Bethany Christian Assemblies, Japan Newsletter
(3/5)
Evangelistic Outreach and Missions: We have had many special meetings and concerts to invite new people to the church. Over 300 people packed into the new Bethany Chapel for a series of Jazz, Piano & Cello Classic Concerts and Christmas Banquets last December with all the proceeds and offering going to build the Badi Girls Home, a Christian orphanage in Nepal -a new outreach of our church. In May, the Teppers from Canada performed a series of Piano and Violin Concerts at the churches and kindergarten. We were also able to set up a series of concerts with the public elementary and junior high schools through the Nisshin City Board of Education. Many new contacts and relationships were made with the local community as every school auditorium was packed with over 1000 students and their parents as the moving music opened the door to a message of God’s love and grace. In June, Sasaki Joshua, a former Japanese gangster and karate expert, but now a Christian singer, brought a whole team from his music school for a series of concerts to which many new people came and made decisions to believe in Christ. Along with missions and evangelism in Japan, the church has been involved in supporting world missions and in August of 2009, Nisshin Bethany Chapel was able to send out a member of our church for the first time as a full-time missionary-Mr. Shoji Yoshio. He is now serving with the Operation Mobilization OM ship, Logos-Hope, which is currently in Africa. Please pray for him. Along with various projects in Nepal, Myanmar, the church is also involved in a missions project in Laos building schools and clinics where I was for several weeks in February 2010. It has been a tremendous encouragement and blessing to the church members to see that although there are many needs at home, as we have sent out missionaries and increased our missions giving every year, God has blessed us many more times in return.
Lilac Senior Citizen Ministry: Japan is a rapidly aging society and one of the new ministries which we were able to start with the new church sanctuary was an outreach to the senior citizens in our community which we call the ‘Lilac Group’. It started two years ago with four members and now there are over 40 members. Mrs. Akamatsu, who was saved several years ago and was the first person to be baptized in the new sanctuary, is over 80 years old and has been very active in inviting her friends to the Lilac Group. We meet on Tuesday mornings in the fellowship hall of the church and often the kindergarten children will come up to sing songs and have a fun activity together. After a Bible story and devotion together, several children will pray for the ‘grandparents’. Afterwards, the church members prepare a lunch every time for the members. Many of the members have said that they eat at home alone and are very lonely but eagerly look forward to each Lilac Group meeting. The love of God through the cheery and bright service of the Christian staff has started to melt and open their hearts to the gospel and last Christmas, about ten members of the Lilac Group came for the first time to the church’s Christmas banquet. This is one more way in which the Lord has opened doors so that along with the other church ministries and kindergarten we can meet people at their point of need and love them into the Kingdom.
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