On the Sunday before their forced removal, Lester Suzuki had preached a sermon to the Nisei congregation of the Japanese Methodist Church in Los Angeles: “Brethren, we are facing the eve of evacuation. We must evacuate our homes and churches and be taken to strange places, and we will not know what will happen to us. This is our last Sunday on which we can worship in our own sanctuary.”[1] Suzuki mourned with his church the emotional loss of leaving behind a chapel they had built with their own hands and financed with their hard-earned wages. Many had attended Sunday school in that building since their childhood and were now being forced to vacate without the certainty of return. Suzuki directed the Nisei to consider their Issei parents who now had to abandon everything they had worked so hard to establish. He then comforted his flock with the account of Abraham, who was told by God to leave his homeland at the age of seventy-five (Genesis 12:1-3) and Moses who was past eighty when he proclaimed God’s Word to Pharaoh: “Let my people go” (Exodus 5:1).
Suzuki also made no attempt to hide the suffering his people would encounter. Instead, he bolstered their confidence from the first epistle of Peter, relating the similarity of the Japanese American persecution with that of the early church. The apostle Peter had likewise written to persecuted believers who were dispersed from their homes and facing an uncertain future (1 Peter 1:1). They too were subject to harsh masters with little say about what would happen to them (2:18). Thus, Suzuki reminded his church: “It is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil. For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit” (3:17-18). Peter promised that Christians who suffered unjustly like Jesus, would one day be rewarded just as Jesus now sits at his Father’s right hand (v. 22).
For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed (2:21-24).
Suzuki exhorted the church to be like Jesus. They were not to respond to the wrongs committed against them with angry retaliation, but like the Son of God. Christ’s humility had not been a sign of weakness, but rather a sign of his measured strength. He had given his life for the church, so they could sacrifice on his behalf. Like Jesus, they placed their faith in the God who judges justly and would eventually make all things right. In truth, their suffering in a fallen world was to be expected. As Peter wrote,
Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. But let none of you suffer as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler. Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name (4:12-16).
The Christian’s response to suffering must be vastly different than the world’s. Instead of growing bitter or despairing, believers rejoice at being counted worthy of sharing in Christ’s suffering. In this way, Suzuki prepared his church for isolation and an uncertain future in the camps: “We will not have all the splendid facilities that we have here and we will not have the constant care of a stabilized church. . . . We must look for every opportunity rather than wait for it. If there are no Christians, we should go out of our way and gather two or three and make a Christian congregation.”[2] He called Christians to worship together even if the internment did not possess the comforts and security of home. The church’s joy-filled response would thus bring glory to God as the one who still governed their lives.
In addition, God’s people retained confidence that their earthly suffering was merely temporary. Not even the most severe troubles they faced in this life would last forever. According to 1 Peter 5:10, “And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.” Suzuki expressed his faith that the church would grow and flourish through her persecution. In Christ, they would surely be restored to eternal glory. He described this confidence with a gardening metaphor:
A plant is made perfect in a hot-bed, but when it is transplanted, it is established in a new place, and then it needs to be strengthened by being watered and cultivated and nurtured, and then when all that is done, it grows into a full-grown plant that bears fruits for the farmer. And so we too, when we have gone through the mill of suffering, and we stand the test, we can become perfect, and God will stabilize us, and strengthen us by God’s own way of nurturing, and finally, God settles us into men and women who have God at the center, and therefore are well settled. . . .
As we face an unknown adventure, which will be filled no doubt with ugly things, with undesirable things, with things that will tend to make us cynical, and antagonistic, and pessimistic—try to make things beautiful where there is guileness, love where there is hate, goodness where there is evil. God gives us an opportunity that is not given to others, to make living beautiful, and not merely busy ourselves with making a living. Let us face what comes with courage and faith.[3]
Rev. Suzuki reminded the church that believers must not rely solely on their own resources, for every person eventually faces trials in life which cannot be overcome by human strength or ingenuity. No one can control the nature or extent of the suffering they will face. No one can prevent others from committing horrible wrongs against them. In such fearful uncertainty, life apart from Christ is hopeless. Only faith in a sovereign God can transform one’s view of human suffering. Through God’s power, suffering will transform believers into the image of Christ (Romans 8:28-29), reveal the joy found in God (2 Corinthians 1:3-4a), and teach the church how to comfort fellow sufferers (vv. 4b-5). Christians affirm that God will use even the greatest hardships for the good of the church and the glory of Christ.
[1] Lester E. Suzuki, “Facing Evacuation,” sermon cited in Hunter and Binford, The Sunday Before, 14.
[2] Ibid., 16.
[3] Ibid., 16-17.
