This Sabbath morning we were up early and off to their church hall for breakfast and morning services. Breakfast was fried rice, meat, sauce, bananas, and orange Fanta. The rice was very tasty. Toward the end of the meal I heard drums beating somewhere, of the variety I would normally associate with Africa.

I learned that this was traditional Mizo music and that this was how they notified members that services were about to begin.


This group has it origins in titinerant preacher somehow connected with the Church of God 7th Day. He came through the area decades ago, and taught about Sabbath observance as part of Christian worship. It caught hold and there are now thousands of Sabbath-keeping Christians in Mizoram in a number of different church organizations.

As people gathered in the hall over Lalvuana's house, they began to sing hymns (from a Presbyterian hymnal) accompanied by the drums. As people arrived they placed an offering in a small basket in front of the Chairman's table. The offerings were cash or bags of food, mostly rice.

When it was time for services to begin, the chairman, a wizened old man who sat at a small table in front of the lectern during the whole service, announced a prayer. There was then a Bible reading done by a very animated woman, then special music by young people and then Dave was introduced for the sermon.

Lalvuana translated for him as he spoke on "called, chosen and faithful" which was the same topic I had originally planned to cover. When I had learned that Dave had planned that one I decided to talk about keys to answered prayer in the afternoon service. The Church of God Israel normally has four 1½ hour services per Sabbath: one Friday night, then Sabbath morning, afternoon and evening.

He spoke about an hour after which there was another hymn and they all recited the Lord's Prayer. We took group photos and then broke for lunch downstairs. After lunch we had an afternoon service, identical to the morning service almost except for the Bible reading leader and that I gave the sermon.

After a dinner break, Lalvuana gave a short "sermon" of 15 minutes on the Gospel of the Kingdom. At least that's what we were told since we couldn't understand a word, and no one was up to translating into English for us.

After services, Dave showed digital photos of his last trip among them and also photos of the Philippines.
It's now 23:00 and we can finally go to bed, knowing that we'll have to be up at 6:30 tomorrow morning.