Celebrating God’s faithfulness in Tokyo for 150 years

In 2022, Tokyo Union Church celebrated its 150th anniversary.¹ This celebration was all about the Lord’s faithfulness, and it is to God’s glory alone that this anniversary was possible—especially in the midst of a pandemic. The story of this church should be an encouragement to those who are living and serving in Japan today, for God uses and redeems the work of his people to bring honor and glory to him alone. In the Land of the Rising Sun, missionaries have served an important purpose in proclaiming the good news of Jesus Christ.

Started in prayer and in mission

More than two centuries after Japan declared Christianity illegal, missionaries quietly reentered the nation as early as 1837. Their primary focus at the time was to provide aid and support to the people of Japan, but about ten years later, missionaries began to focus on the mission of proclaiming Christ—even though it was illegal to do so.

In 1857, Townsend Harris came as a diplomat from the US, and he worked with the Japanese government to establish an official relationship between the two countries. Missionaries began to freely enter Japan once again, and other foreigners also began to arrive. During the 1860s, in Tokyo, foreigners were expected to live in the Tsukiji area (now part of central Tokyo). As they started to settle, the foreign settlers also brought their Christian faith with them. By 1872, Union Church was founded in Tsukiji with much prayer, and a building was dedicated by that summer. Missionaries led Sunday morning services and helped develop a community that foreigners would call home.

English is an important bridge in connecting with Japanese today; the same was also true during the late 19th century. Arthur Collins Maclay wrote in his book, A Budget of Letters from Japan, “Many young Japanese go to the missionaries to learn English, and, of course, receive much Scriptural instruction with it . . . The zealous missionaries take turns in preaching to the English-speaking residents every Sunday morning, and it is to be hoped that this will form a permanent feature of their work here.”² The work of the missionaries included both the preaching of God’s Word and English language instruction to those who lived in Japan.

A unique witness and a building problem

A unique aspect of the Union Church was the unity of missionaries from various traditions and backgrounds. Isabella Bird, who traveled Japan in 1878, wrote in her book Unbeaten Tracks in Japan, “There is a complete nest of Missionary Church edifices, a wonderful testimony to the shattered unity of the Christian Church, and the number of houses occupied by missionaries is very large.”³ In this context, the desire of Union Church to be rooted in Christ and to be united as much as possible in witness was no small feat. The Lord was using this church to shine the light of Christ to a nation that had only recently opened up to Christianity.

As much as things seemed to be going well, a problem arose. The Union Church was quickly running out of space, and settlers also started to move out of Tsukiji to progress westward. By 1902, the church had moved out of Tsukiji and became a church without a building. For almost three decades, Tokyo Union Church (TUC) had to move around different parts of Ginza in order to gather in worship. One of the main locations was Ginza Methodist Church. Because TUC was sharing the building, their services were held during Sunday afternoon. In one missionary report dating back to the late 19th century, the Union Church was criticized for holding services on Sunday afternoons when most people would have wanted to enjoy their day away from work. It was deemed a “missionary church” for catering to the missionaries rather than to others who were in the community. There were tensions that brought challenges to this young and growing congregation. The Great Kanto earthquake in 1923 and subsequent fire in Tokyo destroyed a plan to build on a property in Toranomon, delaying the transition to a permanent meeting location.

Tokyo Union Church eventually found a place in what is now known as Omotesando. A building was dedicated in 1930, and the community continued to develop and grow, though it faced hardships during the late 1930s and 1940s as the Japanese government forcefully intervened in the affairs of the church. Many foreigners left during the war, and the building was destroyed during the firebombing of Tokyo in 1945. Yet in the midst of the rubble, an offering plate was found intact, and it is now used each year during Dedication Sunday as a reminder of God’s faithfulness and the dedication of the people’s whole lives to the Lord.

Becoming integrated into the community

TUC again was without a building for several years, but it had become a deeper part of the Omotesando community. In the process of rebuilding, the church called its first full-time pastor, and it served as one of a number of English-speaking churches in both Tokyo and Yokohama. Yet even though it was no longer a “missionary church,” it had not lost its focus and dedication to the “unfinished task of Christ” in Japan as then-pastor Howard Haines wrote back in the 1950s. TUC continued to shine the light of Christ in the heart of Tokyo and worked to serve the community in the subsequent decades. Around the time of the centennial anniversary, TUC was in the midst of growth to the point that there was a need for a new campus as many residents moved into western Tokyo. TUC then planted West Tokyo Union Church for this growing part of the community.

By the 1970s, due to age and the lack of space, a new building for TUC was needed. There was much uproar over the building of the new facility. There were petitions circulated by those living in the neighborhood—specifically in Japanese—to preserve the old building (that had been rebuilt post-WWll). However, a new building was dedicated in 1980, and because of its central location, it serves as a witness to those who are passing by today, and it stands in contrast to the rich material goods that are sold next door.

Staying connected in a time of hardship

A few decades later, a global pandemic, the likes of which had not been seen in recent generations, forced churches to change the way they gathered. After the World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 outbreak a global pandemic in March 2020, the leadership of TUC decided to close the building to weekly public worship out of care and caution for our community and our neighbors. TUC entered a new digital era by broadcasting the services live online and developing an online community in new and innovative ways. Some people from around the world and in many prefectures across Japan joined the services regularly without ever having stepped foot in the building. It was in the midst of this pandemic that the 150th anniversary of TUC took place. While we continued to learn how to navigate through this challenge, God remained ever faithful, calling us into community in new ways. The celebration of this anniversary in October 2022 began with a 24-hour online global broadcast and culminated in a two-weekend event with past pastors joining the congregation in Tokyo. During this celebration we were able to welcome people back fully to our Omotesando campus, and our weekly gatherings are once again filled with people excited to worship God. The Lord helped guide TUC into a new place that’s stronger and better than before the pandemic. More importantly, it reminded us that God is at work even when we cannot see or understand what is happening. The missionaries who started Union Church more than 150 years ago could not have imagined where we would be today.

The work of God continues today both through existing churches like TUC and also through new church plants all throughout the country. As we look forward to the next 150 years, our prayer is that God’s kingdom will come and that his will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Through struggles and hardships, the Lord continues to protect the church, and for those who are serving across the Land of the Rising Sun, may this story of God’s faithfulness be an encouragement to those seeking to serve God and the people in Japan.

A special note of thanks to Rev. Dr. Steven Toshio Yamaguchi, Mrs. Alison Yamaguchi, and Rev. Hector Herrera III of Tokyo Union Church for their important contributions for this article. A special mention to Robert F. Hemphill, who wrote about the first century of TUC in the book A Church for All Seasons, which provided significant background for this article.

1. Tokyo Union Church is the current official name, but it was initially Union Church and we are unsure what year it changed.
2. Arthur Collins Maclay, A Budget of Letters from Japan (New York: A.C. Armstrong and Son, 1886, second edition 1889), 199.
3. Isabella Bird, Unbeaten Tracks in Japan (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1880, reprinted 2010), 33.
Photos submitted by author, from A Church for All Seasons: Tokyo Union Church 1872–1980 (updated edition of original 1972 book by Robert F. Hemphill).