One significant and rewarding part of our weekly schedule was teaching English and Bible classes. We have been blessed to be able to offer these classes free of charge as a community service. Because English conversation is perceived as valuable for personal enrichment and for business success both, these classes met a felt need of Japanese people and were very well received. We also had lots of opportunities to make friends and share about Jesus through the class meetings. Our typical class lasted two hours and consists of an hour of English, a coffee break, and a bilingual Bible study. All parts of the meeting were voluntary participation - this avoids the impression that the Bible study is being "pushed" on people. Typically, all of our students participated in the Bible study, but one student often skipped the English class and came only for the coffee break and Bible study time!

When we prepared to leave Hiroshima, we found other missionaries nearby who were able to start new classes at the same time as ours had been meeting, and one of them was even able to offer his as a free class like ours had been. At our encouragement, many of our students began to go to the new classes when we discontinued ours, so we are greatly encouraged that there is ongoing feeding of the Word of God into their hearts and lives.