Hope all of you are doing well. I have been a terrible missionary as far as the nature of my reports goes. My fellow preacher suggested that I send you pictures showing how I have been doing. You need visual aids to know how I am doing. That's right. Thank God, I have such a friend that can give me advice like this. By snail mail, I will send you three pictures: my family picture, a picture of the church sign we put up, and a picture of one of my students. I am introducing him to you in this letter.

Since you have pledged to support us for three years, this is the final year for your pledge. That means, we need to work harder than ever. Since we began a Japanese worship service, we have had several non Christian visitors. God is gracious to us and has been leading those truth seekers. A few weeks ago, we finally put up the church sign showing the time and the day of the worship service. You will see two signs in the picture I will send you. The left in Japanese is our sign; the right in English shows English worship service in which American Air Force men and wives gather together in the morning. We Japanese gather together at 1:00 in the afternoon.

Last week we invited one of my students to dinner. You will see him in the picture I will send you. His name is Taiji Taomoto. He is a professional artist who makes sculpture. Three months ago he visited us (the Yokota English congregation) in Sunday evening worship service. Because he is interested in English, he visited us. Later I found out that he had attended a denominational Japanese church. Although he was baptized (immersed), his faith has been fading away according to him. His brother suicided; his good neighbor suicided recently. He has begun to think life is not worth living. His faith in God has been weakened. But he has been coming to study the Bible and English with me. I think it is important for me to establish good friendship with him. Since he likes to play pool, I went to play pool with him. That was fun. Also we had him at our home and ate together. His dream is to go to New York and to study art. Although I know he is in the hand of God, I just pray that he will stay with me and keep on studying the Bible with me. Please pray for him.

As I indicated to you, we just bought a brand new car, which is coming to us nest Wednesday. We appreciate your support for us to buy a car. March is the time of a year one should buy a car because many car dealers compete and discount their prices in Japan. I had $ 3700 discount. The whole price is $18000 including tax. The car hold 8 people maximum. We can provide a ride for those people who do not have a car. We think this car should be used for the glory of God. However, we are still short of $6000. Please continue to support for us to finish paying for our loan.

Our boys are growing a lot. Ken is a little confused about language between English and Japanese. Riki has a totally different personality from Ken's. We have decided to send them day care school, beginning in April. Our plan was that while they go to, Mari works. This will help us pay for car loan. But this is not likely to happen. We assumed that she could easily get a job on Yokota Base, but we just found out yesterday (March 5) that she had to make a certain high score on TOEFL, which is a Test of English as Foreign Language. She has to study a lot to pass it. The test will come up in May. She has a few months to prepare for it. Please pray for her.