“For we also once were foolish ourselves, disobedient, deceived…But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by His grace we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life..…Who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us out of this present evil age.” (Titus 3:2-7; Gal. 1:4)
AGONY Warm greetings from a crisp Sendai morn with temps down to about minus 2 C. Warm greetings in the matchless Name of our Lord from Sendai halfway around the world from Jerusalem where the tsunami wreaked havoc 8 years ago. Thousands languish in temporary housing growing older and lonelier. Retired grade school teacher Miyako who apparently lost lots of relatives in the tsunami south of Nozomi Center says people appear to be smiling on the outside—but they are hurting on the inside. One elderly man confessed he would have preferred 3 minutes of agony during the tsunami…compared to the years of agony since. She has written a book of interviews of survivors and reported on post-tsunami grief at a conference in England. Pray for her. Health permitting, she studies the Word with Tsuruko and has begun English with missionary associate (MA) JB. When we met at an evangelistic concert in 2013, she inquired about studying the Bible and is one of few Japanese friends who has met Mom in the Seattle area before Mom’s passing in 2015. We thank families from my home church in Bothell for hosting her then. Things can take a long time in Japan.
HISTORY Greetings from this land of poetry and history lovers. For Americans the Civil War is ancient history. In Japan, warlords (a quarter of whom were Catholic) and clans duking it out 450 years ago—is table talk. Pray hard evidence the gospel reached Japan 1400 years ago (as in China) be unearthed—maybe beating Buddhism. In Japan, tradition talks. Thank you for your prayers for mini messages broadcast in October on RCJ Media Ministry’s “Tohoku Words of the Morning” (Tohoku Asa no Kotoba) over prominent networks, Saturdays at 5:55 a.m. I wanted to introduce Japanese to their own Christian history focusing on heroes who happened to be Kirishitan (Catholics)—or Protestant.
BAPTISM We cannot thank you enough for your prayers and sacrificial giving that has allowed us to serve in Japan these 35 years. Tae* (name changed), kimono shop owner’s widow, around the corner from the former Nakayama mission house, studies with Tsuruko’s once a month Saturday afternoon class for women. She and daughters Yu* and Mi* were baptized decades ago. Each time I see her it reminds me of my folks and when I was a single MA wet around the ears. We praise God for the Kita Nakayama Chapel (RCJ = Reformed Church in Japan) where she attends begun in 1974 in my parents’ living room--though many have gone to their heavenly home. Church planting in Japan takes aeons…and patience. But we do thank God for growth internally. November 11, child care worker None*, raised in our chapel, professed faith and was baptized. February 3, Ryo, 20, the first and only infant (yes) baptized at our chapel…professed faith as an adult in Kobe. His dad Reformed Presbyterian Pastor Katsunori Endo was our church planting coworker and lived next door 20 years ago.
BUSY We have never seen a busier year. With help of chapel folk, missionaries, MA’s, in 2018 we posted or passed out around 20,000 flyers, brochures, tracts, Christian newspapers. May to August. 3-month MA, Laura Baugh from Orland Park, IL OPC posted flyers early to beat the heat and mopped floors on knees…the only way to mop she says. Her dad, Matt, died in a motorcycle accident in 2005 as an OPC missionary in Haiti. Her Japanese sprinkled with phrases from 500 years ago liege lord era texts… brought smiles and admiration. 3 week July to August volunteer Southern Baptist Jasmine Martin from Murray [yes] State, TN gave her testimony after church all in Japanese with little help needed…bringing home that Japanese learning must be improving in this age of information and “anime” (animated films).
