A Prayer to God – A Life Changed

Sándor Németh was born into an observant Roman Catholic family in 1950. He has been arrested on the Yugoslavian-Austrian border for attempting to cross illegally; he has spent six days in the prison of Maribor. There, for the first time in his life, he turned to God. He made an oath that if he escaped criminal prosecution, he would serve the truth for the rest of his life. Some days after his prayer, he was allowed to go free, the Yugoslavian authorities, as they had promised, had not informed the Hungarian authorities. The first thing he did after this was get a Bible, and since then he has been a regular reader of the Holy Scriptures.
While studying the Christian Charismatic movement, he realized that he must have real repentance before God. In April 1976, he met God personally in a non-denominational home-fellowship whose members were mostly made up of reformed Christians.
After being baptized in the Holy Spirit, he immediately joined the activities and organization of home-churches and prayer-groups operating mainly in private homes and vicarages. He became a founder of the Hungarian Charismatic Catholic movement, and through his testimony numerous intellectuals and students of Catholic theology received a personal fellowship with God, among them, was his future wife and closest colleague, Judit, whom he married in 1977.
During the next year, disciplinary proceedings were launched against his now pregnant wife for the distribution of illegal Christian literature and for adversely influencing minors; meanwhile, she had decided to resign from her position as a high school teacher. After this, they had little choice but to provide for their family through housekeeping and other casual work. During this time, Judit also served as an interpreter at various evangelical, free-Christian, charismatic fellowships, in addition, she was also asked to minister in the music ministry as she is a professional musician.

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The Founding of the Faith Church

In June 1978, after being baptized as adults, they abandoned their former religious traditions and become full evangelical Christians. This was followed by a difficult season in their lives full of conflicts. Their Catholic friends and family were at a loss to learn of their newfound beliefs, they approached their faith and way of life with negative criticism and rejection; the personal relationships they had before were severed completely as they had became so called ’sectarians’.
In 1978 they got in touch with the internationally renowned and influential Bible teacher, Derek Prince, with whom they maintained a very close disciple relationship until his passing in 2003. Since then, they’ve regularly received Christian theological literature and study material from Derek Prince Ministries (initially known as Church Growth Ministries) and other American evangelical organizations. These publications were translated into Hungarian by Judit.
In 1979 an evangelical group, formed in Budaörs and based on Biblical faith, began holding charismatic services in a private home. More and more people joined the congregation which had chosen the name Faith Church; meanwhile numerous internationally recognized, mainly American, Bible teachers and preacher visited them. The Nemeth couple were ordained as pastors and strengthened in their ministry at the Good News Church of Fort Lauderdale. Sandor Nemeth was busy with preaching the Word, teaching, and pastoral work; while his wife Judit, in addition to her pastoral work, became the founder and leader of the music ministry.
In the 70’s and 80’s they had three daughters and a son. The fellowship led by the married couple was constantly growing and founding home-groups and churches in many cities across the country.
From 1980 until the fall of communism, the congregation operated as an underground church. Due to this they were the victims of several atrocities under the hand of the communist regime (including being placed on government watch-lists, harassment, arrests, etc.) Sandor Nemeth became a target; he was banned from travel to western countries from 1980 until the fall of the communism. The authorities regarded his travels abroad as a violation of public policy; based on this, the authorities would always deny his requests to travel abroad. During these years many young people, rejected by society, including artists and intellectuals, with views opposing those of the communist government, joined them.

From the beginning of the 80’s, Sandor Nemeth was also in cooperation with the underground democratic opposition. The Hungarian state acknowledged the Faith Church as an official church in May 1989. That year, Sandor Nemeth founded the theological magazine of the church, called New Exodus, which became the first charismatic theological magazine in Hungary. In 1990 Sandor and Judit Nemeth completed their diplomas in theology at the Eastern-Central-European Bible School and Pastor Training Institution, which had operated illegally in the years prior to 1990.
In 1989 the Nemeth couple met Pastor Paul Yonggi Cho in Seoul and attended his church-growth conference where Sandor Nemeth delivered several speeches.

From Prayer Group to God’s People

In the 90’s Sandor Nemeth stayed active in public life outside of his pastoral work. First and foremost, he voiced his opinions regarding human rights issues; as a result of this and his involvement in the church, he often found himself in the cross-hairs of attacks by the press, mockery-campaigns, and slander. Along with other leading intellectuals, he was one of the chief organizers of the Democratic Charta of 1992, a demonstration of over 100 thousand people against anti-Semitism. Mr. Nemeth was also among the organizers of several other campaigns carried out by other human rights organizations.

In 1993-1994, besides his ministry in Budapest, he held regional conferences throughout the country and abroad. These events also contributed to the powerful growth of the church. The fellowship, which started in 1979 with only five people, now has more than ten thousand members.
In line with his work as a pastor, teacher, and church-builder, and led by solidarity for the poor, he founded the charity organization known as the Network of the Contributors of the Faith Church (HAH) in 1994; which now operates over 30 offices in Hungary and abroad.
In 1994, on the 50th anniversary of the Deportation of the Hungarian Jews, Sandor Nemeth initiated the restoration of the neglected Jewish graveyards, and also launched a series of 16 Holocaust Remembrance Conferences in Budapest and throughout the country.

In July 1995, the Hungarian prime minister appointed Sandor Nemeth and his wife Judit as university teachers. That same month, together with some of their colleagues, they founded the Saint Paul Academy, which in 1998 and 2008, was accredited with excellent qualifications by the Hungarian Accreditation Committee.
From February 1995 through June 1998 Sandor Nemeth held charismatic awakening services lasting several days every other month, filling the Budapest Sports Arena which seats 12 thousand people. Guests arrived to the conferences from five continents and 60 different countries, the services were translated into 6 languages.

Public Life and Relations with Israel

In January 1996, at the initiative of Sandor Nemeth, a four-day international conference and pilgrimage titled ‘We Forget You Not’, was organized in Jerusalem; it was attended by 5,000 German and Hungarian Christians. Since 1992, the Faith Church has regularly organized Biblical tours to Israel. In May 1997, at Sandor Nemeth’s initiative, the Peter Bornemissza Primary and High School was founded in Budapest. In December 1997 as head pastor, Sandor established the sociopolitical weekly paper called Hetek (Weeks), which analyzes national and foreign political issues. Since then, he has been chief editor, and the paper has become one of the influential and defining weekly papers of the country.

The dedication of the Faith Hall, the new national center of the church, took place in October 1998. In the following years, the Faith Church acquired new properties in 19 different cities, even amidst the slander campaigns against the congregation, they continued building church halls.
In 2001 Sandor Nemeth published his book titled The Scandal of Faith; it became a number one best seller in the nation among books written by religious figures. He has published numerous articles and studies, and in the following years, published several other books including The Ten Commandments, Thanksgiving, Becoming Born Again, and Hope.
Since December 9, 2001 the interactive live service of the Faith Church, called Happy Sunday, has been broadcast on a weekly basis. The host and preacher of the program is the head pastor, Nemeth Sandor. Happy Sunday is the most well-known and popular among all Hungarian religious programming.

In October 2009 the Federation of Hungarian Jewish Communities presented Sandor Nemeth with an award for his work in Hungarian Jewish relations. At the end of the year he had the privilege of receiving the award, presented by the Knesset Christian Allies Caucus and the Jewish World Congress, which is given to an internationally influential Christian leader each year.
For over three decades, Sandor Nemeth has been working as a founding pastor of the Faith Church which now has 70 thousand members and several hundred thousand supporters. In addition to this he has an extended international ministry in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Romania, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, and Cambodia.