Tadaima! My Japan vision trip report

ただいま (tadaima) = “I’m home”

I am back from my vision trip to Japan! Thank you for praying, for checking in, and for spurring me on with the gift of your friendship. By now you should know that brevity is not my strength, so I will just jump right in.

To give some context, here is a high-level view of what I did.

• I was blessed to have a full three weeks in Japan and visited several places throughout the country. The areas where I spent significant time in were Tokyo, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Osaka, Wakayama Prefecture, and Nagoya. I had only ever visited Tokyo on previous trips to Japan, so this itinerary was a real adventure!
• Within these places, I spent a lot of my time visiting local churches and ministries, meeting with people, prayer walking, reading, journaling, and observing. Frankly, I often had no idea what I was doing, but God orchestrated the whole trip better than I could have (obviously).
• My hope for this vision trip was to receive clarity in two main areas: 1) for why my heart has been pulled to Japan all these years, and 2) if I want to pursue a missions path through the workplace or full-time ministry.

While I would love to share about every high and low from an experience as special to me as this, I will focus on sharing about a portion of the trip that I at first thought had nothing to do with my original objectives, but now I can not imagine this trip without it.

One thread of connecting reflections

An initial reflection on being Japanese-American

Being Japanese-American, and more broadly Asian-American, had turned into a sore spot for me over the years. Starting from the beginning, I grew up in Hawaii where I rarely thought about what it meant to be Asian-American. To be Asian in Hawaii puts you in the majority. Within this majority, Japanese is by far one of the most populous and influential ethnic groups. My public elementary school even had a Japanese language and culture class built into our weekly schedule. Also, most of my friends were the third, fourth, even fifth generations of their families just like me.

When I moved to California for college, I had a mini culture shock when seeing that the Japanese-American population in the mainland (how people from Hawaii refer to the continental U.S.) is so small. I also gained more awareness of what it meant to be Asian-American for other people. I heard about many common experiences of racial discrimination and model minority pressures. I was thankful that I never had to deal with any of that. Walking through the involvement fair as a freshman, I remember several upperclassmen tried to get me to join a six-week program that culminated in a retreat for discussing these Asian-American issues. I briefly considered it, but then I learned that the retreat was basically just a weekend-long party, which caused me to lose interest.

I was introduced specifically to the second generation Asian-American Christian story when I started to attend church for the first time in my life. I have attended the same church throughout my entire walk with Jesus so far. The current demographic breakdown is supposedly 65% Korean, 30% Chinese, and 5% other. I would say this feels like an accurate distribution, though when I started attending my church eight years ago, it felt much more Korean. I felt it through the assumptions that I am Korean just because “everyone is Korean,” seamless switching to Korean in group conversations, references always being made from a Korean context, and general Korean mannerisms that seemed to create bonds between people that no one shared with me. Had I known this would be the type of community I was joining, would I have still committed to it? I guess I am thankful to have not known, so that my personal biases did not get in the way of finding God when and where I did.

To clarify, this is not meant to be a critique against the Asian-American Church or my specific church. I appreciate how much my worldview has been expanded by my first and second generation Asian-American friends. I also find it fascinating how Korean culture has become so internationally loved, making it an accessible means for building an introductory connection.

Still, being at a predominantly Korean-American church has not been easy, which feels ridiculous to say as someone who is at least East Asian and therefore “fits in” from that category. There is still the temptation to believe that I do not belong, which I am aware is a personal stronghold the enemy uses against me in general. Side note, though, lately I have been mulling over the question, “What is my personal responsibility when I choose to enter a community knowing that I am not part of the majority?”

What I did not realize was happening beneath my surface was another temptation to believe that I am less good because of my American-ness and lack of Japanese-ness. Because I do not speak Japanese at home. Because my parents do not cook Japanese food. Because I have little knowledge of my family’s history that I am not even sure my parents know much of. There have been several instances when I have felt ashamed for being un-Asian – “Oh, you mean you don’t _____?” – but there is one comment that I get repeatedly that I am embarrassed to admit how much has affected me.

“Oh, you actually grew up watching TV during dinner? That is so weird, that is so American… I would never do that with my family.” Yes, we did and still do. Yes, my family is quite American. All I can say is, we do not get to choose what kind of family we come from.

---

Going into my vision trip, I had honestly forgotten what Japan was like. The last time I was there was six years ago, and I was such an inexperienced traveler at that time that there was so much newness to take in. Being in Japan this time, I was struck by how many foreigners there were. Jokingly I thought to myself, “Where was all this tourist and expat love in Guatemala?”