RCJ Deep Thank Yous to many who hosted us Uomotos in 2017 when we reported to around 23 churches while transiting around 23 states including airports during our 2 month home service, August to October. Please forgive me for slowness in writing. Upon returning we had to attend the funeral at Sendai Canaan Reformed Church of retired Pastor Hiroyuki Sato who filled the pulpit at Megumi Chapel along with WEC missionary Matt Cummings during our absence. Pray for comfort from above for widow Izumi as well as also her recently widowed older sister Yuri, wife of Elder Watanabe of that church in southern Sendai. His dear sisters helped my folks begin Sunday School in north downtown Sendai in 1955. We grieve the OPC and RCJ parted ways in 2016 over the issue of women elders and ministers. Our mission is looking eagerly for another partner with which to do church planting though personal ties continue with beloved RCJ brothers and sisters.
CREATION 2018 was the first full year of activities in the former boiler firm office and storage the Lord gave us in 2016 900 meters up the street from our cramped one story where the chapel met 19 years. We pray for $65,000 remaining in loans from friends and family…before we all end up in the nursing home ☺. We hosted 3 creation seminars, March 4 (19 attendees) and November 3 (10 attendees) featuring retired Conservative Baptist Pastor Kiyoshi Takahashi, and July 29 with Pastor Sakae Toita (30 attendees). Pastor Takahashi is in his upper 70’s…his credentials can hardly be beat (former associate prof of Agriculture at no. 3 ranked national Tohoku University in Sendai, University of Michigan and NASA to boot). Pastor Toita is an amazing hybrid. As a Kyodan (United) Church pastor, he teaches ethics from an “Intelligent design” point of view at Tohoku Gakuin University, a Kyodan (generally considered more “liberal”) -run mission school and the largest private educational institution in the Tohoku (NE japan) with 3 campuses, 2 high schools and a junior high. Yet he is also on the board of Creation Research japan, the equivalent of ICR (Institute for Creation Research) based in Dallas. The Kyodan is a conglomerate so apparently must also allow conservative types like Pastor Toita. We hear the “2030 Crisis” looms—when half of Kyodan churches may disappear due to graying of members. I plead with dear friends. I know I step on toes. But at the Judgment Throne people will accuse me if I remained silent on this huge stumbling block to the gospel in Japan. I explain it this way. Buddhism and Evolutionism are cozy. With reincarnation you might have been a princess in a former existence, if good…and a pig in the next existence, if bad. Yet it is disheartening having only a handful of attendees when creation seminars draw hundreds in the States. Few here seem interested, leaving “science” up to the experts. But we do praise God for the tiny yet influential creation movement. There are now 4 or more active creationist organizations…whereas 35 years ago there was basically only one (CRJ).
MIURA In 2018, our chapel hosted 2 Ayako Miura Reading Club co-sponsored seminars featuring the books of the best-selling Christian novelist (1922-1999). Like a softer touched CS Lewis of Japan, her 80-some novels, fiction and non-fiction, and books on essays have sold millions. Her first novel “Hyoten” (Freezing Point), serialized in Asahi Shimbun newspaper (1964-5) propelled her from obscurity to stardom, and has been dramatized in film and TV six times. She is one of the most famous citizens of Asahikawa, Tsuruko’s hometown, with the Hyoten Road running near the Ayako Miura Literature Museum. There is hardly a church in Japan (including our tiny flock) without one woman over 50 who became a believer through reading a Miura work. 6 of her works such as “Shiokari Pass” are in English. Many believers would give an arm and a leg just to be able to visit Asahikawa once in their lifetime...whereas Tsuruko had the privilege of attending her Bible studies along with many unbelievers years ago. February 23, our former church planting team member Yuko Endo (mother of Ryo, above) who has done doctoral level research on Ayako Miura literature spoke on a Miura biography of a well-known Sapporo businessman, Kyuzo Nishimura (20 attendees). September 1, Ayako Miura Book Club head (and a former associate prof) Tatsuei Morishita spoke on the Miura biography “Mother” written from the standpoint of the illiterate gentle mother of Christian proletariat writer Takiji Kobayashi tortured to death by police in 1933 as a Communist sympathizer (18 attendees).
