Sunday Highlight: October 12, 2025

Let’s focus our missions prayer time on Japan. We’re going to pray for Natalie Nation, one of our Southern Baptist missionaries serving in Yokohama.

This is a huge city of 3.7 million people on the coast, south of Tokyo. It is a city rich in industry and banking but spiritually poor.

Most of the Japanese people who have a religion practice Shinto, a sort of ancestor worship, or Buddhism. Fewer than one percent of Japan’s people are Christian.

Natalie has served in Japan for nearly four years but began studying the Japanese language a year ago. Now, she studies 40 hours a week as she struggles to master the very difficult language.

Fortunately, she has Japanese Christian friends who are helping her learn to speak Japanese. They also help her with a Bible study in Japanese, which she holds at home.

She has been learning to cook Japanese foods and has learned to eat soupy noodles with chopsticks, a potentially messy challenge for Americans!

Our church supports Natalie through the Cooperative Program. Let’s pray that the Lord will help her meet many Japanese people who are able to share the Good News of Jesus with them.

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