Featured Usagi the Yakuza Gangster

Upon learning these things, my first thought was to institute church discipline proceedings! I didn't want a gangster in my church, obviously. And what would the other members think? And what would our supporting churches think? And was there any danger to any of us through this development?

So I began to pray about what to do. I don't have to tell you that this was serious praying, during which I claimed James 1:5--"If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him."

Here is how God led me. I decided to watch for spiritual growth, and as long as Usagi was growing in the Lord, to put off kicking him out of the church. I'd already seen growth in his great love for the Bible and in the fact that he was coming somewhat regularly to church, depending on his condition after chemotherapy. But would he witness for Christ? Would he develop the fruit of the Spirit? (He was a very rude and crude person.) Would he see the problems in being both a yakuza and a church member? After all, "No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other" (Matt. 6:24).

 

Thanks for the input, Bob. We are the ones who try to limit who God can save and how they should grow in grace! God's ways are far above ours.

 

It wasn't long before I learned that Usagi was indeed a witness for Christ. One day I was walking down the Kaimono Koen when who should I see but Usagi sitting on a concrete bench next to a small, dark Japanese man with a mustache. He introduced this man to me as his immediate superior in the gang, a man named Furuta who was one of the two assistant godfathers.

As we talked I was able to witness for Christ to Furuta, but he laughed it off. "We're all going to Hell. You, too, Usagi." Usagi immediately objected with a clear testimony for Christ, saying, "No, I'm headed for Heaven because I believe in Jesus and He has forgiven my sins." Furuta laughed and said over Usagi's objections, "We're all headed for Hell."

I learned later that Usagi's friendship with Furuta went all the way back to high school, where they were delinquents together. Furuta, a man of about 57 at that time, was suffering with diabetes, a disease common to the yakuza because of their love of good times! Usagi recently told me that Furuta has gone downhill rapidly, losing most of the use of one arm and leg. I've been praying for his salvation ever since meeting him, and praying that God would do a great work among the gangsters of our city. Such a thing seems impossible, but to our God there is no such thing!

 

On another occasion Usagi shared with me his burden for Keiko, a young lady who hung around yakuza headquarters. My guess is that Keiko was a prostitute from some things Usagi said. At any rate, she was hurting and Usagi wanted to help her.

He shared with how much he had been helped by reading the Bible and trusting Christ, and recommended a full schedule of Bible reading to her! But she had no Bible, so how could she do that? Usagi decided to give her his beloved, much read Bible, and did so. He never shared what happened after that, but my hope is that she found Christ.

In the meantime, Usagi bought a new Bible from the several I had at the church for this purpose. The new Bible is exactly what I had hoped and prayed for, since Usagi's original Bible was the "Colloquial Version" of 1957, I believe it was. This Bible was the first ever translated into modern, colloquial Japanese. Until that time all Bibles were in the very difficult classical Japanese, so the "Colloquial Version" was a step up from that.

However, the "Colloquial Version" had some major problems, so I was glad Usagi upgraded. One of those problems had to do with the translation of the Greek future tense, so that the Colloquial says in Acts 1:11, "This same Jesus may come...." Usagi's new Bible was what our church uses, the "New Standard Version," financed by the Lockman Foundation and done from the same principles and texts as the NASV. (There are no Japanese Bibles in print from the traditional texts.)

 

Thanks for the encouragement and the other comments, Bob.

Words are fascinating things, and regional differences are fun to me. Things are quite different up here from Yokohama. For example, up here they have several words for snow that no one uses down there: hatsuyuki (first snow), neyuki (base snow), fubuki (blowing snow).

 

We began to pray for Usagi that he would be able to quit the gang. This proved to be much more difficult than you might think. You don't just go up to the yakuza oyabun ("godfather," literally "the part of the father") and say, "I quit," and then have him say, "Great. Good luck on your next job." He's likely to have you beat up instead. Then he'll cut off a joint of your little finger, which is the main yakuza punishment.

Usagi saw the need to quit early on. He once told me, "The yakuza are a gang of devils." He knew they were evil, he knew they were criminal, he knew they were leading him completely down the wrong path. He'd been in prison three times when he was young, and did not want to end up there again, yet he knew that as long as he was in the gang this was a likely event.

But Usagi quit the yakuza without ceremony, without telling the godfather, without telling anyone. The way he did it was simply by stopping all yakuza activities and stopping showing up at the headquarters. However, he was very afraid they were going to catch him again and refuse to let him quit.

