When we were in the states many
years ago I used to listen to a daily radio broadcast by a marvelous Assembly
of God preacher, DM Ward. He was a man of the caliber of AW Tozer – a very
realistic, down-to-earth, man of God. At the time I was listening to him, he
had a series going on of testimonies of outstanding Christians he knew. I found
those testimonies very helpful. I can’t match the stories DM Ward told, but it
has been my privilege to know a number of unusual Christians over the years.
One man who stands out in my life
is Koji Sekiguchi. Koji was the closest friend I ever had. He was the best man
at my wedding and for years I said he was the most outstanding Christian I had
ever met.
Koji was Rachel Sekiguchi’s younger
brother. Some time ago, I wrote you the story of Rachel Sekiguchi. She was the high
school girl from Oguri that received a tract fourth hand and was marvelously saved.
She wound up being a missionary to Brazil
There were seven brothers and
sisters in the Sekiguchi family. Over the years she saw all her family saved,
including her dad, who was a Shinto priest. Her elder brother, Takao, was the
head elder in my church in Karuizawa.
Koji was about 12 years old when
Rachel got saved. As she, very soon, was a student in the Karuizawa Bible
School, she influenced the entire family to be associated with the Bible school,
and got Koji to come to Karuizawa to live at the Bible school, and go to school
in the Karuizawa public junior high and high school.
As a young boy, Koji didn’t
care for coerced Christianity, but he was a captive and had no choice. The budget
at the Karuizawa Bible School
His roommate was Kimura san.
I wrote you the story of Kimura san some time ago. He was the Japanese fighter
pilot who got shot down by a Christian American pilot overt the Philippine Sea , and then spent seven years as a POW in Siberia . After his release from the Russian slave labor camp in 1952, he
returned home to find all his family had been killed during the war. With
nothing left in life, he devoted himself to being a Buddhist monk walking
around Japan
Quite naturally, the young fellow
was fascinated by the flying stories Kimura san told with him. This excited a
passion to become a pilot himself some day.
After graduating from high
school, Koji ran away from home (the Bible school), and joined JASDF (Japanese
Air Force). His dreams were becoming a reality. At last he was in pilot training,
well on his way to the top in the aviation field. Koji was elated with is
freedom from forced Christianity and was now free to enjoy the full savor of a
life of sin. But he had one major problem. He knew too much Gospel. He knew the
Gospel was true, but wished he had never heard it. All his buddies could go out
and have a good time drinking, and with the girls, but he couldn’t. His conscience
was making him feel guilty, and terribly uneasy. He was struck in a lose-lose
situation. His knowledge of the Bible was keeping him from a life of freedom in
sin, and sin was keeping him from the freedom of Christ.
One day he was sitting in the
mess hall (dining hall) talking to a friend, sharing with him his concern. He
asked, “Aren’t you afraid of death?” His buddy cheerfully responded, “Oh no.
That’s no problem at all. When I die I will just say, ‘Tenno heika sama,
banzai!’ (Three cheers for the emperor).” Koji wasn’t sure death was that easy.
The next day he was standing
along side the runway watching aircraft take off. There was one T-33 on take
off. At the most critical point of getting about 10 meters (30 feet) in the air,
suddenly they had flame-out, and settled back to earth. The bird was going too fast
to stop, and overshot the runway. The plane went through the perimeter fence
and wound up sitting in a ditch just outside the airbase. Koji was the first
one at the scene. The pilots were unhurt but the fuselage had been twisted in
the crash, and they couldn’t get the canopy open. There is a lanyard on the outside
of the T-33 that someone can pull to get the pilots out. Koji grabbed the
handle and gave it a might jerk. Nothing happened. The canopy was jammed. The
plane had a full fuel load and the wingtip drop-tanks had ruptured in the crash,
dousing the area with JP-4 fuel. Some of the fuel got near the hot engine and ignited
a fire. The two pilots inside were frantically banging on the canopy trying to get
out. Koji was standing on top the fuselage pulling on the canopy and looked
inside to see the face of the terrified trapped pilots. The man in the front
seat was his buddy he had been talking to the day before. The intense heat of
the fire drove Koji away from the aircraft, and he stood 50 feet away watching
his friend burn to death in that cockpit. Koji said. “It wasn’t ‘Banzai’. It
was just horrible!”
That sobered him up. It was
bad enough to watch a man burn to death in a cockpit, but he didn’t want to spend
eternity burning in hell. No pleasure of sin was worth that. He surrendered his
life to Jesus.
Now he was a Christian, life
looked a little less complicated, but another problem came up. He was having
serious problems with ear blocks coming down from high altitude penetrations. Of
course, all aircraft are pressurized, but there still is a serious change in air
pressure from about 10,000 feet to sea level. This was causing terribly painful
earaches. The pain was so intense Koji finally had to go to the base hospital
to see if the doctors could do anything to help. An examination revealed that the
hole in the inner ear, that provides for equalization of air pressure in Koji’s
head, was smaller than usual, making it impossible for the air pressure to
adjust. This was the cause of the earaches. He was within days of graduation. Because
of this medical problem, Koji was grounded. Another crash.
Being eliminated from pilot
training, Koji left the Air Force and returned to his roots in Karuizawa. He
had gone far enough in training to acquire a commercial pilot’s license, which
was a treasure for any young Japanese boy in 1962. They had a special ceremony.
Koji stood up and announced, “I have only one idol in my life” – and he burned
his pilot’s license.
He got pressured into
marrying the English interpreter, Yoshiko, at the Bible school. Nothing seemed
to go right as he was struggling to find God’s will for his life. They worked for
an apiary honey man in Yokokawa for a couple of years, but that didn’t work
out.
In 1968 he was at loose ends
between jobs and came up to see me one Sunday. Just at that time I had a friend
coming in from the states and had to take two weeks off from the language
school to show my friend around Japan
Then the devil got involved.
There were a couple of extremely serious failures where I had to discipline him,
but still wanted to maintain our relationship. I had to fire him from the
language school but kept him on working full time with me in construction. But
the bond was gone. It was like a divorce that was a huge loss for both of us.
After a year of strained
relations, I called him in one night to try to find out what caused the break. To
this day I still don’t know. With intense pain in his heart Koji said, “Do you
remember the time when the students in the language school were coming to me
with their problems rather to you; and you were jealous of me?” I adamantly
replied, “That never happened! I was pleased that you were doing so well, and
everyone respected you so highly. I was never jealous.”
“Yes you were. I could tell by the look on your
face. That hurt me deeply.”
As near as I can tell, it was
100% demonic interference by imagined misunderstanding. But it was a
misunderstanding I have never been able to bridge. To Koji it was a very real
event. And to me it was one that I could never recall.
That was over 30 years ago.
Koji is now 67 years old. He went on to start his own construction company, and
has done very well. I have had loose contact with him over the years, and he
has gone on well as a man of God. He is a major leader in the church today and
has a good tract record in heaven.
And with you too;
bill
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