December 2003

To Our Friends and Supporters:

Christmas Greetings from Japan. As we write this letter, Advent is just beginning and our Christmas decorations are going up. Our Christmas activities are already underway, as Tim preached the message at the citywide “Shimin (Citizens’) Christmas” held in the Baptist church on Saturday.

Every year during this season, we are involved in a number of special events, and thus it represents both our busiest season as well as the time of year that we typically have our most fruitful ministry. This year, however, we have a bit of a “complication,” as the pastor of the Tsukuba Church next door to us suddenly took ill with a blocked intestine and had to be hospitalized. That was on Saturday morning, November 22, and so Tim needed to come up with a Japanese sermon on Thanksgiving for the next day. Relying on the “archives,” he adapted and translated last year’s English Thanksgiving sermon, which fit the situation perfectly.

Rev. Onji is on the mend and will be discharged this week to take it easy at home, and so his work schedule will still be curtailed for some time yet. Please do keep him in your prayers. Juji’s twice-a-year treatment has gone well, and she too will be discharged from the hospital this week, just in time to get ready for the events she is so heavily involved with in the couple of weeks leading up to Christmas.

This organ is patterned after organs of northern Germany from the 17th century. In fact, the only thing different is that someone isn’t back there furiously pumping away on the bellows to send the air through the pipes. That is done with a modern, electric blower. Everything else, however, is the same as it would have been 300 years ago, with complex mechanical keys and stops. The church has provided him with a workshop and the raw materials. He does all of the woodwork himself and even forms the pipes from sheet metal.

Over the last few years, Tim has spent several evenings helping Mr. Mitsuhashi out, mostly in modifying the church building to improve the acoustics. This and other building projects have provided a welcome change of pace from sitting a computer writing sermons and newsletters, as well as saving considerably on the limited financial resources.

Speaking of building projects, the men of the church are planning on building a two-story education building to house the church school and other such activities. As is typical in a crowded place like Japan, there isn’t much land to work with, and so the presently existing prefab that is falling apart anyway will have to first be torn down before the other is built. In the near future, Tim will also be contributing his building skills to this effort.

We wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Tim and Juji Boyle

The 2004 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 92