Our last few days in Japan were full of opportunities to deepen our relationships with the students and share the Gospel with them. On July 4, we spent the entire day with students from OPU at Nara, a popular place to go sightseeing. At Nara, the students showed us several Buddhist temples and brought us to one of the biggest statues of Buddha in the world. We asked the students what they thought about Buddhism, since almost all Japanese people grow up performing Buddhist rituals. Most of the students said that they didn't really believe what Buddhism taught, but they burned incense, prayed to Buddha, and performed other ritual practices because it might bring them good luck. We used these questions about Buddhism to springboard into Gospel conversations. At the very least, we tried to get them to think about what they believed and why.

After our day in Nara, we invited several of the students to spend the night at the church. Six of the male students agreed to stay, so Collin, Nate, Dan, and I had a sleepover with them. While we were all in our sleeping bags, we played the onion skin game, a game in which each person asks a question and then every other person answers that question. It's called the onion skin game because each question gets progressively deeper, just like the layers of an onion. Collin, Nate, Dan, and I tried to ask pointed questions. For example, Nate asked, "What is the most important thing in your life?" The students gave their various answers, but Collin, Nate, Dan, and I all answered, "God" and explained why. We talked about who God is and what He has done for us- why He's so precious to us. It was very easy to see the contrast between the students' answers and our answers. For the most part it seemed like the students understood what we were saying. The sleepover was great. There were a lot of laughs, and the guys on our team were able to form deeper bonds with the six students that came.

Because the students slept over at the church on Saturday night, they were able to come to Sunday service the next day. Not only did those six students come, but three other students came as well. After Sunday service, we had planned on hosting a cooking battle (iron chef competition) at the church. We didn't know how many students to expect. We thought that maybe 15-20 would show up, but about 40 students ended up coming! Praise God for so many opportunities to share the Gospel.

 

After the cooking battle, our team had planned a time where we could share our testimonies. In a lot of ways, our time together after dinner was a culmination of the entire trip. Many of the students who came were the students that we had been interacting with in the past two weeks. The students knew us. They trusted us. They cared about us. And they knew that we cared about them. They knew that when we shared the Gospel with them, it was coming from people who really cared about them. It's BECAUSE we cared about them so much that we wanted to tell them about Christ and the free gift of salvation. After two and a half weeks of building relationships, I think the students really understood that.  Dan and Linda both shared their testimonies, and I shared the Gospel one last time.



After the three of us talked, Okada Sensei gave one last challenge to the students. He encouraged them to seriously think about Christianity, eternity, and their own souls.



In general, Japanese people don't think about religion. Like I said, they all occasionally do the Buddhist rituals, but they just do so for the sake of tradition and don't really think about what they're doing.  God, faith, and eternity are all foreign concepts to them. But we shared the Gospel with them so many times that they were really forced to think about their own spiritual lives. Although they were not accustomed to thinking about religion, they really couldn't ignore Jesus because He came up in so many conversations! I believe the Lord is truly working in some of their hearts. One student said that he wants to learn more about Christianity, will come out to church in the future, and wants to come to a final decision soon. Another student said that he will seriously think about Christianity and wants to discuss it with his friends. Please continue to pray for these students- that God will miraculously call them out of darkness and into marvelous light!

In the short time that our team has been back in the United States, we've tried our best to maintain contact with the students. We've sent many emails and facebook messages. I'm confident that God will provide us with some long-distance Gospel opportunities in the near future!

-Chris

Hello! We've all arrived safely back in the States. Thank you for your many prayers. God has been so gracious to us. Be on the lookout for more updates on the final few days of the trip. Some pretty exciting things happened!

Hello everyone, this is Daniel updating from the tatami room "team HQ", about what great things God showed us this past Sunday! That day was the most exciting day on the trip so far for me, and I think the rest of the team can agree because of how God did far beyond our expectations. Please read on to find out more!

As a reminder, the week before we had been inviting OPU college students to come to church for the service as well as for games and dinner the rest of the day. Many replied that they were busy or had plans already, so we only expected maybe one or two students to show up. However, during the second service on Sunday, one of the students we had befriended last year showed up along with two of her friends. Her name was Hitomi, and she was from Osaka Christian College, which we were unable to visit thsi year due to their fear of swine flu. Even though Hitomi and her friends Tomo and Nana lived far away (about an hour by train) and we didn't even visit their schools this year, they still showed up to a church service! God was using the friendships we built last year, and worked in their hearts so that they'd come when Deborah invited them. They're also planning on coming the next Sunday too, so praise God and please pray for their salvation!

Okada sensei preached on the rich young ruler from Mark, so I'm glad they got to hear it and it was also a good reminder for the rest of us not to dilute the Gospel or seemingly lower the requirements for salvation. This reminder was fresh in our minds for that very night - an example of God's providence in every area of life! After the service, Takako (one of Aaron's English students that we ate dinner with before) showed up with her friend Nina. The girls on the team ate lunch with them, and then we all went on a photo scavenger hunt at a nearby park with the five girls and some church members (the goal is to build relationships between the students and the church). After we returned to the church, we started playing games and getting to know each other better, and we were pleasantly surprised when a large group of OPU students joined us. We ate dinner with them, and afterwards Deborah and Nate shared their testimonies while Okada sensei translated (praise God for his service!).

