A church with abundant energy, resilence and vigor is a living proof of someone’s abounding, precious labor of love and sacrifice planted on the church. A church is the body of Christ. Its spritual vitality and growth are amplified with the love, sacrifice, and service of that someone. This is how a church was built upon from the start, a church was built upon the love of Jesus Christ and His sacrifice, and that is the DNA of a church.
Often times we don’t see clearly the emormous gravity of such labor of love and the sacrifice. What we usually see instead is only the ”tip of of iceburg”, and if you find yourself starting to see even the tip, it is an indicator that you have grown spritually. Furthermore, if you not only can see the tip but start to feel its gravity underneath, it is another reflection of how much you have grown spritually. If you find yourself becoming part of the iceburg, contributing to its gravity, you can assume that you are very close to God.
All the work and service done at the church are all precious. We cannnot drop any of it as less valuable since any services done at the church is the result of someone’s love and sacrifice. Due to the COVID 19 panemic, the normal church activities have been put on hold for a while. However, even in this time of prolonged dormancy, there are those who offered themselved willingly for the work of God becoming a part of the iceburg hidden underneath the water.
I want to especially call out those who willingly volunteered themselves to the church; they made possible the continuation of the Sunday worship service. They planted many hours of labor, love, tears and sweat to prepare and broadcast the online worship service. Their sacrifice for the effort is probably more than your imagination. The two Mokjas assumed the responsibility of all the work needed for audio and video for the online worhip service. The effort needed for the audio and video may seem trivial but it entails a lot of hardwork. Also there are the two Mokjas who lead the live praise for the worship service with just a single guitar on their shoulders while two Mokyeos supplimented the praise with piano. They did this while keeping all the precautions to prevent the spread of the virus. It is their labor of love that gave abundant energy, resilence and vigor to the Sunday worship service.
They did not stop here but even took the responbility of santizing the entire church building once the face to face worship service had started back and resumed. Their continued service inspired others and triggered more helping hands to volunteer as well. I thank all of you from the bottom of my heart.
The sacrifice and willing offering for the service does not end here. There are those who offer live English translation service, publish and translate the weekly bullentin, lead ESC ministry, lead children ministry, lead new family welcome ministry, handles accounting, clean the church, and were there together with us by prayer and offering. I do not have enough space to list them all here.
We always thank God for all of you and continually mention you in our prayers.
We remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith,
your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope
in our Lord Jesus Christ.
(1 Thessalonians 1:2-3)
From the pastor, Jiwon Choi