Amysan

When the Nokendai Bible Fellowship church first started, they handed out approximately 10,000 fliers to the houses surrounding the community inviting them to attend church. Of all the fliers that were handed out, Mr. Onoe was the only one who responded to the invitation. He is one of their original attendees and still attends every week.

At the beginning when NBF was first established, there were three elderly men who attended the service together. One man was very enthusiastic about the church and service. Every week he listened intently to the message, encouraged the other two to attend the service, and was always with a smile at church. Another man was skeptical and was overheard telling the other two men that the church was a cult and that they should get out of there before they were scammed. Mr. Onoe was the third and when he originally came out approximately three years ago, he looked like a man overburdened with a life filled with pain and hardship. He was a man that kept his eyes to the ground, never smiled and was very quiet.

As time passed by, the ethusiastic man suddenly stopped attending service. When Kohichi tried to contact him to invite him to Christmas service, the man replied asking him to stop contacting him – he had found that Christianity had similar beliefs and values as Buddhism and that he preferred Buddhism instead. The skeptical man continued to attend service and in his skepticism, continued to ask hard questions and dig deeper. He became a man of faith and continues to attend service. Mr. Onoe also because a changed man. When I first met him, he greeted me with a smile. He introduced himself as an 85 year old man who has been attending the church for about 3 years now. He looked like a happy healthy man. I had found out later than he was a survivor of WWII fighting for the Japanese. He had worked in the financial industry afterwards as a banker and spent a portion of his life in New York City working at Chase Manhattan. Shirley explained to us that after the war, Mr. Onoe carried a lot of guilt, shame and pain as a survivor of the war. In general, the nation of Japan was devastated after having lost WWII. They were occupied by foreign states and forbidden from ever establishing an army even to protect themselves. Seeing Mr. Onoe now, I would never have known him to be such a man full of history. Every week, he visits the old-age home to play Go with friends who live there. He is often their only visitor. He was our host and translator when visiting the old-age home to sing for them and share with them the message of Christ.

The story of the three eldery men at NBF reminds of a passage in the Bible.

Matthew 13:3-9
Parable of the Sower

3Then [Jesus] told them many things in parables, saying: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. 4As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. 5Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. 6But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. 7Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. 8Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. 9He who has ears, let him hear.”

The enthusiastic man was the seed which fell on shallow soil – it sprang up quickly but withered when the sun came up because it had no root. He eventually turned to Buddhism. The skeptical man and Mr. Onoe was the seed which fell on good soil – I pray that through them a crop of hundreds can be produced.

Mr. Onoe’s testimony was amazing for me to hear how Christ can transform a person and create such a huge difference in his life. From someone who carried such an obvious burden that you could see it on his face to someone whose face is always lit up and smiles every times he see you. That is the work of Christ in his life.