John will be leaving today with Phil Tsai, short-term worker, to work with a Rengo Disaster Response team in Iwate prefecture from the 15th to the 19th. The eight member team will include Pastor Sasaki, Rengo Board member, Pastor Kurashima of the Masago church, Associate Pastor Yamauchi of the Chuo church, the Wakaos of the Ishikawa Kita church and Pastor Yokota of the Minami Urawa church. This team is loaded with pastors! John and Phil…
We are back home from the disaster area of Rikuzen Takata City Iwate Prefecture. We are safe but have lots of sore muscles. We worked at shoveling 6 inches to over a foot of dirt, sand, mixed with oil and other debris from the sidewalk that the elementary kids will walk on starting today. The school has been closed since the 3/11 disasters and is opening on Friday 5/6. The side walk is along a…
We both leave tonight (5/2) with Tom Ellison and 7 others from the Nerima Baptist Church on a volunteer team to the disaster area. We will be working in Rikuzen Takata City, Iwate Prefecture until May 5th. We will be cleaning damaged houses, ministering to people in evacuation centers and developing ministry to children. Due to the earthquake and the tsunami over 2/3rds of the population of Rikuzen Takata City are homeless. There is only…
1. Along with efforts at disaster response are also our regular ministries to women, LeadNet coaching meetings, Elijah Group and other ministry. Continue to pray for balance in the midst of so many opportunities. 2. The first session of the personal evangelism training last month at the Crossroad Church was excellent. The next lesson is May 22nd. 3. Continue to pray for the CPI Leadership Team as we consider the implications of this large disaster…
Last month John joined a team from the Kokubunji Baptist church that did volunteer work in Ishinomaki, Miyagi Prefecture April 17-20. Pastor Nakano from the Crossroad church also joined the team. There has not been time to develop a video yet, but some pictures and video with English are at the church webpage http://homepage2.nifty.com/kbch/new/tohokusupport/tohokusupport.html. The trip was very successful in completing several projects. John and a short termer from America will also be joining a…
Churches in Kessenuma Miyagi Prefecture celebrated Easter yesterday. For these churches there was a need for resurrection of their facilities to be able to use the church again. http://www.japantoday.com/category/national/view/japans-christians-celebrate-easter-amid-disaster Some of these churches were helped by CRASH teams and some from the B1 network that missionary Jeff Chapman has been working with. See my previous post http://www.gospelrest.com/churches-shattered/ In Ishinomaki the city where John volunteered the nearest church to the neighborhood he worked had water up…