August Update 2012

Greetings from Hungary!  It’s time again for an update from us on what’s been happening here.  

Family: In July we traveled to Belgium and stayed at the home of a family there with which we have become good friends.  Whenever we go there, they show us so much love and hospitality.  We had a great time of fellowship with them, as well as prayer and worship at the church there.  They have truly been experiencing revival since February, and the Lord is continuing to manifest His presence there powerfully!  We all enjoyed the times of refreshing!

While we were in Belgium, some boiling, cooking oil splashed into Christopher's eye, causing excruciating pain.  Initially we thought it went directly into his eyeball, but we just prayed for him. Afterward we discovered that it had burned his eyelid.  But the Lord healed it up miraculously, so that the pain went away without using any analgesic, and he was able to sleep like a baby.  Praise the Lord!

The gleeful boys on the plane

This time we flew there by plane, rather than driving.  Our friends picked us up at the airport, which is an hour and a half from where they live, and arranged everything so that we didn't even need to rent a car while we were there.  The children really enjoyed the flights, especially the boys, since it was the first time on a plane for Joseph and although Christopher had flown to Hungary when he was three years old, he no longer remembers it much at all.

Jennifer had to sit separate from us on the plane due to the fact that we did not have reserved seating. She sat next to a young Belgian man, who was returning from the US.  He said he had gone to California to seek spiritual answers.  He was very open and inquisitive about the gospel. She said the Holy Spirit gave her the words to say to him and she felt it was a divine appointment.

Our dear friends, Pastors Sakis and Josy

We also got to spend an evening with pastor Sakis and his wife Josy there in Belgium, talking with them.  They invited us, like they did the last time, to come to their home the next day for the entire day. So we were with them for about eight hours the following day.  That was real quality time for us, which we are very grateful for.

We have included a few photos of the trip in the "More photos" section of this news letter below.  But if you have the time and interest to see two albums, you can also see all of the Belgium trip photos. 

We mentioned last month that Jennifer's parents had been planning to come for a visit in September.  However, they have once again cancelled their plans, since they do not feel led to come.   Naturally that was a disappointment for us, as we had all been looking forward to seeing them.  But we know God is in control.

Len injured his great toe this month, and may have broken it.  Some of you have already begun to pray, and healing is taking place.  Len is walking on it again carefully and has wrapped it to the adjacent toe. Please join us in praying for a complete healing.

Charity immediately following removal of her braces

Charity's braces were removed in August, successfully completing two years of very expensive treatment.  From beginning to end, the Lord provided for it all in the most amazing and math-defying way.  There was a surprise, very large, balloon payment for her retainer on the day the braces were removed.  In direct answer to prayer, the Lord was faithful to provide the needed funds for that, too. Praise His name!

Ministry: Len has continued to meet with and disciple Gábor and Greg. Greg has been attending worship camps and festivals this summer, including one in Serbia, which he says have been really wonderful.  He is also spending the last half of August and first part of September in the States.  So if anyone from California to Tennessee wants to connect with him, let us know and we can arrange it.

Another one of the young men that Len has discipled, named David (pictured below), came to our home for a visit in August.  The Lord truly ministered to him that day in multiple ways, and he would like Len to speak with his pastor.  He has been sharing with us many wonderful testimonies of the Lord's working in his life.  In addition to being one of the leaders of his church youth group, he has also started a new Life Transformation Group for discipleship with one of the young men.  It's so wonderful to see that he has been caring for the sheep, and they held their summer camp in July.  He said:

"It was awesome!  On the last night of the camp, which was Saturday, we had planned a teaching, but it never happened.  The Holy Spirit moved and the presence of the Lord was there.  People were being filled with the Holy Spirit and experiencing the fire.  We continued into the night like that and danced before the Lord."

David and Len during his visit to our home recently

"The next day on Sunday, the rest of the church came down to the camp and joined us for our final service. I led the worship and preached.  It was very exhausting, but a lot of people said they were encouraged by it."

"After the meeting on Sunday, I got a call that two of our youth, who stayed home, were having a house fire." They were at the third floor apartment of the parents of one of the two girls.  And the girls were the only ones home.  "The fire started while they were cooking, and it completely destroyed the apartment.  But thank the Lord they made it out alive, and no one was hurt.  When I got the call, I went to prayer with two of the other youth, who were leading at the camp.  We were crying out to God.  I was asking the Lord to dispatch angels to the girls in the fire.  And we were crying.  God spoke to me through the other leaders with me that He had already sent angels to them."

"The firemen told the family that it was the strongest type of fire, and the temperature in there was 1,000 degrees Celsius.  So they were very blessed to make it out alive.  During the fire, they ran to the living room, which was the one place still free of smoke where they could get some air to breath.  One of the girls ran through the smoke to the door to get out of the apartment.  But the door was locked with a key.  She ran back into the living room and told the other girl.  She then ran to the door a second time to try it and the door was wide open!  She told me that an angel opened it for them, and I was so blessed to hear that.  She ran back to her friend in the living room, and they both got out alive together."

