Nakasendo Goal Completed

Oct. 26th 2011

Dear Family and Friends,

Praise the Lord! We finally finished the Nakasendo Walk and made it to Sanjyo Oohashi in Kyoto this past Oct 4th. Looking back, we thank the Lord for the 60 people who walked, the 41 churches we visited, and the many people with whom we shared the gospel over the 534 km route that took us through the central mountains of Japan. We visited a cross section of churches of many denominations and yet were accepted like family and old friends though we met for the first time. The fellowship of the saints is surely sweet.

Though some of these places are considered some of the hardest areas to evangelize, we were encouraged with a new generation of young pastors who were working together to reach out to people in their communities. There were many towns, especially along Kiso that had no church presence and we prayed that the Lord would send laborers into the harvest field. The Nakasendo is lined with temples and shrines and we often felt weak in ourselves to change people's hearts and communities, but we trusted in God's strength and looked to him to speak to people through the gospel tracts that we handed out especially in the rural areas.

We thank you so much for your prayers and interest in the walk and look forward to what God will do along the Nakasendo in the years to come.

I have posted some new pictures from the final week on the Japanese website.

For the Harvest,
Jon Benedict

First Week

Sep. 12th 2011

Praise the Lord! We just finished walking the first of two weeks that will lead us to Kyoto. Our team of 12 walkers started out from JR Niekawa Station and walked five days and 126km to Mitake-juku sharing the gospel and visiting four churches along the way. This Kiso valley is one of the most beautiful areas of Japan following the winding Kiso River and crosses over mountain passes with breath-taking vistas. But it is also an area with very few churches. The team prayed, gave out tracts and talked with people along the way, sowing the gospel seed and watering the seeds sown many years ago by past missionaries and pastors.

One 70 year old lady in a town with no church said that her junior high school teacher from over 50 years ago was a Christian. Pastor Oyama of Tono Full Gospel Christ Church said that over a hundred years ago, some missionaries came up the river on horse drawn carts to plant churches at each of the train stations but were not always welcome and pelted with stones and horse manure.

Our prayers were that the Lord would strengthen the few believers, cause a revival, and would plant strong Christ-centered churches in the Kiso district.

We will pick up the walk on Sept. 26 where we left off and will walk seven more days to Kyoto. The schedule is to visit 15 churches during the seven days that will take us through Gifu, Shiga, and into Kyoto. We welcome you to join us and if you can't ask that you would pray with us to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His field.

(Jon Benedict)

Prep-Walk

Aug. 6th 2011

Tetsuya Kazama, Masao Himei, and myself did a "prep walk" along a portion of the Nakasendo on August 1st in preparation for September. The 28 km section between Kanoo (Gifu City) and Sekigahara ( historical battleground) twists and turns and we wanted to confirm the route to make sure we don't get lost. We visited Mizuho Chapel and had a brief time of fellowship with Pastor Kawamura who served us cold tea which never tasted better after the hot walk. The schedule in September is to stay overnight at Mizuho Chapel on the night of the 27th.

As we walked this time, we were impressed by the fact that this section of the Nakasendo has very few churches and we were compelled to pray for laborers to be sent out into this field. Please pray for the walk next month and for laborers to be raised and sent into the harvest in Gifu Prefecture.

Here are some photos we took of our prep walk on August 1st.
(Jon Benedict)

Setting our eyes on the Goal in 2011

Feb. 14th 2010

Last year we walked the first half of the Nakasendo from Nihonbashi in Tokyo to Niekawa in Nagano ken. This year we will continue to share the gospel along the second half of the Nakasendo and aim to the walk the 292km to Sanjo Ohashi in Kyoto. Come and join us!

We have been contacting churches and have set up the schedule which spans 12 days in September and October. Please take a look at the map and schedule and share this with others. We also appreciate your prayers for the churches, participants, communities, and people we will meet.

2011 Walk With Jesus Pamphlet

Feb. 14th 2010

We have printed up a pamphlet for the 2011 Walk (Sorry. Only Japanese) Please contact the office if you would like any.