Paul's Journal

Edith and Francis Schaeffer

There are four questions that Edith Schaeffer would try to ask people who were serious about becoming Christians. The four questions are:

1. Do you believe God exists?

2. Do you acknowledge the fact that you are a sinner?

3. Do you believe that Jesus came in space, time, and history?

4. Do you bow to this God, and accept what Christ did for you, personally and individually, taking your deserved punishment, for your individual sins, as He dies outside Jerusalem?

I have shortened the questions-some of them are quite a bit longer-but I believe that these four questions are key and that we as Christians need to sometimes review our faith to make sure our basic faith is secure.

And of course as we talk to our non-Christian friends these are the kinds of questions we should be asking if we get the chance.

Paul

Morishige Noboru San, Paul, and Reiko at the Festival

This year, Mr. Mido from the New Life Church, and Reiko and I were able to once again attend the annual Takarazuka Bluegrass Festival. We got there just in time to hear the Christian Singer-Song-Writer, Morishige Noboru, singing at the center stage. Morishige San always sings original songs in Japanese that have a strong Christian and gospel message.

After Morishige San was done we stayed to talk with him and also to listen to some of the other music. As I have mentioned before, the themes in bluegrass tend to be Jesus, Sin, Salvation, and Heaven. As they are usually sung in English the message might not be getting through but I am always so happy to hear such songs being sung in Japan.I trust that there are those who understand English and also those who take the time to translate some of the songs.

At any rate, we had a wonderful time and I hope we can go again next year.

Paul

The thing about real life is that important events don't announce themselves. Trumpets don't blow, drums don't beat to let you know you are going to meet the most important person you've ever met, or read the most important thing you are ever going to read, or have the most important conversation you are ever going to have, or spend the most important week you are ever going to spend.Usually something that is going to change your whole life is a memory before you can stop and be impressed about it.

Edith Sachaeffer Page 53 of the new expanded edition of L'Abrii

The view from Starbucks-notice the red and white pattern on the lacquer stall.

People often worry that Japan is becoming too western and that all of the traditional Japanese culture will be lost in time. I myself have been noticing the opposite. It seems that no matter how western Japan gets, wherever you go, there is always something very Japanese and very traditional in sight.

This was brought home to me this morning as I sat in Starbucks. From my seat I could see the French supermarket clearly. Coffee from America and vegetables from France-how much more western can you get?

However, when I first sat down that was not what I saw-I seemed to be surrounded by a mountain of traditional Japanese lacquer ware. A lacquer ware seller has set up his stall next to Starbucks and the seat that I chose happened to be right next to his stall. I moved to the next seat where I could see, not only the lacquer ware stall but also the rest of Starbucks and the French super market.

I was especially interested in the red and white cloth that covered the bottom part of the stall-this is as traditional as you can get-it is a Japanese pattern that stall owners use all over Japan. Needless to say I have never seen it in Minnesota or other parts of Asia.

My experience this morning was typical I think. No matter where you and no matter how western things may look at first, look a little bit closer and you will for sure see some traditional Japanese items or patters or whatever.

So, for myself I am not worrying that Japan is becoming too western-I just don't think it will happen. Enjoy Japan.

Paul

The Mt. Makio Visitor Center

Ever since my stay in the hospital I have been very very weak. I have been able to handle some local shopping but doing any kind of hiking or climbing so far has been out of the question. However, I can't keep the mountains out of my system.

The other day I decided to visit Mt. Makio-not to climb but to at least breathe some of the mountain air and talk to some of my friends there. Reiko and I drove to Mt. Makio around noon and headed for the Makio San Kanko Center for a bowl of udon. (Japanese noodles) The owners were worried about me and glad to see me again. In Osaka that day it was really really hot but in the little shop there a couple of fans were all that were needed to keep everyone nice and cool-it was good to be back in the mountains again!

Reiko and I were enjoying our udon when the owner's wife brought us a couple of onigiri (rice balls) and this really completed the meal. Even though I could not climb the mountain or do any rock climbing I was able to relax and at least enjoy the mountain atmosphere.

I am praying for the day when my strength returns and I can tackle the mountain again. At the same time I am thankful that even in my weak state I can still visit the mountains and have an enjoyable time there.

Paul

Mark Sayer has written a very interesting and easy to read book about what he calls Hyperreality. Hyperreality is the view or reality or worldview that is presented to us through all of our modern communication tools-our PCs, the internet, our cell phones, ads, and the media in general. His view is that this is a distorted view of reality-that it makes us want to become people we cannot be and own things we really cannot ever buy. It promises to make us more beautiful than we ever can be and otherwise gives us many false hopes.

Some of his chapter titles are: The Whole of Life as Shopping: Hyperconsumerism, Hyperconsumerism as Religion, and Good-bye to the Plastic Jesus of Hyperreality.

He has divided the whole book into three sections-Hyperreality, Reality, and God's Reality. Mark is very different from Francis Schaeffer but I believe he is tryting to do in 2009 what Schaeffer was trying to do in the 60s and 70s-to wake Christians up and to get Christians to understand the kind of culture they were living in and the kind of culture that their children were growing up in.

This is a book that I highly recommend.

Paul

Paul at his friend's coffeehouse on the 9th of July.after getting out of the hospital

On the 23rd of June I was suddenly hospitalized.Both of my kidneys were infected and my bladder was also not working right. On the 26th I had simple surgery to run tubes from both of my kidneys to my bladder and also a tube from my bladder outside. The surgery was successful and I began to get better right away. However, I soon ran unto another problem-I had an alergic reaction to some of my medicine it took some time to take care of this.

By God's grace this problem also cleared up and on the 4th of July I was given a clear bill of health-however it was suggested I stay the weekend at the hospital and check out on Monday the 6th-which I did.

I am now home trying to get used to non-hospital life again. I am very very weak but have a good appetite and so hopefully I will be able to gain back some of the weight I lost.

I want to thank all of you who have prayed for me and have come to visit me. I was extra glad that Lydia came to see me before flying to America and that Mr. Mido brought his guitar and sang some original songs for me. Also, Pastor and Mrs. Konishi made quite a long trip to see me-thanks. And of course my wife, Reiko, was a wonderful support and helper to me in the hospital.

Please continue to pray for me as I battle my sickness and serve the Lord here. Daily, God gives me the strength for that day and I am so thankful for that.

Paul

I am now reading two very good books about capitalism. The first is "The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism" by Michael Novak and the second is "Money, Greed, and God" by Jay. W. Richards.

Michael Novak is an American Catholic philosopher and his book is one of the classic works on the subject. I have not finished reading the whole book yet but he seems to cover his subject in a very complete manner. His book was first published in 1982 but is really timeless. He started out as a socialist but gradually came to change his thinking. In his book he takes us through the steps that led to his conclusion that democratic capitalism was not only a good system but seems to be the only economic system that really works. It is a long and scholarly work and seems to be full of what I can only call "wisdom". At any rate, a very good read.

Jay W. Richards is a Protestant Christian Theologian and Apologist and his book was published just this year. (2009) The subtitle for his book reads, "Why Capitalism is the Solution and not the Problem". That pretty much sums up his message. It is a shorter book and is much easier to read than Michael Novak's book. However, their message is the same and I suspect that Jay's book may become a modern classic on the subject. Those who may not read "The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism" because it seems too long and difficult will no doubt find "Money, Greed, and God" easy and fun reading while being very deep at the same time. He uses eight myths that most people believe about capitalism and each chapter is devoted to one myth and showing why it is a myth and not the truth. And so, in this case also, a very good read.

If you have not yet read these two books I highly recommend them.

Paul

Lydia trying her hand at rock climbing at the Kura Iwa in Osaka, Japan.

Some weeks ago I wrote about "One Rope" and how thankful I was to have someone share their precious climbing rope with me. Some days ago, I went rock climbing with Lydia (Jon Dugan's daughter) and learned another important lesson-that was the joy of sharing.

When I bought all my climbing equipment last fall, the last thing I though about was someone else using it. That thought just did not enter my mind. However, talking to Lydia and finding out that she really wanted to do some rock climbing here I realized that to make it happen I would need to lend her all of my equipment.

Some days ago on a beautiful spring day we went rock climbing at Mt. Makio. After looking at the various climbing areas it was time for Lydia to climb. I helped her into my harness and explained the several pieces of equipment needed. I then had a really wonderful time watching her climb. In fact I think I enjoyed watching her climb more than had I been climbing myself. There is something special about enabling someone to enjoy and experience something new. There is the joy of being helped but then there is the joy of helping. There is the joy of receiving but then there is also the joy of giving.

At any rate we had a wonderful time of climbing (even though I did none of it) and were happy to go down the mountain a bit to the rest house in front of the temple for some hot coffee and good conversation with the good people who run the rest house there.

Matthew: So in everything,do to others what you would have them do to you.

Paul

Snow on Mt. Fuji above 2000 meters on May 28, 2009

My wife and I try to take a trip every April as our wedding anniversary is then. However, this year my physical condition was very bad and we could not do it, In May my condition improved and so we decided to take our annual trip. We decided on Mtl Fuji-not to climb but to look at and to take pictures of. One of the best spots for that is the Lake Kawaguchi area and so we took a hotel there,

On thre way we were treated to a wonderful view of snow covered Mt. Fuji. However when we got to our hotel the clouds moved in and by 5pm it was raining. What to do?

The next day it was raining even worse and so we decided that if we could not see Mt. Fuji from afar we would try to see it up close. In the rain we drove to the 2305 meter point using our 4WD vehicle. By the time we got there, we had entered the snow zone-everything was white-the ground, the rocks, the trees, and of course the parking places, We found a snow free spot to park and spent some time at the gift shop and at one of the coffee shops there. The air was very very cold and the coffee was supposed to warm us up. Realizing that we needed an old fashioned stove we headed to a shop that had a good stove and warmed up. It was amzaing to us to experience snow at this time of the year!

After that we enjoyed a nice drive back to Lake Kawaguchi-it was beautiful green green forest all the way. We just enjoyed the beauty of God's creation as we drove.

Even though we did not get to see the views of Mt. Fuji that we were expectiing driving in the snow zone above 2000 meters more than made up for it-we had a wonerful trip overall.

First of all I want to thank all of you for praying for me. After a very long period of weakness I am again feeling strong and healthy.I used to spend all of my evenings in bed but now I am up and around and can even enjoy various evening programs and visit friends in the evening In fact, by about 3pm I used to be very tired and would often head to bed at that early hour. I also would often run a fever in the evenings-38.5C was not un-common. However, I now do not ever seem to have a fever and have the strength to do many things. Please pray that I will continue to be in this state and of course that the cancer will continue to be contained.

My blood reports are all about the same with no big changes one way or the other. My next CT scan is scheduled for June 23rd-please pray for good results.

By God's grace I am preaching and teaching here at Bethany and also getting lots of exercise by doing rock climbing.My doctor seems very happy about this and encourages me to go to the mountains as much as possible.

Again, I want to thank all of you for your faithful prayers-I am sure that I am alive today because people have been praying for me.

Enjoying real "Kura" life in the early 50s

When I first came to Japan when I was two and a half years old we lived in a house that was formerly owned by an "Ohmi Shounin". Ohmi is the old name for the Shiga area of Japan while Shounin means "merchant". Many famous merchants came from the area. One of the more well known would be the Takashimaya Department Store chain which was started by a merchant from Takashima in Shiga Prefecture.

After the war, many of these beautiful traditional houses were up for sale and my father's mission bought one for their mission headquarters. A traditional Japanese house has many special features-it has a "hanare" (which means separate) which is a small house on the grounds connected to the main house with a corredor or two. This house is for the eldest son to life in with his wife and family. They can be "of" the family and "not of" the family at the same time in this way.It also has of course a "kura" or two ot three or ten depending on much treasure there is to store. At first, treasure was mostly rice so a ""kura" is rat free. It tends to be cool in the summer and warm in the winter. Other parts of the house would be a traditional Japanese garden and wall around the whole thing and a large official gate. The floors would all be "tatami" (straw mats) and the walls would be mostly paper sliding panels. This means that a 4 mat room can be turned into an 8 mat room or a 16 mat room or even a 24 mat room simply by sliding some paper panels around. As a result no one ever knew how many rooms we really had. I think I used to tell people we had 38!

At any rate, this bunch of foreigners moved in and set up shop. They had no treasures so the second floor of the "Kura" became the Sunde's apartment. The first floor was used for the closest thing that the missionaries had to treasure and that was their barrels and suitcases and boxes of stuff. Also, a ping-pong table.

Living in a "kura" was great all year but I liked it in the winter the most. Every missionary family was given one wood burning stove. That meant that in the evening everyone spent their time around their stove. The Sunde Family was no exception. Eveything took place near the stove. In the picture it looks like Mom is studying, Dad is pretendting to study and I am just having fun doing whatever it is I am doing. I used to color, look at picture books, play with various toys I had, and sometimes just daydream. I have only pleasant memories of those long Shiga nights around the stove. The air was warm, we were a family that loved each other and we were together here in a land not our own but a land that God had sent us to.

It was a good time to be alive. The world has changed-now things move faster-computers are everywhere-but some things aught not to change. A family in a room together spending time together as a family is something we need now more than ever.

Even a five year old can climb rock!!!

Last week I met the youngest rock climber that I have met so far-he was only five years old!. He was climbing with his mother and his grandfather-all rock climbers. It looked like he had more gear than I had!!! At any rate, here he was climbing a 50 meter slab of granite and seeming to enjoy it.

His mother told me that he had already climbed it once and this would be his second time up the route. I climbed parallel to him and took some pictures. Everything seemed to be going just fine. However, about four fifths of the way up the route, there was a change. He became frightened and scared. I suspect he suddenly realized that being at the top of a 50 meter rock slab was not the safest place in the world. The first time, no doubt, he concentrated on the holds and nothing else and had a great time. The second time, he let his mind wander and fear set in.

I was immediately reminded of Peter when he was walking on the water. As long as he kept his eyes on Jesus and concentrated on how much power Jesus had, he was fine. The King James Bible tells us that "when he saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid".And he started to sink.

Well, Peter was ok-Jesus saved him. And the little boy was ok-his grandfather and his mother made sure he was safe.

But it really made me think. We need to concentrate on the RIGHT things-otherwise we will sink.We need to keep our eyes and our minds focused in the right direction.

Peter went on to become a great disciple. Jesus made sure of that. And I am sure my young climbing friend will go on to become a great climber in the future. His mom and his grandfather I am sure will see to that.

But we all go through life learning lessons-at five years old-or at fifty years old-it makes no difference.

Hopefully, I will keep on learning both as a climber and as a Christian.

"Praise him with the sounding of the trumpet,
praise him with the harp and lyre,
praise him with tambourine and dancing,
praise him with the strings and flute,
praise him with the clash of cymbols
praise him with resounding cymbols.

Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.
Praise the Lord."

Psalm 150:3-6

Our church recently received a banjo and so I believe we are the only church in the New Town with a banjo. Psalm 150 tells us that everything that has breath is to praise the Lord and so I am hoping that our new banjo will be used in that way-to praise the Lord with new sounds.

We have the banjo-now we are waiting to see who will take up the challenge to learn how to play it and to praise God with it.

Ted Preaching at the Sakai City Bethany Church

"Denial of self is an utter unconditional surrender to Jesus Christ, including the giving up of all of my "rights to myself". Here is the root of sin in experience-my idea that I have a right to myself, or that these are my rights. Thus, the reason that we are so easily irritated, jealous, touchy, impatient, anxious, proud, or angry (to say nothing of other gross sins) is that we have not denied ourselves. Our part is to deny self, to nail the disposition to have our own way to the Cross. The Word says that positionally "our old man was crucified with Him" . It is already done, for there we were crucified, there we died, there we were buried. As far as God is concerned, He is through with the old man. However, in our experience, God will not make this real until we give Him permission by making an absolute surrender to Him-a surrender so complete that death (to self) is the only word that can properly describe it. Then we can go on and reckon outselves "dead unto sin, but alive unto God in Christ Jesus (Romans 6:11).

T. A. Hegre: Founder of Bethany Fellowship (1908-1984)

The menu at the Makio Kanko Center

Osaka is famous for many things but maybe mostly for its good food. And so of course if you want a good bowl of "udon" (wheat noodles) Osaka would be the place to come. It is true that I eat "udon" on a weekly basis at home and also I am sure I eat it at a noodle shop somewhere at least once a week. So, it would seem that if someone asked me directions to a place where they served really good noodles I should be able to answer right off. Wrong!

There are many many chain stores in the Osaka area that specialize in udon. Every shopping center and every mall would have several "udon" shops. And of course all the major highways have "udon " shops waiting for customers. When I climb Mt. Kongo I have a choice of two places to eat "udon". And yet, if I were to be asked where to go for really good "udon" I used to not have an answer. Now I do.

