Yoshiya Okita

Pastor Yoshiya Okita’s Testimony

I was born into a Christian family. My father is a pioneer church planter. From infancy, I grew up listening to Bible stories. Everything around me taught the Bible. I was involved with Christian picture books, Scripture Memorization, attending Sunday School, worship services, and family devotions. I accepted it all without question. Then, in third grade, I was baptized, just as the natural progression of things. I certainly believed in Jesus Christ, but I had just accepted what my parents taught me. It wasn’t my own faith yet. I had always been a bit shy. After starting school, it was hard to get used to the new class each year, especially when I started 4th grade. I couldn’t break into the central circle of our classmates, and I felt like an outsider.

You get bullied when you’re on the fringe in Japan, and I went through bullying that whole year. One kid commented negatively about me, and instantly, all the guys that had been my friends just dropped me and joined the in-crowd. I could see how easily friends could be divided and swept away at that young age, and I realized, “This is what sin does to people.” I was caught in loneliness and anxiety from that point on.

When I was in junior high, I started teaching Sunday School to the little kids in church, mostly because I was looking for a place to belong. One day, I was arguing with my mother about how the church conducted Sunday School. She got exasperated and expressed, “I don’t know what’s the matter with you!” That question shook me to my core. I don’t know why I was so upset at the time, but I ran to my room sobbing, and I started to pray to Jesus. I asked him not to leave me alone. It was the first time I had reached out to Jesus in prayer. After that, everything changed; Jesus became alive to me, and I began a new life of faith.

Everything that I had been hearing about Jesus became real. Jesus was really alive, loved me, and was with me. And, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Matthew 28:20 From that point, I began a new life of faith, and I continually sought the Lord, learned to listen to His Word, and the Scriptures became the foundation of my life. Jesus Christ is my Savior and Lord.

Recent Ministry:

The 60th-anniversary meeting of the Japan Conservative Baptist Association was held in Miyagi Prefecture, and I served as a Miyagi representative on the organizing committee. As a committee member of the host prefecture, I had to liaise with the venue facilities and hold meetings with the volunteer-serving churches.

It was itself a great experience for me.  What we at Sennan Chapel were grateful for was that members of Sennan Chapel were also able to take part in this special event. In the past, I had my personal experience serving at Conservative Baptist Union events, but we have never had the opportunity as our church to participate in such an event. Prior to this event, I invited and called the attention of the congregation at our church about this opportunity, and some responded. At the 60th anniversary event, members of Sennan Chapel were given the role of a reception counter. It may have been a small step, but we were grateful for that opportunity as a church to serve. The members who took part in the service said they would like to meet more Christians from other churches at similar opportunities in the future. We hope that the networking inter-churches will further strengthen and do well for our member development in the future.

I am involved in the U30 Pastor Training in a Barnabas coaching role, intending to pass on what I have received to the next person. I am in charge of a pastor who just started church planting this year. Member-caring him and listening to his stories gives me the opportunity to look at the work of my church in a new light.

Keisen Christ Church and Sennan Chapel held a joint camp for young people between junior high school and 30s. I participated as the pastor in charge. From our church, an American youth, Davien, traveled with me to the camp. There are no other young members from his age group at Sennan Chapel, and this camp for youth and young professionals was a big encouragement to him. On the car ride, Davien asked me how Japanese people could become Christians and why are there no young adults at Sennan Chapel. He asked me these very frank but important questions. I could not give him an immediate answer, but I listened to him sharing with me about how he was led to faith in Christ back in the U.S. Then I told him the history of Sennan Chapel and the stories of those who have been saved, and together we had a dialogue about how we could lead young people to church. We continue to search for the answers to these questions and hope to be a good team.

• Pray for the spiritual growth of high school students Waka and Akane, who were led to a profession of faith, and for my wife and I to develop good relationships and lead them in discipleship.
• Pray for me as I build a relationship with Davien, the young American man. We communicate in both English and Japanese but are not able to fully express what we want to say.
• Please pray for me that I will be able to maintain my spiritual and physical health as I continue to serve as a committee member at the Keisen Christ Church Network Conference and other interdenominational gatherings. Pray that I can be sustained in serving in good balance with the ministry of my own planting church and for other groups. 

