Sunday Worship Service November 23, 2025

Prelude
Call to Worship 1 Peter 3:15
Hymn JBC # 146 Thou didst leave Thy throne
The Lord’s Prayer
Hymn JBC # 554 All the way my Saviour leads me
Offering
Scripture 1 Kings 8:27~29, 41~43
Prayer
Sermon “All the people of the earth may know your name”
Prayer
Hymn JBC # 384 I love to tell the story
Doxology JBC # 676
Benediction
Postlude

Today, I will deliver a worship message commemorating the “Baptist World Prayer Week,” a week of prayer promoted by the Japan Baptist Women's Union.
To be precise, this year's Baptist World Prayer Week runs from next Sunday, November 30th, through Sunday, December 7th.
Though it's a week early, in today's message, as we remember the Baptist World Prayer Week, we want to listen to God's message.
During the Baptist World Prayer Week, we remember in prayer the various missionary works both domestically and internationally promoted and supported by the Japan Baptist Women's Union, and we remember and pray for those who serve in these ministries.
The specific details of their work will be introduced by the members of our Women's Group in next week's worship service.
Any missionary (evangelical) work requires the prior, and ongoing prayer of fellow Christians and their continuous support based on prayers.

Fortunately, our church is a member of the Japan Baptist Convention, a nationwide missionary cooperation organization. Our church continues to be supported by the prayers of the churches and missions connected to the Convention.
And not only are we supported, but do we also remember the churches connected to the Convention and the work of the Convention, by offering our prayers and support.
　I understand that the Baptist World Prayer Week is also an opportunity for us to confirm that we support one another through prayer, and it is an opportunity for us to rejoice that we can do so.
This year, we have been hearing God's word as our worship messages from the Book of Acts in the New Testament.

Today, let us take time to hear God's message from a prayer found not in the New Testament, but in 1 Kings chapter 8 of the Old Testament. Let us also reflect on the missionary work being done both domestically and abroad, and on the workers involved in that work.
The book of 1 Kings, chapter 8, is largely comprised of a prayer offered by Solomon, who succeeded his father King David as king of Israel, after completing the construction of the temple.
Solomon's prayer in this chapter teaches us many valuable lessons about prayer.
How do you all perceive prayer?
Some may think prayer is difficult and hard to do. Certainly, prayer can be difficult. Yet prayer is also a source of great, great joy for Christians.
One of the gifts Christians receive from God, a grace so precious it could be called the most precious gift is prayer.
Today's passage from Solomon's prayer teaches us that prayer draws us closer to God and also draws us closer to others beyond ourselves.

I believe it is fair to say that the Christian walk is one in which the joy of praying to God increases, and in which one grows closer to God and to others through prayer.
I myself pray to God, saying, “I want to acquire the joy of prayer more and more,” “I want to know the joy of prayer. Please teach me the joy of prayer.”
I once heard a story from someone who visited our church for the first time, saying that they were deeply moved and impressed by the sight of Christians (us) praying in church.
The day that person came was the first Sunday of the month, a day when our worship service included a “prayer time.”
That person said they were deeply moved and impressed by the fact that we pray together in church, remembering each other, as well as pray for the society and the world.
　Of course, prayer is not something we do to be seen by others. Yet the very act of our fervent praying also conveys to others one important aspect of faith, the joy of being able to pray to God, the joy of connecting with Him.

How wonderful and joyful it is that our prayers can convey, even a little, the magnificence of God who hears our prayers.
　We desire to know more about the joy of prayer, as well as the power and effect (influence) that prayer possesses.
　Solomon fulfilled his father King David's wish and completed the magnificent temple. Over seven years, using vast quantities of materials and labor, King Solomon completed the temple for the Lord God.
　Yet even after accomplishing such a great undertaking, Solomon's heart remained humble before God. Let us listen once more to the opening words of Solomon's prayer in today's passage.

27 “But will God really dwell on earth? The heavens, even the highest heaven, cannot contain you. How much less this temple I have built!

