February/March Update

It’s already March, and we’re asking ourselves where the month of February went. When Amy and I used to work for the Word of Life Bible Institute (WOLBI), we felt like each year passed very quickly. Time in Tokyo, however, is passing us even quicker, it seems.

We are thanking God that in spite of its quickness, He has worked through us to reshape the church culture in Tokyo and to make visible contributions to the community of believers in the city.

Before I share some of the things that we have accomplished or planned, I want to share some praises.

First of all, Amy applied to get a spousal visa in order to stay in Japan longer than three months, which is the period allotted to visitors with tourist visa status. We have known many missionaries who have raised full support yet could not serve in their country of calling due to not being able to attain a visa. Amy and I went to the Immigration Bureau of Japan on Tuesday, and we were told that we would receive a response within the next three months indicating whether she can attain this status or not. However, two days later, we received a letter from them with her new visa. We were thrilled to see God work in a way that was unheard of, and we’re encouraged to see God pave the way for us to stay in the country and continue the work of the Gospel.

We are also grateful that through the ministry God has given us, He is motivating different people to move to the center city area of Tokyo so that they can work with us closely to spread the word of the Gospel and establish growing Christian communities around the city. One of these people is Nohara Tomizawa, who attended WOLBI when I used to teach there. She lives in Gunma Prefecture, but she is moving to Tokyo this month so that she can assist our ministry and meet the spiritual needs of our community. Please pray for her as she looks for a new part-time job and a place to live since we cannot afford to pay her with our financial situation. We also have few more members and friends who are contemplating moving closer to our church so that they can help us build community. Some of them commute two hours each way to attend our church weekly. They are truly committed to the values and vision of our ministry, and we would like to see them find a job closer to us.

We are also thankful to God for providing Adam Yoder and Paul Mackey as interns for us during this summer. They are both currently studying at WOLBI and interested in working with us in the future in one capacity or another. It would be a blessing to be reconnected to them and to serve together for the spiritual growth of God’s kingdom in Japan. If you are interested in supporting them, please let us know.

Now, let me share some of the things that we have been doing over the last month and a half.

So far, we have:

1. Started publishing daily mobile devotionals in Japanese for people in the city. Currently we have over 50 subscribers, and we are planning on promoting it more publicly in the near future. The purpose of this project is to introduce a foundational biblical worldview from the Scriptures, so that the subscribers can reflect on God’s reality and live according to that reality by faith. We are receiving a lot of positive feedback from various Japanese-speaking people around the world, so we are excited about how it is being used by God. Our goal is to keep editing it so that by 2012 we can publish it in a printed edition.

2. Reorganized the entire ministry structure and leadership of our church. We did this to make the organization more structured but also to create a better environment to train the next generation of leaders and mentors. Now, as we are moving forward with our new structure, people are held more accountable to others. This structure also allows me to delegate more responsibilities to other trustworthy men and women. Starting next month, we will be training all the leaders with our values and vision so that people can understand how their ministry to going to influence the body of Christ in order to bring greater glory to God.

3. Moved our church to start a new nursery and a kids program in order to attract new families. Our church is very unique in a sense that we don’t have a lot of older people. Most of the people are in the 20s-30s without kids. So, naturally, the church never invested money or people to start programs for children. Since Amy and I have started to work with our current community, we knew from the beginning that we need to change this so that we can become a place where families can come and grow in God’s grace. We are currently recruiting new workers who would be willing to be in charge of these programs, and I am trying to introduce a new budget plan to meet the needs of the children.

4. Started working on our church Web site. We still don’t have all the money to complete the entire project, but we cannot wait too long, so we decided to divide the project into several phases and at least work on the main page. My brother, Shin Kato, who used to work for Yahoo in Japan, is setting aside his regular job for two months in order to help us with this major project (check the previous post for details). He and his wife just had a baby last year so his willingness to rely on God’s provision through people’s support was a huge spiritual decision for them. If you can financially contribute to assist our project, please get in touch with us. I know it will bless my brother and his wife (and their baby), and bring more seekers and believers to our community. Having a fund-raising event for our ministry might also be a great way to revitalize missions in your church or your family.

5. Amy started to attend a short-term Japanese class three times a week. She has made many friends so far and even ended up becoming a paid English tutor to one of the fellow students, who is from is Pakistan.

