Hello! Kumi here writing this month’s newsletter. It’s been a bit since we last wrote you. We think of all of you often, and we are very thankful to be connected to you. Thank you for believing in us and standing with us, and thank you for taking time to read our newsletter. How has your 2025 been so far?
I know many of you start the year with an extra intentional rhythm of prayer and fasting. I had started recent years with a mad challenge of “read the whole Bible in 30 days”, but this year I changed it up. I wanted to disengage from the mode of me trying to do something to get ahead, not disengage from the Bible I hasten to say, and instead be extra sensitive to listen to the heart of God.
I turned 50 at the end of the year, and so January was an extra special one for me. A new year, a new decade, a new half a century! So how did I spend it? Well, I intentionally gave myself space to slow down and quieten down, to align with the flow of grace. I believe the Lord has one for us in each season. Yes, even in the midst of the busy-ness of Tokyo, we can intentionally choose the flow of the Spirit. I find that if we are not intentional in finding our own rhythm of grace and peace in the Lord, it’s so easy to get caught up in the noise around us.
2025 for WILDBRANCH
We continue to release an invitation, a call to come to the feet of Jesus and find life in Him.
What we see in our heart for Tokyo has not changed. We see a place of God’s dwelling, His glory. There is a people arising, passionately in pursuit of the One Thing - beholding Jesus.
And as we position our lives here in Tokyo, Japan, we want to serve the church of Japan to see it stand in its God-given place in the global church.
For 2025, we feel it’s time to open the prayer room/space in central Shibuya. We have been talking about this since we moved here: having a place of prayer where people can encounter God in a real way. I often described the function of it as a spiritual portal, going up and going down, digging a deep well, pursuing the heart of God right here, lifting up His name, offering up our adoration to Him.
It will first of all be a place to minister to the Lord, a place of encounter with God for believers, as well as those who are encountering Him for the first time. People will come in and be met by the love of God, be overcome by more hunger for Him, and be filled with His Spirit to go out to find the ones He loves. I am filled with expectation for what the Lord can do through a humble but sacred space set up for Him in the midst of darkness.
This is actually a very personal step of faith for me, as this is the kind of environment where I deepened my relationship with the Lord during my time in England in my twenties. This was connected with a prayer movement that started in England at the time. Then last week, an unexpected connection opened up to us with this very same group. We are aiming to have our prayer space open and host our first whole week of prayer joining their global week of prayer September 1st to 7th.
It seems a little more than crazy to be planning to set up a prayer space in downtown Shibuya while we are still looking for housing for our family. (We need to be out of our apartment by the end of March!) But we have experienced the Father’s goodness and kindness again and again whenever we set our hearts on finding what’s on His heart.
Would you dream and believe with us, and pray for us? We are excited to see what and how the Lord unfolds this next year to us.
We bless you all in the name of Jesus. May we all be more and more fascinated and captivated by Him. -Kumi