Magyar Egyház, 1967 (46. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

1967-04-01 / 4-5. szám

MAGYAR EGYHÁZ

11

that country where their cradle rocked, where a million memories bound these Hungarians who became exiled.

Only God knows the sorrow that filled the hearts of Hungarians in a foreign land when they remembered their homes, churches, people and country left behind. The bells of memories tolled in their souls, their eyes filled with tears. Homesickness sobbed in their hearts, and these sorrows brought the songs of Zion to their lips. Every time their hearts ached they began to sing in the foreign land; life became bearable only because the Lord’s song made even the foreign land a home. These were Hungarians, living in a modern Babylon, good Hungarians who through their churches kept their nationality and the songs of their fathers.

The Hungarian Reformed remembered what his Saviour told the woman of Samaria at the well of Jacob, that the Lord’s song could be sung anywhere. There is not a single place in the world where Christ cannot be Lord, one can sing with Him in the night in the garden of Getshemane, under the crosses of our lives, in the prisons of Philippi or anywhere in this world. One can, and one ought to sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land. By the waters of sorrow our only consolation is that we can sing the Lord’s song anywhere.

We American Hungarians have remained good Hungarians in this land because the Lord’s song was upon our lips for these more than 77 years. We didn’t bring anything with us, only our memories, our faith, and our prayers, the songs of our ancestors and our loyalty to the land of our fathers. Our heart ached all the more when we remembered the churches we left behind and the peaceful Sundays of old, and then the Spirit moved upon us to make this foreign land our home by building the same kind of churches and singing the Lord’s song with our other exiled brethren just like our forefathers had done throughout the centuries.

With the song of the Lord churches were built here, and this strange land became our second home. The flowers pressed in our prayer books turned to dust, many memories vanished into oblivion and the faces of loved ones have disappeared into the blue yonder, only our love for our father’s home and the songs of Zion will remain upon our lips as long as our hearts shall beat.

The storm of history carried a mustard seed from the ancestral land across the sea. Lo and behold, a miracle took place, the seed grew and now there is a Hungarian Reformed Church on this side of the ocean. We call it American, because this is our country, we are faithful and loyal citizens of this country, many of us are bound to this land by the graves of departed loved ones, our children were born here, yet we think of the land of our fathers, our spiritual mother with filial love. We are the only ones in this world who use the word “Hungarian” before the name of our religion, and whenever we introduce ourselves, we call ourselves Hungarian Reformed.

We were singing the Lord’s name in a foreign land until the word “Hungarian” became a word with a spiritual meaning, not only a nationality. It means that we are Reformed Christians forged by the Holy Spirit from the Hungarian soul, in the land and history of the Hungarians. It has a special flavor, strength and fragrance. We are Reformed, just like our brethren, yet we are different, because we are Hungarian Reformed. The violet is blue here, and everywhere, but if you pick a violet in a garden in Hungary and enjoy its fragrance, you will know the great difference between that flower and the violets grown anywhere else in the world. Try

the fruit of the land of Hungary, taste its flavor, taste the wine of the Hungarian hills, and perhaps you will then understand what the difference is in the word “Hungarian” used before the word “Reformed”. The Holy Spirit is forming the fate of our church in America, but we have brought its fragrance from Hungary, its aroma is a result of the 400 year tradition, its thousand times blessed and holy history. This dear faith we will hand down to our children. It is unbelievable what we do with the English, the Irish, the German, the Polish, the Slovak, the Roumanian, and heaven knows what nationality that joins our ranks. We don’t convert them to be Hungarians but we make them love our Hungarian Reformed faith from the bottom of their hearts. With the help of the Spirit we transform foreigners into Hungarian Reformed Christians.

Dear Reformed Brethren in Hungary! We, the Benjamins of the Hungarian Reformed who live in America, bow down with you before God Almighty to thank Him for this glorious, bloodstained, 400 year old Hungarian Reformed church history full of trials and tribulations. We confess with you that we thank God that we live and exist today. We thank Him that together with His Living Word He gave us His written Word, and that He gave us, too, the Second Helvetic Confession to be used as the interpreter of His Word and guiding light of His Word among the thousands of temptations and trends of the times. We confess with you that God has loved us very much when His Holy Spirit made Heinrich Buliinger write this Confession 400 years ago, and when His Holy Spirit made our forefathers accept it as their own Creed. We gladly admit that it is a gift and guide to lead us to Christ, to explain the Word of God, to advise us, and to keep us in the grace of God — even we, the Hungarian Reformed in America. It is ironical, or perhaps a tragic fact that when our American Hungarian Reformed life was torn asunder, this confession was used by brother against brother, and the then Free Magyar, today Hungarian Reformed Church in America used this Second Helvetic Confession in court to prove that they were the true Hungarian Reformed Christians. Only he could be Hungarian Reformed who accepted the Second Helvetic Confession and the Heidelberg Catechism as his creed. Our ministers, as they do in Hungary, take an oath that they shall preserve their forefathers’ faith, and that they shall not teach ideas contrary to our Confessions. We thank God that now even the Canadian, and lately the United Presbyterian Church in the USA accepted the Second Helvetic Confession as one of her creeds.

As we rejoice with our brethren at this anniversary, and as we praise God’s Holy Name that He gave us the Second Helvetic Confession to be used as the golden band to hold together the Reformed Church which is surrounded by the Carpathian Mountains, we ask Him to preserve our church in unity, obedience, and faithfulness. Let its ageless truths lead us to the Living Word, and may the humble faith tried in the fires of human history make up for its shortcomings.

Our love toward the Hungarian Reformed Church of Hungary cannot be changed by time, distance or any changes. In this country, our beloved Hungarians are moving homeward like migrating birds. The Lord’s song becomes more and more faint. But, lo, a miracle is happening, the sons step into their fathers’ place, as it is the custom of old, but they sing the Lord’s song no more in a foreign land, but in the land of their birth, the Hungarian Reformed way, in English.