The best udon that I have ever eaten is served at the Makio Kanko Center located at the base of Mt. Makio. It is a very small shop-cement floor with old comfortable chairs and tables. Most of the customers are pilgrims who are visiting the 33 Sacred Temples of Saikoku of which Seifuku Ji located at Mt. Makio is No. 4. Otherwise the customers are hikers or rock climbers.

What makes the "udon" here so good? I suspect that it is made from an old family recipe. The udon is made by a mother and daughter team while the father sells souvenirs outside. This family of three is very friendly and kind to all who come in. So, I suspect a lot of kindness and love goes into the "udon" that cannot be copied at a chain store. Even if a customer does not feel like ordering anything he or she is invited in for a cup of tea and encouraged to sit and rest. Overall this makes for a very nice eating experience. Good "udon" in a good atmosphere.

I don't know if anyone comes just for the "udon" but for me the best "udon" in Osaka is to be found in this out of the way place.

There are three kinds of people in the world. The first class is of those who live simply for their own sake and pleasure, regarding Man and Nature as so much raw material to be cut up into whatever shape may serve them. In the second class are those who acknowledge some other claim upon them-the will of God, the categorical imperative, or the good of society-and honestly try to pursue their own interests no further than this claim will allow. They try to surrender to the higher claim as much as it demands, like men paying a tax, but hope, like other taxpayers, that what is left over will be enough for them to live on. Their life is divided, like a soldier's or a schoolboy's life, into time "on parade" and "off parade", "in school" and "out of school". But the third class is of those who can say like St. Paul that for them "to live is Christ". These people have got of the tiresome business of adjusting the rival claims fo Self and God by the simple expedient of rejecting the claims of Self altogether. The old egoistic will has been turned round, reconditioned, and made into a new thing. The will of Christ no longer limits theirs; it is theirs. All their time, in belonging to Him, belongs also to them, for they are His.

And because there are three classes, any merely twofold division of the world into good and bad is disastrous. It overlooks the fact that the members of the second class (to which most of us belong) are always and necessarily unhappy.

C.S. Lewis

(page 21 of Present Concerns)

The demand for equality has two sources; one of them is among the noblest, the other is the basest. of human emotions. The noble source is the desire for fair play. But the other source is the hatred of superiority.

C. S. Lewis

(page 33 of Present Concerns)

Paul is happy after a successful rock climb.

I go rock climbing for many reasons. My main reason of course is to keep in shape and for my health. However, I also go to enjoy beautiful mountain scenery and breathe nice fresh mountain air and of course I also go to be alone with God in the mountains that He has made.

However, there is another reason and that is the many wonderful friendships that I have been able to make in the mountains. One of the wonderful people I have met is Mr. T. The other day I arrived at the Kura Iwa and found him in full climbing gear. He at once invited me to share his rope and to climb together rather than for me to use my own. I had a wonderful time of climbing and and also relaxing together over coffee.

Afterwards I thought of this concept of one rope. To offer the use of your rope you are letting someone else touch and use a very basic piece of equipment. The rope is what makes sure we come back alive after each climb. To let someone else use that is a great sacrifice I thought. Secondly, it involves the giving of your time. Mr. T did all the hard work of setting up the rope and now he is going to let someone else use it while he just watches. Each time I use his rope to climb is time that he himself could be climbing. But, for the sake of comradship and friendship he decided to offer me the use of his rope.

Of course, accepting the offer is also meaningful I thought. It involves trusting his rope. I know I can trust my own rope but to use someone else's rope means you trust them. I also have to give up any ideas of my own about which route to climb. Of course, for me, spending time climbing with Mr. T was more important than choosing my own route and so I gladly accepted his offer.

Let me end with a quote I have used before.

"Mountaineering transcends all everyday matters. It transcends all national frontiers. Mountaineers are a band of brothers. They are all one party on one rope."

Guido Tonella: Italian climber and journalist

Today was Easter Sunday and at Bethany Christian Church we were able to hold our 60th baptism. PTL 60 people have confessed their faith in Christ and in His Resurrection in this small baptism pool. Over 20 years ago we decided to build our own baptism pool. The believers got shovels and dug the hole and mixed the cement and we were able to complete this little pool to use for the glory of God.

I came to Japan in 1973 with the commission from God to make disciples, baptize, and teach people the words of Jesus. (Matthew 28:18-20) In our church I have been trying to concentrate on that and by God’s grace nearly every Christmas and Easter and sometimes at Pentecost we have been able to hold baptism services. Sometimes it is one person, sometimes two, and sometimes even three. Every time we are able to hear wonderful fresh testimonies and hear how God has worked to bring people to Himself and to the point where they are ready for public baptism.

This year, young Mr. K got baptized here. He is just starting high school and our church was so glad to see such a young person confess Christ as Savior and Lord. Listening to his testimony I realized that age is not an issue-God’s Voice and leading will get through no matter what.

Please continue to pray for our church that God will continue to send new people to us and that they will become disciples of and believers in Jesus and that we will be able to continue to see people baptized here in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost.

"I am a democrat because I believe in the Fall of Man."

C.S. Lewis

(Page 17 of "Present Concerns")

The subtitle to this book is, "How the world's most notorious athiest changed his mind". I found it be fascinating reading. For 50 years Antony Flew preached and published the athiestic view of life. And yet, now, he has changed his mind and believes that there IS a God. How did this happen?

In the early 50s Flew was a member of the Socratic Club at Oxford, England. The chairman of the club was C.S. Lewis from 1942 to 1954. This club would meet every Monday evening and much of the time was taken up with athiests and Christians debating the problem of the existence of God. The moto of the club was the statement of Socrates: "We must follow the argument wherever it leads". This is what Antony Flew did and it took a lot of time but in the end it lead to him coming to believe in the existence of God.

Towards the end of the book he writes, "I must say again that the journey to my discovery of the Divine has thus far been a pilgrimage of reason. I have followed the argument where it has led me. And it has led me to accept the existence of a self-existent, immutable, immaterial, omnipotent, and omniscient Being".

C.S. Lewis used to say that an honest seeker of truth would always in the end be led to faith in God. It seems that Antony Flew was that type of seeker of truth and his honest seeking has led him to change his mind about something that he believed in strongly for 50 years.

I think this is a unique book and I recommend it highly-happy reading!

Mountaineering transcends all everyday matters. It transcends all national frontiers. Mountaineers are a band of brothers. They are all one party on one rope.

Guido Tonella: Italian climber and journalist (1946)

This week turned out to be quite the week for me as far as mountain climbing goes. On Monday I climbed the Katora Valley of Mt. Kongo. The upper part was all snow and felt and looked like the middle of the winter. However, when I returned via the Wasabi Valley, that valley had no snow at all. It felt and looked like spring had come for sure. From the Wasabi Ridge the slopes of the Katora Valley could be seen and of course they were pure white with snow. So I ended up walking in spring weather while looking at a winter landscape-very neat.

Then, on Thursday, the weather really turned warm and I decided that it was time to start rock climbing again. It was exciting to again put on my rock climbing shoes and climb the Kura Iwa Slab. The sun had warmed the rock and a nice breeze was blowing from the sea. As I neared the top, suddenly something silver colored flashed past my eyes-it was my camera that had slipped out of the case and was now banging down the slab. I imagine that the next time I come I can find what is left of it but there is no chance that it can be repaired. I had not thought about it before but dropping any kind of equipment on a rock face is fatal!

From the slab, I made my way up to the Mt. Makio wall where I planned to do some top roping. I had not used my equipment since last fall and so I was a bit worried if I could remember how to put on my harness, use the figure of eight, etc. but it all came back to me and I had a very enjoyable climbing session.

After that it was a matter of following the main ridge down to the parking lot and having a bowl of noodles at the shop there. The owner and his wife were delighted to see me again and told me how happy they were to see me back from America safe and sound.

Looking at the weather report, it looks like next week will be cold again so I suspect I will be climbing Mt. Kongo again and maybe even seeing some more snow.

I can't remember the last time I gave a report here but I know many people are praying for me and so I will try and give a bit of an update.

During the months of December and January I continued to be very weak-so weak in fact that I could not even start chemo treatments. I was able to finally take a CAT scan in December and am glad to report that the cancer has not spread. PTL

In January I was also strong enough to start chemo treatments again. My doctor and considered trying a new type of treatment but I chickened out at the last moment and decided that in my un-balanced body the last I needed to do was to try yet another new medication route.And so I am now back on my old once every three week 48hour IV chemo medication route. This seems to be working out very well. In fact at this moment as I write this I have a chemo bottle hanging around my neck and am having an IV injection through the IV injection port in my chest. It sure beats laying in a hospital bed for three days!!!

At any rate, over all I am doing ok. I am preaching every week and am also doing some Bible Studies. I also climb mountians (at a very very slow rate). I asked my doctor about this and he said it was about the best thing I could be doing and that rather than telling me to take it easy and rest more he encouraged me to climb as much as possible-mountain climbing is also a type of anti-cancer medication he said.

I want to thank all of you who are praying for me-I am sustained daily by the prayers of God's people!!!

The other day I was leading a Bible Study about Quiet Time. Afterwards I was asked when and how I myself came to read the Bible on a daily basis. I answered that rather than reading the Bible, the Bible was introduced to me by my parents reading to me every night before going to bed.

When I was maybe 3 or so, my parents started the custom of reading to me every night from the book, "Egermeier's Bible Story Book". This is basically the Bible for young children. It starts with Genesis and ends with Revelation and is very well written and laid out. I could not wait to hear the next story and looked forward to bedtime every night. As a result, by the time I made my own personal committment to believe and follow Jesus Christ I had a good over-all idea of how the Bible was laid out and what it taught. What happened in the OT and what Jesus taught in the NT etc. I will always be grateful to my parents for introducing me to the Bible-the Word of God-in this way.

However, this is quite the old book now. The copyright is 1923 and the copy that my parents used was printed in 1947. I still have it and it is real beat up but all the pages are there and it is a bit of a personal treasure for me. Whether or not it is still in print I have no idea nor do I know if second hand copies are easy to obtain or not. However, this is a classic work.

Taking the book down from my bookshelf and looking at it again I was reminded of what the Christian author. Larry Christianson, said about this book. In his book, "The Christian Family" he mentions that family devotions were going nowhere and he was concerned and did not know what to do. However, he decided to on a nightly basis gather his children and read a chapter from "Egermeier's Bible Story Book". When he did that, every night his children would be waiting and wanting to hear about what happened to Noah or Abraham or David or whoever. This book started his family on the road to good family devotions.

Looking at this old book again I was challenged that somehow each new generation of children need to be introduced to the Word of God-the Bible-in some way that will hold their interest and cause them to become lovers and students of the Bible when they are older. Again, I am so thankful that my parents were able to do that and that as a result, even now, one of the things I look forward to the most every day is to read some chapters from the Bible-the Bible never gets old. PTL.

So much has been written about "TheShack" that I am sure I have nothing to add. However, I do feel that I need to say that I thought it was a wonderful book and really challenged me about the love of God and the character of God. As I am in the midst of fighting cancer the love of God and the plans of God are especially important to me and the book was very helpful to me.

I ordered a copy in Japanese and I trust that those in my church may also read it and be challenged by it. I am not sure of the title in Japanese but it is available and so whether in English or Japanese I highly recommend reading this excellent book.

On January 26, 2009 the Christian Street Muscician Condor Sakata made his 50th climb of Mt. Kongo.Condor Sakata is an ocarina player of great talent who is also into outdoor activities. One of his jobs is to guide walking tours around the largest lake in Japan-Lake Biwa in Shiga Prefecture. I did not know that he also was climbing Mt. Kongo but over a year ago he added that to his schedule of things to do.

A few days before his 50th climb he found out that I was also a Mt. Kongo climber and as a fellow Christian he wanted to share his 50th climb with me. I had first met him in November of 2008 when we invited him to do an ocarina concert at our church. At any rate, he called me up and asked if we could do this climb together as two Christian brothers. I told him that I would be very glad and honored to do so but that I was worried about my physical condition. If I was not in good shape that day we might have to use the ropeway. He told me that was ok so we set up our plans for the 26th.

The morning of the 26th greeted us with a nice blue sky though the temperature was way down there-in other words a perfect mountain day. The climb went perfectly with us enjoying great conversation the whole time. I think it was about 90% conversation and 10% climbing! At any rate we arrived at the peak ok and I took photos of him having his card stamped for the 50th time and also a picture of him in front of the snow igloo and also standing by his new name plate that announced to the world that he had climbed 50 times.

I remember how excited I was when I did my 50th climb-I was more excited then than when I did my 100th climb or my 1000th climb or my 1500th climb. Your 50th climb proves that you can do it. If you can climb 50 times you can climb 100 or 1000 or 2000 times or whatever!

On the way down, when the snow had thinned out, we found a comfortable place and he played several hymns on his ocarina. The beautiful sound of hymns being played on an ocarna in the middle of a mountian valley is just wonderful. I think the valley sides served to send the sound all over the mountain.

I am so happy to have yet another fellow Christian climber on Mt. Kongo. In Condor Sakata's case this means that the sound of Christian hymns will also be heard more and more. Wonderful! PTL

For those of us cliimbing Mt. Kongo on a regular basis, the first snow of the year is always an exciting time. Actually, snow can fall on Mt. Kongo as early as October-however, early snow almost always totally melts away. Thus, the thousands of people who climb Mt. Kongo during the New Year holidays do not always see snow. However, this year has turned out to be a good year for snow. The whole mountain is nicely covered. In fact, some of the parking lots are icy and hard to get to.

On thhe 3rd of January I made my first official climb of Mt. Kongo for 2009. The way the trees were snow covered and frozen was really really beautiful-I gave up counting the number of camera men with tripods and huge lenses. The cold and snow also brought out the wild birds who hoped for a hand out of seed from camera men who hoped to get the "picture". Quite a few birds came up to me and were not too happy that I was not a seed carrying camera man but just a plain hiker with nothing to give them.

The only problem with the snow this year is that it is not quite deep enough to make an igloo. The staff at the top of the mountain always make an igloo but this year they have started but still not been able to actually make an igloo.

However, there is plenty of snow for sledding so there were lots of happy kids around. Also lots of tired parents pulling their kids in their sleds. The kids looked perfectly happy but the parents doing the pulling had that, "Never again" look on their faces.

At any rate, the snow season has come to Mt. Kongo and it will be a busy time for the next few months. My rock climbing equipment is sitting sadly in my office with no use while my American winter boots are proving their worth. Not only in keeping me warm but in starting conversations. Most conversations start with "My, those are nice boots-where did you buy them?" This usually leads to some new friendships.

And so the time of snow has come to Mt. Kongo once again.

I will remember the deeds of the LORD;
yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago.

I will meditate on all your works
and consider all your might deeds.

Psalm 77:11-12 NIV

Again this year I have been thinking about the unique place that Christmas holds in the church in Japan. Of course Christmas is important in all churches all around the world. However, my memories of church and Christmas in America centered on attending Christmas events with fellow Christians as opposed to Japan where Christmas (at least for me and our church here) is centered on evangelism.

I am in Japan based on Matthew 28:18-20. Many of our baptisms take place at Christmas. Christmas is one of the few times that our church can be filled with people who have never been to church before. It is also the time that many people make the decision to become disciples of Jesus.

Yesterday, we had our Christmas Service. Miss N was baptized and she gave a wonderful testimony of how she came to believe in Jesus after hearing a sermon based on the calling of Mattew where Jesus told Matthew to come and follow Me. Mattew was a tax collector and a sinner but Jesus went on to say that He came to call sinners and not righteous people to Himself. I do not have an exact figure but there was a huge number of non-Christians in church who were able to hear this testimony and to see a Christian baptism take place. And of course also it was a chance for people to hear about the true meaning of Christmas-to hear the Christmas Story read straight from the Bible.

Christmas is also a time when we have a big meal together at church. It is a chance to relax together and talk together-again with many people who normally are not in church and where this might be the only chance to talk with them. I was overjoyed to see the church packed with people and to see and hear the gospel being proclaimed through not only preaching and testimony but through songs and private conversations.

Again this year I was impressed by the fact that Christmas continues to be a tremendous time for evangelism and for the church in Japan. Please pray that many of the people who heard the gospel this year will follow through with more visits to church or with more talks with Christians. Thank you Jesus for Christmas! Amen!

