12:4 You have not yet resisted to bloodshed, striving against sin. 12:5 And you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons:"My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord,Nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him; 12:6 For whom the Lord loves He chastens,And scourges every son whom He receives." (New King James Version)

Today is the founders' day of our conference. We remember the founders of our church as well as our conference today.

It's not easy to build up church. I mean not physical church building, church as a body. Church is different from other organizations. It is the people of God, the body of Christ and the temple of the Holy Spirit. Others may grow up by the power of money, human resources, and the structure. Church needs blood, sweat, and tear for her growth.

Blood means sacrifice. A historian said, "Martyrs' blood became the seed of church." The first century church was built upon the sacrifice of martyrs. Sweat means labor, effort, hard work. There is a song of a TV cartoon. It says, "I wanna make money without sweat, I wanna become a hero without hard work." No valuable things come without sweat.

Our church also was built on the sacrifice and hard work. Most of Issei went to the evacuation camp. Most of Nissei went to the front line of battle during the war. After they came home, they begun to work for church rather than their home. They left spiritual heritage, good reputation in the community, and tangible resources; land and buildings.

If we do not keep the heritage, if we loose the reputation, if we do not develop and improve the buildings, we may turn the sacrifie and effort to vain. Do not just eat up the resources that Issei and Nissei left for us. Develop them and work with blood and sweat for the growth of our church.

The third element that builds church is tear. This tear is not for our own. It should be for others. In philippian 3:18-19, Paul says, "For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame-who set their mind on earthly things."

Paul was weeping for the people who were against the cross of Christ. The cross is the only way of the salvation. However many reject it saying, "I don't need it." "It's not relevant." "It's foolish." We do not think that they are happy. They do not know the purpose and meaning of their lives, and spent their life only for the temporal things. Therefore we want to share the gospel with them. If we loose empathy to them, church becomes the tool of God's saving love though it remains as one of the groups for social activities.

Our conference was praying and weeping church. Bishop, Rev. Kuzuhara, wrote an article titles "A Group Prays Weeping" in 1923.

(quote) Some look down us because we pray weeping. Let them despise us. I hope that we pray in tears more.

Jesus told us, "Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for Me, but weep for yourselves and for your children."(Luke 23:28) James said, "Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom."(James 4:9) "Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you!"(5:1)

I do not think that a true Christian has no experience to thank God for His grace in tears, and never drop a single tear for the people without Christ. If you have no tears, check yourselves. A pastor struggled in his heart because he has no experience to cry when he think of the sufferings of Christ. This should be a true attitude of an authentic Christian.

I doubt that the fellows who despise the people praying in tears, are true Christians. They do not have faith to the word and the Lord. Nothing can melt the frozen hearts of people except tears. Cry, weep, pray in tears. It's a shame that we do not pray weeping. (unquote)

If we cannot weep for others, we have to weep for our sins at least. We have to repent our unfaithfulness in tears. Our church will be sanctified and built up when we pray in tears.

We have few people in our prayer meetings. Are they too busy to pray? But they come to fun and food, or musical meetings. They set a low value on prayer. For most of us prayer is just the sign of starting and closing the meetings. Church is called "house of prayer." If prayer ceases among us, our church will die. Fewer members of the prayer meeting may be a sign of dyeing church.

Our founders built up the church with prayer. Join the ministry of building the church in your prayer. Your prayer is essential.

(April 27, 1997 at SDJCC)