December 6, 2020 Sunday)
In the spring of 1967 I was invited by Dwight Dudley, who was a foreign missionary, to visit him and preach to his church, an English-speaking church in Naha, Okinawa. By the time I arrived, however, he was no longer the pastor but the church scheduled a youth retreat in which I was the speaker. All the boys at the retreat were in the military and were awaiting deployment in Vietnam. We also visited, with other missionaries and service personnel, several of the Ryukyu Islands of which Okinawa was a part. I was thrilled to see every person in every village in attendance at meetings where the gospel was shared by a Japanese preacher. I will always be thankful for that experience.
One of my stops on the way to Okinawa was Taipei, where I stayed in a hotel designed for westerners such as I. I planned to visit a missionary whose name was attached to our local Woman’s Missionary Union. I had the address written down in English, so I asked the desk clerk to translate it on the piece of paper. Problem. Big problem for me. I said “translate it into Japanese,” when I should have said, “Chinese.” The man was so angry I thought he would have a heart attack or stroke.
It was just a slip of tongue, but what a slip. You see, Japan had big ideas about an empire taking in all of the far east, and to make that happen Japan set out to conquer several nations, among which was China. History reveals that the Japanese committed all sorts of atrocities against the Chinese, so the desk clerk in Taipei heard me say, “Japanese,” and I may as well have called his mother an obscene name.
Japan had a lot of success in setting up their empire, and when December 7, 1941 (Pearl Harbor Day) rolled around, that attack was just part of their overall plan to conquer all the Pacific nations and Asian nations as well.
On this day in history, Japan’s fleet, loaded with attack bombers, was making its way across oceanic waters toward Hawaii and a secret attack against the American fleet stationed at Pearl Harbor. It’s hard for many people to understand how such a massive movement could go undetected, but it did. The American aircraft carriers were on maneuvers and not present but many other American ships were there along with several thousand men and their families. Casualties were numerous, and a conflict began which America would eventually win, but for the time being was losing.
As a 10 year old boy I don’t recall ever being told anything about Japan before the day Pearl Harbor was attacked. But as an objective observer today, I find it difficult to understand how the United States and her allies could be so completely caught off guard. The history books tell the story. Japan had not kept secret her plans to dominate the far east and then the entire Pacific.
Time marches on, and Japan is now our friend. We are allies. The world has changed. But not all for the better. We were awakened to a new world of danger by the activities of terrorists. This country must always be on alert for possible dangers.
The following solo is from an original recording of the bi-centennial musical, “I Love America” (1976), written by Don Wyrtzen and John Peterson.