Hello Hungary!

Tuesday evening, I stood on a cold platform at the Bratislava train station...waiting. The train, bound for Budapest was late, leaving me with no choice but to anticipate its unknown time of arrival in the cool breeze that tunneled through the station. Fortunatly, I wasn't alone and much to my delight, Olga offered to stay until the train came.

Through the wind we laughed once again as we had for the entirety of the trip; what a blessed soul she is. Similarities in our chosen vocation, educational path, struggles we faced as new counselors and our common belief in the healing assistance of animals were a few of the elements that had drawn us close. Trying to catch our breath through the laughter, the train finally pulled in.

Goodbyes were said and a genuinely sincere hug was given. I was then off to Hungary. As the train progressed towards a city I had been trying to get to since I was 18, I couldn't help but feel a slight sadness in my heart and doubt that my Hungarian experiene wounldn't match that of the one I had in Slovakia.

Two hours later, I stepped down off the train, only to have my doubts erased almost instantly. Eagerly, a tall, smiling woman made her way through the crowd and greated me with a hug whose caliber matched that of the one I had left in Slovakia. Finally, I had met Csilla.

And the laughter resumed! Being the first time that we had met one another, we were suprised how unlike our photos we were...thankfully! And, it wasn't long before I was sitting in a dazzling plaza enjoying a mozzarella and tomato salad, discussing which ice cream shop we would visit after dinner.

Concluding our stay in the plaza with a short trip inside H&M, we started the drive to Orbottyan. In the car, she shared about her niece, who recently became a Christian. I shared about my journey through graduate school and how I had learned more about myself than I had originally signed up for.

She was genuine, personable and fun...Hungary was going to be good.

The next morning, I was able to tour the grounds. For the next five days we are using the facilities of Ellel ministries, a British based organization that works in Eastern Europe. How refreshing it was! A forest boarded the southern side of the property, a small lake was right in the middle and the streets were fantastically muddy! Walking around in the fresh morning air, I heard the calls of sheep and horses, saw dogs playing in the sun and listened to the roosters alerting the town of the morning hour.

I feel that this is an appropriate time as any to tell you that I thoroughly enjoy any good European city. I'm a lover of food, classical music, and can spend hours in any art measume on the continent, but truly, in my heart of hearts, I am a small town girl! A day spent outside with my horse and dog getting respectably dirty and I couldn't be happier. Needless to say, my soul drank every drop of country goodness that was offered that first morning.

This morning, the conference participants arrived. Sixteen people (plus one 18 month old beautiful baby and her wonderful babysitting grandmother) make up our group. They are enjoyable people with whom I have already shared wonderful conversations.

I probably shouldn't say this, but of all the conversations that took place today, I did have a favorite. Stephan is a young Dutch man who has recently become engaged to his Hungarian girlfriend. Being from the same generation, we mutually expressed our frustrations in receiving the negative messages of marriage that are presented outside as well as inside the church.

He was tired. Tired of people portraying marriage as a chore and something in which the happiness you feel now will inevitably disappear. He was convinced that although he was lacking sufficient examples in his life, that marriage could and should be so much more, so much better than what the 'bitter' older couples had been telling him.

Listening to his frustration, I told him that four years ago my then fiance (now husband) and I were having the exact same conversation. I was able to share with him that my experience has been that if each individual is healthy coming into the marriage, things won't neccessarily go through all the pain that so many people have promised him would happen.

This is the message I feel God has given me. Amidst a society and church culture that say otherwise, marriage is fun, and certainly not the guarenteed frustration, pain, annoyance and difficulty that is so consistently preached.

It's not without challenges either, but predominantly because life is not without challenges. If you and your partner are healthy, God fearing inddividuals, the struggle is going to be out there, jointly battling the stresses a fallen world will inherently throw at you. The struggle is not (or at the very least, should not) be within the relationship.

I know I'm relatively new at this, but for the past four years this has been my life (any for what it's worth, I have seen it lived out in the lives of my parents, who will celebrate 30 years together next summer). I am well aware that due to our imperfect backgrounds, inidividual stressors and worldly challenges, that not every couple will have a marriage experience similar to mine. But should those individuals find themselves in a difficult situation, the one thing I would say would be to look at yourself.

The basic pre-requisite for marriage should be a willingness and a practice of self evaluation. Bring yourself before Christ and should you be brave enough, plea for His transforming evaluation of your life. But if you do so, be prepared to let go of your very self concept. Should you let Him, He will take all of what you think constitutes the substance of your being and begin by replacing each and every facet of yourself with the Truth that is Christ Himself.

Please don't think that I am in any way striving to discredit the difficulty that so many people suffer. I chose to be a counselor because I felt that God was desiring to use me to reach another individual in the midst of their pain and hurt.

I hope you don't get the feeling either that I don't see a need for counsel to be given by couples who have suffered and overcome their marriage difficulties. Those are some of the most powerful examples of the indwelling power of Christ we can be privileged to witness while we are still on this earth. But I hope you do hear what I am saying, that just as desperatly, we need GOOD examples. We need GOOD messages. Older generations, the message you have been sending is clear, and it's negative.

Instead of receiving warning and discouragement, my generation NEEDS to be encouraged, supported and allowed to be excited! Marriage is now, more that it has ever been, in danger of extinction, and it's with a heavy heart that I say the church has yet to provide a strong contradiction to the ideology we receive from the secular society.

In the entirety of this beautiful creation God gave existence to, He saw so much good in every portion of His work, except one. The only thing that was not good was the loneliness of man. With this in mind, perhaps we should put some effort in altering the sincerely damaging message of marriage we have supported for the past few decades.