A Hidden agenda of the Japanese Church disclosed

by Pastor Hideki Kusunoki

After the World War II, missionaries came to evangelize Japan with the gospel of Jesus Christ which supposed to save Japanese souls who lost the war and their dignity. Despite of their tireless work, The Christian population has declined to almost 240,000 over 124 millions. After 7 decades of evangelism, Christianity is considered as a dying religion. Evangelical Churches are disappearing from the map of Japan. One out of 12 churches has no pastor. An average Japanese church attendance is declined from 30 to 25 people.  As you look into the fact, Japanese church is slowly and surely dying despite of missionary’s effort during the post–war era.

My question is “Why Japanese is not responding to the gospel?”

So many programs and evangelistic plans have been introduced to Japan. American missionaries brought their programs that had a success in the United States. They had experienced a spiritual awakening. Therefore, they brought their modified programs to Japan.  These evangelistic programs supposed to change the demography of the Christian population. Since Japan has a freedom of speech and religion, we also had a stable economy for more than 40 years; However, these modified evangelistic programs could not win Japanese souls. There was a phenomenal success for evangelism elsewhere. Unfortunately, none of these programs had worked in Japan.

A reality check is that there is not even one program that made a significant change among Japanese society for the last seven decades. It had been miserable failures one after another. We are facing critical point for the survival of the Japanese Church. Young people are not coming to Church anymore. A majority of attendees is over 65 years old elderly women. For the next 20 years, the statistic would indicate that the Japanese Church will not be able to sustain as a religious organization. 25 percent of current 8000 Evangelical churches will not be able to hire pastor or even deacons to run the church. Japanese Christian will become endangered species. Japan has become already the most secularized democratic nation in the western world. 

Missionaries have not yet recognized this cold fact. The Western style Evangelicalism has been rejected time after time by Japanese. On the contrary to their genuine motive and sincere love for God, their programs slowly killed Christianity in Japan.

California based mega church is trying to introduce their evangelistic program. They have been looking for a Japanese leader who is able to run the program. However, they could not yet find a local pastor who qualifies as a leaderfor over ten years now. Nonetheless, Missionaries kept coming and trying to introduce their own programs. I am not being a pessimistic, but these programs had not worked before and will not work in the future. I am just being a pragmatic. For instance, Korean church sent hundreds of missionary to Japan since early 1980s. Dr. Paul Yongi Cho’s Church (the biggest church in the world) failed to evangelize Japanese. Moreover, Onnuri church in Korea sent even Japanese pastors as missionaries to Japan, they were able to minister to Korean and Korean Japanese. Again Japanese did not respond to the gospel by their programs.

As I mentioned previously that a history repeats itself, Foreign made programs would not work in Japan. The real question is when foreign missionaries and sending organization realize this cold fact.      

  Here is my hypothesis. 

  Most programs ,which American or Korean tried to introduce to Japan, had a fatal assumption. They were trying to re-vitalize existing churches or Christians. The intrinsic mistake was made from the beginning. They assumed that Japanese Church or Japanese Christians were spiritually healthy to revitalize.  Sending mission board misdiagnosed spirituality of the Japanese Christians. They sent missionaries to the already problematic churches. They should have sent missionaries targeting non-believers instead. Missionaries could not recognize that Evangelical churches had a spiritual hindrance. Foreign missionaries and sending administrations could not analyze dying Churches’ reasons why Japanese churches are not growing or rather dying spiritually and numerically.  

 We need to analyze the spiritual growth. The growth rate of the church may indicate the condition of the Japanese church.  0.2 % is a barometer for their spirituality. Japanese Church (and its leadership) is the root of all problems. Majority of Japanese pastors could not recognize the fact since it is too offensive to the current Christian leaders. The revitalization of Japanese church has no chance in heaven. Simply because they are the problem.

