Evening bath time...

"Do you know how people do something bad, and then think, 'I won't do that again!', but in reality they soon commit the same sin again?" (a very loose translation of my pastor's words last night...)

The others of us in the room (Cindy, me, and another girl who isn't yet baptized) were all sitting there nodding. We were curled up on the floor of what has been deemed the "prayer room," where we have worship and prayer times twice a week from 9:15pm-10pm. Before we began offering the two worship times, Sensei (my pastor...sorry, the Japanese "sensei" is just engrained in me!) asked if he could also give a short message during that time. Cindy and I were a little hesitant to approve, because we'd originally wanted to offer the times as simply worship and prayer in God's presence...not more learning, but a little more experiential and peaceful...but in the end said, "Sure! Go ahead!" And I'm so glad that he was inspired/that we said yes...

I'll admit that we're all still learning what those times look like, and sometimes I know it has to be anything but worship done by angel choirs...I'll be stumbling through some new Japanese worship song I found, and others will be trying to follow along as best they can, and the sound we make maybe equals other-worldly, but not so beautiful. :) We don't really have a set structure, so some days there is prayer and some days not, and some days a message and some days not...

But I was reflecting last night, as Sensei spoke about confession, forgiveness, and freedom based on Psalm 51, that we are so incredibly blessed to have these times. And so often lately it seems like God uses the words of Sensei's simple message to hit my heart, and almost everytime he finishes speaking, I want to say something like, "God is so good!" or "Isn't salvation so amazing?!" :) Truly, it is being taught so that we can respond with praise...

Yay for God's blessing on pastors who teach with love and joy...yay for times to be reminded again and again, with different word pictures, about how great our God really is...

Another church member who comes to the evening worship times says that it's like a hot bath...you think, "Blah, I'm tired, I don't want to get a bath tonight!" but then you get into the warmth and realize, "Ahh...this is exactly what I needed!" She says it's the same way with worship...by evening, she is tired and ready to go to bed...but upon entering the time of prayer and worship, she's wrapped in the warmth of God's presence and the community of believers and realizes, "Ahhh...this is exactly what I needed!"