by John Bolm

I arrived in Sasabe at 1:00 p.m. and found the church locked. I opened the church, brought in four bags of cloth that Ruth had sent down for women who are taking a sewing class, and began setting up for the service. While back in the storage room stowing the cloth and getting the CD player to play accompaniment for the hymns, I noticed a ladder outside the window. I went out, climbed up the ladder, and found that the storage room has been reroofed.

One-thirty came and went, and nobody showed up for the doctrine class I had planned to start. People began arriving for the service at about 2:00, and we had a brief choir practice at about 2:15.

We began the service at 2:30 with 12 adults (Ben was the only man) and 18 children present. The readings were 2 Kings 5:1-14, 1 Corinthians 9:24-27, and Mark 1:40-45, and the message was about how the gospel is for everyone and all believers can share it.

After the service I explained that I had misspoken when I had said that Pastor Baerbock would come to conduct the service on February 21 and that he would actually come on February 28. Neither of the women who had asked to have their children baptized were present, but Patricia said that she would tell them about the change. We then had a Bible study about Jesus' response when his disciples tried to turn away people who brought children to be blessed. Patricia taught eight older children, Dalia taught nine younger ones, and I taught the adults. There was good participation by several women, including Cristina, a non-member who has been coming regularly for several months.

After the Bible study we had our usual fellowship hour.