CONCERTS In 2018 we hosted 2 evangelistic concerts. April 15, western-country genuine cowboy artist Greg Hager from North Dakota brought a concert for the second year straight, with 15 attendees. December 12, Wednesday eve, 31 attended the professional level Lee University (Tennessee) orchestra and singers concert, 14 being from the Lee U team. Their leader, Prof. Arden Jensen, was the MA I replaced in 1984 who served with my folks teaching English at Nakayama Chapel. We humbly thank God that Greg’s concert, March 20, 2017 at our chapel was I think his first ever in Japan…and probably the Tohoku’s first ever country-Western evangelistic concert. In 2017 when he came with wife Andrea and performed at Nozomi Center I guided them, their staff and Lauers down coastal Joban Tollway on a “radiation tour” (to “glow in the dark for Christ” ☺ …and relay the suffering of Fukushima people to the world). Electronic billboards 5 kilometers (3 miles) from the still leaking plant showed a high of 3.4 micro Sieverts/hour or 34 times the government set “safe” level of .1μSvh--like around our home. We returned home on national Route 6 just two kilometers from the plant. September 21, 2017 we enjoyed a Chinese buffet lunch with the Hagers in Fargo, North Dakota. In 2018, Greg’s concerts were warmly received up north in tsunami devastated Rikuzen Takata, April 16 and west of Kesennuma on the 17th with advertising done by community leaders. 7 years of faithful Christian relief work has won the trust of many. Many relief agencies already have pulled out. But the Sendai Eiko (Glory) Chapel-centered volunteer team celebrated their 100th 3 hour one way almost monthly relief work visit around June, 2018.
SAMURAI July 16 we hosted (15 attendees) seminar speaker journalist-editor of Word of Life Press Yoshimasa Moribe on the hero of the movie “The Last Samurai,” Takamori Saigo, whom many even believers do not know was deeply influenced by the Chinese translation of the Bible when Japan was opening up to the West and the world in the 1850’s to 1870’s.
CLASSES We are thankful for the handful of students attending Laku Laku (Easy Easy) Piano classes for middle aged and older, and for English students taught by MA JB Hellman. Pray for more students and steady income for JB. Sendai Reformed Church and Sendai Eiko (Glory) Reformed Chapel much appreciate the help of MA’s and Lauers in their evangelistic English classes for kids and adults, Tuesday and Thursday afternoons.
EXPATS We have been encouraged by expatriates JB from San Marcos, CA OPC, Michael Serge from Gospel Life, Chicago OPC, and David Shaffer from Mt. Shasta, CA visiting for 3 months. Pray for healing for David so he can serve long term in Japan. David led a grandma Tsuyo Onodera to the Word and church when she was sight-seeing in Mt. Shasta. Her daughter lives in Sonoma, an hour north of San Francisco. She has been attending church and Wednesday prayer meetings a year having been introduced by David to our chapel which he found on the Net. He has friends who attend the Redding, California OPC. Michael teaches English in Ehime Prefecture off the coast of Osaka, but is scheduled to move to the Sendai area in July now that he is engaged to a young woman in our chapel.
EVANGELISM EXPLOSION In 2017, WEC missionary Matt Cummings led probably the first ever EE course in the Tohoku (NE Japan)—at our chapel for 13 weeks straight, from January 7 to April 1. In some ways I can still say that, “We have seen more fruit than in 34 years I have been back in Japan”…though of course only the Lord knows hearts. Four women made credible professions of faith in Christ—during OJT’s (on the job training). N*, a child care worker raised in our chapel, was finally baptized, November 11, 2018. “February 10 [2017], Tsuruko and teammate Mana on OJT heard the first cry of a babe new born—humanly speaking. Mrs. Murashima living below our Nakayama area apartment 30 years ago—professed faith in Christ in her tailor shop on Nakayama hill. Her parents, members of RCJ Sendai Canaan Church, are “in glory.” She continues to close shop on 3rd Sundays to attend church. Pray for healing from lower back pain. Pray for the two other women who studied the Bible 8 years with Tsuruko and professed Christ when Tsuruko presented the material one-on-one. Mrs. Hiromi Tanaka, a bus tour guide, continues to be “inching—or ‘centimeter-ing’ toward faith” and continues to study with Tsuruko. But Toshie Matsuda now has a part-time job keeping her away from studying. Pray the seeds of the gospel not be plucked out of hearts. EE emphasis on prayer partners was a blessing—encouraging those not in the course as well. No system is perfect. EE was introduced to Japan in the 1970’s but sputtered—until revived by energetic director Pastor Yamanaka of Kyoto. With 2 years to evaluate, I still would give a warm recommendation for the training, especially as there is much less of such in Japanese. And EE encourages people to tweak and to make the training personal.