Usagi knew where the danger was. After he was baptized, he continued to receive chemotherapy for his hepatitis, and the gang knew this and knew which hospital he went to. So he knew they would try to kidnap him when he went for chemotherapy. But he was ready--or so he thought.

 

I've heard the same about Inuit, so you got me curious and I looked it up. According to Mario Pei (The Story of Language, p. 119) they have about a dozen words for snow, a few more than Hokkaido dialect.

 

So Usagi quit the yakuza. Cold turkey. Without telling them or the police or anyone but me. He just stopped showing up at yakuza headquarters and stopped doing anything they wanted him to, and stopped answering his cell phone, which he periodically threw away and replaced anyway because of fear of the Japanese National Police finding out his number and monitoring yakuza communications. And he hid out in his one room apartment.

But he still had to go to the hospital and have his chemotherapy, so that's where they watched for him. One day he was about to get on the bus to go home from the hospital when two of his old buddies walked up to him, marched him to their car and said, "Get in." Having no choice (no one refuses an invitation from the mob), he got in.

They took him to the godfather, who sat him down and gave him a good talking to. The godfather didn't ask him anything, he simply told him, "You're not quitting!" And that was that. As Usagi told me later, the godfather had been hugely helpful to his family many years ago. In Japanese terms, based on Confucianism, that meant that Usagi was in moral debt to the godfather, and could not lightly break the relationship. (This is called ongiri [恩義理], and is extremely important in Japan, especially to the yakuza.)

So there I was, with a member of the Japanese mafia still in my church and still a yakuza. But let's never leave God out of the equation!

 

It was around then that Usagi made a decision which made me proud. He decided that though he could not yet exit the gang, he would stay away from anything legal. He was finished as a criminal! Believe it or not, the yakuza have some legal functions in this society, such as manning the snack carts and providing security sometimes at festivals. Usagi was going to be a clean yakuza!

There is a longing among some yakuza to at least have a clean image, if not actual purity. I was once at a gym in Nagano Prefecture with Bill and his family. As we walked outside, Bill pointed to a sign and said, "Do you know about that? This community gym, like many around the country was donated by yakuza-connected Sasanaka (not his real name; no longer living). He runs the motorboat race gambling in this country. His goal in life is to get the Nobel Peace Prize, so he contributes to a lot of charities." Then it hit me. I remembered seeing his face on TV commercials for his motorboat races, visiting Africa and surrounded by little black children his charities supposedly fed.

Another time I took a young American black belt into downtown Tokyo to the headquarters of his karate organization to see if we could get him into a dojo (training gym) to train with the Japanese. Something about the name of the building rang a bell. There on the fifth floor we walked into the headquarters and began talking to the karate people there, and were able to work things out for the young man. And there on the wall, large as life, was a huge photo of Sasanaka, the yakuza-connected right winger! We were in his building, and he was the sponsor for this lily white karate organization representing one of the top karate styles in Japan!

But Usagi wanted actual purity. He wanted to be clean of all the dirtiness of the gang. By God's grace he would strive to live for Christ in the midst of crime and moral filth.

 

Oops! You are so right!

 

Merry Christmas to you and yours, also!

 

Usagi took his request to stay clean to the godfather. As a result, he was appointed the driver of the godfather's limo! You see, the godfather had driven poorly (or drunk, I'm not sure which) one times too many, and had his license suspended!

Not only that, the godfather appointed Usagi to be his gardener. And snow shoveler. And generally his all around "gofer." Now these were all unpaid jobs. The thing is, in the yakuza you are only worth what you bring in through nefarious and illegal schemes. You don't get a salary, you make your own way. So now that Usagi was not bringing in money from drugs and con games, the only money he had coming in was the government stipend given to hepatitis patients since it was the government's fault the disease had gotten into the blood supply.

When a yakuza godfather or "squad leader" (my own term for the 3rd level bosses like Usagi) takes his men out to a bar or restaurant, he's in charge. He's also stuck for the bill. He pays for all the parties. He pays for all the fun. But he doesn't give his henchmen a salary. This system would cause problems for Usagi after we got back from furlough this year, and he got some wonderful news--or was it bad news? It depends on your perspective.

 

Tomorrow (Sunday) we will have a special service ending with the singing of "Silent Night" with candlelight, then have a potluck meal with our believers. We're bringing KFC chicken, which everyone likes over here. Mr. Ueno will probably bring sushi, Mr. Hashiba a dessert, Mrs. Takasugi a casserole, and so on.

In previous years we've had special Christmas tracts, children's programs ("Grandpa Truth," a puppet play I wrote about the true meaning of Christmas) and other special outreach efforts.

May God give you and yours a special Christmas also.