Since the fire, the whole church has been helping them and serving them.  David led a team of ten people on two consecutive days to empty out the apartment of all the destroyed furniture.  Since the elevator was damaged in the fire, they carried everything down the stairs from the third floor. He said, "It looked like something from a horror movie in the apartment.  Everything was charred black."

He said the church is helping the family that lost everything in the fire to get back on their feet. They will help them to get an even better apartment than they had before.  Praise the Lord!  What an amazing testimony of the Lord's angelic protection, and the Body of Christ uniting in love to care for a family in need.

We've continued conducting evangelism, and prayerfully planning future ministry activity.  We have so much fun distributing gospel invitations in busy, public squares.  The presence of the Lord is tangible at times.  Plenty of people refuse to receive the gospel, some politely and others not. But we're so amazed at the hunger of some people for the gospel.  They are the good soil where we're seeking to plant seeds.  We've actually had people on a few occasions come up to us and ask for a tract.  Other times when we reach out to give one to someone, another person nearby will reach out for one, too. Praise the Lord for such wonderful opportunities!

Len still plans to travel to Romania at the end of the summer for ten days into September.  He is going to be ministering to pastors and three churches in the region north of Bucharest.  Would you please join us in praying for a powerful move of God to happen in these churches?  Pray that the gospel will go forth, the Word will be preached, people will turn back to God, the sick will be healed, and the captives set free.

Gábor

Gábor, one of Len's disciples (pictured right), continues to share his faith in Christ with coworkers. Also for several months now, his pastor, named Geza (pronounced "GAY-za), from the Rose Garden Baptist church in Budafok, has been meeting each week with him and a few other people in Gabor’s home out in the village of Tököl, which is about 30 minutes away from the church.

And he said that about four or five elder couples from various churches in the surrounding towns have all agreed to help plant a Baptist church in Tököl.  So now they are just prayerfully waiting upon the Lord for His divine timing when to start the new church.  They have even discovered that believers from Tököl have been traveling to churches in other towns for worship, and the team that is starting the new church has invited those people as well. Gábor says those people believe they will eventually become a part of this new church once it is planted.  He has invited Len to come and encourage the believers in his home group.

He said he and his wife lived together before they were saved, and when they came to Christ, they got married before a justice of the peace.  Now the Lord has made it clear to them that they need to be married in the church.  So they have set the date as September 22. As we mentioned in our last newsletter, this is the same day as Dora’s wedding, but two hours later.  So it looks like we will be attending two weddings that day!

Administrative Needs: Our immigration visas (known as resident permits) are due to expire in October, so we are required by law to apply for renewal in September.  Praise the Lord that He has now provided a Hungarian Christian sponsor! We have been working very hard on preparing all our documentation and gathering finances to cover this expense. Len needs to have that project 99% completed before he goes to Romania, in time for us to apply with the Immigration Office when he returns to Hungary.  So that gives us only two more weeks, and the pastor who represents the denomination that is supporting us is out of the country this week. Please pray that all will be completed and that we will be granted renewal of our residence permits.

Resources:  In our last two newsletters, we have written about the Lord's imminent return and the need for the Church to prepare for His coming.  We would also like to encourage you to read "Is Obedience Optional?" (see here), as well as "Obedience by the Spirit" (see here), and "Now But Not Yet" (see here). Our eleven-year old daughter, Hope now has a blog called Words of Hope, so please check it out (see here).

As always, Len's entire collection of most popular blogs are at "Writing for the Master" (see here).

In closing, we have much to praise God for, and many opportunities for you to join us in prayer.

Praise the Lord with us for the many answers to prayer:

1. For protecting Christopher from the boiling oil and healing his eyelid.
2. For the times of refreshing in Belgium and a safe journey both ways.
3. For the opportunities to evangelize the lost here and the hunger of some for the good news.
4. For the successful removal of Charity's braces after two years of treatment and His provision.
5. For the wonderful ways he is working in the lives of David, Gábor, and Greg, and our opportunities to minister to them.
6. For our progress thus far on the residence permit visa applications.

Next steps and prayer needs:

1. For the Lord to reveal Himself to all the non believers in Budapest whom we touched.
2. For the Lord to continue using all of us in our personal evangelism work, including the children.
3. For the Lord to continue using Len's disciples David, Greg and Gábor to reach the lost with the gospel, as well as make disciples.  And for the Lord to enable us to spend some extended time in fellowship and prayer with them this summer.
4. For the Lord to heal Len's injured toe.
5. For the outpouring of His Holy Spirit here in Diosd to ripple all across Hungary and Eastern Europe.
6. For the Lord to prepare hearts there to experience revival and receive a mighty outpouring of the Holy Spirit and fire.
7. For the Lord to powerfully anoint and help Len as he meets with pastors, elders, and disciples here in Hungary and Romania this summer.
8. For the Lord to send forth laborers to the Hungarian Roma (gypsies), as the Lord is laying a burden on our hearts for them.
9. For our financial blessing.  
10. For the Lord to help us gather all necessary documents and successfully renew our visas in Sept.

Thank you so much for your partnership in this ministry.

Love from all of us,

The Lacroixs

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