Our Last Sunday

Today was our last Sunday at Koganei church. It was a little difficult waking up but we all made it for morning service. Chie caught a cold, so she rested the whole morning.

Justin and Richie gave their testimonies during first service, and Yuuki and I gave our testimonies during the second service. In between, we led two kid's praise songs during the children's Sunday School. We also performed a skit about how God made us all special.

The kids and the team got to do suica-wari, which is basically using a watermelon as a pinata. Although we used three different sticks, none of them broke the watermelon!

We enjoyed eating the nice cold watermelon with the kids before lunch, and then ate lunch with the youth, young adults, and other members of the church.  The young adults had set aside a time of fellowship set aside for us, so we sang worship songs and played games together in the afternoon. They really seemed to enjoy playing Boom-Chicka-Boom-Boom and Fruit Basket!

They also asked all of the team members to share something we remember the most from our past week, and many of the Koganei young adults shared their memories of past Peninsula teams and their experiences of coming to America as well. Many of them have been encouraged and to serve in youth and children's ministries and they all continue going to church, even though their lives are busy with school and work. I hope that this bond of encouragement and serving our God can continue in the future, too.

We ended the night with fireworks in the parking lot. Several more people from the other Free Methodist Churches that we've met in previous mission trips came and joined us. It reminded me that, even though we may only see these people once or every other year, we are still bonded together because of our Father and His love for us!

- Satomi