Then, Okada sensei talked for a while in Japanese, and the Japanese students seemed to be listening intently. (Later on Okada sensei told us that he explained our purpose for coming to Japan, asked the students to consider their lives and purpose, think critically about religion and deeper spiritual issues, and question why they go to temples and perform rituals - what is the point?) We were able to split up and talk to the students afterwards, and praise God again because we could ask them what they thought about about Okada sensei's talk, which started many meaningful conversations about the Gospel and thinking seriously about life and death. This was a bit new to most of the students, as they shared with us that most Japanese people never really think deeply about religion and things like the purpose of life or eternity. Many of the students had come by train, but even when we asked if they had to leave they said that they wanted to stay and talk with us. From the team sharing later and from my own talk, I think the students truly wanted to talk to us to find out about Christianity instead of focusing on learning English, like most of our previous conversations. This is clearly God's work in their hearts, as it was totally nothing we did to cause them to come and we weren't even sure what Okada sensei was talking about in his talk but God used that in a mighty way to display His glory!

In the following section, I will share summaries of specific conversations that team members had, and prayer requests for some of the students. You can read it (or not) however you'd like, but please take some time to praise God for His answer to all of our prayers as we see His hand begin to move - we've never had gospel opportunities and thought-provoking conversations of this magnitude in the whole history of the Japan 1 STM's visits to OPU or any other schools! Thank you all for your support and prayers, I hope this sharing will show you how faithful God is to answer. Please keep praying hard for God to call His people from this dark country.

Shota: Nate shared the gospel with him. Unfortunately he wasn't able to come on Sunday. Shota seems to understand that he has sin and probably wouldn’t go to Heaven, but at the same time it’s unclear if he actually believes in Heaven or Hell and overall he doesn’t seem to think it’s important to think about it.
Pray for him to seriously consider his life and what happens at the end of it, to realize that time is short. He enjoys our friendship and says that we are nice people, so please also pray that we'd continue to be modeling Christ, especially since Shota is fairly worldly in speech and interests.
 

Miki (picture on left): Amanda shared with Miki, but her English didn’t seem that good so it was hard to tell if she really understood the gospel because there was not much of a response. It may have been difficult because she's completely new to hearing about Christianity. The good thing is that two of the Japanese staff were able to come over and help translate the gospel as Amanda illustrated it. She did seem genuinely interested.
Pray for her to be able to understand and ask questions, and to think seriously about her life. Pray also for more opportunities to talk to her.



Ayaka: Linda shared with her, but most of the gospel points seemed very new to her; especially the concept of sin (not just crime). Ayaka was willing to stay longer to listen though, so praise God for her genuine interest.
Pray for the wisdom to know how to best lay the foundation for her in a way that is simpler but able to help her understand the whole gospel. She lives somewhat close to HBC, so please also pray that she would be willing to come out to church and perhaps build a relationship with the Japanese staff since her English is not as good. She has a busy part-time job, but we will see her again at the Nara outing so pray for her to think about what was discussed in that time and for more conversations.


Tomo (left) and Hitomi (right): Deborah and Estella shared with them and talked about Deborah's testimony - Tomo asked good questions which allowed them to share about why their faith is so important to them and how God is the only eternal source of satisfaction. Tomo and Hitomi agreed to hear about the evangelism training outline, so Deborah and Estella were able to go through the gospel in much detail with them. Through the sharing (and good questions by Tomo and Hitomi), the Japanese students understood that they weren't good people by God's standards, and that God must punish sin because He's holy and just but is loving too. This paved the way for sharing about Christ and true faith and knowledge of God. Deborah and Estella got them a Japanese-English bible and hi-lighted some passages to read.
Pray for follow-up conversations, to ask them what's holding them back from committing even though they understand the gospel. Tomo has a Christian friend in Australia so she's had some experience with Christianity before. Pray for next Sunday too when they come again.


Kou: Collin shared the gospel with him last year, praise the Lord for that, and Okada sensei's message got him thinking a lot. He sees virtue in Christianity and its morals, but can't get to the belief part. He also shared that Japanese people have a notion that religion in general is dangerous, and that they're raised from childhood not to even think about religion.
Pray for Collin to explore his reasoning more, and to get to talk about the gospel more in depth. Pray for God to overcome his fears about Christianity.


Akira "Skywalker" (center): We met Akira from last year and we got to hang out with him in Irvine this past year. He's come to a lot of events so we know him pretty well. Chris got to talk to him on Sunday, and found out that he went to elementary school in Cambridge before, and that his parents told him to go to church there. He learned a couple things such as how Jesus died (there were many religious icons of the crucifix at the church apparently), but his main problem is understanding substitutionary atonement and how Christ can pay for our sins as well as impute His righteousness onto us believers.
Please pray for him to really be serious about his life and to care about where he's headed for eternity. Pray that he can understand the gospel (Christ's atonement) and since we'll be seeing a lot more of him, for future conversations as well.
Yusuke (right): I got to talk to Yusuke with Nate on Sunday and build on the foundation that has been laid already in previous conversations. Deborah gave him a bible last year because he was interested in learning about Christianity and what we believe in. On Sunday, he shared how he and Akira had talked on the train before coming that Japanese people didn't think about religion seriously enough, and so Okada sensei's talk really had an effect on him. We talked about how there were many distractions in life that prevented them from thinking about eternity, and I got to use many personal examples to illustrate how short time is and how God's ways are best for us, even when we can't see how it is. I also talked about knowing God vs. knowing about God, how to study the Bible, and borrowed from Solomon in how God is the only one who satisfies completely and what He's given us on earth aren't meant to satisfy in themselves, but to point us to His goodness.
Please pray for his salvation, he's been thinking a lot and was really eager to talk again. He knows our reason for coming and that we are sharing the Gospel because we care about him. Pray for him to commit and for the follow-up conversations - it seems he's kind of close to believing!


Thank you once again for your prayers and support, and for reading!
Please also pray for Thursday (Namba trip) and for Saturday (all day Nara trip, and some boys will be sleeping over at the church with us - and going to church the next day!).