Largest Unreached People Group in World

We were listening to a John Piper sermon on missions (imagine that!), and he mentioned the Japanese people as the largest unreached people group in the world. I checked into it at the Joshua Project website:


Largest Unreached People Groups (click link or above chart for more info)

Top 3:
Japanese (Japan) 120,420,000 people
Bengali (Bangladesh) 96,400,000 people
Shaikh (India) 73,012,000 people

We certainly understand first-hand the real need for the gospel here in Japan, but I never realized that in terms of people group break-down, Japanese are the largest unreached people group!

The Japanese people being ranked first is in part due to the very homogeneous population of Japan vs. other unreached countries, which are splintered into various people groups, but still reveals the GREAT NEED OF JAPAN!
----------------------------------------------

Another interesting way to look at the statistics is to look at the largest countries in the world by population, and see which countries are most unreached. Within the top 10 largest countries by population, Japan is "tied" with Pakistan and Bangladesh as the most unreached country at only 0.4% evangelical Christian.


Please be praying for the whole world, but especially that by God's grace the Good News would be known in these most unreached places!

Leading Worship at Church

This is my second week of helping to lead worship at our church in Karuizawa. Last week I played along with another Japanese guy, but this week he called in Sunday morning saying he couldn't come. So it was up to me! Playing guitar was no problem, but introducing the songs and leading the Lord's Prayer in Japanese were a little daunting!

I did my best, and thankfully, Ide-san, who plays the piano, stepped up and lead the Lord's Prayer with me. (I've actually be working hard at saying the Lord's Prayer in Japanese, but I can't keep up with the speed of the congregation, yet!)

I'm now playing every week, and enjoying playing Christmas songs during worship.

Click on the photo to see a larger picture, and notice the words projected on the wall. This is one of the kids songs we do. It is verbatim from Heb 12:2 of the Japanese Bible, so now I know my first memory verse in Japanese!!!

Curious Food Discoveries in Japan

Wow! KitKat with sweet red azuki bean flavor. (Actually I love it in Japanese treats, but not so much in a KitKat!) They also sell apple flavor KitKats too. (Nagano prefecture is well known for apples.)


Banana Soda flavored Fanta was too unusual to pass up, but finding Cherry Coke was an unexpected blessing! A 7-11 on the way to Nagano city had them, so we bought 6 to save for later!

We got a Winnie the Pooh cereal for Olivia "Puu-san no Hachimitsu Daisuki", but laughed when it was dwarfed by the American sized "Froot Loops" we had received from a friend!
(*Note* Click on all photos to enlarge them.)

HS Ministry Outreach Postponed :(

Well, this is part of the reality of ministry in Japan. Our well laid plans have to be changed. Our English teacher contact said due to a big upcoming test, students were not able to come to the event. Grades are VERY important to Japanese high school students, as they are very competitive as they seek to enter the most prestigious universities.

Please pray that God would open new doors for us to connect with students. The teacher is still interested to do an event, probably in December sometime. Pray for our wisdom and patience, too.

Karuizawa High School

Here are two students from Karuizawa High School, in uniform. All high school students wear uniforms, so that only leaves footwear & socks as ways to express themselves!
Together with Mr. Sekiguchi of our church outreach committee, we went to speak with the Principal and English teacher at the Karuizawa High School. All of the flyers we passed out a month ago didn't result in any new students coming to our English outreach club, so we decided to try to build the relationship more strongly with the school leadership, hoping to open some new doors.

By God's grace, we were very blessed, and the Enligsh Teacher was very open to our ideas. She even offered to pass out our flyers directly to students from her classes, and come along with them to a special event we planned for this upcoming Thursday, Nov 16. Please be praying for this opportunity to build a strong relational bridge, both with the administration and the students!

"Momiji" - Japanese Maple Leaves

It is beautiful here in Karuizawa in the fall. The maple trees especially are brilliant in their reds, oranges, and yellows. ENJOY!

Reaching Out with our Local Church

As you know, our primary focus right now is Japanese language study (and Karuizawa is not our long-term location for ministry). As we study, though, we also are looking for practical ways to use and improve our Japanese. The church we have been attending recently approached me with an opportunity to serve the church, and also build relationships with Japanese high school students in the area.
In cooperation with members of Karuizawa Christ Church, I will be helping to reach out to students from the large high school right next to the church building. I'll bring some "international flavor" and appeal, and we hope this new ministry will help break down barriers and bring new students into the church building on Saturdays. This is designed as a "pre-evangelistic" outreach, to introduce students for the first time to God's people and God's word in a welcoming and fun environment.

We met early on Wednesday morning in front of the school to pray, and then pass out the above flyer to the students as they came in by foot and bicycle. Pray with us that God would bring the right students, and that we would soon be able to establish a sense of "community identity" that will continue to attract new students in the future. Pray that God would bless my Japanese ability and enable me to work well with the church members, and that together, we would be able to share the love of Christ in a very real and tangible way to the students.

Olivia and Annabella - Opening new doors

These are photos from a "tea party" that was held on our behalf at the community center. A new friend that we've made organized the party to help us meet other young families in the neighborhood. What a blessing. Our girls are definitely opening up new doors for us!


Here are some photos from the nearby "child support center" where the girls also go to play, do crafts, and sing songs. The hand print at the bottom is Olivia's (labeled with her name "oribia-chan") and represents the bright red "momiji" maple leaves that will be coming out soon.

Jon's Mom finished with Chemo!

Thank you so much for your prayers for Mom. She just finished the last of her scheduled chemo treatments at the end of September.

She still has some important tests coming up to confrirm what the next steps are, but what a blessing that God has carried her through this difficult phase which much grace.

Here is a photo of her looking beautiful as always (with some borrowed hair, just for fun).

Local "Undoukai" Sports Day

Here we are at the Karuizawa Elementary School "Undoukai" (Sports Day). It is big part of life in Japan, and is almost like a festival of sorts for the community. Some new friends of ours invited us to watch, and we actually saw a number of people we had met at various other places - including church!
All students are split up into the Red team and White team and compete for team points (notice their hats). The above picture shows a very team oriented game, the o-tama korogashi, where each team has a huge ball that they have to pass down the line of 100+ students, carry it around a pole, and then back to the starting point. The Red team won both attempts at this one.
This game, was quite amazing. Called kibasen, or cavalry game, it is played in teams of four. Three team members form a base, called the horse, and the fourth rides on top. The object of the game is for the "rider" to steal the caps of riders from the other teams. It actually was quite aggressive. A thowback to the old Samurai days! (In case you're wondering, the White team won this game quite handily.)

We learned a lot about Japanese culture: the importance of community, the pre-eminence of "team" over "individual", and the importance of tradition and protocol to the running of events.