On December 7th, 2008 I finally met my guardian angel. My angel appeared in the form of a wheelchair opperator at the Osaka Kansai International Airport. I arrived back in Japan from my Thanksgiving visit to America in very bad shape indeed. I was so anemic and weak that I could not walk more than 2 or 3 steps at a time. However, there was a wheelchair and a wheelchair opperator waiting at the door of the plane and from that moment I felt I was in Heaven-all I had to do was to sit quietly while the wheelchair opperator wheeled me through customs and all the way to my sister-in-law's waiting car. I was so weak that I did not feel like talking and in fact did not hardly talk at all except to tell one of the officers that my condition was caused by cancer and was not some rare tropical disease that should keep me out of Japan. At any rate I have never been so thankful as I was to this un-named wheelchair opperator-I am sure he was an angel send by God to help me.

From the airport I went straight to bed and the next day talked to my doctor. The following day he had me come in for an IV and I am now eating normally and my strength is coming back. In fact, I am feeling very very good right now. Thank you for all of your prayers and I would continue to ask for them.

While the Bible assuredly insists that man still bears the divine image, although impaired by his fall into sin, it nonetheless stresses God's ontological as well as well as moral and noetic otherness; divine revelation is not manipulatable through man's initiative and mystical techniques, but is mediated everywhere at God's initiative through the Logos of God. The Bible, moreover, represents this mediated divine disclosure as rational and objective, and not as transcending logical distinctions and the sphere of truth-and-error. That the Logos of God is central to the Godhead is an unyielding scriptural emphasis. While there is a mystery side to God, revelation is mystery dispelled and conveys information about God and his purposes.

Page 73 of God, Revelation, and Authority Volume I by Carl F. H. Henry

Modern scientific culture thinks that the great problem of human history is the control of man's external environment and that man himself has the wisdom and skill to achieve an ideal heaven and earth. Christianity holds that the problem of the universe centers in man himself, contemporary man included, who does not recognize the revelation of his transcendent Creator and Lord, and who subdues nature not according to God's spiritual mandate and purpose but in quest of his own comfort and wealth. Man the sinner presumes to displace the divine Creator; he exploits nature for his own use, indeed, for personal security in flaunting moral and spiritual imperatives. He shuts he eyes and heart to the revelation of the Logos in nature and conscience and reason, as well as in the Word incarnate and written.

Page 42 of God, Revelation, and Authority Volume I by Carl F. H. Henry

Reiko and I are now in Maryville, Tennessee for Thanksgiving. My doctor gave me the ok for this trip and so we are very thankful to God that is has worked out. However, traveling is very hard on my system and I have had one very bad night here. By God's grace I am now all right but I can tell that taking this trip was a challenge to say the least. I would ask all of you who support us in prayer to please pray that I will have the needed strength for the return trip on the 6th of December.

My brothe, Dave, is now here with my folks and we are enjoying daily fellowship together. For my health, Reiko and I are staying at a motel in Maryville. I am looking forward to Thanksgiving dinner with my family-we have a lot to be thankful for. Of course, for me personally, my biggest thanks is that by God's grace I am still alive! I will be visiting my doctor here in Tennessee and also catching up with friends in America.

Thank you for your prayers and please keep praying for us. I need prayer about my physical condition and Reiko needs prayer for her mental and spiritual condition as she supports me in my fight against cancer.

The New Testament exhortation is for Christians to be always ready to defend our claims against anyone who asks a reason for the hope we hold. (1 Peter 3:15) Hope without reason has little in common with the Christian hope which is focused on Jesus Christ, who has come and is coming again. True Christian hope is always Christological in its foundation.

From the Introduction to "God, Revelation, and Authority" Volume I by Carl F. H. Henry

Patti Davis speaking about her father, Ronald Reagan

"He did have something special with God; he talked to God all the time. It didn't mean that he was anymore special in God's eyes or that he believed that. We are all special with God. It's not that God's speaking to anybody more than anyone else, it's that some people choose to listen. And talk back. And my father talked to God. That's what I got as a child, I got that he just talked to God all the time. He just had conversations with God."

Page 154 of "When Character Was King" by Peggy Noonan

This is from Peggy Noonan's book, "When Character Was King" and is talking about Ronald Reagan's mother.

"She was busy and bustling and she believed completely in what was known as, in the title of a popular book of the era, The Christian's Secret of a Happy Life. This was the secret: Jesus is with you, is aware of your life and fully engaged init; God is in everything; He will let little befall you that will not be to the ultimate benefit of your soul. Sometimes He steps aside for trouble coming your way but only if it will refine you or prepare you to be with Him someday in heaven, where you'll know a happiness beyond all human understanding. So there is no cause then for sadness, only for joy. "Do not be afraid.""

Page 20 of When Character Was King by Peggy Noonan

Why do I so enjoy rock climbing? What makes it so special to me ? I have been asking myself these questions lately and that has brought back some childhood memories of mine while growing up in Shiga Prefecture, Japan.

My earliest memories of "outside" play are of me playing in the traditional Japanese garden of the WEC Japan headquarters. This building and garden was built by a rich "Ohmi Shounin" (a merchant from the Ohmi area of Japan now known as Shiga) and was huge. In the garden were quite a number of really large boulders and my main activity there was climbing them. For a small child some of them presented quite the challenge. Also, some were in groups so that smaller boulders had to be first climbed in order to get to the top of a larger boulder.So, for me, "play" in the outdoors first meant climbing boulders.

When I got a bit older, the younger missionaries used to take me with them when they went on outings, These outings usually consisted of climbing the nearby Mt. Kinugasa. And of course this involved even more boulders-only larger. It also exposed me to real rock faces and I had a great time climbing there.

Finally, when I was in grade school I was able to attend many of the church summer camps held at the WEC campsite located near Lake Biwa. For most campers the beautiful beach of white sand was central but for me the endless line of boulders on both sides of the beach was more interesting. I spent endless hours climbing these boulders and sometimes seeing how far I could get out into the lake by jumping from one boulder to the next. I attended these camps all the way through my junior high school years and never stopped enjoying climbing the boulders there.

These memories of mine seem to be the answer to my questions to myself about why I enjoy rock climbing so much. Rock climbing has always been a part of my life and it looks like it will continue to be so. I am now in my 50s but I meet many rock climbers in their 60s and 70s and they seem to enjoy the rocks and the mountians now just as much as ever. So, I will no doubt do the same.

I really believe that anyone who bears the name of Jesus Christ has a calling, whether they're a pastor or a layperson. We must all surender ourselves fully and make ourselves completely available to God. We must all ask, "What's my mission, God? Where do you want me to serve? What role would you have me play in your grand kingdom drama?"

Pages 185-186 "Courageous Leadership" by Bill Hybels

Let no one apologize for the powerful emphasis Christianity lays upon the doctrine of the world to come. Right there lies its immense superiority to everything else within the whole sphere of human thought or experience....We do well to think of the long tomorrow.

A.W. Tozer

Reiko and I just got back from three days in Nagasaki. I found it to be one of the most unique Japanese cities that I have ever been in. The main reason is that one of the major attractions of the city is the city's churches. In fact, the first place that many tourists first visit would be the Oura Tenshudo Church which was constructed in 1864 to honor the 26 martyrs of Nagasaki. These 26 Christians were arrested for their faith in Kyoto and then marched to Nagasaki in the middle of the winter for the express purpose of seeing them all die on 26 crosses waiting for them there. The youngest was only 12 while the oldest believer was 61 years old.

Another place that a tourist might decide to make the first place to visit is the monument that stands in honor of these 26 believers. In fact, throughout the city of Nagasaki these 26 martyrs seemed to either follow us or be waiting for us.

The last church that we visited was the Urakami Tenshudo Church-another spot that most tourists visit. Our first reaction was very negative-it just seemed like a large modern church. However, things are often not what they seem on the surface. The Christians of the Urakami area went underground for 200 years while Christianity was banned. When they were free to surface the first thing that they did was to build the largest Catholic Church in East Asia.with their own hands. This was their way of expressing their faith. All the persecution in the world could not stop them from believing in and following the true God. However, on August 9, 1945 the A-bomb was dropped on Nagasaki and totally destroyed the church. Again, the first thing that the Urakami believers did after the war was to rebuild their beloved church. Their message was that neither persecution nor A-bombs could destroy their faith in God ! And so, even though it is a modern building, it is a church with great meaning

And of course besides the famous 26 martyrs were many many others who gave thier life for their faith. In each case, the message was the same. Believing in and following Jesus was more important than life itself. The confession, "I believe in Jesus Christ" was the road to physical death while the confession, "I renounce Jesus Christ" was the way to physical life. I am now fighting cancer but it is simply a sickness that has come upon me which I need to accept while the believers of Nagasaki of their own free will chose suffering and death. This was a great challenge to me.

On our last evening in Nagasaki, Reiko and I visited the church next to the Oura Tenshudo. This was a church built for prayer here and now rather than looking back to the past. We enjoyed a time of prayer and meditation there. Again, I was amazed at the city of Nagasaki. A Japanese city with a unique message-To die for Christ is the way to Eternal Life. I am sure that all the students and young people who visit this city are forced to think about what is most important to them. Is there anything that they believe in that is worth giving up their life for? And of course those most basic questions of all-Does God really exist? and Who is Jesus Christ? Is He really the Son of God and our Savior from sin?

On our last day in Nagasaki we got into our taxi to go to the train station and found out that our taxi driver was a Christian. In his taxi he has a book that listed every one of the churches in the city and we spent most of our time talking about Christianity and faith. Only in Nagasaki would such a thing happen! I trust that God will use this city to challenge people about the importance of faith in God and the importance of Eternal Values.

After nearly a year I have finally been able to solve a major problem at the Mt. Makio rock climbing area.

Mountain climbers and rock climbers have different goals. A mountain climber has the goal of climbing a certain peak. A rock climber, on the other hand, often has the goal of solving a certain climbing problem. This problem may involve only a few feet of rock or it may involve hundreds of feet. At any rate, the rock climber has to figure out how to get up that certain section of rock. Interestinly, many mathematicians are also rock climbers. They seem to use the same brain cells for thier mathematics as they do in figuring out moves on rock. As I am not a mathematician maybe that is why this particular problem has taken me so long to solve !

The problem I set out to solve about a year ago is a rock formation called the Chimney. The name needs no explanation-the climb involves climbing a tube of rock shaped like a chimney. However, this formation is located way at the top of the rock climbing area and so getting used to the hight alone took some time. Then I had to figure out the moves involved in actually climbing this route. About once a month, starting about a year ago, I have working on this section of rock. Overall it is about 120 (40 meters) feet of climbing. The first section was quite easy and the second section was just a mattter of getting used to the hight. However, the last two sections were a real bear. The moves were few and far apart and a lot of time it seemed that the only thing that would work would be basic friction rather than actual holds-not a happy propect when you are way up high ! However, I finally was able to figure it all out and have now climbed the entire route several times. There is something very exciting about climbing a route that has taken that long to figure out. The hight is always the same so it is always scary but of course that is what make is special.

I suppose in time I will start working on other even harder problems but for now I am just happy to have solved the problem of the Mt. Makio Chimney and plan on enjoying climbing it for some time to come.

On Friday the 22nd I checked into the Kindai Hospital. It was the same old problem, my colon just decided to quit working. One good thing was that my main doctor, Dr. Sato, was on duty that morning and arranged for me to be hospitalized. My bad condition had started at about 10pm on Thursday night and continued on till about 4pm on Friday. At noon, on Friday, they put me on an IV and I was ordered to not eat or drink anything-this continued till noon on Monday. However, around 4pm on Friday my colon started to move again on its own and my doctor said that I was over the hump. However, it would take time to really get my colon moving again as it should so I needed to continue the IV treatment.

Things went smoothly and so at noon on Monday the 25th I was able to eat my first meal since noon of the 21st. I continued to improve and so I was able to come home on Wednesday the 27th.

It will take some time for my colon to recover and for me to gain back my strength and so my next chemotherapy treatment will not be till the 16th of September.

I want to thank all of you who have been praying for me and would also like to request that you continue to pray that God will give me the grace and the strength to do all that I am to do here in Japan.

I did not enjoy the IV treatment at all but I did enjoy lots of good fellowship with Christians who came to visit me and I also was able to do a lot of enjoyable reading. PTL

Please continue to pray for me-thanks. Paul

"I have often said that the sole cause of man's unhappiness is that he does not know how to stay quietly in his room." Blaise Pascal

It was 55 years ago that I first came to Japan with my parents and settled on the east coast of the largest lake in Japan-Lake Biwa.I grew up wondering what was on the other side of the lake. Well, now I know.

For two days the four Bethany churches in Japan got together on the west coast of Lake Biwa for our annual summer camp. Last year I was in the States and was not able to attend but by God's grace this year I was able to attend and had a wonderful time. Looking out across the lake I thought about the fact that it was pretty amazing that 55 years after coming to Japan with my parents I should be here by Lake Biwa with a group of Japanese Christians.

With the small churches in Japan it is important at times to get together with other churches and other Christians for a fime of fellowship. At our annual camp, we always have the singer/sonwriter Noboru Morishige come and present the message that God has given him through both his songs and his sharing. Our main theme this year was Belief while the small group that I was in had as their theme, Who do you believe? What do you believe? and When do you believe? The answers to Who do you believe were very interesting ranging from Jesus and God to My Mom and Myself!

Camp is also a time to really get to know people as there is ample time to talk. Japan is a busy country and finding the time to really relax and just talk is really quite hard. And of course to really get to know people you need that kind of time and I thought it was wonderful to see people using the camp to do just that-though it seems some people talked all night long which is overdoing a good thing!

At any rate we had a good camp with no accidents and everyone who attended was really blessed. The high gas prices were even a blessing as the roads were much less crowded this year as a result !

Last year everyone at the camp prayed for me in the States that my operation might go smoothly but many people thought I would not be able to make it back to Japan much less attend camp again. And as a result many many people came up to me and told me how happy they were to see me there and that they could hardly believe it. For me personally, one of the highlights was to have everyone lay hands on me and pray for me. As a pastor I am used to praying for people but through my sickness I am learning also how to be prayed for.

Please remember the four Bethany churches in prayer-the Sakai and Suzuka Bethany Churches and the Kawachinagano and Kyoto New Life Churches. All four are Bethany churches but Kawachinagano and Kyoto have decided to use the name, New Life, rather than the name Bethany for their individual churches.

Reiko and I were able once again to attend the annual Takarazuka Bluegrass Festival. This is a four day day festival held in the mountains of Hyogo Prefecture and features non-stop bluegrass music from early morning on into the wee hours of the next day. What is interesting is that a majority of the music is basic Gospel music. Typical themes are sin, salvation, Heaven, prayer, Jesus, and church.Every other song or so is of this type. Most of the songs are sung in English and so it is possible to be blessed by a whole lot of Gospel music in a short time. Of course the question that a Christian asks is, "Are the singers Christians?". And the answer is no. However, it is significant that hundreds of people have decided that it is better to spend their time singing about Jesus than it is to sing rock or folk or popular songs. They have found something in this music that touches their hearts.

However, usually there are at least two musicians at the festiva who are born again Christains. They are the Singer/Songwriter Morishige San and the banjo player Inaida San. Morishige San writes original songs in Japanese and is a real "messenger" of the gospel of Jesus. Christ. His songs always really speak to the people and leave them something to think about. Plus, on Sunday morning, the festival allows him to be in charge of what they call Gospel Time. It is not exactly church but it does mean that on Sunday morning there is a spot of time set aside to sing praises to Jesus.

Inaida San sings and plays traditional bluegrass music. However, he has a great burden that the message of the songs gets out and so he translates traditional bluegrass gospel music into Japanese and presents these songs at the festival. There are a lot of wonderful songs that most people at the festival know but do not understand the words or the message. It is these songs that Iaida San translates so that people know not only the tunes but also the message of the songs.

My favorite song to hear this year was "Are you Washed in the Blood of the Lamb?" This song was sung with deep feeling-my prayer is that the singers will in time go beyond the feeling to touch the message of this great old song. May the message get out!

"The leaf hanging from the tree does not fall, nor does either of the two sparrows sold for a farthing fall to the ground, nor does anything else whatsoever happen without God's providence and will either intending it as a particular or permitting it as a particular."

Luis Molina, Concordia (Page 554 of Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview by J.P. Moreland and William Lane Craig)

It is that time of year again when the cool canyons of the Japanese mountains start calling. With the daily temperature in the 90s there is something very attractive about the idea of a cool valley where the temperature is in the low 70s. Add to that a cool breeze and the sound of natural flowing water and it is nearly impossible to not seek out a canyon to climb.

Mr. N and I choose to climb the Marutaki Valley located on the north side of Mt. Kongo. The north side is the "wild" side of Mt. Kongo where few people live and few people venture into the mountains.

