Hungarian Church Press, 1958 (10. évfolyam, 1-2. szám)

1958-01-15 / 1-2. szám

HCHP Icl5 ,-11.1-1353, VolsX/l-4

ident1s management of the General Convent fell on me, This service of nine was aggravated by the great distance between Budapest and Pápa, and by the fact that: • "there was given to me a thorn in the flesh" (2, Corinthians 12:7) I am giving thanks to God that Ho has not taken away His Holy Ghost from me, even more "I am full of power by the; Spirit of the Lord" (Micah 3:3) more richly than I ever dared to ask and hope,, hid God has pnorMed me with collaborators ready for any sacrifice among them Í mention .in the first place Dr, László Búza, Listrictual Curatca^-Genérái, ny old dear friend who kept carrying the burdens of tho lay Curator General of tho General Convent together with mo beyond our districtual affairs with lie art and soul,

— On tho very day when I began writing ngr report I was reading the second chapter of the prophet Joel-'s prophecy and I was greatly hit on heart by some underlined voids of God-’s Word: "Therefore also now, saith the Lord, turn ye even to me with nil your heart5 end with fasting, a;d with weeping, and with mourning • and rend jvur heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the Lord your

, God©9i, and it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out ny Spirit upon all flesho" In this prophecy there is a peculiar consolation from end to end and every word has its own special accentuations Nevertheless I was much hit by the underlined words; Therefore also now saith the Lord., He sends word: turn ye even to me with all ■ your heart, and only afterward will Ho poms out Lis Spirit- upon the church and people keeping penitence.. All living members eg,our Church individually and collectively must do penance not only for .ail Virhat/nappenied in the Reformed Church in Hungary before October the 23rd. .1.956 but for those, too., on November the 1st 1956 and later oh, Tensions will bo resolved in repentance as well as relations and events waiting for settling, 17c can but approach God and each other in repentance and shall be "as workers together with him" (2t< Corinthians 6:1) and receive "one another as Christ also received us to the glory of God " (Romans 15:7). The Holy Ghost creates privity among us, He preserves the church from running after political aims,,

— Biere are even now a good deal, of pasters and ciders who have not

reached the decision claimed by God’s herd and the Holy Ghost, and they trust in their own righteousness and wait the repentance from the others. There arc people who do not want to recognise that ir. the elapsed 10 or 5 years something had also happened what is good., and there are seme others who wanted to follow the way on

which wo have been walking up to now. Let us cast a glance backward's and inwards.-- In the past year a lot of criticism was uttered of the measures taken by the olurch and of the events in tho church during the elapsed 12 years or at least in the past 6-7 years,. It is unquestionable that there were mistakes both in the state-life and in idle relation between tho state and church, and inside the Church, The leadership of the church ./ere unison ihat these mistakes may be eliminated, oven mare had to be ceased« I take upon myself responsibility for ail what

had happened with my participation on a country scale and for all what I had done in this church district .in my capacity of bishop and together with my co-president respectively. I take upon myself all my previous reports I delivered to the general assemblies of the district, they might have been accounts or showing the way.

I am emphasizing that not the way of our church waa-io blame in the past 10 years — and I boldly say even now amidst of the recent and latest events -- that our walking on it was deficient,. He gratefully experienced that the leaders of the State- Office for Religious Affairs did. not hinder our claims on. endeavours for correcting mistakes and remedying troubles but even more they backed us morally.

— Striving after a renewal is not a phenomenon of new type neither alien, still loss political in our church, for the renewal pertains to the undisturbed function of life of the Reformed Church as breathing in the organism for