Greetings from Tokyo Japan. I have been so busy that I have not been able to seed you a report. I hope you had a nice summer. Here in Japan we had a very strange weather. It was not like summer at all. We had many cloudy days and rainy days. There were many floods all over in Japan. At the same time, we are in deep recession as you know. Last few months, we have had very dangerous and terrible crimes. Poisonous substance was put in soda drink and dishes while people were having a picnic. Some people died from this crime. This type of crimes occurred several times last month.

I attended Christian Retreat and spoke of the topic of joyful fellowship on August 11. Also I attended the Teachers Meeting of Japan School of Evangelism. It became a very important meeting. We discussed the direction of the school and the curriculum. Because some teachers misunderstood one another, we needed to clear the air. Now we are heading for the right direction, but still have a long way to go.

I have the crucial thing I need to report. While I work with Yokota church of Christ and help them build a new church building, they have supported me and my family with \60000 each month. The original agreement was that this support was for my work (preaching and teaching) with the Yokota. Meanwhile, I have tried to work with Japanese and study the Bible with them. This has not been working well. I believe that my primary responsibility is to establish a Japanese congregation. I have to refocus my work with Japanese. I have suggested to the Yokota congregation that they reduce my ministerial salary for what I do with the Yokota, but to consider supporting us for my mission work. I would like to reduce my work time with the Yokota congregation. I have suggested that we attend only Sunday Morning service and Wednesday evening study, but we will not attend Sunday night service. We are planning to have a Home Bible Study in the afternoon every Sunday. This makes us very busy Sunday afternoon. In order to have a stable family life, we have decided not to attend Sunday night service. At the present time, Mari has a part time job and still looks for a more secure job. I also have a part time job delivering papers for an hour early in the morning. This will not hinder my work with Japanese and Japan School of Evangelism. Sometime this month the Yokota congregation will have a congregational meeting and decide concerning my request.