We held a family worship service and BBQ gathering called Family Day. This initiative was aimed at inviting the families of the children, who usually gather at the Sunday School, to church. Our previous report shared that Masaya, a primary school student, had not attended worship for a while. He recently resumed attending worship, and on this day, as well. Thank you for your prayers. Along with his salvation, everyone in the church prayed that his family would be led to the church activities. I praise God that his middle school sister, Mami, attended the morning service for the first time on this family day. The Lord answered our prayers as his mother, A, and Masaya’s high school student sister, Ami, attended the BBQ after the service. The mother, Ai, became friends with the mothers of the other families that day. Church members prayed and thought about how to care for Masaya so that he would feel excited and more welcome. One of the church members always encourages Masaya to attend the service by preparing sweets and goodies to pass to him when he comes. We are grateful for the congregation’s action.

We also sense a deepening of our fellowship with another seeker family. Their two children, Touya, grade 6, and Kotone, grade 4, attend our Sunday School. Their mother, Eriko, has recently come along and recited scripture verses together with her children. The other day, after Sunday School, Eriko told us of her concern for Touya, who was withdrawn and not attending school. Eriko prays to God herself, and I am grateful that we could pray together then. We hope this will allow the family to experience the Lord’s amazing work. Touya is quiet and not good at expressing emotions, and we were concerned that he might be unable to enjoy church. We were thankful when we learned through Eriko that Touya was happy to attend Sunday School. During the holidays, they plan to participate in a camp with the churches of the Conservative Baptist Alliance in Miyagi Prefecture. Please pray with us that each member of the family will encounter Jesus.

• Pray for preparations for the upcoming camps, Miyagi Junior & Senior High School Students Camp and Sennan Kids Camp.
• Pray for the salvation of the families with whom we fellowship. I pray my wife and I can form closer relationships with both families.
• Pray for good understanding and consent from the parents of the children for their participation in the Bible camp.

Ongoing Ministry for Your Prayer:

Meetings and Fellowship

We have had many opportunities for meetings and fellowships with other churches, including the annual general meeting of the Japan Conservative Baptist Association and the one in Miyagi Prefecture, as well as attending pastor-appointing ceremonies held at different churches in the prefecture. At the Miyagi region’s pastors’ meeting, support for churches without a pastor has been on the main agenda. Although we are a church that aims to be self-supporting, we have been so preoccupied with the need for self-supporting that we have forgotten to work to create the next church plant. I am reminded that while we are aiming for independence, we want to continue to make a conscious effort for our next new church planting.

Please pray for outreach opportunities and the salvation of the youth. Many of the youth coming to church this school year are in the 6th grade. We pray that we will be able to share the gospel well with them this year and that they will stay connected to Jesus and the church. The youth typically get so busy with school life and after-school athletics or music activities that they are more reluctant to attend church activities once they are in middle school. 

Please pray for Sayaka’s salvation and that we can relate to her in an age-appropriate and loving way. She is a 6th-grade student who has recently started coming to church again. She asks me many questions when her friends are not around: what it means to be loved, what happiness is, and why study. She also is anxious about her future. She asked me why I became a Christian and told me that she used to think there was no heaven, but after listening to what the Bible says, she started to believe that there may be heaven. Pray for her to find hope.

Pray for our outreach guitar and flute concert. We have distributed fliers to the church’s neighboring town blocks.

Pray for the healing of my rheumatoid arthritis. My test results show that the joints in my fingers are beginning to deform. Please pray that the symptoms will subside, and I can continue playing the guitar for worship and praise music at Sunday School.

Rakugo is a form of traditional Japanese comical storytelling and a new approach for me. We invited a gospel Rakugo storyteller, and I experienced how the gospel is shared using various creative methods. Twenty-four people came to this event. Compared to previous outreach events, most people attended this event at a friend’s invitation. Pray for those who attended and that we can develop friendships and build relationships with the attendees.

