We really appreciate God’s grace and the blessings upon us in all our history before the Triune God. Twenty-two years ago we had a big earthquake that caused serious damage. The Covenanter book store had totally fallen with the earthquake. We helped in the quick rebuilding of the book store, and then were waiting to rebuild our church building for about twelve years. Then, the Lord gave us a new church building ten years ago. We praise the Lord’s name and give the glory to the Lord with the joy of Psalm 126!
We had rich blessings from the Lord on the worship that took place on this ten year anniversary. The preacher was Dr. Rev. Yoshiaki Matsutani who is a retired pastor and prominent scholar in the study of Puritanism and the Westminster Standards in Japan. He was a visiting lecturer at the Kobe Theological Hall too.
We had about 50 members at the morning worship and also had the same numbers at the afternoon lecture that remembered the 500th anniversary of the Reformation. Rev. Matsutani preached from Ezekiel 37：1-14 and Ephesians 4:1-6; the title was “The Body of Christ “. The Word of God encouraged us and gave us hope in the Lord’s promise of His sovereignty in the building of the body of Christ.
Rev. Matsunati also gave us a lecture of the history of the East Asia mission and the hope for the future of world mission that we have from the Reformation. As a Covenanter, we know the hardship and the blessings in the history of mission to the world. However, His promise is established by His sovereignty and His grace! (Psalm 126, Matt.16:18) Especially, he reminded us of the need for true worship with Word and the Spirit for building the Body of Christ.
Rev. Sumito Sakai