The temple Solomon completed was incredibly massive and majestic for its time.
Therefore, I think it would not be surprising at all if Solomon had become consumed by pride, declaring, “This is what I have accomplished.”
　　However, Solomon never boasted about the temple construction project he had accomplished. For he never forgot how great God truly is.
　People must have marveled at the newly built, immense and majestic temple, and also at Solomon's immense wealth.
But Solomon himself knew well that this temple (and his wealth) was nothing compared to the greatness of God.
　”God does not dwell on earth. Heaven, even the highest heavens, cannot contain you.”
　“How much less this temple I have built!” Solomon prayed.
　　Solomon is NOT being submissive (debasing himself) here.
Rather, Solomon knew well, or had been made to know how small and insignificant he was in relation to God, and how little value anything he accomplish on earth held before God.

　This shows just how intimate and rich Solomon's relationship with God was.
It may sound paradoxical, (as if it is saying two contradictory things) but the more we build a rich and intimate relationship with God, the more we come to know how small and insignificant we are, and how little we amount to before Him.
　We desire to remember that intimate prayer to God, a rich relationship with God, humbles us before Him and causes us to just bow down before His greatness.
　We also wish to reaffirm today who (what kind of person) on earth it is that hears our prayers.
It is God, the Creator of heaven and earth, who sent Jesus Christ to earth for our salvation (the salvation of Christ we definitely need!) and gave His life on the cross.

Such a God hears our prayers.
　Therefore, when we pray, we desire to be believers who sincerely pray with hearts that say, “Please hear the prayer I offer,” like Solomon's prayer in today's passage, rather than assuming, “Of course God will surely hear my prayer.”
　Let me repeat: that God hears our prayers is never something to be taken for granted.
Let us now consider the extraordinary grace that allows us to ask and pray for anything from God in the name of Jesus.

Let us read 1 John (letter) 5:14
14 This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.

　We desire to deepen our conviction and joy that by building a rich and intimate relationship with God, offering prayers in accordance with His will, and we will be convinced that those prayers will surely be heard by Him.
　I would like to turn our attention to the passage beginning at Chapter 8 Verse 41 of today’s verse. From there, Solomon's prayer extends to “the foreigner who does not belong to your people Israel.”
The people of Israel were strongly convinced that they were a special people chosen by God, a special people who embraced Abraham, the father of faith.
　However, this time’s Solomon's prayer already clearly expresses God's desire that the Lord God's grace would extend to gentiles too, over the people of Israel, foreigners (from the Jew’s perspective), and all peoples.

King Solomon prayed, “May the name of the Lord be widely proclaimed, and may the Gentiles who have come to believe in God also be able to come to this temple. And when they pray, may You also hear their prayers.”
Solomon offered a prayer here, envisioning a temple where all peoples from various nations and regions would gather.
Solomon offered his prayer here, envisioning a temple where all the people would gather, pray together, and offer worship, a temple based on that very dream (vision).
Here in Beppu, where people from many countries and regions gather, we at Beppu International Baptist Church have been granted a vision for mission and permitted to stand as a Christian church. It is here that people from many nations come together.
What binds us together in this way is not the work of human hands or our desires. It is the grace of Jesus Christ, the power of the gospel of Christ.

Jesus died on the cross for me. Christians are kept alive by that grace. As an expression of gratitude and response to that grace, we gather in church.
The precious grace of Jesus Christ, Christ's grace alone, binds us together as one.
And the solidarity among us, being forged by the grace of Jesus Christ, solidarity among Christians, solidarity among churches transforms us into those who pray for one another.
　The Lord God uses us, bound together by His grace and made to pray for each other, for the work of His gospel ministry.
At the recent our church’s organization anniversary service, we took time to reflect on our church's journey and history thus far.

In the past, the prayers of our spiritual forebears, along with earnest prayers and generous offerings from overseas, particularly from Baptist churches in America were given to us.
We know that missionaries were sent all the way to Japan to carry out the work of evangelism in Japan.
We wish to remember and give thanks once more for the believers who, in an era when traveling overseas was far from easy as it is today, concretely envisioned and prayed for the gospel mission in distant Japan, sent out missionaries, and offered precious donations.
And we desire to pass on the grace we have received, that very grace, to others who need the gospel of the Lord.
We desire to serve in the gospel ministry within the community where we live, and let us remember and support with prayer and offerings for those workers serving in the gospel ministry in distant lands.
Let us rejoice that we may share in the work of being sustained by the gospel of Christ and proclaiming the gospel of Christ.