Pioneering in Japan

Mr N was excited to learn that there was going to be a Bible Class on Wednesday (we've had 3 already, but he hasn't always noticed the announcements). While Mr N doesn't seem to mind Sunday church services, all along his personal concept of "studying Christianity" involved sitting behind desks, perusing through worksheets, and getting assigned homework. We pioneer pastors are nothing, if not accommodating . Yes, I have worksheets. Yes, I can assign homework. Yes, I can order desks from amazon.co.jp (my wife calls them " fellowship tables ", but desks... yeah, they're desks! They sure are!). So while I'm laying the worksheets on our desk , my wife is setting out onigiri , tea cakes and barley tea on the, er, fellowship table.  I read through the first chapter of Genesis, pausing only for embellishments  comments, and emphasizing how God is merely laying the foundation and building up to the unveiling of his greatest creation: mankind ....

When my wife and I went to Mexico City in 1990-91 (we drove out of Las Vegas, NM in 1990, and didn't arrive in Mexico City until 1991), it was a whole different world, communication-wise. We didn't have a telephone, and didn't get one for several years. Telephone lines were in great demand in a city of 25 million people, and we were at the bottom of the list. A letter took from one to three months (if it even arrived at all). My mother-in-law would mail us a letter with photographs, and it would arrive over a month later, opened, stamped, sealed and re-taped. My mother would mail us a birthday card with a $10 bill tossed in, and it would arrive crisp and hermetically sealed (we called it the Mail Lottery - one just crossed his fingers and hoped!). We even went to the Telegraph Office from time to time. Suffice it to say, our interactions with our families were few and far between. They would go for months at a time not hearing from us, wondering if we were alive, dead,...

One of our Fellowship pastors wrote me, and asked if I could get in touch with his family in Japan (ok, he had my attention). Apparently his mother, like my mother, is Japanese, and they are actively in contact with their family in Japan. Happily, in this instance, the brother has names, phone numbers AND EMAIL ADDRESSES... (also, it helps that his family isn't located near the border of RUSSIA, or on the Senkaku Islands. Some people must think that Tokyo is the size of Indianapolis, and that everyone lives about 15 minutes away). He later wrote to tell me that his grandfather had suffered a stroke, and would I visit him, or at least pray for him. I was able to go visit his grandfather this afternoon. The aunt and a close friend of the family (who spoke English!) met me in the lobby of a large hospital in Shinjuku. We went up to the ICU and they took me to the grandfather's room, and introduced me to the grandmother. All three of them (the aunt, the grandmother and the fr...