Our Easter service was a lively pot-luck fellowship, with some people attending for the first time and others for the first time in a long time. M.S., a 4th-grade student, and his mother offered to help with the preparations—the day before, we fellowshipped over a meal and prepared for the event together. M.S. dreams of becoming a pastry chef, so I showed him how to bake a cake. He told me that he wants to make cakes for the church from now on. Easter was the first time his mother attended a worship service. She told us that although she does not understand the Bible well, she was impressed by how Christians serve one another in the fellowship. She would like to participate again if such an opportunity arises. Please pray for the family’s salvation.

W.I. is a high school student who attends Sunday School and meetings for students.  I had several opportunities to talk at length with her. During Easter Worship and other Sunday services, she shared that she felt the words “Acknowledge the Lord” were coming straight to her and said that right now, she is half believing and half not believing; thus, she cannot decide to believe God fully. She restarted her life at a different high school this spring, is thinking about her life, and is being urged to acknowledge the Lord. Please pray for her solid decision to accept Christ in her life.

Pray for the opportunity to deepen our fellowship with other churches. We will hold the 2024 church general meeting at our Church, and there will be many general and church network meetings in the same prefecture. Pray for the salvation of the families attending and that the families will be added to our church. Please pray that we can provide spiritual and social support for elementary, junior high, and high school students and wisdom for heartfelt words of encouragement for students anxious about their school life and their decision of faith.

Student M.’s older sister took the high school entrance examination this month. Her mother was particularly anxious about her daughter’s test result, so we visited the family several times before the examination and prayed for her. At the end of the month, we hope to have the family at our home for a dinner fellowship. Student M. is the only one among the family who comes to church, and we pray that his family will be led to the church.

Ms. N., who has been remembered in your prayers for quite some time, continues to be battling cancer. She was urgently hospitalized on February 18th and underwent a surgical operation. It seems that the effects of the surgery have been less severe than the doctor’s initial explanation. Thank you for your prayers. Through the process, we got to know her family and colleagues and let them know about our church and how Christians serve each other. We keep in touch to exchange information about her with the family. Please pray for her healing and my good testimony in this process to her family as our Church’s outreach.

I had to take the first half of the month off from ministry activities due to my wife’s infection with COVID-19. I was able to serve and worship with a confirmed negative antigen test. It was the first COVID case in our church, and with my wife recuperating and my activities restricted, I felt the desperate need to raise up ministry co-workers and partners. This also strengthened my desire to set my personal and ministry goal for 2024 to “equip the saints for the ministry of service” from Ephesians 4:11,12.

Pray that the elementary, middle, and high school students who gather at the church will be led to salvation. Pray, especially for student M., that he will be led in making a clear decision.

Pray for Ms. N.’s recovery after her cancer removal surgery. She has cancer in other organs and will start to have treatment at another hospital after she regains physical energy.

Pray for good preparation for the new fiscal year, that everyone in the church will look back to count on the past year’s blessings, and that we will be united as we head into the new year. For the 2024 edition of the church yearbook, we invite testimonies from church members and summarize the blessings of 2023.

Pray for my physical condition. The test results for my rheumatoid arthritis, for which I have been undergoing treatment, have been increasing since the fall, and my physical pain has been gradually increasing. If that continues until my next visit to the doctor, I expect to be on more potent medications. There has been a history of weakening of the medicines due to side effects. Please pray that my health is stable so I can focus on my daily ministry activities.

The church theme for the next fiscal year, April 2024-March 2025, “What Would Jesus Do?” was shared at the New Year’s Day service, Sunday services, Sunday School, Wednesday meetings, and the small group for middle and high school students. This past year, in 2023, we have emphasized promoting the daily habit of reading the Bible and praying.  Then, for the new fiscal year 2024, we will encourage the congregation to practice the Word in their lives by following the example of Jesus.

