Three Weeks After the Disaster

Let me give you the latest update on what God has been doing through our effort in the last week. Since so many exciting things have been happening just in that short amount of time, I will try to go back to the beginning of last week.

- Photo Report can be seen by following this link.

As we have started to raise donations and clothing from our church website, we were contacted from many churches and individuals all over Japan. What originally started out as a small community effort ended up as a multi-church project, involving over sixteen churches in Tokyo. Not to mention, several secular companies and hospitals that aided us and many people who live locally who read or saw what we were doing.

Before we knew it, our entire church was filled with nursing items which were requested from the churches and care facility in Miyagi and the US NAVY. However, under these circumstances, it is easy to gather items, but very difficult to transport them, especially when there is a nationwide gas shortage.

Our original plan to transport them to the Yokosuka Naval Base was frustrated because of the government recommendation for the immediate evacuation of all US military personnel. While the initial panic didn’t last that long, it made our communication with them very difficult as people were not answering phone calls and emails. There were days when we did not hear anything from them, and we were concerned because those were the days when people’s lives were at the highest risk, and also our church building was already packed and we did not know whether they could be taken to the right place before Sunday.

But God is good all the time and He was orchestrating a better plan for us without us knowing. Finally, on Tuesday, I was able to get hold of a gentleman named Mark from the NAVY who was in charge of transporting goods to the Naval base. It was God’s goodness at work because he is also a believer in Christ and once he knew what we were doing, he recommended us to another Christian ministry, called Every Nation, which was specifically focusing on transporting food items to places where our government would not aid.

Although I never heard of this ministry before, I called them up and shared about our project to assist an elderly care facility in Miyagi. We quickly agreed that our facility qualified as one of those places where they wanted to help, and we recognized that we had the same passion to be used by God to provide both physical and spiritual reliefs. We were both excited in the Lord about this opportunity. We quickly arranged the pickup date, and thanked God for His sovereign goodness.

However, back in our church, we were facing another great issue that we did not anticipate. Originally, we planned to collect 3,600 cans of nutritious food and about 1,200 boxes of drinks. However, the food shortage in Tokyo ended up being more severe than we expected and by Wednesday, we only had 400 cans of food and 200 boxes of drinks. The truck was supposed to pick up the supplies on Friday and these people in Miyagi were counting on us for food to survive. We did everything we could do at that time, and all we could do was to pray and ask God to provide for those people with or without us.

That evening a representative from Every Nation ministry called me and said they had one of their trucks about one hour away from the care facility in Miyagi. He wanted to see if they could send the driver to the facility after his delivery to make sure that the roads were decent enough to make the delivery on Friday. I quickly contacted the pastor who was in the area and made the arrangement. However, I still did not know how God was going to come through this time, as we were only able to collect 15% of what we promised. I kept pacing around the house feeling restless not knowing what to do about the food items.

Then, about an hour later, I received a phone call from the driver, Mr. Hosoi, who was on his way to the facility. When I talked to him, he somewhat apologetically asked me, “By the way, the last facility I was planning on dropping off the items received a supply from somewhere else. I have about 1,000 kg of food left in my truck. Can your people use that food for something?” When I heard those words, it literally sent shivers up my spines. Without any hesitation, I told him yes, and called the pastor back. Although it was already late that night, the truck arrived and the pastor’s wife and a few others from the facility came to receive the food. It was one of those George-Muller-moments that only God could have orchestrated.

The next day, Mark from the Navy called and he said he would make sure that his trucks would arrive on Saturday and everything would be gone before Sunday. Also, Every Nation said due to their inability to acquire another truck, they had to postpone the pick up until Saturday morning. Now, that those people in Miyagi had some food, having another day to collect more items was a blessing to us.

On Friday, I called the pastor in Miyagi and told him of the situation. He proceeded to tell me that they had just received special permission from the government for their church vehicle to be used as an emergency supply transportation vehicle. He was then able to get some gas to check other churches and facilities in the area. He said that as he drove to other care facilities, he discovered that there were others that were in worse conditions than his without having any running water or electricity. They had decided to share the food they had with them which meant all the food they received a few days ago was gone by that evening. I told him that the food was going to be on it’s way the next day and to do their best to keep people safe.

