Churches Helping Churches

At our next retreat in Japan, we plan to deliver a collection of hand-made cards we recently received from two missionaries in Thailand.  They included this letter:

Hello!  My wife and I are from the United States, but we are serving as missionaries in Hua Hin, Thailand.  We had the youth from the Youth Group that we run here in Hua Hin write letters to encourage people in Japan that have suffered so much because of the Tsunami.

We have been following Churches Helping Churches and are encouraged by the work that you are doing, and we are hoping that you can send these cards along to people in Japan.

Thank you so much for helping us get the cards to the people that need them most.  We are praying for your ministry.

We pray that God gives you wisdom and discernment in your endeavors to show the love of Christ to brothers and sisters in need.

Thank you for your assistance.

Blessings,

Bill and April Reeser

What a thoughtful way to encourage the pastors we’re serving in Japan.  Thank you, Bill and April – we appreciate your thoughtfulness and will hand-deliver your cards in August.

What can you do to encourage someone facing difficult circumstances?

During our retreats in Iwate and Sendai, we learned a lot about the pastors we were serving.  However, the evaluations we asked them to complete after the retreats wrapped up proved to be even more insightful.

Here’s what we learned.

The pastors who attended feel run down.  They’ve been working non-stop since the disaster, and many of them are living in temporary housing that also accommodates volunteers or others in need.  As a result, they have little privacy, and very little time to focus on their own families.  One pastor’s wife said the retreat allowed them to spend time together as husband and wife – not just coworkers – for the first time since the earthquake hit.

When we asked pastors what they wanted, “more time” came up repeatedly.  They are desperate for time to collect their thoughts.  Time to fix trees on their property, spend time with their kids, study God’s Word, play the guitar.  To take a vacation with their loved ones and get away from their new normal for a while.

But, most of all, they’re desperate for more time to serve those in need, especially those in their own households of faith.

It’s hard for the pastors to admit these things.  In Japanese culture, they simply don’t talk about themselves, and certainly don’t ask for help – even when it’s desperately needed.  But in this case, their honesty is critical, because it will help us better serve them and other pastors like them during our next retreats.

What’s most astounding is the sincere gratitude the pastors display.  Many say they have regained more than they lost in the disaster.  They sing along with the psalmist “It is good for me that I was afflicted…” (Psalm 119:71).  They are thankful for how God is using the earthquake and tsunami for good.  They’re thankful for volunteers, for generous giving, and for how much people in their meager congregations have grown in their faith in the past few months.  They are thankful for the fellowship they have in each other.

They were also thankful for time with a Haitian pastor who has been there, who has seen God’s hand in the face of tragedy, who is better now for the experience.  They were thankful for the retreats, for time to sit down and reflect, and for the accommodations that were made for their mothers, in-laws and their children so they could attend and participate.

We’re excited to be able to put what we’ve learned about these pastors, and about their needs, as we begin to plan our next round of retreats.

Please continue to pray for Japan.  The region hardest hit by the earthquake and tsunami experienced another major earthquake (magnitude 7.0) this past weekend.  Although the damage this time around was minimal and tsunami warnings were ultimately cancelled, the recurring earthquakes and ongoing radiation continues to shake the pastors and their congregations.

“Make decisions slowly by consensus, thoroughly considering all options; implement decisions rapidly.” This is a management principle of Toyota, and it is also embedded in the Japanese culture. Organizations that have skipped this crucial step of listening and consensus-building are finding their help being politely turned down.

In light of this, we held a workshop at the pastors retreat to explore and prioritize needs from the pastors’ point of view. We listed the various types of responses to the tsunami and pastors secretly voted on priorities, which included construction, food/supplies distribution, and counseling to name a few. For a culture that doesn’t elevate self under any circumstances, the top three responses were shocking:

Counseling
Pastors’ fellowship
Personal and family care

Other feedback reinforced these findings. In private questionnaire, one pastor when asked the question, “What have you lost?” responded, “Peace. I feel like my legs are always shaking. I have a fear of earthquakes happening and when anything shakes, I become anxious.”

After some brainstorming with these pastors, we collectively decided to hold monthly retreats, similar to the ones we did. Here, church leaders and their families will have an opportunity to receive counseling, fellowship with one another, and discuss ministry challenges/priorities. The retreats will last 24-hours and will run from August through December. As I read the individual questionnaires from these retreats, the comments reinforced this need.

We are back in the United States after an intense week of ministering to a group of about 40 Japanese pastors, their wives – and even a few children!

You might notice we don’t use names very often when we refer to the specific pastors we’re working with in Japan.  There’s a reason for that.

In Japanese culture, giving comes very naturally.  In fact, as a guest, you must be careful to mention you admire something in a host’s home – they will likely offer it to you and insist you take it.  But receiving?  That’s an entirely different story.  For our Japanese friends, it’s difficult to receive assistance even from close friends and family.  Receiving is an issue of dignity, and accepting help from an outsider especially is a humiliating experience that essentially labels them as someone who couldn’t provide for their family.

As a result, serving these pastors comes with some unique challenges.  However, we have exhaustively worked to respect these cultural sensitivities, and as our work in Japan continues, some of the pastors we serve are slowly becoming more open to accepting our help.  Although we may be outsiders, we are first and foremost family in Christ providing for one another as we are commanded to do:  “So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.’  (Gal 6:10)

Occasionally, we still face tense moments.  At one of our retreats, for example, I reached out with an envelope containing a cash gift for one of our pastors.  He refused to reach out to accept the envelope.  With my arm outstretched and everyone watching, the moment lasted about 15 seconds.  Finally, without a word and barely looking up, he pushed his clipboard forward about an inch – his reluctant invitation to leave the envelope there.

Later, he approached me privately with a breakthrough change in perspective, saying, “I know this comes with prayer from brothers and sisters all over the world. I should accept it gratefully. I’m sorry.”  This understanding will enable us to more freely help pastors like him in the future, as they more fully understand who we are, and why we are doing what we’re doing.

We may not use their specific names, but each and every one of these Japanese pastors needs to be covered in prayer.  We will also be praying that they will be even more open to the help we have to offer when we return next month.

Will you join us?