Since November, my wife and I have been taking turns accompanying Ms. N, one of our church members, to the hospital. She was diagnosed with adenoid cystic carcinoma and breast cancer and has been going back and forth to university hospitals in Miyagi, Fukushima, and Yamagata prefectures. Katsue was affected by the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami in 2011, and she was led to our church and came to faith through the recovery and reconstruction assistance coop after the disaster. She was the first member who was baptized at our church. Since all of her relatives live far away, we have been helping her with hospital visits. In January and February, the frequency of hospital visits increased, often taking a whole day, and my wife and I are feeling strained in our mental and physical strength and in the use of our time. On the other hand, I am thankful that the members of our church have begun to pray spontaneously through this, and we have been able to pray as one heart. We are also grateful that giving rides to Katsue allows us to greet people at her workplace and her neighbors, and through this, they have a good impression of Christians and Christian churches. My wife and I admit we sometimes feel reluctant to spare adequate time and effort, to be honest.  Yet our heart is to be available to accompany Katsue, although it is challenging. We believe that the Lord will make these experiences meaningful.

During a kids’ event on Saturday, Mr. S, who attends the service, said to his friend, “You should come to the Sunday church service tomorrow, too. It’s a lot of fun.” I was delighted that the worship service was an enjoyable time for him. His friend responded that he would come, but the next day, the friend did not attend the service, but his mother came. We are grateful. At the same time, Mr. S taught me via his attitude toward his friend that I should invite anyone, including seekers and non-believers, to worship at the church. I realized that I was overthinking too much about the strategic focus on inviting our friends to church; instead, I should tell people about the joy of worship and how blessed it is to be able to worship at church.

We have a couple who are interested in transferring their membership to our church. Taking this as a great opportunity, we are starting a new study group once a month to share our vision, our view of the church, and the characteristics we strive to achieve as Christians.

Pray for Ms. N; she is slowly losing cognitive and physical functions due to the tumor. Pray that the youth who attend church outreach meetings will be led to salvation. Pray especially for Mr. S that he will make a clear decision of faith.

I was inspired by what Pastor Fujita, the speaker of the KDK (White Field Japan) Seminar, shared about his church planting experience, which was to set intentional appointments to visit seekers at their homes. I made an appointment with Mrs. E, who recently came to our church for the second time and shared the gospel with her.  Her child used to attend our Sunday School but stopped coming; we learned that her child also stopped attending school.  When we shared the gospel with her, she responded, “I do not have clear assurance about redemption through Jesus yet and we prayed together.

As a Christmas event, we tried our hand at a community cafeteria. We cooked before the service on Sunday, set the table with prepared food for the guests after the service, and welcomed people from the community and served them. It was an excellent opportunity for church members to serve the community. The believer woman who conceived this idea lives in another city from where our church is located and has not been able to participate in our other outreach events before.  The weather was terrible, with snow and hail on the event day, and we could not reach the number of people we were targeting. However, we sensed that day was a significant first step. Some people came to the church for the first time, as well as families with their children. Moreover, because of the need for assistance and future cooperation, neighborhood residents and Council of Social Welfare members joined us from the beginning of the service and offered their cooperation. When we were supporting the relief effort and recovery from the Great East Japan Earthquake over a decade ago, we were warned by the Social Welfare Council and others not to let our faith affiliation get in the way of the support and community activities of the church. However, this time, they continued to offer their cooperation after attending our worship service at our church and learning about our philosophies. We are grateful for the opportunity the Lord has given us in such a way. 

Prayer requests:

Pray for each church member as they choose a scripture verse for the year and seek to live out the Word of God by following Jesus. Pray for healing for Ms. N.  Since last fall, my wife and I have been taking turns accompanying her to doctor’s appointments at the university hospital in Yamagata prefecture for further treatment since no medical institutions within Miyagi prefecture provide proper treatment for her adenoid cystic carcinoma. Pray for us as we feel the time, mental, and physical burden of accompanying her. Pray for peace in our hearts that we will be able to serve her with love.

