Report on Japan Trip

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

     With eager anticipation we got up very early on January 28 to board a plane from Kansas City to San Francisco to Osaka. Pastor Kanamori met us at Osaka and took us to the Covenanter Center Building to meet students and professors there, and then took us to the new Kasumigaoka Church where stayed in the apartment of the Penningtons for nearly a month. We then moved to the Covenanter Center Building apartment for a few days.

     We were impressed anew with the cleanliness of Japan. The clean streets, the homes, and the cleanliness of the people is outstanding in Asia and also in the world. Also, that fact that everywhere you go there are lots of people is also imporessive. The trains, the streets, the stores, and every other place you go is full of people. (except in the mountains) And we are constantly reminded that 99.5% of these fine people are not Christians, but nearly all worship some kind of idols, which is an insult to our living and governing God. How greatly these people need the grace of Christ and His saving power. In spite of their unbelief, we find the people of Japan to be very polite and kind. (Those in very competitive business may be different.) I find some Americans who really hate the Japanese, but we find them very lovely people. We were impressed with earnestness of the Kasumigaoka Church members. You know, I think, that they built a big fine expensive church building, and a lot of the basic planning was done even before the Penningtons came to pastor the church. Elder Kato led a meeting in a very able manner just as a pastor would, and Mr. Kitani who has graduated from the Kobe Theological Hall led a meeting of a dozen women (serveral of them are not Christians) in a very able manner. (A new lady came that day and continues to come.)

     I preached in our five churches (all except Hontamon) and the attendance was good and the attention fine at each church. But most surprising was the attendance of 68 people at the Mukonoso Church service. There was only room for 50, so some were standing through the whole service. A lot of friends and even my doctor came to the service. Each worship service in the churches was special in some ways. The special evengelistic service at Keiyaku Church was very encouraging. And after each worship service there was delicious food and lots of opportunity to talk with new folks and folks we have't seen in a long time. We continue to pray as always that God will ever bless these churches, and will add to them other churches for His own glory.

     The Kobe Theological Hall continues to train young people and some older ones. I taught twelve classes, four of which were lectures in apologetics. (Subjects: 1. Atheism 2.Evolution 3.Chance 4.Biblical Creation) I was impressed with the earnestness of the students. I was present in one of Prof. Takiura's Greek classes and those students were standing at the blackboard translation short sentences into Greek, then with the teacher they were correcting the mistakes which they had made. I never ever saw a class like that in my seminary classes. For short times I was in classes taught by Pastor Kanamori and Pastor Sakai, and it is easy to see that the students are getting excellent teaching each day they study. Mr. Endo graduated from KTH and also from our Pittsburgh Seminary, and now he is also one of those fine teachers. (About 17 students attend KTH, but they are not all full-time students.) It is quite clear that all of these pastors who are carrying a heavy load of teaching at KTH as well as their own pastoral work, responsibilities for Presbytery and their own families, are extremely busy. They need our prayers and ANOTHER MISSIONARY to help with the work.

     Another thing that impressed us was that several men who left our church years ago came to visit us and brought generous gifts. All but one are now serving in other churches. One of my former students is a respected pastor in an evangelical church. Also, several friends came from quite a distance to visit with us. Ruth and I both spoke to some groups of women. There is at least one group of women meeting in every church, and several women or maybe most of them are not yet saved. They always served us delicious food after the meeting. There is a lot of potential growth in these groups, so we all need to pray earnestly for them and their leaders. We enjoyed visiting with a number of friends who invited us out to meals. We received a lot more kindness than we deserved, but enjoyed very much the fellowship.
      Finally, shortly before we returned to the U.S. the members of Keiyaku Church and some others also, prevailed upon us to take a short vacation to the southernmost islands of Japan. They planned in detail and paid for the whole trip, so off we went to Ishigaki Island for three days and two nights of sightseeing and rest. We went down to the depths in a huge cave, we saw a weaving factory, we saw much coral and many fish through the glass bottom of a boat, we rode across a lagoon in a cart pulled by a waterbuffalo, rode in fast ships, and shopped in the quaint narrow streets. How can we show enough gratitude for all of that? But our greatest thanksgiving goes up to God for all He has done and is doing in the churches in Japan. Yet, the work has hardly begun in Japan. More than a million Japanese die every year without Christ.

Yours in Christ,
Gene and Ruth Spear