Praying for Japan

See below for a prayer list from a mission team working in Japan and seeking to be useful for God after the earthquake and tsunami ..

ASK & RECEIVE Special JAPAN EARTHQUAKE UPDATE
MTW Tokyo Team


Dan Iverson (Tokyo MTW team leader) written 3/11/2011, excerpts below

Please pray for us as we decide where to go and help with hands, food, water, diapers, and money, etc. At this writing there are more than 1100 dead or missing, and we have the sad expectation that this number will go much higher considering how big and widespread the tsunamis were.

Where to go?
There is 130 miles (200 km) of coastal area devastation from this monster earthquake and resulting tsunamis, so it is difficult to know where we should go to help. We are looking for missionaries or churches in an area to partner with and that could be our base. Pray for wisdom: when to go, where to go, who to go to, and what to take.

So, as we and so many Christians mobilize and seek to relieve incredible suffering and pain in the name of Christ to the 5 million people of the devastated areas, pray that this will bring a turning to the true and living God, and to Christ and his grace and love. Japan really needs true hope that does not disappoint.

It needs to also break our heart that this very rich country is really so spiritually impoverished, with so many with no hope. To put the spiritual darkness of Japan in perspective, Japan averages about 90 suicides per day. It is so sad that already 1100 people appear to have died in the earthquake/tsunami, and yet a normal 12 days in Japan brings about this many suicides. Japan has grown strong economically and educationally and has "made it", with 100% literacy, longest life expectancy in the world, etc. But like in Ecclesiastes 2, so many Japanese people who sought the "abundant" life have found that "all is vanity." Pray for a new turning to the One who really does give abundant life (John 10:10b).

The stats on Japan's spiritual poverty, and especially the affected area:
The areas affected by the earthquake and tsunamis of Miyagi, Fukushima, and Ibaraki are some of the most spiritually needy places in Japan. With over 4.9 million people yet only about 9,000 active Christians (about 0.15%; about 1/6 of 1%). Fukushima has the lowest average worship attendance in all of Japan with only 19 per church. There are is one city and 44 towns with no church at all. There are 86 missionaries (adults, including husband and wife) assigned to these prefectures.

One town in Ibaraki has over 46,000 people with no church and several others have over 24,000 people with no churches. Average attendance for all the churches in Japan is the lowest in Fukushima prefecture. Ibaraki prefecture has the least number of people claiming to have any religious beliefs.


How do we help? Our plans?

We are renting a truck and preparing to go: Need to know where to go. Please pray for that.

We have rented one truck and are having people bring supplies to worship to take up north. Email and cell phone access are down in the Sendai area where things were the worse. We know OPC missionaries there who could be a base for us to help with their churches, if they and the churches are okay, but all we know is that "OPC missionaries the Cummings are okay, but have no electricity or other utilities" (word we finally got 2d hand). And, because the two nuclear power plants in the affected region are a very serious concern, we may not be allowed into some areas to help.

Please do pray for Japan, and for us!

Overall Prayer Points
• Pray for team members: to be prepared with earthquake necessities, to experience the peace of Christ that is greater than any tremor, and to be able to pass that on to others. Pray they would be able to set aside their own fears to comfort others. Pray as they seek to assemble a team of volunteers to go and help in the affected areas, that it would be in God’s timing and the location that would give Him the most glory.

• Pray for the Japanese Christians: Pray that after being jolted from their routines they would look to Christ, and as they contact family members and secure their safety, that God would fill them with a new desire and urgency to love and share the gospel with their families and friends. Pray that God would put it into their heart to give generously of supplies and food, time and labor, to reach their fellow countrymen for Christ.

• Pray against hopelessness – pray that many would not give in to the hopelessness that surrounds them, but would reach out to the true hope found only in Christ.

• Pray specifically for the salvation of our many contacts and friends as they process the “whys?” of this catastrophe. Many students have relatives in the affected areas and may have experienced death directly. Pray that they would be comforted and counseled with the love of Jesus.