Four years ago, Abby and I made a decision that seemed courageous at the time, but in hindsight seems very easy.

We opened up our home for three weeks to Motoi Tanaka, a student on the Mission to Japan Homestay program.

Motoi’s English was not wonderful (though it improved dramatically over the month), but we had a blast teaching her some of our crazy games, doing laundry together, going to Home Depot and Publix, and sharing all the weird ways our country is different from hers.

Shortly after Motoi returned to Japan, she trusted Christ to be her Lord and Savior.

Last year Ray and Julianne Lau hosted a student named Yuki, who wrote this past November:

I was baptized in the sea yesterday. It was sunny and the sea was beautiful. I was prayed and blessed by many kind people. I have Bible study every week with some students, a English teacher and  a doctor of the medical department of my university. I’m excited to start my Christian life and want to grow with Jesus.

Not every Japanese homestay student becomes a Christian after this program. In fact, I wouldn’t even say it is frequent. But Warren and Yukari Griffith have created a program which is both a lot of fun as well as purposefully missional, and God has definitely shown his favor on it. There is much sowing, and on occasion some reaping.

Every March they challenge OGC families to host one Japanese college student for most of the month. Host families provide breakfast, a sack lunch, dinner, and transportation to and from Northland (or a carpool drop-off location). During the weekdays the Griffiths and American college students teach the students English, Bible (which is totally new to them), and take them to the attractions and shopping centers. The weekends are spent with the host families, doing whatever activities they normally do together. Students have homework questions for their host families like, “Is it legal to carry a gun in your country?” and “Do most college students have curfews in your country?” and “How did you become a Christian?” This makes it easy to both share your faith and live it out in front of them.

Because March is right around the corner, let me encourage you to not let this opportunity pass you by. All the details about the program, including the daily schedule, can be found on the Mission to Japan website with questions.

A number of you reading this have already calculated that I’m writing to someone else, and have told yourselves that your lives are too full of stuff to make this sacrifice of time, food, living space, and relational energy. If that’s you, I want to make you a promise. (Since hearing last Sunday’s message, I wanted to call it a Johannine promise, but then I discovered that the definition of the word pertains to a specific John. Drat.) Anyhow, here’s the promise:

Sometime during the Goodbye Party on March 28, where there will hardly be a dry eye in the room, you’ll look back over the three weeks you’ve shared with <insert Japanese name here> and will echo the sentiment of Hudson Taylor: “I never made a sacrifice.” All the rides and the extra meals and the intrusion into 3 weeks of your life will seem ridiculously cheap compared to the crucial gospel witness that you have just made to a representative of one of the world’s least reached peoples.

It’s true that a lot of the “heavy lifting” in terms of gospel presentation is done by Warren and Yukari and the other volunteers during the weekday program. But it’s equally true that the design of the homestay program is to put the students into families who show grace to one another, share in carpooling, share in activities, and share in a church home. And this creates a powerful witness that might speak louder than words.

In short, they will know we are Christians by our love.

(Which I’m pretty sure is Johannine.)