Self-Introduction : Sora (Sky)(English version)

✔ Even though I'm working hard, for some reason I can't feel at ease

✔ I can't see the future, and I'm living day after day without answers

✔ Even when I talk to someone, I feel like they don't really understand

There was a time when that was true for me too.

After finishing eight and a half years stationed in the United States, I returned to Japan alone, leaving my wife and two children — who wanted to continue their education — behind in America.
That was how things stayed for a while after that day.

It's been four months since I started this Note. I've been writing articles based on stories from the Bible, but I had never once talked about the name “Sora” (空 / Sky), or about myself. Better late than never — let me take this opportunity to introduce myself.

#Days Without Answers

After returning to Japan alone, I asked my company to send me back to the U.S., but for personal reasons it didn't go through easily. When friends asked me, “What are you going to do?” I couldn't answer.

Every day I'd make an international call to hear how the kids were doing, talk it over with my wife, and feel a little relieved. Living that way, I threw myself into work even on weekends, and told myself that was enough to feel at peace.

#An Encounter With an Article

Around that time, a friend in the U.S. had given me an article about a Christian businessman, and I had the chance to read it. Reading about how vividly he lived even through many trials, I found myself asking, “Why can he live like that?” — and that was the beginning of everything.

Curious, I attended a gathering and was invited to a nearby church. Someone spoke to me over lunch after the service — I was a first-timer, but it was a very warm, welcoming church.

As I kept attending, I noticed something.

“Anything that comes from a self-centered mindset is different from God's heart.”

I realized that I had been evaluating myself for how hard I was working and becoming arrogant, trying to hold on to as much as I could by myself — and that, in the end, my worries hadn't gone away at all. Little by little, I came to understand that this was “sin,” a departure from God's standard.

1. The tendency to compare myself with others (jealousy, feelings of inferiority) — unable to genuinely rejoice in someone else's success

2. Words and attitudes that hurt the people closest to me — a contradiction I kept repeating even when I meant to change

3. Small lies and appearances to protect myself — self-defense that hides my true feelings

The Bible told me that there was someone who could help a person like me.

As an engineer who had always believed that “what I can understand and be convinced of myself is what's right,”

I learned that I was seen and valued as a person, with a depth of care beyond anything I could have predicted.

The One who created heaven and earth came to this earth at Christmas, took my place on the cross for my sins, and wiped them away.


That same One has a plan to lead me into eternity that doesn't end even in death.

When I realized that, through the whole Bible, so many things I couldn't fully understand were held together by one same theme — God's love for me — I was amazed, and at the same time filled with the peace of being kept safe by Him.

When I decided to believe in Him, and was baptized at church (publicly declaring what I believed), a weight I could never have lifted on my own — all the burden of my own striving — came off my shoulders. I was filled with a clean, refreshing satisfaction I had never experienced before.

And when I believed in God, I was naturally filled with deep joy from my heart, and wrapped in peace.
I remember, even now, how strangely light my heart felt.

After that, even without rushing ahead to plan everything myself, everything somehow moved forward well.

Even without worrying about and directing my family back in the U.S., I could just leave it to God — for the first time, that kind of peace of mind was born in me.

#A Door Opened

After that, following five years of living apart from my family for work in Japan, a way opened unexpectedly for me to work in the U.S. again.

After six years apart, my wife and I were able to start living together again — in America!

For six long years my wife worked and supported our family on her own, and I could never repay my gratitude to her, or my gratitude to God for making that reunion possible — it was a grace too great to repay.

Looking back, if even one of these had been missing — the struggle of returning to Japan alone, the church I found there, the salvation I was given to believe, the one chance meeting with a former boss before going overseas, the prayers of my brothers and sisters at church, or being rehired in the U.S. where my family was — I wouldn't be who I am today.

The Bible has a word that says God has a special plan for each one of us, and works all things together for our good.

God's guidance was the greatest thing my family and I have ever been thankful for in our lives.

After that, I worked at a manufacturing company in the U.S. until retiring five years ago.
When my wife later faced breast cancer, our second son, a doctor, moved close by from a state far away to help take care of her.
And last year, when another illness put my wife in the hospital, it became the occasion for us to completely change our lifestyle — reducing medication, restricting diet, managing water intake, and adding moderate exercise after meals.

Thanks to that, a year has passed, and she has now regained a healthy life and is doing well.

Thanks to these trials my wife went through, the environment around us was put in order, and we received a great grace from God that we never would have noticed without that hospital stay.

God had already seen ahead and planned what was best!

Many other things have happened since then too, but even in what I don't understand, I keep walking, choosing to believe there's a leading toward God's grace within it.

What the Name “Sora” (Sky) Means to Me

Below the clouds, there is rain, wind, and storms. Life has just as many worries, anxieties, and hardships. But once you rise above the clouds, there is always a light there that never changes.

Even when I can't see what's ahead, even when nothing about my situation changes, there is a place where I can still believe that “all things work together for good.” For me, that place was the sky above the clouds. That's why I gave it this name.

#Words That Have Always Spoken to Me, Right Beside Me

Since I came to believe, the Bible has never been just a book to me. It has felt like someone who is always right beside me, who knows everything about me, and who keeps encouraging me, guiding me, and speaking words of love.

Three verses in particular have carried me through, again and again.

“I know you”   — from Psalm 139

I should have been terrified that everything about me was seen through, but somehow I felt at peace instead. During my lonely days working far from my family, when I felt like no one could truly understand me, knowing that there was Someone who did understand was more support than anything else.

“Do not fear, for I am with you”   — from Isaiah 41:10

When I returned to Japan alone and spent each day unable to see what lay ahead, this word encouraged me again and again. Even when nothing about my situation changed, simply believing I wasn't alone gave me the strength to face the next day.

“I know the plans I have for you — plans for peace”   — from Jeremiah 29:11

I met this word during those days without answers, after my request to be sent back to the U.S. didn't go through. Once I started attending church, even when my own plans didn't work out, believing that God had a plan became the starting point for letting go of my worries and entrusting them to Him.

Every time I encountered words like these, I truly felt that the God who inspired the Bible wasn't just teaching — He loved me, and truly wanted to help me.

That is why I came to believe.

#What I Want to Share From Here On

In Japan, the Bible may not be something people are very familiar with. But for me, it has been a living “guidebook for life,” always there beside me whenever I was in trouble.

And that continues even now.

Even in everyday life, I often notice ways my own heart doesn't match God's heart — my own sin.

And each time, it brings me the words of love I need in that moment.

Through the words of the Bible, I turn back toward God, am encouraged, and am given the desire to take another small new step forward. I walk on, thankful for that grace.

I believe that every encounter and event from here on will be just as precious to me as every encounter and event that brought me this far — each one within God's plan.

With that in mind, through this account, “Sora” (Sky), I hope to share the heart of God written in the Bible in a way that's easy to understand — in a way that can reach the hearts of those who read it, even just a little.

If you're in the middle of days without answers right now. If you're working hard but somehow can't feel at ease.

I hope that in the time you spent reading this, a new, meaningful encounter and a small light reach you.

If you don't mind, I would be very happy to hear your thoughts and impressions in a comment 😃!

Thank you very much, and I look forward to continuing from here.

With gratitude