Surfing and stories
After four years of relationship building through the local surf and snowboard club, a young Japanese man asked me last winter if I could organise a one in a lifetime dream come true, basically a surf trip to California.
K and his two childhood friends worked hard the last couple of years to save enough money to live on a small tropical island in south Japan for one year to do nothing else than surf everyday. Half way through their endless summer surf dream gap year they now went on a one week surf trip to California with me (their highlight of the gap year).
As I organised the trip we stayed at a friend’s house and another friend was our surf guide who showed us around. They are both Christians so it was a great framework to share about our faith. On top of that we went to a church with mainly surfers and a message with lots of surf allegories.
I warned them beforehand that I’ll tell them Bible stories everyday and they seemed accepting of this idea, perhaps out of obligation cause I organised the trip, but anyway they were open to listen and there was no way for them to not listen.
To make it short we spent lots of time together in a tiny car driving around, as well as time in the water and eating together. The best times to share was during the meals we had together, either lunch after a surf session or in the evenings when everybody was relaxed and open to talk.
One observation was that even the three of them being really close friends (knowing each other since childhood and now living on a small island together for one year), they were very reluctant in really sharing from their heart after the stories. They all only opened up in one to one conversations. It might be a guy thing or the strong sense of not disturbing the group harmony or even the Japanese culture of keeping the real self hidden. I don’t know exactly.
They heard a full story set from creation to resurrection – due to illness and massive lack of sleep, it was far from what I wanted it to be, but they heard it and were able to understand it. So on the last morning before we parted and went home separate ways, our surf guide shared his testimony as well and I showed them a short video clip of another testimony of a Japanese Christian surfer. After that we asked them what they’ll do with what they heard and experienced and all three said they will pray to Jesus from now on that he’ll reveal himself to them.
So let’s keep on praying for the Spirit’s work, that they’ll really search for Jesus with an open heart.
For me it was super encouraging to see them going form zero and no interest in Christianity to ‘I really want to try this Jesus thing’!
One intense week together creating good memories gave more ‘ministry opportunities’ than the last four years trying to share my faith within the surf community here.
Share with permission of JPK
