Friday is the day of worship in the Middle East, and most Christians follow that calendar. The church building is called the National Evangelical Church (NEC). It is one of essentially 2 protestant buildings in the country. It is used by congregations from the many language groups on the island (Indians, Filipinos, Malaysians, etc.). There are church services from 6 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. on Friday and others throughout the weekend.
The RCA presence is the English Language Congregation (ELC - Click the link to visit the website), which holds services on Friday morning and Sunday evening. The Sunday evening service is the historic time and is more blended in worship with fewer instruments. The Friday morning service is now the main service, with about 350 people from 25 nations, worshiping in English. I preached at the that service.
What is immediately obvious is that there are people from many nations present! How fun! There is also much joy in the room - it is completely alive (I'll have to show you the video). I felt like I was at a great service at Trinity, only with many nations present - there was upbeat music, testimonies of God's faithfulness, and earnest prayer. There was also a special mission offering for Darfur suffering in Sudan. I met many wonderful people and was so blessed by them all.
When Dick came to pastor the church, he made youth his priority and it is obvious. The ELC was also hosting a regional youth conference on beauty, body image, and sexual purity, using a speaker from Ravi Zacharias ministry in Florida. It was a joy to witness a church that was completely focused on following Christ in mission and ministry.
Here are some pictures of the congregation. You'll notice pictures of the front of the church and the congregation at worship in the new church building, the praise band of young people, NW grad and Trinity attender Jamie Ongna leading a time of prayer for the youth group, and 1997 NW grad and Trinity attender Sunell Vincent with me. 
On Friday evening, I went to a play put on by the Al Raja students, faculty, and staff. It followed the story of Narnia, including clips from the movie, acting on stage, and songs and dance routines to go along (to contemporary Christian songs, a couple of hymns, and the Hallelujah Chorus). It was a special evening to see the students put on this huge production, which was exceptionally high quality in nature. NW grads who teach at the school gave a lot of extra time to make it happen, and it was very special.