I expected to feel like and to be treated as one of these foreigners. An ethnically Japanese foreigner, but a foreigner still nonetheless. I quickly noticed that every service worker I encountered would speak to me in Japanese. At first I thought this is what people meant when they return from vacation complaining that Japanese people do not know English as well as the internet claims. Then I noticed that in heavily touristed areas, I would hear the service workers switch from speaking in English to a clearly non-Japanese person to then speaking in Japanese to me. Then there were a handful of times when a local would come up to me and ask me a question in Japanese. Was all of this an invitation to let myself claim my being Japanese?

In many of these interactions, I could only keep up speaking in Japanese for so long until the person would catch on to my confusion and switch to English. Welp. Never so quickly did a feeling of belonging immediately get pulled out from under me.

Where does Japan belong in God’s story for me?

One of the cities I was most looking forward to and also most nervous to visit was Hiroshima. My paternal grandpa’s family moved back and forth from Japan and the U.S. a couple of times and lived in Hiroshima during World War II. My aunt and uncle sent me directions on how to find the location of the family home, as well as a more detailed account of my grandpa’s experience on the day of the atomic bombing than what I was told growing up. He passed away from cancer when I was five years old, and unfortunately I do not have a lot of my own memories of him since my dad’s family lived in California while I grew up in Hawaii.

The Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum was an absolute must-see for me, especially with the new-to-me family context I now had. Any succinct attempt at trying to describe the impact of this experience on me would fall short.

The spherical nature of the nuclear blast and subsequent damage was portrayed on a map by concentric circles around the bomb’s hypocenter. I pinpointed the location of my family’s house on this map, and to my horror, the house was right along the border of the “totally collapsed and burned” zone that covered an approximately two kilometer radius.

Had the atomic bomb been dropped maybe even a few hundred meters closer in the direction of the house, what would have happened? Would I be here, these eighty years later, to contemplate this at all?

After taking in the museum and the surrounding Peace Memorial Park area, I hopped on the local bus to visit my grandpa’s old neighborhood, just in time to catch golden hour. The house is no longer there and has been replaced by an apartment complex, but standing in the same spot still felt surreal at the end of such a sobering day.

Why did God spare my family mortally? Why did God spare me eternally?

There are many questions in this life that we will never know the answers to. As I sat along the river where my grandpa used to play during his childhood summers, I grieved and I hoped. I wondered if my grandpa’s family had ever heard the gospel when they lived in Japan. I felt overwhelmed by God’s mercy that allowed me to live and come to know Him. I had to surrender to the truth that God is still good and to be trusted even in some of the worst of darkness on this side of heaven.

Any doubt about my Japanese identity was quelled by this day in Hiroshima. If I want to be able to embrace other cultures and stories in my hope of doing cross-cultural missions one day, I need to first learn how to embrace my own culture and story. I had gotten used to detaching myself from my ethnicity because I did not feel Japanese “enough,” and also because “my identity is being a child of God.” This is the truest thing about me, yes, but it is not the only true thing about me. Our ethnic identities reflect the multi-faceted glory of God, and God wrote Japan into my family’s heritage.

While I came on this trip to see if Japan is meant to be in my future, I found that Japan is most certainly at least part of my past. Moreover, I have been given a second chance at life through the generations of my family. There is no way that I am going to waste it.

Where do I belong in God’s story for Japan?

After my time in Hiroshima, I took a detour from my original itinerary to visit Nagasaki, thanks to the suggestion of an old church friend, Tom. “You’re already going to be all the way out in Hiroshima, what’s another three hour train ride?” I mean, I guess I do have an affinity for trains…

The older I get, the more I lament how bad I am at learning history, but what I learned and saw during my visit to Nagasaki will be unforgettable. Nagasaki is significant as it was the center of early Christianity in Japan and continues to hold a strong presence today. Christianity entered Japan in 1549 by the way of Jesuit missionary Francis Xavier and spread rapidly out from the Nagasaki region, with the number of Japanese Christians reaching 300,000 (!!!) before the end of the century. The Japanese government leaders, however, saw Christianity as a threat to their power and enforced anti-Christian edicts that lasted for over 250 years. The Japanese Christians were forced to go underground with their faith, else they faced persecution or death. If you have watched the movie Silence by Martin Scorsese, then you are familiar with what cruel tactics were used.

One of the most famous acts of persecution was in 1597 against a group of twenty Japanese Christians and six foreign missionaries, known as the 26 Martyrs of Japan. They were forced to march in public humiliation from Kyoto to Nagasaki where they were crucified. On the hill where they shed their blood now has an entire museum dedicated to them and all the other martyrs of Japan.

Of course, Nagasaki is also significant for being the other city that had an atomic bombing during World War II. When I visited the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum, I was moved by the Christian influence across the various displays. For example, there was a prominent section on the Urakami Cathedral, a church that the Japanese hidden Christians built for themselves after the ban on Christianity was finally lifted. The Urakami Cathedral finished construction in 1925 and was the largest Christian structure in all of East Asia, up until its destruction in the atomic bombing only twenty years later. How does one respond to suffering as seemingly relentless as this?