ASSOCIATES Four years ago, it looked like the year would be lonely, with families leaving. But God sent Todd and Melissa Whitford from Pilgrim OPC in Raleigh, North Carolina to serve as MA’s along with Akiko Oshimizu from a New Jersey Christian Reformed Church, though she married a Japanese Christian, last spring. August, 2017, JB Hellman, graduate of my alma mater, Westminster Seminary in California, joined the Mission as an MA assigned to serve at our chapel. He’d been an assistant language teacher (ALT) 3 years in Yokohama, Gunma and Ibaragi, towards Tokyo. Whitfords served at Nozomi (relief) Center on the coast and English classes at Sendai and Sendai Eiko churches...but returned to the US in March, 2018. Their cheerful presence and as a Christian couple leaves a big hole. Melissa served also when single, 2006-8. Pray the Lord grant them to return to Japan someday. Todd set up a website for our chapel in Japanese & English and recorded and added Sunday messages weekly. Pray for classes for JB.
BELIEVERS We continue to be encouraged by the presence from July, 2016, of Taeko, the first baptized by Dad at Nakayama Chapel in Sendai 40 years ago, and from September, 2017, by Megumi, a Korean believer married to a Japanese unbeliever, whose now 7th grade son Daisuke was the first English student at our chapel. Baptized as an infant, he studied “Confessing Christ” with me half a year in 2018. Pray for Christian friends for this lad.
PRAYER Since September, 2015, Mrs. O*, a seeker in Wu*, China had joined us via Skype computer video for international Wednesday evening prayer meetings but has not participated for a year. She returned to China, early 2015, after living in Sendai 20 years with Tohoku University researcher husband and 2 sons. She seemed to have initial faith in Christ and joined in during prayers. Pray a genuine faith be granted.
STUDENTS I had the privilege of speaking 7 times this past school year at the morning chapel and Tuesday evening men’s dorm and Monday evening women’s dorm chapels on the Izumi Campus of Tohoku Gakuin University (founded in 1886 as a seminary by German Reformed Church missionaries from Pennsylvania) to around 10-200 students and staff. In their February presentation at church, the Gideons’ Sendai chapter reps (RCJ members) report they hand out yearly around 11,000 New Testaments at junior, senior highs, clinics and hotels. We have helped pass out New Testaments in front of schools nearby.
FAMILY CATECHISM October, 2015, Tsuruko and RCJ retired Pastor Tsuyoshi Sato in Odawara, SW of Tokyo, finished an 8 year project (due to tsunami relief) translating Starr Meade’s “Training Hearts, Teaching Minds,” a family devotional based on the Shorter Catechism. A Mission project, the 427 page book was basically self-published with help from an OPC in the Seattle area. The first printing by Word of Life Press, the largest Evangelical publisher in Japan, of only 1500 books (indicating the graying of the population) sold out and the second run of 500 books was printed, November, 2018, praise the Lord! Pray an electronic format also be published soon. Individuals and churches have bought the devotional for friends and members.
Thank you again for your prayers and gifts. May the Lord bless you richly in 2019.
Yours in Christ,
Murray Uomoto