Where Everybody's Crazy

It's a bit of a shameful admission, but after five years of Japanese degree and then six years of private study, I've finally read my first book in Japanese from cover to cover unassisted.

I may be in danger of becoming a complete Mitsuo Fukuda fanboy here, but it was his "Mentoring Like Barnabas", and it was very very good - and in lots of ways, very humbling. It made me think about what right or experience I have to be talking to others about leadership, which is a good question to ask, whatever the answer.

And it contained a lot of good stuff about coaching, mentoring, counselling, church management and general Christian life. One of the bits that really hit me was something that everyone who is working as a pastor in Japan should know:

In the words of the pastor and counsellor Nobuo Tanaka, many Japanese come to church in search of a father figure. This is a part of a conversation with a consellor: "In my thirty years of counselling, not one person has honestly come to be honestly for a consultation. It may take the form of a consultation, but actually they are looking for a substitute father in me. So proposing any kind of solution is a waste of time. A consultation is the name they put on it, but it is merely an excuse to see me; they come not to seek a solution to their pain, but to find love." Many people coming to church choose the pastor or pastor's wife as a substitute parent, subconsciously seeking the acceptance that they did not receive from their natural parents. If this is true, then what the church needs to provide in order to face their situation is not teaching but relationship.