Hallelujah! We are now in a very exciting season of our church plant; four of our faithful, saved, and baptized adults are getting ready to become the legal charter members of our church! These adults specifically were local Christians who were already saved and baptized when they first came to our church but were looking and praying for a sound, soul-winning Baptist church where they could worship and serve actively, as our city had none before God led us to plant our church here. While it is our greatest desire to see the lost we are currently ministering to get saved and to see those who have been reached through our ministry get baptized and become members as well, we are thrilled to know that our church plant is a major answered prayer for the few Christians who were already in our once churchless city and that those same Christians are now growing, serving, and getting ready to become the founding core members of our church plant!

Throughout this month, God allowed us to finalize the constitution draft of our church plant, comprising the church covenant, statement of faith, and bylaws, all in both Japanese and English to serve our multicultural congregation, and all which have been carefully developed through over a year of prayer, fasting, and counseling. As our prospective charter members complete our membership classes that will teach through these documents, all rich with Biblical principles and references, we are excited to see it signed and published as a church. February 2 was a very special Sunday, as we not only held our first membership class after our regular services, but we enjoyed our first church meal that was prepared by someone in our church plant other than my wife and me, one of those potential members who volunteered to serve in this way once every month! However, the greatest blessing of that day was that her daughter made the decision to follow in believer’s baptism during the invitation of that day’s worship service! We are looking forward to the first baptism at our church plant after my wife gives her a thorough explanation of her decision in Japanese, as well as our charter signing when all four of our prospective members complete their membership classes! What exciting days we are in!

Bro. Ben Liu, the first visitor to our church who has been faithful since, also became the first to complete the membership classes, as well as the first man in our church whom I entrusted to lead a tennis fellowship activity on February 10 in the absence of my wife and me, as we were both ill on that day. It has been exciting to see both him and several others display significant growth in the areas of prayer, Bible reading, Bible memorization, faithfulness to worship and serve in the church, and being a personal witness to the lost. In addition to the core faithful soon-to-become members of our church, God has continued to give us a regular group of those who are newer in their Christian faith, some who have yet to be baptized, as well as those who are not yet saved. Our most recent addition is one of the young Japanese men whom I had the privilege of leading to Christ and discipling in our previous ministry as the interim pastor of the Immanuel Bible Baptist Church of Nayoro, Hokkaido. He had moved to Tokyo and had fallen away from church, but God has allowed me to continue ministering to him from a distance. Through a series of events that could only be orchestrated by the Lord, he ended up staying in our home for a week toward the end of the month, and during his stay, God gave him an opportunity to move to our city and find work here through Bro. Ben Liu! February 20 became one of our sweetest and most memorable midweek services, as we took extra time for the four of us to pray for one another, especially for this young man’s future and Christian growth. We are excited to see how God will glorify Himself in all of these opportunities!

Danielle’s Journey

It has been so exciting to see how God is working in our ministry and using what we have, just as we have prayed for. At the beginning of this month, one of our teenagers made a decision to get baptized. We are so excited, as it will be the first baptism to be held at our church here in Kisarazu! Though she has been busy with her school tests, I will be discipling her on baptism in the upcoming weeks. It has also been a blessing to see the ladies in our church step up to serve anywhere they can in areas like preparing the meal for the afternoon or helping to serve the food. It is so encouraging to see their desire to be used by the Lord in the church. We have also had a lot of guests in our house this month. It has been so exciting to see God answer our prayers and use our house as a place of refuge for those going through heartaches, those in the middle of big decisions, as well as those in need of rest. It has been fun preparing the room for each guest, just waiting to see how God will use it. It brings me so much joy to be able to be used in this way! Thank you for always taking the time to read our praise reports and pray for us and our ministry here. Your thoughts and prayers mean so much to us!

Your friends and co-laborers to Japan,

Go and Danielle Oishi