We knew we were getting near the entrance to the valley when the still hot air changed to cool moving air. We were soon in the canyon following the stream which was our only path. At the first large waterfall we took a picture and coffee break and then pushed on into the depths of the valley. From the first waterfall on it was just one waterfall after another but as this valley has become popular recently there was always a rope wherever getting up a particular waterfall seemed difficult.

Finally, we came to the side valley that contained the waterfall that gives the valley its name-the Marutaki-the Maru Waterfall. There we took another break and prepared for our escape from the valley. I say "escape" because the only way out it is to climb a high rock wall-you either climb the rock wall or you are stuck in the valley with no way to get out.

In a Japanese map this place is marked as an "akuba" which means that it is dangerous and that care must be taken. Here, we actually had to use a rope to get out but we made it out ok and started up the last stretch of the now waterless valley. At that point, the sky turned black and we heard thunder. We got ready for a real soaking but the rain really never came except for a few drops that caught us nearly at the end of the trail.

About three hours after we started we found ourselves at the peak of Mt. Kongo and ready for a late lunch.At the peak the temperature was even cooler-only 64 degrees. It was hard to imagine the 90 degree weather at the foot of the mountain but all good things have to end sometime and so after lunch we headed down the south side of the mountain to be picked up by my patient wife waiting in the car there.

I think I have discovered the perfect way to spend a hot summer day!

I am now listening to a really great CD. It is "Soliloquy" by David Qualey. David is not really an American Primitive Guitar player but is for sure a great finger style guitar player. He has been described as an "American classical guitarist now living in Germany". As all American Primitive Guitar players mix in classical playiing or have classical influences I think that I can include David Qualey in that group.

I suspect he is not so well known in America (or in Japan) as he lives and records in Germany. I also suspect he is quite well known in Europe. At any rate, after having known his name for many many years I finally was able to get his one and only Windom Hill CD called, "Soliloquy. It is a real feast for the ears! I believe that his "Opus 20" and "Santa Cruz" are well known among guitarists. These two tunes are both on the CD plus 10 other original compositions. Though he is called a "claissical" player, he does not play the classics-rather he plays his own original compositions. He plays in a "classical" style but his music is much more than that.

I strongly recommend this CD-however, there is one big drawback. It is not in production now and so the only CDs available are second hand and they are very very expensive. If I had not been looking for this CD for such a long time I never would have bought it but for me personally it has turned out to be worth the high price.

At any rate, David Qualey is a really great guitarist-I am sure his more recent work is also great. Check him out if you have the chance!

"It has been said by someone that the proper study of mankind is man. I will not oppose the idea, but I believe that it is equally true that the proper study of God's elect is God; the proper study of a Christian is the Godhead. The highest science, the loftiest speculation, the mightiest philosophy, which can ever engage the attention of a child of God, is the name, the nature, the person, the work, the doings, and the existence of the great God whom he calls his Father."

Charles Spurgeon, Sunday morning sermon, January 7, 1855

Amen!

1600 times! Today, I climbed Mt. Kongo for the 1600th time. The Rainy Season cooperated and in spite of the 50% chance of rain forecast, the weather was wonderful-nice and sunny. I enjoyed a cup of coffee at the peak and then enjoyed my noon meal at the lodge about a mile from the peak. My heart was full of thanksgiiving as I thought back to July of 2007 when I was diagnosed with cancer. Of course one of the things that I thought at that time was that I might not be able to climb Mt. Kongo anymore.

However, as I prayed after my operation in America in September of 2007 God clearly led me back to Japan-not only to preach and to do Bible Studies but also to continue to climb mountains. And so I have been able to continue to climb Mt Kongo on a regular basis-often alone but sometimes with Mr. K from our church.

The question that always comes up is why climb the same mountain? Well, for one thing Mt. Kongo has about 100 official and un-official trails-each ridge and each valley seems to have its own trail. Each trail is totally different. So it is really like climbing 100 different mountains.

Also, Mt. Kongo under 2 feet of snow and Mt. Kongo in the heat of summer is like 2 different mountains. And of course the same thing applies to spring and fall-Mt. Kongo with fresh green leaves and cherry blossoms and Mt. Kongo with fall colors and falling leaves again is like two different mountains. Not to mention the weather and the time of day. Climbing Mr. Kongo in a blizzard is an experience not to forget as is climbing at sunrise and at sunset.

At any rate, climbing Mt. Kongo is never boring-I look forward to each new climb with expectation.
By the way, Mr. Hirano has climbed Mt. Kongo over 10,000 times so climbing 1600 times is not considered much of a feat among the Mt. Kongo climbing community. So, I plan to continue to climb Mt. Kongo, not to set any records but to enjoy the fresh air and good scenery and good company of other climbers that I meet there.

If you live in the Osaka area, try climbing Mt. Kongo some time. And if you live outside of Japan, when you make that visit to Japan and come to Osaka, think about adding a hike up to the peal of Mt. Kongo to your travel plans.

"The idea of God has guided or deluded more lives, changed more history, inspired more music and poetry and philosophy than anything else, real or imagined. It has made more of a difference to human life on this planet, both individually and collectively, than anything else ever has,."

AMEN!!!

On the 24th of June I went into the Kinki University Hospital for a CT scan. The report was very positive as the scan discovered no new cancer outbreaks or spreading. The cancer in my rectum has stayed the same size though the section spreading into my bladder seems to be a bit less than before. My blood test was also good and I was able to start my regular chemotherapy treatment that day. My doctor has also decided to do chemotherapy once every 3 weeks instead of once every 2 weeks as the chemotherapy seems to be keeping my cancer in check just fine with that schedule. PTL

Overall I am in very good health. My doctor seems to be givng me all the right medication to cut down on side-effects so that I hardly have any. Right at this minute I have a portable chemotherapy container hanging around my neck and am receiving an IV injection but am feeling fine as I type this while enjoying a good cup of hot coffee.

I am preaching at my church every Sunday and also teaching several Bible Studies. I am also keeping up my mountain climbing schedule-hiking at Mt. Kongo and rock climbing at Mt. Makio.

Thank you so much for all of your prayers. I really believe I am alive today because of the prayers of my church people, my Chirstian friends and contacts, and of course my fellow missionaries around the world. Thank you so much!!!

And finally, please continue to pray for me and for Reiko as we try to walk by faith and not by sight and to walk in victory and not in defeat keeping our eyes on our Good Shepherd, Jesus.

1 Corinthians 10:13 "No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it." NKJV

The following is Jay E. Adams' remarks about this verse.

"Secondly, Paul says that Christians can't say "can't", because even though the basic designs are not unique, temptations and tests are tailor-made to each individual; and God is the Tailor.He will not allow the Devil to tempt them above that which they are able to withstand. The book of Job stands as a sturdy witness to this promise. At any given period in his life, what a Christian is able to withstand may differ from his previous ability or from that which God will enable him to endure at a future time. But whatever the test may be at any moment, it is not beyond his ability to withstand in Christ. Given the grace (help) of God, given his knowledge of God' Word, given the sanctification that is his to that point, given the resources of the Holy Spirit, no test is beyond his ability to withstand. It may be that it is only in stepping out to do God's will that the strength will come. God does not promise dying grace before it is time to die."

Amen!

page 132 of "Competent To Counsel"

I am now re-reading that great book that came out in 1970 called "Competent to Counsel" by Jay E. Adams. His emphasis on personal responsibility, the need for real repentance, and the transforming power of the Word of God and the Holy Spirit is like a breath of fresh air in this day and age.

The title of course comes from the fact that Jay Adams believes that if a person is a Christian and has the Bible, the Word of God, he has at his disposal all that is needed to counsel people and to be a good counselor, And of course he believes that Christian counseling should consist of applying the Word of God to our lives and obeying it. Also, that sin is the main cause of the problems that we have and that the place to start is always with repentance and re-newed faith in Jesus Christ and in God.

As this is an old book I suspect many of you may have a copy in your bookshelf collecting dust. I would challenge you to dust it off and read it once again. Orif you have not read or heard of this book before, think about buying or borrowing a copy and give it a read-it will bless you,

Hebrews 4:12 "For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart." NIV

Romans 1:16 " For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek." KJV

AMEN !

"Ontological priority even governs the evangel. All four Gospels are bent on aswering one primary question: Who is Jesus? It is not what he did or even what he said that is the first matter of importance. It is who he was. If he is understood to be who he was, then his teaching will be powerful and existential, not just abstractly true, and his life, death and resurrection will be among the most significant events of the cosmos."

Page 57 of "Naming the Elephant" by James W. Sire

There are two sounds that I can hear when I go rock climbing at Mt. Makio that I cannot ever hear while I am at home here in the New Town.

The first sound is the sound that a swift (Japanese: Ama Tsubame) makes as it cuts through the still air. Near our church we daily see many barn swallows and they seem to fly so fast and yet they make no sound. A swift looks like a large swallow but it flies so fast that there is actually a "swish" sound as it passes by. The first time I heard this sound I did not know what it was but now I look forward to seeing and hearing the swifts as they fly over the cliffs and rocks of the climbing area.

The second sound is a more sinister sound and I have only heard it only once. It is the sound that a rock or stone makes as it comes down the mountain at tremendous speed. It is a "whine" and a "buzz". Actually, it sounds like a wasp or a bee. However, when you look around to find the insect, instead you hear the sound of a rock shattering on the valley floor. And then you know that you were in the right place at the right time as that particular rock did not hit you-that it was close enough to hear but that was all. As I said at the beginning I have only heard this sound once and I hope not to hear it again-at least for a long while. But it is a unique sound and I am glad that I at least know what it sounds like.

Needless to say, I will continue to enjoy the sound of the swifts and continue to dread hearing the other sound. And I will certainly be careful to not drop any loose stones or rocks down the mountain and be myself the cause of that awful "buzzing" sound to be heard by others who might be on the mountain that day!

The man who is living in full dependence on God is not concerned whether he is tired or strong, whether he feels healthy or sick; he has learned to receive from his God promptings for service. If he feels he must rise early, for him that is the will of God, necessary in order that he go safely through the day. He, childlike, goes to his Father, saying, "Give me from the moment I rise my daily bread," and that includes the Spirit of God working in the mortal body, so that body, soul, and spirit become, moment by moment, what the Lord wants them to be for His Service.

Page 274 of The Spirit of Christ

According to the 2002 April edition of "Acoustic Guitar" American Primitive Guitar is "a style of instrumental guitar playing that favors open tunings and deft fingerpicking with roots in traditional folk and blues as well as more contemporary sources".

"In the regenerate man there is no more subtle temptation than this-that even in the service of God, self still seeks to assert itselt in its will and strength to do God's will, instead of waiting in dependence on the Holy Spirit for Him to work, to will, and to do. This is why the Lord Jesus said so distinctly, "Let a man deny himself, and take up his cross";the life and the power of self must be sacrificed and given up for the Spirit to work. Even so He speaks of our hating and loving our life ((soul) if we are to find the true life, the life of the Spirit." Page 230 of The Spirit of Christ

Yesterday I climbed the Katora Valley with Mr. K. I had a specific reaason for climbing this valley at this time. The Katora Valley contains probably the best wild flower field in all of Mt. Kongo. There are several types of flowers which take their turn blooming there but the most famous is a flower called ICHI RIN SOU in Japanese. Another type called NI RIN SOU is also famous. These are both small white flowers that totally cover the ground in the upper parts of the valley. Both sides of the trail are totally covered with flowers-a wonderful sight. Mr. K and I were able to see these flowers in full bloom.

Another aspect of the valley that we enjoyed was the spring green. The shade of green in all of the valley was just un-believable. I am sure I see it every spring but each year I am amazed again.

A third high light of climbing the Katora Valley is the natural spring located about half way up the main trail. Here, a spring flows from a rock face, For the past 20 years I have never seen it run dry or for that matter increase in any way-there is just a steady flow of cold clear water. Mr. K and I talked about Moses in the desert when he had water flow from the rock. Some people might thing water does not usually flow from solid rock but our experience has been that that is the most common way for springs to appear. It looks like the water is flowing from solid rock.

For those of you who live in the Osaka area, it is still not too late. Climb the Katora Valley and enjoy the spring flowers!

I climbed Mt. Kongo today and was surprised to see that the cherry blossoms were all in full bloom Of course the cherry blossoms at the park peaked about a month ago but I thought that the cherry blossoms at the peak of Mt. Kongo would also be be gone by now. The Mt. Kongo Cherry Blossom Festival is held on the 3rd of the May and so that is usually when they are at their best. However, this year they seem to be late.

I was especially excited to be able to see the Kongo Cherry Tree in full bloom. This is a type of cherry that is only found on Mt.Kongo and the official name of the type of tree is Kongo Cherry. The blossoms are almost blue-a very strange and beautiful color. At any rate I had a wonderful time taking pictures of flowers and had the experience of being able to see early spring twice this year-once in the New Town where I live in April and now once more at the peak of Mt. Kongo.

I also went looking for KATAKURI flowers but I was too late for them-all I could see were the leaves and even the leaves will soon disappear till next year when they again will pop out of the ground and delight us with their purple flowers.

The first church service at Bethany Church was in 1980. However, the seeds for this work were planted in 1974 and 1975 at the Omega Coffeehouse in Umeda. My original vision for evangelism in Japan was not through a church but through a Christian coffeehouse.

Over a dozen young Christians from various local Osaka churches joined me in this venture. However it was not long lived and I realized that God was calling me to a more traditional type of outreach-in other words church planting and pastoring.

However, to go from running a Christian coffeehouse to pastoring a church is not an easy process. I am forever thankful that this group of young Christians that gathered at the Omega coninued to support me with prayer and advice and all manner of other help. As a result, in 1980 I was able to start the Bethany Christian Church. However, the Omega people continued to pray for and support Reiko and I. and this support has continued to the present.

One of our main co-workers at the Omega was Shin Chan. He is a Christian Singer/Songwriter and often gave lived gospel concerts at the Omega. Last week he called me up and suggested that we get together to record some of the songs that we used to sing back in the 70s.

And so, yesterday, he brought all his recording equipment and we set up a bit of a recording studeo in our upstairs spare room. We ended up recording 4 songs.

The first was "Glory Glory". This was a song that really sustained me throught the first 2 or 3 years of my missionary work. It is a simple song that I could sing anytime to encourage myself and also if I was placed in front of a crowd of people I could alwasy share a bit about my relationship with Jesus Christ and then sing this song. Besides Shin Chan and I we also got Reiko to join in on this song.

The second song ended up being a secular song-"Country Roads" of John Denver fame. It was a song we sang an awful lot back then and so decided to record it even though it is not a gospel song.

The third song we recorded was "Since I Opened uo the Door" by Lovesong. The only problem was we could not remember neither the melody nor the words! I went searching and found an old tape with the song in Japanese. Through that tape we were able to remember the melody and also the English words of the chorus. So, we recorded it in Japanese with the chorus in English.

Finally, as kind of an afterthought, I recorded "I've Got Peace Like a River"-another simple song that we sang often at various and sundry meetings.

Recording these songs was a wonderful experience as it was a chance to think back about all the help and guidance that God has given us over the years. All the members of the Omega group are serving God in the place where He has put them. It is wonderful to realize that God is alive and He never stops working-the same God who was working in the 70s is now working in 2008. Praise the Lord!

When I came to Japan as a missionary in 1973 I had no idea what Golden Week was. Either the term was not used in the 50s and 60s when I was living in Shiga Prefecture or it just had no relationship to the Sunde family schedule. At any rate I had no knowledge of Golden Week-usually spoken of as GW.

What Golden Week is is a period of time in Japan where there are so many national holidays that the whole work force pretty much takes it easy for a week. The holidays are April 29th, May 3rd, May 4th, May 5th, and May 6th.

Whap happens during Golden Week? Basically, people that can afford it take long trips while others take in a lot of day trips or just spend their time taking it easy at home I have done all of the above. Some years ago, Reiko and I and the Dugan family took a very nice trip to the Shinshu area of Japan during GW. Shinshu is kind of like Minnesota and so it was a lot of fun.

This year, so far, I only have one special event in my schedule. On the 1st, Shin Chan, who I used to do music ministry with back in the 70s, will be coming over and we hope to do some music together and actually do some recording if possible.

Many years on the 3rd of May I head to Mt. Kongo for their annual awards ceremony. Last year, I received an award for climbing Mt. Kongo 1500 times. My friend and fellow Bethany Church member, Mr. K, received a medal for climbing 100 times. I may or may not make it this year. Interestingly, because Mt. Kongo is over 1,000 meters high, the cherry blossoms are in full bloom on the 3rd so that event is known as the Mt. Kongo Cherry Blossom Festival.

At any rate, if you know people in Japan and are having a hard time contacting them, it is probably because of GW. Wait a week and try again and they will be back on the job..

