VVV  OSAKA DIRECT VVV  Christmas 2003

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News

Happy Birthday Jesus and Merry Christmas to All!

    The new Grapevine Cell Church held its first Christmas celebration just a few hours ago, and it was a wonderful success.  We read Scripture, sang Christmas carols, and watched a children's video about the birth of Jesus.  In attendance we had fifteen people total, with most of them being people whom we first met through the summer workers' literature distribution efforts last June and July.  I know it was hard for some of the summer workers to envision the fruit that would some day come from passing out all of those flyers and stuffing mailboxes, but the fruit of their labors is slowly beginning to appear.  Most of these people are not Christians and probably will not be for months or years, but they are solid contacts who are ready to begin hearing about the gospel at special events and other opportunities.  Several are English students in Aukje's classes where they have the opportunity to get regular Bible lessons as well.  While we would all like for things to move faster at the cell church, we rejoice in the progress that has been made and we look forward to what the Lord will do in the coming year.

 
Full house at the Osaka International Church Christmas Eve Service; next door the new building is taking shape

       Challenges abound at the Osaka International Church (OIC) as well, although they are of a different sort than the challenges at the cell church plant.  OIC is a well-established church that ministers to people from many countries.  At one service we asked to see what countries were represented, and that day we had people from Nigeria, South Africa, Canada, USA, New Zealand, Indonesia, Columbia, England, Malaysia, Finland, the Philippines, and of course Japan.  Just a few weeks after that, a man from Ethiopia asked permission to use the church for an Amharic (Ethiopian) language Bible study and suddenly we had a group of seven Ethiopians coming regularly who before had been only occasional visitors.  At the Christmas Eve service, we had a special musical presentation by the Chinese language church plant that we help support and thus had a small invasion of Chinese people from both Taiwan and the mainland.  It seems like the whole mission field comes to church here, and it is an extraordinary challenge to try to minister to such a diverse group.  Of course, Japanese are by far the largest group in the church, and this helps us to maintain our primary focus on Japanese outreach.  The old pews in the chapel do not provide enough seating, and every Sunday we put folding chairs out in the back and on busy days in the aisles also - a practice that would probably give a US fire marshal a heart attack.

       Taking on the challenge of pastoring this church as well as working on the church plant has stretched my (Dan's) schedule to the limit, but it is also a joyous stretching.  Many people have been asking whether I can stay as the long-term pastor and, more importantly, I have felt the Lord steadily pushing me to open my heart to this possibility.  So, a few weeks ago I finally told the congregation that I am willing to continue to serve long-term if called.  But I also emphasized that they should go through a regular pastoral selection process and see whether other more qualified applicants might also come forward.  The Lord used an African proverb to show me that taking on the challenge of ministering to the international church might actually make us more effective at planting the cell church in the long term: "If you want to go fast, go alone; but if you want to go far, go together."  If the Lord confirms that this is the direction He is leading us by having OIC call me as their long-term pastor, then I think that it will also show that His plan is for OIC to partner in the cell church plant and for us all to "go together" so that in time we can go further than we could have gone on our own.

      In addition to the potential for OIC to partner with the cell church plant, there is a lot of opportunity for ministry right at OIC.  We are pretty full at the English service on Sunday mornings, but there is a lot of room left at the bilingual Saturday night service and in June we will be in a new building with three times as much seating.  This is a wonderful blessing as we are going to be able to move into the brand new building without spending hardly anything up front and with only a small increase in rent.  This is possible because the Osaka Christian Center that we rent from is replacing their old building and they are inviting us to move with them.  So, come June it will be "goodbye old pews and folding chairs", with a total capacity of about 120 and "hello brand new sanctuary", with 350 seats.  Praise the Lord and may the seats be quickly filled!

Yumiko's Baptism - Praise the Lord!

       Yumiko smiled from ear to ear all evening and was still grinning at church four days later.  In the picture, her mother is smiling politely, but I talked to her quite a bit and even though she gave permission, she is still having a lot of struggle inside about the baptism.  Her worries reflect what many Japanese people feel about Christianity.  She admires Christians for their moral standards and the good they have done in Japan and elsewhere, but she feels that to try to be a Christian in Japanese society is impossibly difficult, and she is very worried that her daughter will face many difficulties.  One of her biggest concerns is that her daughter may have trouble getting married, but she is also concerned about everything from job hunting to family relations.  She wonders why anyone would want to get baptized when it will make their life so much more difficult, and she shared how she converted from one branch of Buddhism to another when she got married in order to join the Buddhist group her husband belongs to because it makes everything easier.  To her, the important thing in choosing a religion is to choose what makes makes family and social relationships go most smoothly.  The idea of changing religions based on an abstract concept like truth, or to have a relationship with someone you cannot see, is totally foreign to her and almost incomprehensible.  She is a wonderful sweet woman, and she loves her daughter and wants the best for her, but she doesn't understand about Jesus at all.  But her daughter Yumiko knows Jesus very well, and together perhaps we will be able to help her mother open her eyes as well.  It is a very wonderful step that she not only permitted and attended the baptism, but was also willing to openly share her worries with me.  I think the door is open for me to share with her more in the future because she truly wants to understand why her daughter has chosen the path of Christ.

Party for the Osaka Christian College Alpha Class

Alpha-Christmas-Pizza Party, a delicious success

       Last time we wrote we were getting ready to start two Alpha classes, but this did not come to pass.  The Alpha class at Sekime was postponed due to having only one student signed up (makes it difficult to have a good discussion), and the other Alpha class was postponed due to lack of a suitable location.  But we did manage to have a good Christmas party for the gals who signed up for this class and we plan to try to start both classes again in January.

Grapevine Cell Church Finds a Second Location

Karen waves from the 2nd story window at the new Abeno Location

     As noted above, the second Alpha class was postponed due to lack of a good location.  Most of the students who were signed up were Yumiko's friends from the Osaka Christian College (although only one other girl is a believer) and the Sekime location was too far for them to commit to coming to a weekly class.  Now the Lord has provided a solution, as Grapevine Cell Church signed a lease at the beginning of December on a second office-type location.  The second location is right at Abeno where we held several outreach concerts this past summer, and very convenient to the college.  We are getting the place set up and will be ready to hold the Alpha class, and perhaps other meetings, there starting in mid-January.

Sekime Christmas Outreach to our nearest 3,000 Neighbors

Dan, Karen, Aukje, and Ken prepare Christmas gift envelopes

       We continue to do literature outreach as we are able, and for Christmas we stuffed 3,000 envelopes with a Christmas booklet, church flyers, and invitations to church events.  Ken, a short-term worker (left side at the back in the photo) who was with us for a month, helped with this effort as part of his ministry.  We continue to do as much as we can to reach out to new people while at the same time ministering to the people the Lord has brought to us.  But we also need to be praying and looking for others who can help with the ministry in all areas.  Some of these people may come from the international church, some from other contacts within Japan, and perhaps the Lord is also calling someone who is reading this now to come and help.

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