It's hard to believe that we got back from Japan just 3 weeks ago. We wanted to take a moment to reflect on the second half of our ministry.
Our 5.5 hour train ride to Tokyo proved to be a much needed reset for Felicia and myself after the craziness which was ministry in Shingu. We used this time to finish planning our bible studies, sermons, worship, for the last half of our trip. Now getting on that train was a rather close call. Everything was going according to plan as we attempted to pick up our tickets in Shingu when we realized that Kinoshita had left his credit card at home which we used to reserve/pay for our train. We stayed at the station with our luggage as he ran home to get the card. As the train approached the terminal, so did Kinoshita who tried expedite our tickets. Meanwhile three ladies from the church who came to see us off started running with Felicia to catch the train. The separation was concerning, we still had no tickets, and the guards told me to run for the train too, which was a few flights of stairs away. Ultimately, Felicia and I had one foot on the train as Kinoshita ran us our tickets which we would need for the trip. It was a very sweaty, brief, and exhaustive goodbye. =D
And thus our Tokyo adventure began. We met Kishio Sensei at the Tokyo Station. He is the pastor of a small 3 person church in Niiza. He has done a lot of work to get a cancer ministry off the ground as well. This if for people who are recovering from cancer and it builds relationships with the community. We got to explore a bit of Tokyo with Kishio going to the top of Tokyo Tower which is similar to the Eiffel Tower in Paris, and we also visited Odaikyu which has a giant gundam (Fighting Robot) stature which is 6 stories tall.
The next day we started our Niiza ministry with a English Bible study. The fun and terrible thing about missions work in Japan is that you have to be very focused on your target, but incredibly agile/flexible about how God leads you there. We had prepared a great bible study for English speakers with small pieces of scripture that we could talk too. Three attendees arrived: a young member of the church, an older christian from another church, and a older woman who went to a christian college but did not know Christ. All with limited English skill, and Pastor Kishio had to be at work, so we were on our own with Jesus. Thus as we moved through the bible study, we could tell translation wasn't cutting it, so we adjusted our content. Instead of describing Jesus's compassion and healing from two sentence verses, we had them read through the entire woman at the well story, the healing of Lazarus, and the woman who suffered from bleeding who reached out and touched Jesus's cloak. Overall we were really able to connect with the tree of them, and better yet they were able to connect with each other too.
Later that day we got to meet with Deura Sensei for dinner. Deura is a Japanese English professor who helped us minister to college students on behalf of Niiza church last year at a Buddhist University. While not a christian, he is very open to discussions about God and politics. He was very fascinated about the topic of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Kishio has continued to try to build positive relations with Deura because he is very influential leader of the community. Japanese culture is very hierarchical, so if he found Christ, the impact could be huge. During dinner we had many discussions about differences between Catholicism, the protestant church, Buddhism, Shintoism, Jehovah Witnesses, and Mormons. We also discussed evolution vs creationism vs gradual creationism. It ended up being a 3 hour dinner, and it built very strong connections. Its amazing how God can move through simple encounters/fellowship.
The next day we lead a bible study with Tamagawa Church with is a 20 person church lead by Fukui Sensei. this is one of the healthier churches that we get to work with, and it always exciting to equip the congregations with practical tools which they can use in their own ministries. During the bible study we met a young woman named Kai Nakagawa who is a masters student in teaching. She has really been seeking God's purpose in her life, but was not yet a christian. Fukui told us that she would be able to help us translate during the 3 days kids camp.
As some of you know many children came to know Christ and be baptized during last year's 3 day kids camp. Going into this trip Kishio let us know that there were many knew kids, and that it was unlikely that we would have the same kind of alter call response. Never the less, we continued to pray with the expectation that God would move through us in a big way.
The pastors were very strategic this year about making sure the kids were practicing English, so they actually gave each child a recorder so that they could record conversational english as well as bilingual worship music so that they could spread their ministry to the parents as well. Additionally we made curry over a campfire, dragged kids through the pool, played worship songs, preached three times, played English and bible games, and shared our personal testimony.
As Kishio began the alter call we were shocked to see two children and Kai Nakagawa commit their lives to Christ and want to be baptized. It was absolutely amazing. We have continued to stay in touch with Kai and she is really moving forward in her faith aggressively. She's experienced so much healing and purpose in her life because of Jesus. Continue to pray for here and the other children as they learn how to walk out their faith.
Over all God has done amazing things through our ministry in Japan. Pastors have been equipped, communities are connecting with the local church, and people are meeting Jesus.
God is already laying out plans for our next trip which we will share in our next blog. Thank you for your continued support of this ministry, it is definitely yielding fruit.