“Is there not a deep relationship between the war’s end and the one holy place in Japan, chosen as a lamb for sacrifice on the altar? I am grateful that Urakami was chosen and raised up upon God’s altar.”
– Dr. Takashi Nagai, a famous Japanese Christian physician, author, and survivor of the Nagasaki atomic bombing

I am not trying to get into a theological debate on how to make sense of such a tragedy, but wow. This type of resilient faith leaves me speechless.

Overall, my time in Nagasaki forced me to stop and really consider the weight of my words when I have so freely said that I want to be a missionary in Japan. I must think about the spiritual legacy that I would be stepping in to, of all of the missionaries and Japanese Christians who lived before me, counting the cost with their whole lives. They were truly willing to die for their faith… am I?

Then Paul answered, "What are you doing, weeping and breaking my heart?  For I am ready not only to be imprisoned but even to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus."  And since he would not be persuaded, we ceased and said, "Let the will of the Lord be done."
Acts 21:13-14

Where do I belong in God’s story for His glory?

Prior to leaving for my trip, I had a conversation with one of my pastors whose last words of encouragement to me were, “More than going to any country or people group, we must remember that what we really want is to let our lives be for the glory of God.”

It reminded me of a moment with God that I had experienced right before I finally had the guts to book my flight to Japan. I was at our church’s prayer room, worshipping to these lyrics:

So put me anywhere, just put Your glory in me
And I'll serve anywhere, just let me see Your beauty
"All Is For Your Glory" by OneThing

Where could “anywhere” be? Well, as I was praying, I got an image of myself… standing alone in a small, dark closet. That is not exactly where I had in mind. But it is where I heard God say to me, “If I put you here, would you still trust Me?”

If I can trust God that He would be pleased to put His glory in me even if hidden away in a seemingly useless function, then I can trust Him wherever I may be and whatever I may be doing. His love for me, for the world, and for His Name does not depend on either of those things. It is with this trust that I was able to take the risk of going to Japan and to now come back full of affirmation and confidence.

So, what now?

After this trip, I have a clear sense of direction – I am ready to say without hesitation that I want to be a full-time missionary in the future, and it feels great to say! Bless those who are called to minister in the workplace, but my heart is and has been gravitating toward some type of vocational ministry. Even aside from missions, I think of distinct memories in recent years of when I have felt the most activated and motivated and purposeful, and those have largely been in church discipleship contexts. With the desire for this calling comes the responsibility to test it, because who is to say that I will be proficient enough in ministry to make it a full-time thing? I do not exactly know what it will look like to test the call yet, or what that call to vocational ministry even looks like for me… but whereas before I would stay still from my fear of making a wrong decision, I now feel at peace with taking one step at a time. Maybe I will discover that this is actually not my calling, and that will be okay too.

In regards to Japan, I also am ready to say that I feel called to keep pursuing Japan as a future missions field in my journey. That is until God tells me otherwise, in which then I will obey to change course accordingly.

---

Bonus sharing (click to open): Three moments during the trip when I felt especially seen by God…

• On my first Sunday, I fumbled because I had failed to realize that I did not have the address for a church I planned to visit. I ended up visiting a different church in Chiba, a neighboring prefecture of Tokyo. I showed up unsure, but I was warmly welcomed in. The very first person who happened to walk in after me was a church member who spoke great English and I later learned is the son of the pastor of the church I had originally planned to visit! I know the world is small, but come on… I also met a woman in her 70s who shared her story about becoming a Christian when she studied abroad in America fifty years ago. The three of us had lunch together after service and chatted for over three hours. We were at the church for so long that the pastor had to gently make us leave, but not until after he offered to pray for me for the rest of my trip. This, this type of fellowship among believers, bonded by our shared passion for Christ… there are few things in life sweeter than this.
• At another church I visited in Osaka, I was touched by the sermon as it made me think about how I desperately want to stop having a default mindset of self-rejection. We sang “The Power of Your Love” by Hillsong in Japanese as our response, which touched me even more as I have been meditating on this song for several months in using it to learn how to play the piano. “Lord, renew my mind as Your will unfolds in my life in living every day by the power of Your love.“
• Throughout the trip, I slowly read Life of the Beloved by Henri Nouwen, which I had randomly picked up at a thrift store a couple of months ago. I had no idea what the book was about beyond the title, so I was surprised that the introduction started with Nouwen telling a story about trying to convince his friend to quit his job and do what he was really passionate about instead… sounds like a familiar situation! There were additional anecdotes in the book that hit really close to home, that spoke to areas of my life in ways that no one else has. It was perhaps the best book I could have brought with me on this trip.

This path to pursue missions often feels lonely, but you make it feel less so. I hope that I can do the same for you. May our obedience to the Great Commandment launch us into the Great Commission, together.