August 25, 2006

Dear Friends,

After several years of praying and trying, Praise the Lord, the work in Assai has become a reality. Assai is a name of Japanese origin meaning SUNRISE. Urai, where we have been for several years, signifies SUNSET. The initial service was held on June 31st, with about forty persons attending: twenty from Urai and twenty from Assai. We had distributed over 2,000 announcements from door to door. The Lord provided a large building with seating capacity of 200 persons on the main avenue of town. We have painted the interior and built ten benches that will seat at least 100. New lights have been installed. The building makes a pretty auditorium.

A STRANGE EMOTION ON THE FIRST DAY: Saturday, August 5, 2006. As Alta and I drove to Assai and viewed the city of 20,000, as we viewed it from the highway in the valley, my heart and mind went back to June 6, 1944. Our ship, the Liberty ship George E. Pickett, carried the British pilot for the convoy. We sailed out of the Bristol Channel and soon joined with four other merchant ships forming the first convoy of five merchants ships carrying infantry troops to the Normandy Beachhead. Early on D-Day plus one we arrived. A continuous flow of bombers overhead, battleships belching out death and destruction, the channels marked by buoys with little red flags, German cannon fire from the beach tops, many barrage balloons secured to the ships with steel cables as a defense against dive bombers, and two of the five ships damaged by floating mines produced feelings of fear and loneliness.

As I viewed Assai in the valley, for a moment that feeling returned. I remarked to Alta, "I am having the same feeling I had as we sailed toward the beachheads of Normandy." There we depended on military force and there were many. Here it is not by force nor by might but by the Spirit of the Lord. Get the picture: Two old people invading a city of 20,000 filled with idolatry and Pentecosts, where every unconverted heart is an enemy of Christ and us. But the promise of His Spirit is sufficient and so we invade.

Saturday, August 5th, First service, one man; Sunday morning, August 6th, one man; Sunday evening, August 6th, two children (one trusted Jesus); Saturday, August 12th, no one; Sunday AM, August 13th, no one; Sunday PM, August 13th, having waited almost thirty minutes, we were preparing to close up and seven persons from a Japanese family arrived. Praise our Lord! Saturday, August 19th, no one; Sunday AM August 20th, six persons; Sunday PM August 20th, seven persons. Dear Friends, we need your prayers. Pray the light of the Son will enlighten the hearts in darkness in the city of the RISING SUN. Sixty percent of the city's population is of Japanese origin.

In His Love,

John and Alta Hatcher