"The flesh and the Spirit are the two powers. Under the rule of either, every act is done. Let our every step be a walk after and through the Spirit." page 190 of The Spirit of Christ

Amen

"The flesh and the Spirit are the two powers. Under the rule of either, every act is done. Let our every step be a walk after and through the Spirit." page 190 of The Spirit of Christ

Amen

It is that time of year again! This morning I just could not get myself to head in the direction of Mt. Kongo.It is still cold and the leaves are not yet out at the peak.

Instead, I took down my rock climbing shoes and headed off towards Mt. Makio. There, all the leaves were out and the late cherry blossoms were in full bloom. The sky was blue and the sun was warm-a perfect day to start the 2008 rock climbing season.

Because of my weak body, it took me a bit of time to get to the main rock climbing area. However, that was just more time to enjoy the scenery and to take pictures. The rock was just like I remembered it from last year-nice and dry and just waiting to be climbed.

I had a very enjoyable climb up to the main ledge where I enjoyed the view and a cup of coffee for a long long time. I then headed up to the peak to again enjoy the breeze and the view and a second cup of coffee.

I'm sure I will still continue to climb Mt. Kongo but at the same time I am pretty sure that when the weather is good, I will mostly be climbing the rocks at Mt. Makio. After the snow and the cold it is great to enjoy a different kind of mountain and a different kind of climbing.

"The really hard life is the one lived in opposition to Jesus' path. All you need to do is to look at how hard life is for folks who cannot forgive others, who desperately need to be the focus of attention, who have to be in control of everything, who are driven to succeed to prove they are significant. This is the hard life, not the life of self-denial. As one gets good at self-deial for the Kingdom, life gets prgressively easier."

Page 148 of "Kingdom Triangle"

On the 8th of April, Reiko and I celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary by taking a three day trip to Okinawa. It was a wonderful three days of relaxing and thanking the Lord for all these years together.

However, I realized that it was also my 30th anniversary of being involved in Christian Church work here in Japan. I had at first been involved in youth ministry and also in music. However, God clearly spoke to me that the need in Japan was for more churches and that church planting and pastoring was what I was to do. When I was younger, I had decided that being a missionary was the one thing I would not do. However, if I did become a missionary, Japan was the one country I was going to avoid. Finally, if in spite of everything I became a missionary to Japan, church planting and pastoring was the one thing I would not do.Well, God had other plans and in 1978 I gladly entered into my new ministry of church planting and pastoring.

It has been a wonderful 30 years and I can see God's grace throughout. Of course there have been many battles to fight. 20 years ago I had my first fight with cancer and now I am in the midst of the second round. Developing local leadership in the church has taken time and I have made many mistakes. But, overall, more than my mistakes and more than any hard times the church may have gone through, these 30 years have seen the guidance and the power and the grace of God at work.

I am looking forward to God's continuing guidance and can't wait to see what God has in store for me and for the church in the next 30 years. Praise be to God!

Romans 1:16-17

After 30 years Mark Fosson has finally decided to release the album he recorded in 1976 and 1977. At the time, Mark was working with John Fahey and his record was supposed to be a Takoma Records release. However, things did not work out and the master tapes have been sitting in Mark's garage ever since!

They would have stayed there if it were not for Mark's cousin, Tiffany Anders. When she heard that he know John Fahey and had actually made a record she strongly encouraged him to release those recordings. They are now released as "The Lost Takoma Sessions" and are a great example of American Primitive Guitar.

Mark seems to play a Martin 12 string that was bought for him by John Fahey. It seems he used to open for John and so his music has that "Takoma" sound to it.

If you want to listen to some genuine American Primitive Guitar I would strongly recommend "The Lost Takoma Sessions" by Mark Fosson. Happy Listening!

For most people in Japan the appearance of the cherry blossoms is a sign of spring. However, for me, it reminds me that the last snow of the season is probsbly falling up on the peak of Mt. Kongo. This year was no exception. Today (March31) the cherry blossoms are in full bloom. However, as I headed toward Mt. Kongo the weather slowly changed and by the time I got to the parking lot all I could see was fog.

As I started walking toward the peak, the wet ground first turned to slush and then slowly grew whiter and a snowscape started to appear. The closer I got to the peak the more snow I saw and then it actually started to snow. It was strange watching the snow come down knowing that back in Sakai City the sun was shining and people were enjoying cherry blossom viewing.

When I finally reached the peak the temperature was exactly 0. Needless to say, sitting by the stove in the coffeehouse felt awful good. I had brought a book along and so as I drank coffee made with local Mt. Kongo water I enjoyed a nice long rest.

I suspect that this might be the last snow I will see this season and so I am happy that my health and schedule allowed me to enjoy this last sight of, not white cherry blossoms, but white snow on bare tree branches.

It was in the early 70s that I was first introduced to the idea of a "worldview" by Francis Schaeffer. As a result I have tried to develop a consitant Christian worldview for myself and have tried to understand the worldviews of others. However, I am ashamed to admit that I only recently read "The Universe Next Door" even though it was first published in 1973 and is the premier textbook on worldviews. Over 250, 000 copies have been printed so far

In this book, James Sire tells us what kinds of questions need to be answered when looking at a worldview. He covers most of the modern worldviews that we would come into contact with. He covers Christian theism, deism, naturalism, nihilism, existentialism, Eastern panthiestic monism, New Age philosophy, and postmodernism. Because of recent events, I would hope that in future revised editions he might also cover Islam as a major worldview held by a great number of people today.

It is important to realize that we all hold a worldview whether or not we think in those terms or not. James Sire has written a great book to help us understand our own worldview and also the worldviews of others. I would strongly encourage you all to read this important book.

Next to our Chrismas Serice, our Easter Service is no doubt our biggest yearly service. While Christmas is a household word in Japan, Easter is hardly known at all. However, I am thankful that those who are Christains are aware of the centrality of Easter to our faith and our Easter Service is always a time for our church members to once more think about the wonderful power of God that raised Jesus from the dead.

Whenever possible, at Easter, we try to schedule a baptism and 2008 was no exception. Mr. M was able to share his testimony and be baptized in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost. Mr. M mainly came to faith in Christ through reading the Bible-first the New Testament and later the Old Testament. As is often the case, it took a lot of courage and the grace of God to cross the thresshold of the church but Mr. M was able to do so and as a result we were able to welcome into our church membership. If some of you have not been able to hear his testimony, I would urge you to borrow the CD from the church.

After our Easter Service and lunch we all went to our church gravesite for a simple service of praise and thanksgiving there.We were joined by the members of our sister church, the New Life Church of Kawachinagano and a wonderful time of fellowship was had by all. We were worried about the weather but our service started at 2:30 under a cloudy sky but with no rain. We ended at 3:00 and enjoyed coffee and tea and talking together till 3:30 when it started to rain and this seemed to be a clear sign that our Easter schedule for 2008 should end.

For myself, Easter was quite a challenge as I was fighting a fever the whole week before. However, by God's grace I was able to preach and baptize Mr. M and also share at the gravesite service.

Let me close with the words we read in church at our service.

"He is not here, for He is risen, as He said." Matthew 28:6

If there is one lesson the believer needs to learn, who would enjoy the full indwelling of the Spirit, it is the one taught so forcefully in this passage: that the law, the flesh, and self-effort are all utterly useless in enabling us to serve God. It is the Spirit within, taking the place of the law without, that leads us into the liberty whereby Christ has made us free. "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty."

page 118 of "The Spirit of Christ" by Andrew Murray

It was over 20 years ago that I first heard of the guitarist Daniel Hecht and of the album "Willow". Every time I went to a record store here in Japan I would look for this album but never could find it. Finally, now, I have been able to obtain a copy of the CD and have really enjoyed finally hearing this fine artist.

Willow was put out as one of the first Windom Hill albums. Early Windom Hill and American Primitive Guitar are basically the same. In fact, Will Ackerman's first album, "In Search of the Turtle's Navel" was thought to really be a John Fahey album as John would often invent new names for himself and was into turtles in a big way. As to Daniel Hecht's style of playing he sounds just like early Alex deGrassi. (Turning: Turning Back) (Slow Circle)

Daniel Hecht has a background in classical guitar and that shows I guess. Early in his career he came down with psoriasis and this basically ended his guitar playiing. He is now an author.

Even though the album "Willow" is only available second hard I strongly recommend it-give it a listen if you have the chance,

The Bible is an extensive collection of literature that, when taken together, presents the story Christians call the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Christians believe this book is inspired by God and interpreted by the Spirit of God, but it remains a book written by human authors and understood primarily in the obvious ways we approach any literature. The message of the Bible answers the biggest, most important and most vital of life's questions and proclaims God's saving message to all persons. The rich literary contents of the Bible can occupy anyone with much study, but in its basic message-its essential, Christ-centered message-there is a remarkable directness and brevity. You do not have to be an expert on first century Judaism or the sociology of sacrificial systems to understand the Bible. The message is ably summerized in the Gospels and elsewhere in the New Testament. Even a child can understand it, believe it and live it.

From a recent post on Michael Spencer's blog

Amen!

First of all, thank you so much for all of your prayers and encouragement-Reiko and I really appreciate it.

On the 4th of March I had a CT scan taken and the results were very good. The cancer has not spread at all. PTL! My blood test that day was also very very good and so my doctor was in good spirits. I was able to have my normal chemotherapy treatment that day and things went smoothly. Some weeks ago I fell into shock as a result of one of the drugs used in my treatment but that drug has been identified and removed from the mix so I can continue with the FOLFOX treatment minus that one drug.

I have been gaining weight and my appetite is good. I have no pain though overall I am weak. I still try to get to Mt. Kongo for exercise every week though I have to walk slowly and take things easy. I have bee slowly doing more things with the church. I am now doing a weekly Bible Study in preparation for our Easter baptism service.

My daily verse is 2 Corinthians 4:16 and I am really experiencing the truth found in that verse-daily God is re-newing my inner man. PTL!

Thanks again for all of your prayers-I trust you will continue to remember me in that way.

On February 24th, 2008, Larry Norman went to be with His Lord. After a long fight with heart trouble the cause of his death was heart failure.

Larry Norman was a great challenge to me in the early 70s when I was still a student. His music and his articles in the Hollywood Free Paper (put out by Duane Pederson in L.A.) always encouraged my faith and challenged me to be a better Christian and to reach my generation for Christ.

Larry Norman is known as the Father of Christian Rock and also the Father of Christian Contemporary Music. In 2001 he was inducted into the Gospel Music Association's Hall of Fame and in 2007 was inducted into the San Jose Rock Hall of Fame. One of his first records was produced by the same person who produced the Beatles' albums.

In the early 70s I attended the Campus Church which met at the West Bank of the U of M. Larry Norman's wife was a member of the church so often it was Larry who would be the special music during the time that the offering plate was passed. Pastor O'Neill would never introduce Larry and so it was always a pleasant surprise to hear such songs as "I Wish We'd All Been Ready" being sung while the offfering was being taken.

However, many Christians did not like Larry or his music and I am glad that I was able to catch him at least once at a concert in St. Paul. I believe it may have been the best Christian concert I have ever attended. His music was just great-both beating on his old classical guitar and also his piano playing. The mix between his sharing and his singing and his playing was just perfect. Also, he was not someone to disappear after the concert-he simply came down from the stage and had coffee and cookies like everyone else and talked with anyone and everyone. As a result I also was able to at least spend some time talking with him and this made me an even stronger believer in what he was doing.

After those years, Larry tended to be out of the Christian spotlight in a major way but he never lost his initial vision for reaching out to people. Some years ago I know he was in Tokyo singing Christian rock and sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ.

I would like to add my voice at this time to the many who are writing tributes to him. I want to say, "Thank you, Larry, for being such a help and challenge to my Christian faith." I trust that even though he is gone, his message will continue to get out to the world through his CDs.

I have never met anyone anywhere like Francis Schaeffer, who took God so passionately seriously, people so passionately seriously, and truth so passionately seriously. The combination was dynamite, and it is that vision and style of faith, rather than the content of his thinking, which is the debt I owe to him. Os Guinness in a recent book review

Let me quote the last sentences from Francis A. Schaeffer's book, "Art and the Bible".

"No work of art is more important the the Christian's own life, and every Christian is called upon to be an artist in this sense. He may have no gift of writing, no gift of composing or singing, but each man has the gift of creativity in terms of the way he lives his life. In this sense, the Christian's life is to be an art work. The Christian's life is to be a thing of truth and also a thing of beauty in the midst of a lost and despairing world."

AMEN!

This is Os Guinness' latest book and he basically is developing a theme that he has already mentioned in a previous book. In his 2005 book on evil, "Unspeakable", he makes the following statement. "I have long been a proponent of the "civil public square", set off clearly from the extremes of the "sacred public square" on one side and the "naked public square" on the other."

This is basically the theme of the whole book-the need for America to have "civil public square". In America now, there are those who call for a "sacred public square". These are people who believe that Protestant Christianity should have "special" treatment" and should have government protection or help. All other groups would be excluded.

There are also those in America today who call for a "naked public square". These are people who believe that ALL religions are bad-probably even "evil" and that all public religious discussion should be banned. These people believe that religion is "private" and must never be allowed to have any impact on public issues.

In "The Case For Civility" Os is calling rather for a "civil public square". That is, he believes that Protestants and Catholics and Jews and Muslims and Mormons and Athiests and Agnostics should ALL be allowed to discuss and share their views publicly in a "civil" manor. The problem now is that rather than freely engaging in discussion, people simply call people in other groups nasty names or simply denounce them as wrong period. Often, there is a great amount of anger and even of hatret involved. When issues of religious freedom come up, rather than engaging in discussion in a civil manner a lawsuit is prepared and the issue is handed to a secular judge to take care of.

In this election year in America this is a timely book and I would recommend reading it and taking to heart the things that Os shares in it.

Last month I visited Tower Records in Namba with no plans to buy anything-just to take a look around. However, I ended up finding a really great CD of American Primitive Guitar players. The CD is put out by the Numero Group and the full name is "N 018 Wayfaring Strangers Guitar Soli". It seems that the guy in charge of the 6th floor of Tower Records is an American Primitive Guitar fan and so there was a large pile of these CDs plus you could listen to them on their stereo there. At any rate, this is a great CD-that is all I can say.

It features 14 artists with one guitar tune each and most of the music is from the 70s. Out of the 14 artists there were two that I was very interested in. One was Daniel Hecht. I have been trying for years to get a copy of his CD "Willow" but have never been successful. I knew that he had quit playing the guitar and was now a successful author but I had no idea why he quit. In the booklet that comes with this CD I read that he came down with psoraisis. I have never heard of this sicknes before but when he played the guitar it took all the skin off of his hands and left them a bloody mess. Needless to say, he gave up the guitar.

The other artist I was interested in was Mark Lang. I have been a long time fan of the Minneapolis based guitarist, Peter Lang. However I did not know that his younger brother, Mark, was also a guitarist.Peter is still playing today but it seems that Mark decided to move out of the music business.

At any rate, if you are a long time fan of American Primitive Guitar, I highly recommend this CD. On the other hand, if you have never heard of American Primitive Guitar, this CD would be a great introduction. It comes with a 40 page booklet that not only tells about each one of the artists but also has articles about American Primitive Guitar and Fingerstyle Guitar plus a list of CDs called "Suggested Listening" which features a good cross section of American Primitive Guitar players. Also the articles mention just about anyone and everyone who is important in the American Primitive Guitar and Fingersyle Guitar world. If you can find this CD, give it a listen.

Let us not forget that violence does not and cannot flourish by itself; it is inevitably intertwined with lying. Between them there is the closest, the most profound and natural bond: nothing screens violence except lies, and the only way lies can can hold out is by violence. Whoever has once announced violence as his method must inevitably choose lies as his principle....The simple act of an ordinary courageous man is not to take part, not to support lies! Let the lie come into the world, even dominate the world, but not through me.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Nobel address, 1970

I am now reading Os Guinness' latest book, "The Case For Civility". As I am not done with it yet I cannot give a full report on it but I would like to share one quote of his and comment on that. When I have finished the book I promise to give a full report.

The quote is, "Religious liberty, or freedom of conscience, is a precious, fundamental, and inalienable human right-the right to reach, hold, freely exercise, or change one's beliefs, subject soley to the dictates of conscience and independent of all outside, especially goevernmental, control."

Now, that is a sentence! I am glad that he also added the phrase, "freedom of conscience" because sometimes the phrase, "religious liberty" can be misunderstood. But what religious liberty is all about is freedom to follow your own conscience. I have thought about the importance of our conscience a lot lately. Following God or the leading of the Holy Spirit often comes down to simply following our conscience. Our consceince is the voice of God in our heart that leads us and tells us what is wrong or right.

