November 4, 2015
Dear Friends,
We have had a busy Fall with a lot of special events. Here are the highlights:
Christian Workers Conference in Esztergom:
One of my ministry goals is to influence other churches in Hungary in the area of missions and evangelism. On September 26th we held a regional conference for Christian workers. The turnout was excellent with more than 100 adult and teen participants. We were very pleased to have people attend from 10 different churches. Most were from our region (North-east Transdanubia). The feedback was excellent, and we will see how the Lord leads in further meetings.
One church in our region has specifically asked for further assistance. The Baptist church in Oroszlány, Hungary is located about an hour from us. The church has only 10 members, most of whom are elderly, and is struggling to gain new people. They have one fine young couple who have a desire to evangelize and reach new people with the Gospel. A few of us from Esztergom and Tata met with them to see how we could help. We had a great meeting, and the Lord led us to put together a team of people, who would go once each month to hold a special evangelistic service in their city. The first such service will be held on November 22nd! One of our men from Tata will be preaching, and our worship team from Tata will do the music. Please pray that many visitors would come, and we would see this dying church find new life!
20th Anniversary service in Esztergom:
On October 15, 1995 we held our first Sunday service in Esztergom at one of the local high schools. On October 11, 2015 we celebrated the 20th anniversary of our church! What a great day we had thinking back on all the blessings of the past 20 years. Some of our earliest converts who were young people at the time are now married with teenage children!
We had two services on this special Sunday. In the morning we held a special thanksgiving service and gave our members the opportunity to give testimonies of God’s blessings in their lives. After 1 hour and 15 minutes of testimonies, we had to cut things off for lunch. We had many visitors attend our afternoon celebration including the mayor. Janos Papp, president of the Baptist Union of Hungary, was our special speaker. It was a great day of encouragement for us personally and also for our church.
First service in our new auditorium in Tata:
On November 1st, we held the first service in our new auditorium in Tata. This was not our grand opening, as we still have a lot of work to do on the exterior of the building, grounds, and the refurbishing of our old building. Nevertheless it was a special day of thanksgiving and praise. On July 1st we began construction, and it is amazing that just four months later we are now able to use the auditorium. The vast majority of the work has been done by our people with hundreds of hours of volunteer labor. I am especially grateful that Gabor Szucs, one of our men, has overseen the entire construction project.
It is our prayer that this new auditorium will not only be a blessing to our current church members, but also give us the opportunity for more growth. Thank you for your prayers and support of this project.
Special prayer requests:
November 22 – Special outreach service in Oroszlany, Hungary
November 29-December 13 – Evangelistic Sundays in Tata and Esztergom
Upcoming Christmas events – puppet outreach, Christmas shoebox gift distributions.
Serving for His Glory,
Marc Patton
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| Meeting in Oroszlany |
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| Team prepared to help in Oroszlany |
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| 20th Anniversary Service |
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| New auditorium |