6. We are starting a new Bible study for seekers next month. We need to be more intelligent in how we explain the truth with love to those who commonly reject the idea of a personal and moral God. So by all means, we are going to engage with a person’s intellectual questions (what we might call rational apologetics). But we equally recognize the need for relational apologetics. We need to show people that it’s good to live under God’s reign who is personal and moral (Deuteronomy 4:5-8). As Blaise Pascal put it, we need to make people want to believe our message before we can persuade them that our message is true.

7. Accomplished many other obligatory behind-the-scene type things that were time consuming but too tedious to mention here.

It is truly astonishing how much work is required to run a growing church community by ourselves. Every week, I am investing somewhere around 20 hours to write my sermons, starting with translating the texts directly from the original languages to Japanese, and another 20 hours on the content of the mobile devotionals. Once you start adding other meetings with different group leaders, administrative staffs, editors and spiritual seekers and more, it is somewhat understandable how the time flew by so quickly.

Please pray for us as we are stretched thin physically and mentally for the ministry of the Gospel, so that the life that Christ gives may be displayed clearly to those we serve. We love what we are doing because as we spread the knowledge of God, His grace is being experienced by more Japanese people, causing thanksgiving to abound to the glory of God. Spiritually, we are encouraged and far from being burnt out. But physically and mentally it feels overwhelming at times.

Currently I am preaching through the book of 2 Corinthians. And as I prepare my sermons, I am totally blown away by how committed Paul was to the glory of God. Paul was not interested in promoting himself or his ministry (3:1, 4; 4:5). He was often misunderstood and attacked by those whom he loved (2:4-11). Yet he willingly became like their slave (4:5). As result, he was constantly in danger of physically dying like Christ (4:10). He was pressed on every side by troubles; he was persecuted and knocked down at times (4:8-9). One might wonder what kept this man going? He endured all of those things for their sake, so that they may experience the grace and life that God provides through their faith in the Gospel. He endured all things for their sake, so that the grace that was including more and more people might cause thanksgiving to increase to the glory of God (4:15). What we experience as missionaries is nothing close to what Paul endured for the sake of the Corinthians. Yet we resonate with his ministry because we are willing to endure hardship and stress so that the life of Jesus may be visible in our body for the sake of Japanese believers. That is what keeps us going.

Please pray for the following requests as we continue to work with you to bring more people from Tokyo into the Body of Christ.

1. I personally need a secretary who can take care of editing, printing, communicating, and scheduling for me. Currently I am doing most of the work that anyone (who can natively read and speak Japanese) can do. It really prevents me from corresponding with key partners more frequently and taking care of other important tasks.

2. Pray that God will provide other like-minded full-time workers who are culturally relevant and professionally competent.

3. Please keep Amy in prayer as she will start working twice a week at a local Japanese nursery next month in order to build up her credentials and also to make more contacts with non-Christian people. Amy will be playing a huge role in one of the new ministries we are planning, which involves teaching English to unchurched pre-schoolers and their mothers. She will continue her language training during this time.

4. Please continue to pray for our financial needs. The value of our support from the U.S. still remains low. God is using this time of financial stress to grow our dependence on Him, but it would be nice to be able to solely focus on our ministry and not be forced to make difficult financial choices due to a lack of funding. If you are not yet a regular giver and would like to join the team, please fill in the regular giving form and become our quality ministry partner!

5. Please pray for workers with media/graphic designing skills. As we are starting to publish more resources, we need to package them professionally to make them appealing to those living in Tokyo. We need creative people who can design and promote our resources professionally in order to increase the effectiveness of our work. We are also looking for someone who can host a mirror site of our website in the US. That will definitely speed up the loading time of this site for those who live in the US.

Thanks for reading our rather lengthy update. I will try to update more frequently in the future, as originally planned.

One of my favorite authors from my childhood, Robert Louis Stevenson, once said, “Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds that you plant.” With this mentality that echoes the spirit of the Bible, and through your prayers and support, we will continue to strive to spread the knowledge of God effectively in Tokyo as God wills. Thank you so much for your involvement. We wish all of you could come and see what God is doing through your generosity and prayer support. If you ever get a chance to visit Tokyo, please come and visit us. God bless.

P.S. We are still raising funds for the special projects mentioned on the last post. If you can help us out with any of them, please let us know by email.

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