There are so many other voices out there trying to get our attention-the voice of human approval, the voices of our friends and family, all the things we see and hear on TV and on the Internet, etc. However, when all is said and done, the only voice we are to folllow is the voice of our conscience.

As I often share in church, I am so thankful that at this point in time, there does seem to be true religious liberty in Japan. We are free to meet together on Sunday and to share our faith together. I believe we need to daily thank God for that freedom that we have and to not forget the prime importance of following the voice of our conscience.

When I finishthe book I will write another report.

No news is good news. My chemotherapy treatments are going well. In now have treatments on the 1st Tuesday and the 3rd Tueday every month. The first week usually gets me into bed for a few days but the second week I am usually feeling good enough to climb Mt. Kongo a couple times. Every Saturday you can find me in my office preparing a sermon and on Sundays you can find me preaching. So, I divide my time between sleeping, preaching, and mountain climbing!

On the fourth of March I will have CT scan taken and we will know if the cancer has gotten smaller or not. Please pray for a positive result. PTL

I have always been a big fan of Matsuo Basho. When I visited Tokyo last year I made a point of visiting the site on the Sumida River where his famous hut was located. I had always thought that I like him because he was such a traveler but I have recently come to see that I really like him because of his simple lifestyle lived in his beloved hut by the Sumida River. It was there that he wrote many of his famous "haiku" poems.

The hut was built for him by his students and soon a banana tree was planted outside the hut. Soon, the hut was called the "Basho Hut" or in English the "Banana Hut". Soon, people started calling him Master Basho and that is the nickname that he is now known by throughout the world. Ever since it seems he was interested in the simple life lived in a hut. The original hut was built in 1680 but burned down in 1682. In 1683 a new hut was built for him.

However, the Basho Hut was not the only hut that he lived in and wrote about. In In 1690 he stayed for some time in the "Unreal Hut" near Lake Biwa. In English this hut is also called the "Hut of the Phantom Dwelling" depending on who has translated it. As I grew up near Lake Biwa I am very interested in some day visiting this hut or the site where it was located. Basho wrote an essay about his life there called, "Record of the Hut of the Phantom Dwelling".

In 1691 Basho spent time at yet another hut called the "House of Fallen Persimmons". Here, he wrote "The Saga Diary" and "The Monkey's Cloak" As this site is also located not too far from Osaka I am hoping some day to visit it.

In 1692 the third Basho Hut was built by the Sumida River.

However, it is another Japanese writer that explained more fully the connection between living the Simple Life and having a "hut" to live in. Kamo no Chomei wrote an essay called, "The Record of the Ten-Foot-Square-Hut". Kamo no Chomei lived from 1153 to 1216 and was based in Kyoto. He gives a very direct description of what a "hut" should be like. According to Chomei it should be first of all of course Ten-Foot-Square. Anything bigger and it is too big and can't be called a "hut". He tells us that his hut contained bookshelves for his books,two musical intruments-a koto and a biwa-and his bed of fern fronds. The koto is a Japanese harp while the biwa is more like a lute or a mandolin. At any rate, his idea of the simple life comes down to a room 10 by 10, books, music, and a bed.

Why am I so interested in "huts" and the siimple life? Maybe because I was born in Minnesota. This past Christmas my brother gave me a book called, "Cabins of Minnesota" which I really really enjoyed. In Minnesota we talk about "cabins" rather than "huts". In Japan, the term used is "Yama Goya" which means "Mountain Hut". In Norway they also talk about "huts" and also in Finland the usual term is "hut". But a Minnesota cabin is the same as a Japanese Moutain Hut-the concept is the same.

Well, how do I put this interest in "huts" into practical use in my daily life? Of course on way is to spend time in Japanese "Mountain Huts"-either to rent a log cabin in the mountains for a day and night or for a few days or to accept invitations from friends who actually own "mountain huts" in Japan. We have some good friends-a Japanese pastor and his wife-who own a 10 by 10 mountain hut in Hyoko Prefecture. They often invite us to come and join them for a day of simple living which basically consists of sitting on their deck overlooking the lake for the entire day. They have a stove on the deck so we heat coffee and cook the noon meal there and never have to move. We can enjoy the view and the breeze and freely talk in a way that is hard to do normally.

However, I have a more practical way of living the simple life and that is through my office. My office is just about 10 feet by 10 feet square-Chomei would be proud of me. It contain 2 guitars, a stereo sytem and more than 100 CDs, bookshelves with over 1000 books. a desk, a table, four chairs, and pictures of Japanese mountains on the walls. When I am in my office I feel a great peace and contentment. First thing in the morning I go into my office and spend time reading the Bible and praying and then for the rest of the day it is my place of refuge from a busy and noisy world. This is my concept of living the simple life.

I have always been a big fan of Matsuo Basho. When I visited Tokyo last year I made a point of visiting the site on the Sumida River where his famous hut was located. I had always thought that I like him because he was such a traveler but I have recently come to see that I really like him because of his simple lifestyle lived in his beloved hut by the Sumida River. It was there that he wrote many of his famous "haiku" poems.

The hut was built for him by his students and soon a banana tree was planted outside the hut. Soon, the hut was called the "Basho Hut" or in English the "Banana Hut". Soon, people started calling him Master Basho and that is the nickname that he is now known by throughout the world. Ever since it seems he was interested in the simple life lived in a hut. The original hut was built in 1680 but burned down in 1682. In 1683 a new hut was built for him.

However, the Basho Hut was not the only hut that he lived in and wrote about. In In 1690 he stayed for some time in the "Unreal Hut" near Lake Biwa. In English this hut is also called the "Hut of the Phantom Dwelling" depending on who has translated it. As I grew up near Lake Biwa I am very interested in some day visiting this hut or the site where it was located. Basho wrote an essay about his life there called, "Record of the Hut of the Phantom Dwelling".

In 1691 Basho spent time at yet another hut called the "House of Fallen Persimmons". Here, he wrote "The Saga Diary" and "The Monkey's Cloak" As this site is also located not too far from Osaka I am hoping some day to visit it.

In 1692 the third Basho Hut was built by the Sumida River.

However, it is another Japanese writer that explained more fully the connection between living the Simple Life and having a "hut" to live in. Kamo no Chomei wrote an essay called, "The Record of the Ten-Foot-Square-Hut". Kamo no Chomei lived from 1153 to 1216 and was based in Kyoto. He gives a very direct description of what a "hut" should be like. According to Chomei it should be first of all of course Ten-Foot-Square. Anything bigger and it is too big and can't be called a "hut". He tells us that his hut contained bookshelves for his books,two musical intruments-a koto and a biwa-and his bed of fern fronds. The koto is a Japanese harp while the biwa is more like a lute or a mandolin. At any rate, his idea of the simple life comes down to a room 10 by 10, books, music, and a bed.

Why am I so interested in "huts" and the siimple life? Maybe because I was born in Minnesota. This past Christmas my brother gave me a book called, "Cabins of Minnesota" which I really really enjoyed. In Minnesota we talk about "cabins" rather than "huts". In Japan, the term used is "Yama Goya" which means "Mountain Hut". In Norway they also talk about "huts" and also in Finland the usual term is "hut". But a Minnesota cabin is the same as a Japanese Moutain Hut-the concept is the same.

Well, how do I put this interest in "huts" into practical use in my daily life? Of course on way is to spend time in Japanese "Mountain Huts"-either to rent a log cabin in the mountains for a day and night or for a few days or to accept invitations from friends who actually own "mountain huts" in Japan. We have some good friends-a Japanese pastor and his wife-who own a 10 by 10 mountain hut in Hyoko Prefecture. They often invite us to come and join them for a day of simple living which basically consists of sitting on their deck overlooking the lake for the entire day. They have a stove on the deck so we heat coffee and cook the noon meal there and never have to move. We can enjoy the view and the breeze and freely talk in a way that is hard to do normally.

However, I have a more practical way of living the simple life and that is through my office. My office is just about 10 feet by 10 feet square-Chomei would be proud of me. It contain 2 guitars, a stereo sytem and more than 100 CDs, bookshelves with over 1000 books. a desk, a table, four chairs, and pictures of Japanese mountains on the walls. When I am in my office I feel a great peace and contentment. First thing in the morning I go into my office and spend time reading the Bible and praying and then for the rest of the day it is my place of refuge from a busy and noisy world. This is my concept of living the simple life.

A Happy New Year to you all! I am now about half way through the book, "Divine Healing" by Andrew Murray. I thought I had read most of his books when I was a student at Bethany but I don't recall this one and I can't find any record of Bethany publishing it either. The copy I am now reading is published by CLC.

I was especially challenged by the 19th chapter where Murray speaks about Jesus BEARING our sickness in the same way that He bears our sins. Let me quote a few lines from page 82.

"The human nature of Jesus could not be touched by sickness because it remained holy. We never find in the account of His life any mention of sickness. Participating in all the weaknesses of our human nature-hunger, thirst, fatigue and sleep, because these things are not the consequence of sin-He still had no trace of sickness."

"Thus it is not IN Him but ON Him that we see sickness as well as sin; He took them upon Him and bore them of His own free will."

After reading the chapter I was reading Galatians and was struck by Galatians 4:13.

"As you know, it was because of an illness that I first preached the gospel to you."

Paul, being a sinner, like we all are, got sick at times. However, see here Romans 8:28 at work in that God used his sickness to enable him to meet with the Galatians and preach the gospel to them.

So, even though sickness comes upon the himan race because of sin, yet, as Christians we can rejoice that Christ has born not only our sins but also our sickness and that God in His love and power can and will use even sickness for good and for his glory. PTL

If you have a chance, do pick up and read "Divine Healing" by Andrew Murray.

This year we held our Christmas Worship Service on the 23rd of December. It was a wonderful time with around 50 people in attendance. Besides new people there were several people who had not been to our church for many years. After the service we all enjoyed a Christmas feast together. Then, at 4 p.m. we held our Christmas Eve Service. In Japan, the actual dates, December 24 and 25, are usually not considered too important. Most churches hold their various Christmas services at the times most convenient for their members and not based on the calendar.

Our Christmas Eve Service was also well attended with a really good atmosphere from beginning to end. This year, for the first time, I myself had nothing to do with this service because of my recent health problems. As a result I was able to sit back and really enjoy the service in a new way. As I sat in the service my heart was filled with thanksgiving as I realized that our church here had matured to the point that church members could now handle everything without any help from myself or my wife. PTL!

In this service also we saw several new people in attendance. The Christmas season is a wonderful opportunity for evangelism in Japan. During most of the year, attending a Christian church is quite a challenge for new people. However, at Christmas, it seems to suddenly become easy and natural. Christmas is also a great time for personal evangelism as all the Christmas Carols and various Christmas events going on easily lead to the question of the meaning of Christmas which of course leads to the gospel-the good news of Jesus Christ coming to earth as our Savior from sin.

I always wish that the Christmas season would last longer and when Christmas is over I find myself already waiting for the next Christmas season to come along.

I am presently reading "Joshua and the Flow of Biblical History" by Francis Schaeffer. This is I believe one of his "minor" books but I am finding it to be a very good book indeed. Along with his book, "No Little People" in this book we see Schaeffer the preacher rather than Schaeffer the philosopher or apologist or sociologist. However, of course, we see him applying the same concepts that he shares in his other books as he looks at Joshua and Moses and Abraham and other Old Testament characters. As modern Christains we tend to focus on the New Testament but this book is especially good in helping us to see how all the New Testament concepts that we hold have their genesis in the Old Testament. I would urge those of you who are readers of Schaeffer to consider giving this book of his a read-it will challenge you.

Today I was finally physically strong enough to once again climb Mt. Kongo. This was of course a great chance to again use my new snake boots that I bought in Tennessee, The temperature was exactly 0 at the peak of Mt. Kongo and there was light snow cover in places-perfect conditions to make use of knee high warm boots.

Because I am still quite weak physically because of my recent chemo treatments I chose to climb the Sillver Course which I believe is the easiest Mt. Kongo route. It was wonderful to be back in the mountains again. I noticed that the wild boars (inoshishi) had been very busy digging up roots etc. all along the side of the valley.

I also enjoyed stopping in at the rest area near the peak for a cup of hot coffee made using Mt. Kongo natural spring water. Over all I had a really enjoyable day. I am so glad that in spite of the chemo treatments I can still look forward to being strong enough to go climbing at times. PTL

I was finally able to purchase the John Fahey CD, "Yes! Jesus Loves Me". This is John Fahey's only CD that is ALL HYMNS and is a CD that I have wanted to own for a long long time. Starting in 1963 John Fahey closed his albums with a Christian hymn. However, this CD consists of 20 hymns played as only John Fahey can play-a really good listen.

Not many well known guitarists put out albums that are all hymns. The only other such album that I own is "A Closer Walk With Thee" by Martin Simpson. Interestingly, the one hymn that many many guitarists record is "Amazing Grace". For example, the Japanese guitarist, Nakazato Isato" has recorded it on his CD "Standards" while John Fahey has recorded it on his CD "America".

Finally, though this is John Fahey's only CD of regular hymns, he has recorded many Christmas albums of mostly Christams carols. In fact, his best selling album is an album of Christmas carols that he recorded in 1968 called "The New Possiblility". As a result he has recorded numerous other Christmas albums over the years and they all are very good-I recommend them all.

On the 19th of November I was admitted to the Kinki University Hospital and on that day had a simple operation to install an IV port in my upper chest. This was for my chemotherapy. On Tuesday the 20th I had my first chemotherapy treatment and as it was my first, I was kept in the hospital for the next few days. The second and third day of chemotherapy was pretty bad but I was able to go home on the 23rd. From around noon of that day I started to improve and actually was able to enjoy some American Thanksgiving turkey that night! By Sunday I was much better and was able to attend church and was able to enjoy it.

This will probably be the pattern that will be repeated every two weeks so I would request your prayers for strength and of course more than anything else that the chemotherapy may do what it is supposed to do and shrink my cancer. (from now on I will NOT be hospitalized for my treatment)

Thank you for your prayers for Reiko and I and also for our church here-everyone is pulling together and working together in a wonderful spirit of unity. Praise the Lord!

Reiko and I arrived back in Osaka safe and sound on the 26th of October.On the 30th of October we visited the Kinki University Hospital and were able to set up a schedule for chemotherapy treatments. My first treatment will be on the 7th of November and basically I will go in for a treatment every 2 weeks.

Please continue to pray for my health and for our church here. In the midst of this hard time, God has been faithful and has given Reiko and I the strength that we needed every day. PTL We are confident that God will continue to lead and to guide us on a day to day basis.

I was able to buy tickets to return to Japan today. Reiko and I will be flying out of Maryville, Tennessee on the 25th of October and will be arriving in Osaka, Japan on the 26th. We are really looking forward to seeing all our friends and family and church members. It has been a long long summer!

I believe that we are lined up with a good doctor when we get back so after a couple of weeks I should be able to get involved in local chemotherapy treatment. Medically, my condition is still grim so please continue to pray. However, on a day to day basis, I am doing very well and am living a normal life in all ways. I can drive and can walk long distances and have a good appetite and have no pain of any kind. Truely, God is good!

I will continue to post updates as there is news to share. May God bless. Paul

Well, I am finally back in front of this computer screen. On the 27th of September I went into Blount Memorial Hospital for surgery. The surgery went very smoothly and I really experienced no pain during my whole time of hospitalization. That is not to say that I did not experience much dis-comfort-lines and bags and tubes coming out of my body and being heavily drugged all the time. But I was able to make it through ok and was dis-charged from the hospital on the 2nd of October.

I am now recovering at my parents' home in Maryville, Tennessee. My appetite is still small but otherwise I am doing fine. I walk outside every day and am living a normal life.

However, there is still some cancer left in my body that they were not able to remove. Future surgery will not help either. So, I would ask for your prayers that Reiko and I would be guided as to how we should treat this remaining cancer. There are many methods of treatment available and we need great wisdom. We also need wisdom about our timing as to returning to Japan. Please remember us in prayer!

Otherwise, I am looking forward to returning to Japan as soon as possible. I am looking forward to meeting all of you at church and also I am looking forward to climbing Mt. Kongo again!

Thank you once again for your concern and for your prayers for Reiko and I..

Christianity was first introduced to Japan by the Nestorians around the same time or before Buddhism was. In spite of this early introduction to Japan, there seems to be hardly any Christian influence remaining from those days. Why is this? Carl F. H. Henry offers an explanation in his book, "God, Revelation, and Authority Volume III". He says, "The gospel has taken poor root, and the life of faith has become vulnerable to many vagaries, wherever and whenever the church has lagged in translating the Bible into the language of the people.This was the case when the Nestorians carried the gospel across Asia to China but neglected Scripture translation."