This past November was a month of many inputs -learning new things -as a pastor. The KDK, White Fields Japan, Seminar allowed me to reflect on and summarize my pastoral philosophy again, especially with the opportunity to give a presentation and to receive feedback from other ministers with rich experiences. I was able to refocus on where I am at in our church planting with a more organized view. Above all, I received many encouraging confirming voices and comments and was assured about being prayed for by many people. We are thankful.

We held a memorial service for a late church member, Shigeo. All of Shigeo’s relatives were non-believers, and of the twenty or so people in attendance, only four were Christians, my wife and I, and my parents. The Word of God was read, and we spoke of salvation in Jesus Christ and the hope of heaven. After the funeral, His wife, Tomoko, promised to have regular contact with us and our church, and we invited her to our outreach events. We also invited their children to attend church to see what kind of place their father attended. We will continue to seek the salvation of his family and continue to fellowship with them. Please remember them in your prayers.

When discussing Christmas events, the church members said they want to have activities to serve local families and children. As a result of that discussion, we decided to challenge ourselves to hold a children’s cafeteria, inviting people from the community. We are thankful that church members expressed their desire to serve the local community rather than just having an event for their enjoyment. This is the first time for Sennan Chapel to have a church-wide ministry with church members participating as servants.

Pray for the Miyagi Junior High and High School Students Retreat with the Conservative Baptist Union. Pray for the relationship between the local children, their families, and the church. Pray that young Christian families will be raised in the church. Pray for Katsue, a church member in poor health. She visited a local doctor for a swollen fundus, went to a general hospital, and then went from the general hospital to a university hospital for more specialized tests. During the examination process, tumors were found in the fundus of her eye and her chest, and she is scheduled to go to another university hospital for further examination. Katsue has no close family nearby, so my wife and I take turns accompanying her to the hospital. Please pray for the doctor to be able to find out what the issues are in her body and for healing.

The summer school vacation started in mid-July and during that month we had many opportunities to interact with the elementary, junior high, and high school students. We are thankful for new encounters. Erkio (mother) and Kotone (daughter, eight years old) attended the Sunday school for the first time and then signed up for the sleepover event. Eriko was working at a church in a neighboring town and was introduced to our church by a missionary unit who had gone back to their home country. She also was acquainted with my wife because she used to send her older children to the school daycare center where my wife worked. We learned that Katone had not had many chances to hear Bible stories before, so we were grateful that we were able to share the gospel with her at length during the sleepover. Her mother came with her the first time, but since then Kotone has been coming to the church by herself using public transportation. We hope that her mother will be able to engage with us as a church fully as well.

Prayer requests:

Pray for the salvation of the whole Yoshino family.

Masaya is nine years old and also participated in the sleepover and heard the story of the crucifixion at church. After returning home, Masaya shared with us that he searched, “Jesus Christ, nailed to the cross” online. He told us that he was strongly impacted by the crucifixion scene on the video. Masaya has an open heart to honestly believe what he has been taught. However, when he told his father what he had heard at church, his father told him it was a lie. Masaya seems confused about which is right, the church or his father’s words. His parents are divorced, and Masaya and his two older sisters live with their mother and only see their father on limited occasions. Their family uses a food bank run by a church of CBA and so we deliver food and have regular interactions and prayer time with the mother.

Pray for Masaya and his family’s salvation.

This coming month we will be sending participants to a joint junior high and high school student retreat camp. I as a pastor will be serving there.

Other events for the children include the film screening, the summer festival, a hang-out event, and our regular Wednesday meetings.

Pray for follow-up after the summer youth camp. Pray for the decisions given and the horizontal connections between friends among churches to be maintained and to grow.

We are in contact with the Council of Social Welfare and local care managers to care for church members who have dementia. Pray that we will be able to open the way for our elderly people to attend worship services when and after they move into a care home facility.

I am currently taking an end-of-life counselor certification course at a local general non-profit entity. Pray for my qualification and also to be effectively used in this area to give advice to the community people so as to gain more contact in this vicinity.

Our Congregation: