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stepping
stones a prayer letter of Iwa
Transforming Ministry and Leadership in our Community
April 2001, Number 01-1
Foundations
for Asian American Ministry
Foundations for Asian American Ministry is the new
title for Iwa’s seven-unit volume of original resource
material, formerly called The Evangelistic Leadership Training
Series. It was renamed because it was thought that “leadership
training” might give people the misleading impression
that the series is a practical manual on how to become a leader.
While it can be used to train leaders for ministry in an Asian
American context, it is basically a reference book for any
leader who needs cultural handles for ministry to Asian Americans,
especially for the ministry of reaching them with the gospel.
Now that the graphic layout has been completed, it will soon
be printed and made available to all who can use it.
In
Foundations, old Bible passages take on new meaning
in light of new cultural perspectives. For example, in the
first section of Unit One, Adopted and Adaptive:
The Role of Biculturals in World Redemption, Moses is
depicted as an oppressed minority person, adopted
by a royal family of the majority culture, given a bicultural
Hebrew-Egyptian upbringing, and forced to flee to the foreign
land of Midian as an immigrant alien. But God used
Moses’ uniqueness for his special purposes, and thereby
affirmed the special character and value of all his minority,
adopted, bicultural, immigrant people:
Moses
repeatedly registered his lack of confidence in his ability
to speak both to the Hebrews and the Egyptians....God had
to appease Moses' insecurity by appointing his older brother,
Aaron, to speak for Moses.
The
question then arises that if Aaron was going to do all the
speaking anyway, why didn’t the omniscient God choose
Aaron in the first place? Humanly speaking, Aaron had more
logical qualifications. Aaron was of the same primary Hebrew
lineage of Levi as Moses. Aaron was the first-born son,
Moses the second-born. Aaron suffered along with the children
of Israel throughout his life. He never left, as Moses did.
He was a recognized and trusted leader and an effective
communicator to Egyptian and Hebrew alike. We don't find
Aaron resisting and offering squeamish excuses to God. So
why did God choose Moses instead of Aaron? Apparently, some
of the very reasons Moses cited as to why he wasn't the
right person for the job were the very qualifications God
had engineered into his life to equip Moses to fulfill His
purpose. Moses' minority, bicultural, and immigrant experiences
prepared him to carry out God's intentions.
Foundations
provides new insights into common, unexamined cultural behaviors
of Japanese- and Asian Americans. Such insights can free Christians
to put aside traditional methods of evangelism not designed
with cultural sensitivity for reaching Asian Americans, and
to try new, culturally appropriate approaches. For example,
Unit Four contains a discussion of omoiyari—
a key cultural trait of people of Japanese ancestry which
might be roughly translated “empathy”—in which
a very familiar scene for Japanese Americans is described
to explain a characteristic of omoiyari people:
(T)hey
seek to maintain consensus or agreement by deferring to
the fulfillment of each other’s needs and desires.
Consider the following example: When a group of Japanese
Americans tries to decide where to go for a bite to eat,
they take an informal poll. They each tend to make their
suggestions in order of personal preference but end by saying
something like, “But it really doesn’t matter
to me. Wherever is fine.” When they have probed each
other for some sense of consensus, someone poses the apparent
group leaning. With the favorable nodding of heads, it is
decided. But chances are, the final selection is seldom
someone’s first choice, protecting anyone from feeling
guilty for not deferring enough to everyone else. Obviously,
this is in direct contrast to when white, majority Americans
seek to make the same decision. They also tend to poll one
another, but, once done, they vote and majority rules. Those
getting their way feel free to be glad if not victorious.
And, those who don’t, accept the decision with the
attitude, “Oh well, you win some and lose some.”
The “winners” are not made to feel guilty for
being insensitive to the desires of others as is the case
with Japanese Americans.
Foundations
ventures into new territory by pre-senting a model of biculturalism
for exploring what would constitute effective evangelism and
ministry to those strongly influenced by two cultures as are
Asian Americans. While Asian Americans may be very “American”
after living in the U.S. for many generations, virtually all
still have at their core an “Asian-ness” that must
be touched by God and the gospel for deep spiritual transformation
to take place, as attested in this account by a Sansei Christian
leader, recorded in Unit Five:
However,
in spite of the fact that I have been a committed Christian
and been involved in Christian ministry for as long as I
have, it has only been relatively recently that the gospel
has been able to touch and transform areas deep within me
largely due to a growing understanding of the Japanese core
deeply submerged beneath my thick layer of adaptive survival
values and skills. While I under-stood Christianity the
way it was presented to me, found it very meaningful, and
was able to apply its principles to my life and teach others
to do likewise, I still could not identify with the conversion
and other faith experiences of Christians whose values were
consistent with my survival value system rather than with
my core. For instance, I did not experience the same excruciating
sense of guilt and deep conviction for my sins that they
did, or, as a logical consequence, the overwhelming joy
they felt over God’s forgiveness, realizing that Christ
paid the penalty for those sins on the cross, even though
I understood and appreciated the reasoning behind the crucifixion
and was thankful for it. The depth of conviction didn’t
come until later when I became able to empathize with the
emotional turmoil within Christ as he, step by excruciating
step, was willing to endure our shame and the painful rupturing
of the eternal relationship he enjoyed with his heavenly
Father, so we could be reconciled and reunited with both
him and his Father through the Holy Spirit; and in doing
so he enabled us to become members of his own family, once
again able to bring honor and glory, rather than shame,
to his name as when first we were created by him in his
image. These last two sentences are hardly sufficient to
make clear the differences between these two presentations
of the gospel, one that makes sense to my American survival
value system and the other that deeply penetrates my Japanese
core, but suffice it to say, that such a difference has
had a dramatic impact upon my life and my ministry.
Foundations
presents practical steps churches and ministries can take
to make their outreach and ministry to Asian Americans more
effective. For example,
Unit Two explains how to develop a ministry that effectively
reaches a target group such as Japanese- and Asian Americans.
Unit Three describes how to ensure that the ministries
developed continue to be viable for and relevant to the target
group for which they were designed. Unit Six outlines
how to introduce positive change in the church and community
as demonstrated by the ministries of Jesus and Paul. And,
Unit Seven presents something that no main-stream ministry
resource has addressed—a process enabling Asian American
churches to identify and call out the leadership chosen by
God:
One
of the major obstacles to evangelism and church growth within
the Asian American community is not having the appropriate
leaders in position to give effective spiritual guidance
to the church. This is due, in large measure, to incorrect
images of Christian leadership and hasty, slipshod approaches
to leadership selection. The basis for such approaches are,
more often than not, a jumble of unquestioned church traditions,
denominational policies, ethnic intuition, prac-tical expediency
and desperation rather than a well-thought-out process first
based upon the Bible and then cultural dynamics before consider-
ing denominational policies and church traditions. It is
recognized that a great deal of denominational policy and
church tradition is founded upon Scripture, but also much
of it finds its genesis either directly from culture, especially
Western culture, or is a result of cultural interpretations
and applications of Scripture appropriate in Western context
but not in others. The biggest problem is when leaders are
selected based upon no particular agreed-upon set of criteria
other than perusing the church directory and asking “Whose
turn is it?” or “Who hasn’t done it yet?”
Supported by funding from Rivendell Stewards’ Trust,
Iwa developed Foundations with the hope that it would
contribute to the transformation of ministry and leadership
in the Christian community that needs to take place so that
the 97% of Japanese Americans and other Asian Americans who
don’t yet know
Christ will be reached effectively with the gospel. If you
would like to reserve a copy of Foundations, please
call, write, fax, or e-mail the Iwa office.
Funding
News
For the sixth consecutive year, Rivendell Stewards’ Trust
will continue to partner with Iwa. For 2001, Iwa received
a grant of $10,000 for the production and dissemination of
evangelism resources. With foundation funding being as uncertain
as it can be from year to year, we are extremely grateful
to the Lord and to Rivendell for such faithful support.
We
are also especially grateful to all who made year-end contributions,
especially to those who responded to Iwa’s appeal letter—about
$7,200 was received. We believe that it is the support from
individuals and churches that is crucial for enabling Iwa
to answer God’s call of creating and disseminating the
resources needed to help bring about a spiritual breakthrough
to the 97%.
We
also thank the Lord for moving in the hearts of a few individuals
who responded to a special appeal for contributions toward
a new computer which was needed so that two staff members
would no longer need to share one. With the new Apple Power
Mac G4 computer, our graphic designer, Danny Matsuda, has
now been able to work efficiently on the layout and design
of Foundations for Asian American Ministry, the redesigning
of Iwa’s internet website, a pictorial directory of Iwa
Board and Associates, and other projects.
Evangelism Classes at Gardena Valley and Cerritos
Baptist
Cyril Nishimoto taught an eight-week course, “Reaching
Your Japanese- and Asian American Family and Friends With
the Gospel,” for the Wednesday night Word in Life Discipleship
Classes at Gardena Valley Baptist Church beginning in September,
and for the Sunday program of Winter Classes For Adults at
Cerritos Baptist Church beginning in January. The course was
a significant step as it was the first time the best of Iwa’s
insights on evangelism were offered in a classroom setting
within a church over a period of several weeks.
Up
to this point, Iwa has been able to offer only a one-day seminar,
workshop, or speaking engagement, often for groups of people
from different churches. And while individual participants
may have gleaned some interesting, paradigm-shifting insights,
the long-term impact on the way evangelism and ministry are
done in our Christian community was unclear and needed to
be addressed. With a course being offered over several weeks,
the potential for impact and change becomes much greater,
as like-minded individuals can work together with the same
understanding, approach, and vision. And we think that churches
may be more open to a program that would fit readily into
their existing structures, such as Sunday School or Christian
Education programs.
In
the classes, we explored cultural differences between Asian
Americans and the American main- stream which may suggest
the need for new approaches
to evangelism. We learned about the concept of omoiyari as
a key to understanding how to reach Asian Americans, and practiced
telling our own stories
about Jesus as a culturally appropriate way of sharing a “relational”
gospel. After covering the steps and stages of individually
leading someone to Christ using Iwa’s Fishing with a
Bamboo Pole evangelism handbook as a guide, we considered
what we can do together, as small groups and churches, to
support individual out- reach. The classes were conducted
in a variety of ways, including Bible study, lecture, interactive
workshop-type exercises, and small group sharing and brainstorming.
With these initial classes receiving favorable response, we
hope to offer them to other churches as well this year.
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