Well, after a decade I’m finally taking my sweet wife to the motherland…Hungary baby! This June will be our 10th wedding anniversary so I’m whisking her away for a couple weeks in Budapest.

There is another reason for going, however. We are also exploring the possibility of long term missions work in Budapest. Throughout our marriage the idea of going to Budapest has come up a couple times a year. But it was about a year ago that we began to seriously consider it a possibility.

Those of you who are close to me know that I’ve been planning to church plant following the completion of seminary this summer, so this may come as a surprise to some. What we’re doing is actually not a departure from planting, but rather what we believe to be the wisest step before planting. If overseas service is on the table, we believe wisdom mandates to explore that option sooner rather than later. So this is partly a “vision trip” to go and see, learn, and experience Budapest first hand. We’re praying that in addition to a great 10th anniversary, we’ll also have clarity to decide between what we have on the table: Budapest or planting a church (which is really a question of planting in Hungary or planting in Houston).

I’ve been in contact with several missionaries and local Hungarian pastors over the past year and had some really enlightening conversations. There is one family in particular who has been a great blessing to Christina and I already. We’ll even be staying with them on our trip.

It’s a wild, challenging, faith-filled time!