Our 5.5 hour train ride to Tokyo proved to be a much needed reset for Felicia and myself after the craziness which was ministry in Shingu. We used this time to finish planning our bible studies, sermons, worship, for the last half of our trip. Now getting on that train was a rather close call. Everything was going according to plan as we attempted to pick up our tickets in Shingu when we realized that Kinoshita had left his credit card at home which we used to reserve/pay for our train. We stayed at the station with our luggage as he ran home to get the card. As the train approached the terminal, so did Kinoshita who tried expedite our tickets. Meanwhile three ladies from the church who came to see us off started running with Felicia to catch the train. The separation was concerning, we still had no tickets, and the guards told me to run for the train too, which was a few flights of stairs away. Ultimately, Felicia and I had one foot on the train as Kinoshita ran us our tickets which we would need for the trip. It was a very sweaty, brief, and exhaustive goodbye. =D
And thus our Tokyo adventure began. We met Kishio Sensei at the Tokyo Station. He is the pastor of a small 3 person church in Niiza. He has done a lot of work to get a cancer ministry off the ground as well. This if for people who are recovering from cancer and it builds relationships with the community. We got to explore a bit of Tokyo with Kishio going to the top of Tokyo Tower which is similar to the Eiffel Tower in Paris, and we also visited Odaikyu which has a giant gundam (Fighting Robot) stature which is 6 stories tall.
The next day we started our Niiza ministry with a English Bible study. The fun and terrible thing about missions work in Japan is that you have to be very focused on your target, but incredibly agile/flexible about how God leads you there. We had prepared a great bible study for English speakers with small pieces of scripture that we could talk too. Three attendees arrived: a young member of the church, an older christian from another church, and a older woman who went to a christian college but did not know Christ. All with limited English skill, and Pastor Kishio had to be at work, so we were on our own with Jesus. Thus as we moved through the bible study, we could tell translation wasn't cutting it, so we adjusted our content. Instead of describing Jesus's compassion and healing from two sentence verses, we had them read through the entire woman at the well story, the healing of Lazarus, and the woman who suffered from bleeding who reached out and touched Jesus's cloak. Overall we were really able to connect with the tree of them, and better yet they were able to connect with each other too.
Later that day we got to meet with Deura Sensei for dinner. Deura is a Japanese English professor who helped us minister to college students on behalf of Niiza church last year at a Buddhist University. While not a christian, he is very open to discussions about God and politics. He was very fascinated about the topic of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Kishio has continued to try to build positive relations with Deura because he is very influential leader of the community. Japanese culture is very hierarchical, so if he found Christ, the impact could be huge. During dinner we had many discussions about differences between Catholicism, the protestant church, Buddhism, Shintoism, Jehovah Witnesses, and Mormons. We also discussed evolution vs creationism vs gradual creationism. It ended up being a 3 hour dinner, and it built very strong connections. Its amazing how God can move through simple encounters/fellowship.
The next day we lead a bible study with Tamagawa Church with is a 20 person church lead by Fukui Sensei. this is one of the healthier churches that we get to work with, and it always exciting to equip the congregations with practical tools which they can use in their own ministries. During the bible study we met a young woman named Kai Nakagawa who is a masters student in teaching. She has really been seeking God's purpose in her life, but was not yet a christian. Fukui told us that she would be able to help us translate during the 3 days kids camp.
As some of you know many children came to know Christ and be baptized during last year's 3 day kids camp. Going into this trip Kishio let us know that there were many knew kids, and that it was unlikely that we would have the same kind of alter call response. Never the less, we continued to pray with the expectation that God would move through us in a big way.
The pastors were very strategic this year about making sure the kids were practicing English, so they actually gave each child a recorder so that they could record conversational english as well as bilingual worship music so that they could spread their ministry to the parents as well. Additionally we made curry over a campfire, dragged kids through the pool, played worship songs, preached three times, played English and bible games, and shared our personal testimony.
As Kishio began the alter call we were shocked to see two children and Kai Nakagawa commit their lives to Christ and want to be baptized. It was absolutely amazing. We have continued to stay in touch with Kai and she is really moving forward in her faith aggressively. She's experienced so much healing and purpose in her life because of Jesus. Continue to pray for here and the other children as they learn how to walk out their faith.
Over all God has done amazing things through our ministry in Japan. Pastors have been equipped, communities are connecting with the local church, and people are meeting Jesus.
God is already laying out plans for our next trip which we will share in our next blog. Thank you for your continued support of this ministry, it is definitely yielding fruit.