leaders, and to grow me as a leader and minister of the gospel.  In the meantime, I have had the opportunity to share more messages in the past two months than probably ever. We started the semester with a series called Questionable, based on a book called Surprise the World, that challenged us to live lives that cause the people around us to question why we live the way we do because they’re seeing the heart of God in the way we live and serve others. It was a great series and I had a lot of fun preparing for the weeks that I taught. This week we began another series called Identity Confirmed, where we’ll be talking about identity and what God says about us in the Bible.

The Budapest Adventure Challenge! We started doing this event during the fall semester last year and it was such a hit that we have done it every semester since. We pick a day, invite as many people as we can, split them into groups, and send them out around the city to take photos together. It’s a great event because it’s an easy way for our young adults to invite their friends to check out Exit in a way that isn’t intimidating. Cool story: one of the girls who has been attending Riverside for the past year actually found out about our church because she had seen the Adventure Challenge on Facebook last fall and decided to join and only found out about the church when she showed up for the event.

Fall Costume Party! We had twenty-five young adults at Exit for our Fall Costume Party making it our largest event of the year. At least half a dozen people who joined us were first time visitors! It was such fun and I believe that whether we see those young adults again or not, we had the opportunity to let them know that they are welcome at Riverside Exit Group.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this quick glimpse into everything happening here in Budapest, Hungary. As always, if you have any questions about what I’m up to here in Budapest, would like to connect on a more one-on-one basis, or have any things that I can pray for with you please send me an email, I’d love to hear from you.

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Here is the part of the Journey in Missions Update where we chat about the important money stuff, please give me just a couple more minutes of your time while I update you and then head to the very bottom of this update for the things you can be praying for as Partners in Missions.  When I raised my funds before moving to Hungary, I raised about 70% of my total monthly budget from monthly partners and the rest was covered by one-time cash donations. So, with the decision to extend my term here, I increased the number of months that cash rollover would need to cover and it comes up just a bit short. During my birthday campaign in September we were able to raise enough money to cover an additional month! Thank you to all of you who gave! That still leaves five months that I need to raise the difference for, totaling about $2500. December 3rd is Giving Tuesday, a day of giving and generosity across the US and across the world. My hope and prayer is that together we can raise the remainder of what I need by then. If just 25 people gave a one-time gift of $100, together we could continue to impact the lives of young adults in Budapest, Hungary. I want to invite you to be a part of raising that amount, by Giving, Praying, and/or Advocating. If you would like to partner in what is happening here but still have questions, I would love to talk to you so please send me an email.  If you want to be a partner but can’t give a financial gift you can still help, you can pray and advocate. What is advocating? It is sharing this update with your friends, pastors, and ministry leaders. It is inviting people to be a part of what God is doing in Budapest, Hungary.  Monthly Partners: First of all, thank you for your faithful giving! You are a huge part of the ministry that is happening here in Hungary, without you I couldn’t be here serving at Riverside Church Budapest and leading Riverside Exit Group. Your giving will continue to come out monthly unless you’ve chosen a specific end date, so you shouldn’t have to do anything to continue to partner with me through June, unless your billing information has changed. With that in mind, I have a favor to ask,  I try my best to check in with you when your giving stops, but life gets crazy and sometimes I don’t notice and neither do you. So, if you do automatic giving if you could check that it’s still coming out every month that would be awesome. Not sure how to do that? Shoot me an email and I would be more than happy to check for you and help you get it updated if necessary.

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Pray & Praise! 

• God is growing Riverside Church Budapest in incredible ways! Since I moved here a little over a year and a half ago we have tripled in size! We expanded to two services last fall, and are currently pushing the limits of our space during both services. Please continue to pray for God’s provision and creativity in how to best use our space and serve our people. 
• God has brought so many young adults from all over the world to Riverside Church, it is incredible to see the way he is equipping young people to impact the world. Please pray that we would follow the Spirit’s lead in everything that we do at Riverside Exit, from fun events to our weekly services, that we would best serve the spiritual and community needs of our young adults. Please also pray that he would raise up additional leaders to serve this community of young adults.
• It is such a blessing to be a part of a healthy ministry team here in Budapest! However, it has been a challenging fall trying to balance the responsibilities that I have at Riverside Church and at Riverside Exit as the primary leader/teacher. Please pray for strength and rest as I learn to better delegate and manage my own time.