Prayer Guide – Week 7 (November 06-12)

This week's prayer focus is Ehime and Kochi Prefectures on the island of Shikoku.

With a mild climate and few natural disasters, the people of Ehime are generally mild. They are submissive to both authority and tradition, while being focused mainly on community issues. This leads them to typically be shy towards strangers and "outsiders."

Those who attend any form of Christian worship service on Sundays account for about 0.002% of the population. Pray for more workers to reach the lost in this prefecture with a population of 1,500,000.

Please pray for:

• Many to hear the voice of Jesus and seek Him
• Those who are seeking, that they would find both believers to meet with and also have their own copies of God's Word
• A new movement of the Gospel to take root in Ehime

"I have other sheep, which are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they will hear My voice; and they will become one flock with one Shepherd." - John 10:16

Kochi Prefecture, Japan.

This mostly mountainous region receives only 70 days of sunshine per year and is hit by severe seasonal typhoons. It is a sparsely populated and mostly agricultural area, yet its amount of produce is not very large due to the fact that 80% of the land is forest.

The people of Kochi are known for being stubborn with a tendency to be anti-authority. They have less respect for the government, their elders, and the emperor than most prefectures. Generally, there is low interest in religion; ironically, Kochi has the third highest number of Shinto believers.

Please pray for:

• The people who are fed-up with the failures of human government and leadership, that they would find the one true and perfect King in Jesus.
• Japanese believers in Kochi to be courageous and bold for God's Kingdom and lead many of their peers to the Lord.
• A church-planting movement to begin through national leadership in this region.

"His dominion is an everlasting dominion
Which will not pass away;
And His kingdom is one
Which will not be destroyed."
- Daniel 7:14b

There are about 8,000 Protestant churches in Japan. About 1,000 of them do not have a pastor, and most churches have aging congregations.

The current number of churches equals out to about one church for every 16,000 people in Japan. It’s estimated that more than 50,000 churches are needed to truly reach every community.

There is a need for renewed worship, fellowship, and outreach in many existing churches. Pray for the Holy Spirit’s life-giving ministry. May church members seek and love God with all of their heart, soul, mind, and strength. May churches receive from God all that they ask for in Jesus’ name!

Pray for the Holy Spirit to lead church planters to specific areas in Japan that need a church. Pray for God to provide the people, vision, faith, and resources necessary for new churches.

It is said that there are 8 million gods in Japan. There are statues, festivals, shrines, and temples dedicated to specific gods. There are also the invisible gods in our hearts – gods of money, power, success, and more. There are also things we turn to, to “save” us when we’re not doing well – alcohol, TV, shopping, and more.

Let us proclaim that Jesus is the only Savior. Let’s turn from other gods and saviors, and pray this for Japan as well. Let’s lift up the name of Jesus as the only God who deserves the place of worship in our hearts and in the hearts of Japanese people, and the only Savior to turn to in times of need

During the period around the second stage of growth, both the body and mind undergo great change.

Let us intercede and pray that we can encounter and live together with the unchanging truth during this sensitive time.

Pray that the youth ministry of the church will be used and that junior high school students will encounter Christ.

Pray that the youth ministry of the church will be used to help junior high school students encounter Christ. Pray that they will be protected from the values that are prevalent in the world, and that they will value their bodies and sexuality.

That they would encounter Christians who are full of love and who live the Word of the Bible.

That junior high school students who have been raised in Christian homes will inherit the faith as their own.

For the Lord's work to reach children who are suffering from truancy and bullying. That the work that is already being done will be used.

Pray that the Lord's help will be extended to junior high school students who are suffering at home.