 First, we need to discern spiritual problem among Christian leadership. I would advice that two major problems need to be addressed before they go into the ministry. Missionaries did not do the homework before they came to Japan. According to my research, Japanese church committed sin of Idolatry during the World War II. Appointed leaders of the church(NIHON Kirisuto Kyoudan) led worship of the Emperor Hirohito during the Sunday worship service. No one has ever confronted Japanese leaders for the sin of idolatry in church.  This fatal spiritual unfaithfulness still haunted present churches. God’s chastisement upon Japanese leaders is a stumbling block to the entire ministry. Japanese Christians must publicly confess their sin of Idolatry. Japanese Christian leaders led the worship of the Emperor Hirohito and hid the fact for 70 years. Second commandment “thy shall not commit Idolatry” was violated among Japanese churches. Hideki sincerely believes that these Christians ,who worshiped Emperor Hirohito, must pass away before Japan receives so called a Revival.

It reminds me of Daniel's 70 years of exile.Why it took 70 years. 

Despite of missionaries tireless effort, Japan remains 0.2% Christian rate because, there was no repentance of their sin of Idolatry. Therefore, there is no spiritual growth for the Christian church. No one has ever pointed out this historical fact. This is much more surprise to me than the actual 0.2% growth rate. Missionaries came to Japan did not bother historical issues. I think that they were not able to  study the Japanese Christian history due to their language skills. Since a majority of missionaries was so called "Katakoto" missionaries in Japan. They can not even pronounce "MacDonalds" in Japanese. MaKUdo NaLudo

I believer that God brought chastisement to the Japanese church. It was just like Daniel’s generation who ignored God’s commandment. They were taken to Babylon as captives. They had to pay the consequence of their disobedience for 70 years.

 There are two key causes for fruitlessness in Japan.

Japanese leaders and Christians compromised their faith and worshiped idol.

Missionaries did not confront or simply did not know the idolatry of the Japanese leaders.

 My premise of the revival is following : God would not be able to lift the spiritual bondage without repentance. God could not grant his blessings to the people who would not confess their sins. Revival without repentance is the impossible scenario.

Let us suppose my hypothesis is on target. then here are my suggestions.

First, Japanese Christians must recognize the past transgression.

Second, Repentance of the Idolatry and ask God for forgiveness. Personal relationship with God begins with repentance. The Japanese church needs reconciliation with God by confession of their sin of the Idolatry.

Third, Focus on non-believers not the church people (believers) for evangelism. Most Foreign made evangelistic programs are aiming to revitalize the current existing churches. That was the reason why they failed to evangelize Japanese. 

 Fourth, Train the Japanese future leaders. We must raise and support national pastors. Foreign missionaries ,who can not read Japanese at college level, should return home. We must train national pastors and send them to the Japanese society not to the dying churches. We should not waist our time re-vitalizing existing churches. We should rather target an ordinal Japanese.

 Fifth, Financial independence must be required for the new pastors. Missionaries or pastors need to raise their own support as tent makers. They should not have financial tie to any tainted Christian organization. The current pastors could not change the church since they could not admit their fault. Young pastors could not point out predecessors mistakes since they have a financial obligations. Therefore, financial independence is a must in order to change the church and its leadership.

Sixth and the last, Ask God for help. We are looking for meek and humble leaders (servant leaders).

Japan needs to raise Christian leaders who are interested in serving Christ not to the organization. The financial independence will be required for future leaders in Japan so that they would not be influenced by the current Church leaders.

Conclusion 

Evangelism in Japan must begin from the scratch.  Current missionaries did not know that they were a part of the problem. Evangelism is a spiritual matter. If commander-in-chief or higher-ranking officers do not analyze their enemy correctly, they are bound to lose the war. The United States had won the World War II, but their missionaries lost the spiritual battles in Japan. 0.2 % is inexcusable result for the 70 years of evangelism. Present leaders of the Japanese Church must resign from the current position; I would suggest that the fastest way to achieve revival is to recognize the past mistake and go forward with a brand new leadership. The revival is on the horizon if they can repent of their sin and leave. The revival scenario is always the same. It will begin with repentance.

 

 Written by the Japanese Christian Church of the Inland Empire California, Baptist General Conference (2006-2013)

         Pastor Hideki Kusunoki currently lives in Kawasaki Japan.

You can read more about Hideki’s comment at www.japanesechurch.blogspot.com