Bethel Fellowship International

We’re thankful for prayer covering over Japan!

Please allow the Holy Ghost to use you to intercede for Japan; allow Him to pray through you in the words of the unknown language(s) He has given you. This is not a “here today gone tomorrow situation.” The entire nation has been/will be affected by the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear fallout. Perhaps the threat of nuclear fallout is most alarming now in Japan. Hillary Rodham Clinton has just said, “This is a situation in history where it is almost hard to catch one’s breath.”

Bethel Fellowship Int’l missionaries living and working in Japan are okay. In calls just made to Mark & Kathleen Benton (Osaka-Kobe) and Steve & Noriko Wall (Nagoya), we were told that they are fine. Mark said when they went to buy toilet paper and rice that it was gone. Steve said the same situation is seen around the metropolitan area of Nagoya. Both the Bentons and Walls are fine. We are fine, too, but continue to wisely keep prepared for anything to happen, especially our heart relationship with Almighty God!

In my junior high school years when I was learning how to type, the sentence we were told to type line after line after line for practice was “Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country.” My, my, how this has become a reality!

PLEASE, make sure your personal relationship is RIGHT with God! We cannot know what will happen tomorrow, but we can know for sure our eternal destiny because of a personal relationship with the LORD Jesus Christ. Do not hesitate! “. . . behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.” There is no place here for putting off until tomorrow what must be done today!

Our hope is in God and we know that He will use every situation to bring salvation to this country! As Christians we have the fruit of the Holy Spirit (love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, meekness, faithfulness and temperance) residing in us. Let us pray that that fruit will be evident in our lives everyday.

Keeping in touch,

Nils & Andrea Olson
Kyushu, JAPAN

As one looks across the face of the earth today, it doesn’t take much spiritual discernment to see that things are shaking as has been prophesied over the past few years.

Many voices, including myself, have spoke over what is known as the “Rim of Fire” nations, or the Pacific Rim. These are the approximately 40-odd nations that ring the Pacific with some sort of volcanic activity.

The tragedy in Japan brings this prophetic shaking starkly to the forefront of the news.  Many are asking the question, “What is taking place?”

First of all, I know that we must stand in the gap and pray for Japan. The enormity of the loss and the intensity of what has transpired will continue to unfold. It is hard to grasp with the natural mind.
What do we know? God had warned us that shaking was coming. This doesn’t mean that it was His desire for it to happen, but more of the biblical fulfillment that He doesn’t do anything without first warning through His servants, the prophets (see Amos 3:7). In fact, I, along with others, prophesied volcanic eruptions would occur in the Pacific Rim.

Others might ask, “Was this a judgment from God?” This is a difficult question. I tend to think that God is grieved that so many have died because, no doubt, many of them did not know Him as the Savior. He is not willing that any should perish without knowing Him.

However, if we all pray and act in this crisis, I do believe that the Holy Spirit wants to breathe the wind of revival across Japan and bring a mighty spiritual awakening to the land of the rising sun with healing in His wings.

Christians throughout the years have paid an enormous price for the evangelization of Japan. Early missionaries suffered the most horrific forms of martyrdom at the hands of ruthless leaders. At one time in the city of Nagasaki, even little children were crucified.

Great Christian leaders such as Dr. David (Paul) Yongi Cho, have spent countless hours and efforts in Japan. The All Revival Koshen Mission during the late 90s prayed for hundreds of thousands of hours and saw a stadium event where it was reported that at least 20,000 came to Christ.
Japanese Christian leaders made prayer journeys to Korea and other nations to repent of the war atrocities from World War ll. There was some Gospel advance, yet Japan has historically had 12 of the mega-unreached cities in the world, representing more than one million in population.
I have personally felt that one of the reasons Japan was such a hard group for the Gospel was the fact that they have had a direct link with the Imperial family as a direct link with the sun goddess, Amaratsu.

After the end of the Second World War, under the U.S. agreements with Japan, this connection was renounced in favor of a representative government. Japan flourished economically after that time.
However, of recent years, this link with Amarastu and sun worship was reinstated once again in a ceremony in which the Emperor participated. The Emperor “spent the night with the goddess” after eating the sacred rice.

Japan has gone downhill down economically in recent years. The debt ratio to GDP is now 200 percent. With the earthquake and subsequent tsunami, the economy and banking system, insurance industry, etc., will certainly take a massive hit.

In the early 90s, the Lord gave me a prophecy for Japan that it was a “sickle in the hand of the Lord” that will be used for great harvest. The physical geography of the islands look like a curved sickle with the handle being the island of Hokkaido in the north.

On the other hand, this island of Hokkaido also looks like the head of a dragon with the body being the rest of Japan. The people of Asia have worshipped the dragon for 5,000 years. If one looks at the place where the earthquake took place, it appears like the soft underbelly of most vulnerable part of the dragon.

My interpretation of this is that while God did not want people to perish, He is going to use this to “pierce” the darkness surrounding the Japanese people if we will cry out to God for them in the midst of this crisis. We, as believers in Jesus Christ need to pray and act. We need to stand with relief organizations such as Somebody Cares led by Doug Stringer, who is half-Japanese and has family still in Japan.

We Americans treated our fellow Japanese-Americans in an atrocious way during World War ll as we put them in concentration camps and took away their dignity and property.  There has been an apology to them from our government and a measure of restitution.
This is our prophetic moment to be a light to the nations and stand with the Japanese people. I feel that God is especially calling for Japanese-Americans as well as the whole nation to help in this crisis. We did so in Japan after WWll and now we must do so again.

If we respond correctly, the darkness and the grip of idolatry of all forms that has blinded the eyes of so many in Japan will be broken off of them. The faithful believers in Jesus Christ will be strengthened as they are used for great harvest across Asia and the face of the earth.

Read more: http://www.charismamag.com/index.php/news/30438-shaking-begins-winds-are-blowing-in-japan#ixzz1Go0hZvGd