Saturday came and we received a phone call from Every Nation saying that there was a truck problem and they would be a few hours late. While we kept sorting through items, Mark and his crew from the NAVY arrived. Before we knew it, we had completely packed two of their trucks and we still had 70 % of the items left inside of the church. While we were discussing what we should do, Every Nation showed up with a huge moving truck to pick up the food items for the elderly care facility. There was still the issue of the 70% still needing to get to the base. God is so good and we figured out that the Every Nation truck was heading to Yokosuka to pick up more items. The location was only 15 minutes away from the Naval base so they would be able to take most of what was left and drop it off at the base before going to pick up more food. We once again rejoiced in God’s orchestration. If the truck had arrived as originally planned, it would have left for Yokosuka before the Navy arrived. Once we decided what we were going to do, the Navy sailors also helped us load up the truck from Every Nation. We packed up the entire truck and we still had one small room full of items left so Mark and his wife decided to come back later that evening.

By Saturday night, everything we had was gone. The food we collected was on its way to Miyagi, six tons of clothing, blankets, and other supplies were being sent to the affected areas by the Navy. Then I talked to the care facility president on Monday, and he told me that finally some of the stores are opening up in the area so everything we did really helped them to survive through that week. Again, I reminded him that it was not us. It was God who took care of them, and He used many churches together to make it happen. We were both excited to see how God orchestrated all the events and people to unite various churches in Tokyo to make a lasting impact in the lives of those in Miyagi.

While we are genuinely excited that everything worked out in the end, we need to also understand that this is only the beginning of the long restoration process. While the attention of many in the world has already shifted from those who were affected by the Tsunami to the war on Libya or the radiation scare, we want to remind people that Japan is experiencing a once in a century opportunity for Christians to leave a positive impact if we work together. We need all the support we can get to make that happen.

Currently, while we will continue to gather specific donations from people to assist those in Miyagi, we believe that we are coming out of emergency mode. So, we are no longer making short-term relief decisions at the expense of long-term development. We will start strategizing to foster progress at the infrastructural level of a community, and this is where we need to invest most of our time and our resources.

We are also carefully listening to local pastors and their churches to see what they really need, instead of assuming what those things ought to be from Tokyo. We are making realistic and effective plans by conversing and building relationships with them.

We also believe that it would be most effective for the overall progress of the Gospel movement in those areas if we lead from behind. What I mean by this is that while we continue to be involved in providing spiritual and physical reliefs, the local churches must be the heroes. So, instead of us taking a week off to go up there to distribute evangelistic tracks and free food, we believe that it would be best if we empower like-minded pastors and churches who went through the same afflictions, so that they can show Christ-like compassion and earn the right to share the good news of God’s love. In other words, we don’t want to go up there to solve their problems, but to serve them so that people can see the authenticity of our message through the empowered actions of the local leaders.

Additionally, we are providing spiritual counseling at our church in Tokyo to those who need comfort and wisdom from God’s Word. Also, God has been opening up doors for me to share His Word to various audiences in Tokyo area to encourage faith in Christ. As one example, God has presented me with an opportunity to address the believers from Fukushima First Baptist Church, a local congregation located only three miles away from the famous nuclear plants in Fukushima, who have evacuated to a Christian retreat center in Okutama, Tokyo. Please pray that God’s Word will run swiftly among those who need to be reminded of the living hope which we possess in Christ Jesus (Psalm 147:15).

Please continue to pray for our work because while we are in mission for the glory of God and the good of the Japanese people, we are still rooted in Tokyo, and we must maintain our stability and our regular work in the city. Please pray for wisdom so that we will continue to see our situation from God’s perspective. Also, please pray for additional workers who are competent and passionate about serving in Tokyo with us. There is so much we need to be doing but without partners, what we can do is so limited. And, finally, if you believe that our strategy to strengthen God’s work in Japan is valid and effective, please prayerfully support our ministry. While we are excited and grateful for the many onetime gifts to assist our relief efforts, the real battle is long term. We are in need of generous supporters who find joy in regularly partnering with realistic and effective ministries that strive to make known the glorious Gospel to those who have not heard it before. Please continue to spread awareness of what is happening, and please don’t let media distract you and make you forget about real people who are facing real challenges in Japan. Please help us to help them so that we can share the joy of people discovering the greatest treasure in the person of Jesus Christ.

Kazu & Amy

＊Special Thanks to our friend Julie for taking photographs to show you what it was like to be there.

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