HVMC Goes to JAPAN!
By Ps Loretta Lim, Janine Boon, Thomas Handoyo, Michelle Ting, Linda Kwok
From 31st July to 10th August, five HVMC members braved the sweltering heat of Japan to help organise and run the Summer Club children's programme at Shekinah Christian Fellowship, a small church tucked away in the beautiful mountains of the rural town of Azumino. We linked up with Glen Ong and his team, who had been faithfully organising this camp since 2012. We crafted a video-game themed programme and wove gospel themes of “God protects, God forgives and God provides” into our games, cooking activity, story-telling and small group sessions.
The camp was attended by 46 children between the ages of 5 to 12, their parents and youth volunteers. These volunteers had returned to help, as they had been inspired by the camps as children. We laboured to cut Mario-like mushrooms from industrial cardboard pieces to make props, and persuaded the innocent (cue Ps Loretta) to forage supermarkets for cardboard boxes. Linda Kwok led the cooking activities, guiding the children to whip up delicious macaroni and cheese, and summer fruit parfait.
We also organised a picnic in a public park for 25 people, comprising families with young children, young adults and seniors. We sang songs of worship and listened to two testimonies; one by Thomas and another from Masaki, a young Japanese lady who had been moved to give her life to Christ, as a direct result of attending these events in previous years. We worked together with our local missionaries, Pastor Glynis, who has been faithfully serving the community since 1990, and Pastor Patricio and his family, who had been called from Chile to reach out to Japan.
During our small group sessions, we were able to connect meaningfully with the children, pray with them and share the love of Jesus. We sensed, and were burdened with open and willing hearts, hungry and thirsty to know the eternal love of God. We look forward to ongoing engagement with the local community even as we seek to live out Acts 1:7-8, to bring the Gospel to the “ends of the earth.”
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