As a result, the fact that the Nestorians brought the gospel to Japan is known, but not one word of Christian teaching or of the Christian gospel or of the Bible remains in Japan from that age.

This is in contrast to the Roman Catholic Church which brought Christianity to Japan in the 1500s. As a result of Christian teaching and portions of the Bible being available in Japanese, Japan was on the verge of becoming a Christian country. In reaction to this, the Japanese government expelled all foreigners and outlawed Christianity for nearly 400 years. During those 400 years there were still Christians who did not give up their faith and their influence remains to this day.

Which all shows how important the Bible-the Word of God-is for our faith and for the church in Japan. It would seem that the life of the church in Japan would depend on the extent to which the Bible-the Word of God-is believed and followed.

Today, Reiko and I met with my doctor and set a date for surgery. The date is September 27th. Please pray for my doctor and for my surgery. Also please continue to pray for Reiko and I as we move towards this important date. The surgery should be straight forward so I can hopefully return to Japan quite soon afterwards. I am looking forward to seeing all of you in Japan soon.

Today I was able to take my last test at Mount Memorial Hospital. With the completion of this test my doctors will now have all of the information that they need to set up a schedule for my surgery and therapy. On Monday the 10th I will meet with my doctor at 1pm and we will go over all of the data about my condition and will decide what to do about surgery and chemotherapy and radiation therapy. So, please pray for good results from the tests and for wisdom in deciding how best to treat my cancer.

Also please pray for wisdom in the timing of my return to Japan. I of course want to return as soon as possible but I need to at the same time do all that must be done here in the States.

Just a few days before leaving Japan for the US, I discovered this classic Amreican Primitive Guitar CD at Tower Records in Namba. It has been un-available for many years but this year it has once again seen the light of day. This CD is as good an introduction to American Primitive Guitar and to the music of John Fahey as anything I know. I especially liked his rendition of "Life Is Like A Mountain Railroad".I would strongly recommend going out and buying this CD while it is available.

I have always wanted a pair of snake boots! However, I have never seen a pair on sale in Japan. I have always thought that they would be the perfect footware for climbing Mt. Kongo in the fall and in the winter. In the fall, there are actually quite a few poisonous snakes around and I have often worried about getting bit. Then, in the winter, the snow is deep enough that a pain of knee high boots would really come in handy. However, none of the local stores stocked snake boots and so I have been waiting my time.

However, yesterday I was able to buy a pair. Here, in Maryville, Tennessee, where I am staying for my medical emergency, I found a store that stocked ONLY boots. And in the back, I found the snake boots that I was looking for. Just about the time my surgery is done and I can head back to Japan will be the time that I can start using my new snake boots to go mountain climbing. So, now I have yet another reason to want to hurry back to Japan as soon as possible!

Today I met with my surgeon and he set up two tests for me. On the 5th of September, he will take a look at my colon using a short fiberscope and so he will know exactly where and what he is to do. Then, on the 7th, I will take a test that will show my doctor whether or not the cancer is only inside my colon or also outside. With this information he will be able to actually set up a time to do the surgery and also what kind of chemotherapy and what kind of radiation therapy to do and also when to do it.

So, the plans for my surgery are going ahead very smoothly. Thank you so much for your prayers and please continue to pray for Reiko and I.

I had my last meeting with my main doctor today. He told me that my recent blood tests and CT scan showed that I had what seemed to be cysts on my liver but that it did not seem to be cancer. On that basis he set things up for me to meet with my surgeon within the next few days. At that time we will set up the actual schedule for my treatment. There will probably be some weeks of chemo and radiation treatment followed by the actual surgery on the lower part of my colon. When that is decided I will file another report.

Otherwise, I have been in good health. I still eat well and am feeling strong and do not have any pain. I have had trouble sleeping at night and would appreciate prayer about that. I would also appreciate prayer for the whole process now that it will go smoothly. And of course I am so thankful that my liver has turned out to be cancer free! PTL

On the 24th of August I had my first meeting with my American doctor. He scheduled me for some blood tests and also for a CT scan on the 27th. On the 28th we will look at the results of these tests and will decide what to do in the future. Please pray that the cancer has not spread out from my colon in any way and that the plans for surgery and any other treatment will go smoothly.

I appreciate all of your prayers so much. Please keep praying!

"The mass media, in summery, are amazingly adroit in supplying new dimensions to the age-old crisis of word and truth. Their indecision about spiritual realities, their deference to moral relativism and spiritual vagabondage, and their obvious accommidation of a materialist and sex-centered view of life are familiar devices for gaining attention and manipulating minds."

..................

"When truth and word remain as the accepted universe of discourse, then all abberations can be challenged in the name of truth. Today, however, the nature of truth and even the role of words is in dispute."

Carl F. H. Henry in "God, Revelation, and Authority Volume One" God Who Speaks and Shows

On the 20th of August the three boys and Reiko and I said a rainy good bye to Minnesota. At 7am in the morning we left for the Minneapolis Airport and by 10:30 we were in the air heading for Detroit. At Detroit we said good bye to the boys and saw them unto their plane for Osaka. Fourteen hours later they arrived and were met by Mr. N and their big adventure came to an end..

Reiko and I continued on to Tennessee and are now taking it easy at my folks' place. I will post no more American Trip 2007 entries but will post Health Updates. Let us keep in touch and keep on praying.

The three boys and Reiko and Lydia all came back safely from camp yesterday evening. The boys were still full of energy even after 5 days of camp!!! Last night they all did washing and then went to play ping pong before going to bed.

We now only have a few days left of our trip. We will spend the last 2 days here at Bethany. We may do some shopping or we may go to enjoy some local sights or attractions. The boys all tell me that they have really come to like America and don't want to return to Japan so soon! So, I am glad that the trip seems to be a success.

On the 20th, we plan to fly out of Minneapolis and then the boys will fly on to Osaka, while Reiko and I will fly to Tennessee. Please continue to pray for God's guidance and protection on this trip. Thank you.

On the 5th of August, we had our 57th baptism service at our church. We usually have baptisms at Christmas and Easter and sometimes at Pentecost but I believe it was the first time for us to have a baptism in August. As I have shared before, I believe that the baptism of new members into the church is the Critical Event that must be happening in a Christian Church. The Christian members need to be maturing in Christ but at the same time there must be a constant reaching out to people who have not yet believed in Jesus and these people need to be led to faith in Christ and to baptism according to Matthew 28:19.

I was especially blessed by Mr. N's testimony as he shared how God started to work in his life 18 years ago through his aunt who lived in Hawaii. Through his aunt's witness and bringing him to church, she challenged him with the idea of the existence of God. For 18 years he was not able to forget this powerful truth and as a result, a couple years ago, was led to Bethany Church and both he and his wife are now baptized members of the church here

Please pray for Mr. N and his new found faith in Christ and that we will again see a baptism in our church in the near future..

ON AUGUST 6TH REIKO AND I FLEW TO AMERICA WITH 3 JR. HIGH BOYS FROM OUR CHURCH FOR A HOMESTAY AND CAMP PROGRAM IN MINNESOTA. THE HOMESTAY SEGMENT IS NOW DONE AND THE CAMP WILL START ON SUNDAY. REIKO WILL GO TO THE CAMP WHILE I WILL STAY AT BETHANY. ON THE 20TH THE BOYS WILL FLY BACK TO JAPAN WHILE REIKO AND I WILL FLY TO TENNESSEE. PLEASE PRAY FOR THE LAST WEEK OF OUR TRIP.

ON JULY 24TH I WAS DIOGNOSED WITH CANCER OF THE COLON. I PLAN TO HAVE SURGERY AT THE END OF AUGUST OR THE BEGINING OF SEPTEMBER. Ｉ PLAN TO HAVE THE SURGERY IN TENNESSEE. PLEASE PRAY FOR REIKO AND I. PAUL

On Sunday the 29th of July our church welcomed the 88th member to join our church here in Japan. At times like that I always find myself looking back over the years. On October 5th, 1980 we held the first Sunday service here with six people in attendance. Over the years, God has guided 88 people to our church here either to believe in Jesus and be baptized or to join our church as an already practicing Christian. At our service on the 29th, the first two people to join our church here, Mr.and Mrs. K, and their son who was recently baptized here and who also is now a member of our church were in the audience. It has been a wonderful experience to see God guide each individual member here and build up a group of people into a living church.

I would covet your prayers for our church here that God will continue to add to this little flock of believers in Japan.

Yesterday I was invited to speak at the Kyoto New Life Church.This is the fourth church connected with Bethany here in Japan and my heart was filled with thanksgiving as I thought about the fact that in the past 25 years or so four new churches have been born here. In 1980 we held our first service in Osaka with an attendance of 6 people. Some years later, Jon started the New Life Church in Kawachinagano. Some years later again, Willy started the Suzuka Bethany Church. Then, just two years ago, Jon took on the work of pastoring this group in Kyoto who wanted to start a new church. This happened just as Pastor Haruna was getting involved in pastoring the Kawachinagano New Life Church. God's timing is just perfect.

In 1980 there were just 6 people meeting at a Bethany Church in the Kansai area while now on any given Sunday it is more like 100 people gathered in four locations worshiping God and hearing the Word of God proclaimed.

I would request your prayers for these four churches that they might continue to be led by God in all that they do and that new people might continue to come to know and believe in Jesus in these four locations.

Speaking of God in "The Dust of Death" Os says, "To know him as creator is significance, to know him in revelation is clarity of knowledge, to know him as personal is fulfillment, to know him in character is order and values, to know him in grace is freedom, love, joy, peace, and adoration."

Amen!

I just re-read this long long sentence by Os Guinness in hi s book, "Prophetic Untimeliness" and was again challenged by the difficulty of living as a true disciple of Jesus Christ in this day and age.

In its place a new evangelicalism is arriving in which therapeutic self-concern overshadows knowing God, spirituality displaces theology, end-times escapism crowds out day-to-day discipleship, marketing triumphs over missions, references to opinon polls outweigh reliance on biblical exposition, concerns for power and relevance are more obvious than concern for piety and faithfulness, talk of reinventing the church has replaced prayer for revival, and the characteristic evangelical passion for missionary enterprise is overpowered by the all-consuming drive to sustain the muliple busines empires of the booming evangelical subculture.

Amen!

The guitarist I have been listening to a lot these days is Glenn Jones. I have known his name for years but have not been too interested in him as I only knew him as the leader of the Boston based band, Cul de Sac. As I have no interest in bands I never looked into his music. However, I have found that he is as good a representative of the "Takoma School" of guitar music as any. (Takoma School is another word for American Primitive Guitar and is taken from the name of John Fahey's album company.)

The two CDs of Glenn Jones that I would recommend would be "Against Which the Sea Continually Beats" and "This Is the Wind That Blows It Out". The name of the first album is taken from a line written on an old map of Martha's Vineyard from the year 1784. The title of the second album is from a poem written by Frank O'Connor in 1936.

Glenn plays both 6 string and 12 string guitar and all of his music is solo. If you have not listened to his music, please give it a try sometime.

This week Reiko and I saw a very interesting documentary on NHK. It was about the people living on an island in Kyushu called Matsushima. What was remarkable to me was the fact that the entire population of the island was Christian. The inhabitants are descendants of the Christians in Kyushu who had to go into hiding during the 1500s.

One of the most prominent buildings at the port is the church. The headman of the village is also the head elder of the church and basically the whole village gathers at the church on Sundays. The main occupation on Matsushima is fishing but all the men rest on Sunday and observe the Lord's Day. I believe that the Hidden Christians of Japan do not have official ties with the Catholic Church and so it is considered a native religion and the Catholic Church does not send a priest to the church at Matsushima. The head elder leads the worship there.

Up to this time I had heard of whole villages coming to Christ in other countries but this is the first time for me to hear about such a thing happening in Japan. Needless to say, Reiko and I were challenged by the faith of this group of Christians who after over 400 years still kept their faith in God the Father and in Jesus Christ His Son. May God continue to lead and guide and bless this village as they live their daily lives centered on faith in the living God.

Yesterday morning when I was rock climbing I heard a loud hissing. I looked around and saw nothing and tried to continue only to hear it again even louder. When I looked closely I was about to step on a mother nighthawk who was guarding her eggs with her life. No matter how close I came she refused to budge-the eggs or chicks she was guarding were more important to her than her own life.
I at once thought of Jesus dying on the cross and giving up His own life that we might live. I also thought of the present culture we are living in where every day there seems to be news about some mother deserting her child so that she can do whatever selfish thing it is that she wants to do.
I also thought of the importance of knowing our priorities-what is really important and what is not. This little grey bird in front of me did not have any problem with that-she knew her priority was to guard her eggs no matter what.
With lots of things to think about I left the mother nighthawk to her task of guarding her eggs and continued on with my climb. I had come just to get some physical exercise but ended up learning a whole lot of other things. PTL!

Today was a special day on two counts at our church. One, it was Pentecost Sunday and two, we had a baptism. It seems to me that for a church the critical event-the event that must be happening if it is a healthy church-is baptism. Jesus' last command was to go out into all the world and make disciples and baptize them. It was not enough just to make disciples-the disciples had to carry through on their decision to become disciples of Jesus by being baptized. Today, at our church in Sakai, we were able to enjoy such a baptism.

One of the best decisions we ever made as a church was the decision to dig and build our own baptism pool. (see a picture of that event on my wife's blog in this same homepage) Mr. KA took charge of the digging and would not let us stop till we had dug a really deep hole. Then we poured the cement ourselves only to have to get help from a pro later. We then painted it and were ready for business. Kathy from America was the first person to be baptized here. After our first baptism we realized we had not thought about how to get the water out! However, a person in church had come to church in a truck with a pump in the back and he emptied our pool after our first baptism.

Now, more than 50 baptisms later, there is still a special atmosphere at church when someone gets baptized that we just don't have at any other time. One reason of course is that we all get to hear a good testimony of how the person came to believe in Jesus and was led to be baptized. Today we were all blessed by Mrs. A's testimony.

And now I am praying for the next person to be baptized-for the next critical event to happen in our church. PTL

Every year around the middle of May there is a mass exodus of climbers from Mt. Kongo to Mt. Yamato Katsuragi, The reason for that is the mountain azalea. A major part of the main peak is covered by wild azaleas. I don't have official figures but I would guess at least in the thousands and maybe even more than ten thousand wild azalea plants cover the peak and actually turn it red. And so every year, in May, the regular Mt. Kongo climbers take a break and climb Mt. Yamato Katsuragi.

This year I climbed with Mr. K who had not climbed this mountain before. The wating time for the ropeway was one and a half hours as we left the crowd behind and started up the main path to the peak. Halfway up we ran into Mr. KN-a regular Mt. Kongo climber. He told us he had decided to climb BOTH mountains and so at 7:30 in the morning he had climbed Mt. Kongo and then followed the Diamond Trail down to Mizukoshi Pass and then on up to the peak of Mt. Yamato Katsuragi. Mr. K and I did not have that kind of energy and contented ourself with just the one mountain that day.

The azaleas were jstill at their peak and the weather was perfect-not a cloud in the sky. We enjoyed our lunch surrounded by the red flowers and the sounds of hundreds of people talking and taking pictures. After taking a short hike through the middle of the azaleas we headed back down the main trail. The people taking the ropeway down had a 40 minute wait so we were glad to be walking rather than taking the ropeway.

No doubt I will not climb this mountain for another year. However, when the middle of next May comes around I plan to again head this way. Every mountian has its special points-Mt. Kongo with its snow and frozen trees, Mt. Makio with its rock faces, and Mt. Yamato Katsuragi with its azaleas.

I am reminded of 1 Corinthians 12:7 "For the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all." We are each given different gifts and are each special in God's sight. PTL

I am continuing to try and get caught up on the books by Schaeffer that I for one reason or another have not yet read. My latest read is "A Christian Manifesto" published in 1981. What continues to amaze me is how current he always is. During the last month or so I have read quite a number of books published in the late 90s and these books basically say the same thing that Schaeffer is saying. The actual titles are "The New Absolutes" by William Watkins, "Legislatiing Morality" by Dr. Norman Geisler and Frank Turk, and "The Death of Truth" edited by Dennis McCallum. In a nutshell the theme is postmodernism-the need to understand it and how to react to it as a Christian.

I have lived in Japan now for over 50 years and it seems that the basic tenets of postmodernism have always been more or less accepted though that term was of course not around 50 years ago. I remember feeling that way when I first read "The God Who Is There"-all the things that Schaeffer warned about were already a part of the culture here.

From the standpoint of being an American citizen, reading these books has given me a new understanding of the importance of state rights vs. control by the centra government and also the fact that the American Supreme Court has in the past 40 years or so slowly but surely worked itself into a place of power that it was never supposed to have.

I again would challenge those of you who have not yet discovered Francis Scheffer to give him a read-basically all of his books are really good. Those who have read him in Japanese claim that his books are more difficult in Japanese than in English. English or Japanese, do try reading his books.

Spring has come and it is time to do some rock climbing! Early this morning, instead of heading to Mt. Kongo I headed to Mt. Makio to do some rock climbing on the Kura Iwa Lower Slab. During the winter months it is too dark to do any climbing early in the morning and the Kura Iwa can be icy and sometimes even covered with snow. However, now even early in the morning the rock is nice and dry and just waiting to be climbed.

I had a very enjoyable climb up the Slab and then checked out the climbing possibilities at the Inner Wall. I see that on the Inner Wall just rock climbing shoes are not enough-I will need to use a harness and a safety rope. However, there is plenty of time. This spring and summer I hope to spend quite a bit of time working on my rock climbing skills till fall and winter drive me back to Mt. Kongo.

I am so thankful that I live within easy driving distance of not only a good hiking mountian like Mt. Kongo but also a great rock climbing venue such as Mt. Makio.

For many years now Reiko and I have had the privilege of holding house meetings at the home of Mr. H in Najio which in near Takarazuka in Hyogo Prefecture. The people who attend are all in their 70s or 80s and most of them come from multi-generational Christian homes. Through talking with these people I have learned what it was like to be a Christian here in Japan during the war years and what it was like to live in a Christian home at a time and in an area where such things just did not exist. I have come to have a great respect for the men and women who came to know Jesus over 100 years ago and who then passed on their faith to their children in the midst of great tribulation.

For example, I learned that there was nowhere in Kansai for Christians to be buried as all the graveyards were run by Buddhist temples. Finally, the city of Kyoto took pity on the Christians and provided a graveyard high up on a mountain there. I visited that graveyard and saw the tombs of many missionaries and Christans of 100 years ago. Even Niijima Jo, who founded Doushisha University, had to be buried there! Later, when the lady who first asked us to hold house meetings in Najio died, I held a burial service for her there at her Christian family tomb.

Today, Reiko and I again visited Najio and had a wonderful time of fellowship,singing hymns, prayer and reading the Bible together. The main verses we looked at today were Hebrews 11:23 and Hebrews 11:27. We were challenged not only by the faith of Moses but also by the faith of his parents. May we also hold that kind of faith today!

The guitarist I am now spending a lot of time listening to is Jack Rose. I first heard his music on a couple CDs that I have which feature a number of like minded guitarists. I was very impressed by his playing and recently bought a CD called, " Raag Manifestos". This was so good that I have ordered another one of his CDs to add to my collection. The term, "American Primitive Guitar" and his name often come up together and he certainly seems to be a good representative of the genre. I do not know many details about him or his life-just that he is an awful good guitar player. If you have not listened to his music, give him a try sometime.

Yesterday was a red letter day for Mr. K and I as we both were presented with medals for climbing Mt. Kongo-Mr. K has climbed 100 times and I have climbed 1500 times. We both started climbing after serious health problems and are so thankful that God has kept us alive and in good health. We were accompanied on our climb yesterday by 8 people from Bethany Church plus Mr. and Mrs. T's dog named Joshua. That is the biggest turn out yet for our Bethany Climbing Club and we all had a really great time.

The actual climbing was very smooth with our biggest problem of the day being to find parking for our three cars! Nearly 3,000 box lunches were served at the top of the mountain yesterday and so I would guess that close to 8,000 people were climbing at that time-maybe even more! Needless to say, Mt. Kongo is the most popular mountain in Osaka.

As a Christian, there is a double blessing in spending time in the outdoors. First, of course there is the beauty of nature itself. But that leads very naturally to thinking about the Creator of all that beauty. I always come away from a time in the mountians with my faith in God stengthened! PTL!

For those of you who live in the area and who have time on Mondays, please join us. Every second Monday of the month the Bethany Climbing Club meets at the church at 10am and we then spend the day climbing a local mountain. Join us! You are welcome!

Yesterday we had a bit of a reunion here at our church. When I first came to Osaka in 1973 one of my first projects was a Christian Coffeehouse called the Omega. The Christians that I met at the Omega have remained my good friends for over 30 years now. One of the Omega group, Yamada Kun, now lives in America but right now is visiting Japan. He attended our morning church service and gave a wonderful testimony and also shared with us a song he had written.

In the afternoon we were joined by another Omega member, Shin Chan, who is also a guitar player and a Christian singer/songwriter. Shin Chan and Yamada Kun basically played non-stop for a couple of hours. When they finally gave up in exhaustion it was time for supper when we were joined by Mr. and Mrs. Furukawa and their son. Mr. and Mrs. Furukawa were also involved with the Omega Coffeehouse and so for the rest of the evening it was just a case of enjoying wonderful Christian fellowship. My heart was full of thanks for God's grace and goodness in guiding and being with us all these years and allowing us to keep in touch. It was sad when our group had to break up because of the lateness of the hour. My prayer is that all the members of the Omega group will continue to stay in touch and that we will have many chances in the future to again get together for fellowship.

Our home is always open-Reiko and I are waiting for the next Omege member to give us a call!

Today I invited Mr. K to come along with me as I tried to get my revenge on Mt. Makio where I was lost 2 weeks ago. This time instead of climbing up to the wrong ridge I continued straight on up the valley and was glad to actually find the correct ridge route marked with a sign. We enjoyed same very nice climbing for the next couple of hours. One of the high points was a look out point where the views of Mt. Iwawaki are the best I have ever seen anywhere. Mr. K asked me if that was really Mt. Iwawaki as it looked so great. The other high point was visiting the Kura Iwa which is a huge rock formation. From here also the views of the surrounding mountians and of the sea can't be beat. Mr. K was amazed that such a place existed in the Osaka area. After that, it was a nice relaxed climb down to the Sefuku Temple and down the stone steps to the parking lot. I'm sure Mr. K and I will sleep extra well tonight!

In spite of the heavy title this is a most interesting and challenging book. In his introduction he makes the following statement on page 16. "Evangelical theologians believe the Bible is an infallible, absolutely true communication in human language that came from an infinite, personal, and morally perfect God."

In part one he covers such subjects as God, Miracles, Revelation, Logic, Meaning, Truth, and Language-all subjects which are very meaningful to us as Christians.

In part two he gives the best treatment of Bibliology that I know of. The term that keeps on coming up in my reading recently about the Bible and Biblical inerrancy is "watershed". Once we lose our faith in Biblical inerrancy all manner of other errors follow. Dr. Geisler starts with Biblical inerrancy and builds his systematic theology from there.

I believe there are four more books in the set but I have not bought or read them and so can make no comments about the rest. However, I would strongly recommend Volume One to thinking Christians who are concerned not only about what they believe but also why they believe what they do.

That is the title of one of Christain Singer/Songwriter Noboru Morishige's songs. Last night some of us went to hear him in concert at the New Life Church. His last song was, "I'll Die Walking" and speaks of his desire to live his life to the end serving Jesus. Not to sit down and give up and die but rather to live and die serving Jesus. Noboru Morishige is a person who has been a great help to all of the Bethany churches here in Japan. He has come and done concerts in at least three of the Bethany churchs and a fourth church expressed interest in having him come in the near future. He also is a regular guest at our annual Bethany summer camp where members from all of our Bethany churches attend. I want to thank Noboru San for his songs and his message to us in the Bethany group of churches here in Japan. He lives in Hawaii but comes to Japan about four times a year to do concerts and evangelism. His homepage is www.theday.org Check it out and if you have a chance attend one of his concerts.

I am now about four fifths through "The Great Evangelical Disaster" by the late Francis Schaeffer. I am ashamed to admit that even though I knew about this book I never took the time to buy it or read it until now. I am finding it really well written and easy to understand and even though over 20 years have passed since it was published it seems to be really timely. While reading it I was reminded of "The Battle for the Bible" by Harold Lindsell. This is a book that I have read many times and which is also a very good book. However, Schaeffer presents his material in a way that only he can. I strongly recommend "The Great Evangelical Disaster". If some of you have never read Schaeffer before, this might be a good book to start with.

For the first time in maybe 15 years I got good and lost in the mountians today! Mr. S and I planned on seeing the Shimizu Waterfall which is the highest waterfall in the Izumi Mountains. After seeing the falls I thought it would be good to go through the beautiful valley up beyond the falls and then take the ridge route back to the Sefuku Temple and then back to the parking lot. However, at the end of the valley I took what I thought was the right route up to the ridge but it was the wrong ridge. After an hour of hiking with a vague feeling that this is not right, we came out on an un-familiar logging road. At that point I knew we were completely lost and I had no idea where we were. Of course the only thing to do was to back track and hope that we remembered the way we came. We made it back to the main valley before dark and so were able to end the day on a positive note. At least I ended the day on a positive note. Mr. S asked me, "Were there any parts of today's climb that you liked?" I assume that that meant that he himself was having a hard time finding any good points-getting all sweaty and tired and then being told at the end that we were lost and would need to back track does not seem to be his idea of a good day!!

Twenty years ago I attended a leader's meeting at Bethany in Minneapolis. At that time we were challenged about the importance of the Critical Event-that in any work there is a critical event that MUST be happening to make that work worthwhile. This Easter that teaching came to mind. For Christianity the Critical Event is the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Either Jesus Christ rose from the dead and is still alive or Christianity is all a lie. Of course that is the point that Paul makes in 1 Corinthians 15:17 "And if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins!"

But praise be to God, Christ IS risen.And on Easter morning that message was preached across the whole land of Japan. Our church had nearly twice the number of people attending as usual-I trust it was the same for other churches and that a great number of people heard the message of the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and came in touch with this Critical Event!

The cherry blossoms are now at their best at Ohike Park. At 5:30 this morning I drove to Mt. Kongo and found the upper part of the mountain all covered with snow. The trees on the main peak were all white with a different kind of blossom-blossoms made of snow and ice. Mt. Kongo is not a high mountain but the contrast between the lowlands and the peak always makes it a worthwhile climb. I certainly did not think I would see any more snow there this year so today was a real treat for me.

Spring has come and is a great time to enjoy canyoning at Mt. Kongo.Today, Mr.K and I took a couple suburban kids canyoning up the Myoken Valley. The whole valley is like one long gentle waterfall and so the kids had a great time choosing which route to take and sometimes getting wet but still loving it. I hope that through this experience the kids will have learned that there are more fun things to do in life besides computer games and comic books. At the end of our climb I was hoping for some nice views from the top but the annual spring winds brought so much desert sand over from China that there was nothing to see. We finished our hike by going to see how the wild dog's tooth lilies (katakuri in Japanese) were coming along. The leaves were out but no flowers yet. So, now I have something to look forward to on a future climb....

God has broken into our silence. He has spoken and has come down Himself. And in his written and living Word we are given truth from outside our situation, truth that throws light on our little lives and our little world. This word of God is the only effective Archimedean point to gain the leverage to raise us above the forces of gravity in our human condition.

Page 107 of Prophetic Untimeliness by Os Guiness

Last night Mr. N who was baptized on Monday went to be with the Lord. How wonderful at a time like this to remember Jesus' words in John 14:1-2. Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father's house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. Mr. N has now gone to the place that Jesus prepared for him. Reiko and I are already looking forward to seeing him when we also get to Heaven. PTL

Yesterday, I accompanied my good church member Mr.K (Barry, you used to call him Captain Wacky) on his 100th ascent of Mt. Kongo, the highest mountain in Osaka. Both he and I started mountain climbing as a result of close calls with death-in my case, with cancer, and in his case, a serious head injury. For the past several years we have been climbing together on almost a weekly basis. After celebrating together over cups of good coffee at the mountain hut, I fell into conversation with the man behind the counter. It turns out he was Mr. Katsuragi and is the 134th member of that family to live and work on top of Mt. Kongo. For over 1,000 years his family has lived and worked on the peak of that mountain. In fact, the old name for Mt. Kongo is Mt. Katsuragi. 100 climbs seemed awful small when compared to over 1,000 years of climbing lasting from generation to generation. On the other hand, all things are small when compared to God and to eternity. The Bible tells us that for God, one thousand years are like one day....

To answer your question, Kent (and others who I suspect will ask the same question in the future) American Primitive Guitar is usually connected with the names John Fahey, Robbie Basho, Peter Lang, and Leo Kottke-in other words the guitarists connected with the legendary Tacoma label. The best example of the genre would be the late John Fahey's album, America, which was recorded in 1971. However, the genre has not died out even though two of the most famous players have-Robbie Basho and John Fahey. Peter Lang and Leo Kottke still play and operate out of the Minneapolis/St. Paul area while I am happy to report that there are many younger players who play in this style. My current favorite is the German guitarist, Steffen Basho-Yunghans. I highly recommend two of his CDs-"Rivers and Bridges" and "Late Summer Morning". If you have not listened to any of these fine guitarists, give them a listen sometime.

A few weeks ago, Mr. N was rushed to the hospital and his family was told that he might not last the week-end. However, he came out of his coma and Reiko went to pray for him. After refusing at first the family relented as they figured that prayer would at least not hurt him. Reiko's prayer opened the way for me to pray for him a few days later. In spite of being known as a non-religious person, at that time he seemed to find his peace with God. A week later, the hospital allowed him to return home for a few days and at that time he expressed faith in Jesus and a desire to be baptized. He also gave me a charm which he said he no longer needed as he now believed in the true God.

This morning, myself and Reiko and a half dozen church members and Christian family members gathered at his home for a bedside baptism followed by communion. It was a wonderful and joyous time. Mr. N was supposed to be in pain but he said he felt fine and has not needed to take any pain medication at all. The swelling in his upper body and in his legs has also gone down. We do not know what the future holds, but it is times like this that make the missionary life worth living.

Romans 14:8 For if we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. Therfore, whether we live or die, we are the Lord's. Amen

This year I read an excellent book about Japan called "Shutting Out the Sun: How Japan Created Its Own Lost Generation" by Michael Zielenziger. If you are seriously interested in Japan, this is a must read. The auther lived and worked in Japan for many years and is an American with a Jewish background. He does not claim to be a Christian but does clearly approach things from a JudeoChrstian perspective. It is an alarming book and a challenging book.

I recently read a classic that I have wanted to read for a long time. It is "Mountaineering and Exploration in the Japanese Alps by Rev. Walter Weston. This book was first published in 1896 after he had served in Kobe, Japan as a British Chaplain and missionary. I had known of this book for many years but had never seen a copy. Amazon said they only had 2 copies left in stock and so that clinched the matter-now they only have one copy in stock! This book is a must read if you have done some climbing in Japan and have lived here some years. Otherwise, it might be a bit hard to relate to.

It is Rev. Walter Weston who made the term "Japanese Alps" famous outside of Japan and even within Japan he is called the Father of Mountain Climbing inJapan. To the Japanese he introduced the concept of actually climbing a mountian for enjoyment. It is in the same spirit that I also try to approach my own modest climbs.

At any rate, an interesting read..

I and eight other church members spent today in Shiga Prefecture where I grew up checking out a camp site for our annual Japanese Bethany summer camp. There are presently four Bethany churches in the Kansai area but our annual summer camp is about the only time that people from all four churches can get together. Last year, nearly 60 people gathered at a camp site near Lake Biwa (the largest lake in Japan) for a wonderful two days of fellowship. Lake Biwa is located about an equal distance from all four churches and so is an ideal location. This year we hope to hold our camp on the 10th and 11th of August and feel we found the perfect location today. When August rolls around I trust you will remember us and our camp in your prayers.

In the last 6 months I read "The Dust of Death" by Os Guiness twice. The last two chapters are realy worth the price of the book. Let me quote his final three sentences.

"The Christian life is not just difficult; it is impossible. But it is exactly here that humanism leaves off and the Christian faith begins.

That is also why only this uniquely "impossible" faith-with a God who is, with an incarnation that is earthly and historical, with a salvation that is at cross-purposes with human nature, with a resurrection that blasts apart the finality of death-is able to provide an alternative to the sifting, settling dust of death and through a new birth open the way to new life."

Amen!

I have finally gotten up the courage to try my hand at actually making comments that can be freely read by people on the web! I wll be 56 this year but I guess late is better than never. Being a bit of a process person I am going to try to stick within the boundaries of the following subjects.

Good Books
Things Japanese
American Primitive Guitar
The Church in Japan
Japanese Mountains

After saying that, as time goes on I may of course expand this list but at this point these are the subjects I hope to comment on. If this list is of interest to you, I hope you will visit often-I will try to post new comments as often as possible.

As this is a Monday (my day off) I am off to climb Mt. Kongo (the highest mountain in Osaka) as soon as I enter this. I am hoping to see possibly the last snow of the season before spring arrives!