Dreams of Jesus

By Andrew McChesney, Adventist Mission

Susumu Kanai had his first vision of Jesus as he lay in bed at 5 a.m. in Osaka, Japan.

Image © Pacific Press

He had spent some time contemplating life every morning for 12 years in his hometown of 2.6 million people, located 310 miles (500 kilometers) southwest of Tokyo. But this time, he was startled to see a bright light. In the light, he saw a back-lit figure with outstretched arms.

Curious to know more, Susumu searched online and found a photo of the giant “Christ the Redeemer” statue with outstretched arms in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He concluded that perhaps he had seen Jesus.

A short time later, Susumu had a nighttime dream in which he was seated across from a Man at a table. The Man had His hands on the table and was surrounded by a bright rainbow.

Susumu realized that the Man in the dream was Jesus when he visited a barber shop several days later. Leafing through a book of famous paintings as he waited for a haircut, he saw Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last Supper” and recognized Jesus from the dream.

The dreams and visions continued. Susumu had a dream that he and seven other men were captured in a foreign country. He watched as the seven men were killed one by one. When his turn came to die, someone grabbed him from behind and whispered, “I’m of the Coptic religion. Come with me”.

Susumu woke at that moment. He looked up “Coptic” online and was astonished to find a Coptic church located only 35 miles (55 kilometers) away. For the first time he wondered whether he should go to church.

A few mornings later, Susumu had another vision. He saw the words “Gospel of Matthew” run across his mind’s eye from left to right, like a digital advertisement. He didn’t know what the words meant, so he looked online and learned that Matthew was a book of the Bible. He immediately downloaded an audio version of Matthew and started listening in his car.

At the same time, he asked his landlady, whom he knew was a Christian, where she worshiped. She brought him to the Osaka Center Seventh-day Adventist Church.

Susumu, pictured left, is among dozens of unsolicited guests who showed up at unprecedented evangelistic meetings at 161 sites across Japan in 2018. Church leaders have never seen anything like it in a country where Christians account for only 0.7 percent of the population.

“The Holy Spirit is doing something extraordinary in Japan, bringing people to the church and convicting them”, said Adventist Church president Ted N.C. Wilson, who met Susumu. “We need to pray for the latter rain of the Holy Spirit so countries like Japan and many others become completely inundated with the Advent message”.

Produced by the General Conference Office of Adventist Mission.
Find more mission stories at adventistmission[dot]org

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Further Thought: 

Read Ellen G. White, “Isaiah 58—A Divine Prescription”, pages 29-34, in Welfare Ministry; “Woes on the Pharisees”, pages 610-620, in The Desire of Ages.

“In urging the value of practical godliness, the prophet was only repeating the counsel given Israel centuries before … From age to age these counsels were repeated by the servants of Jehovah to those who were in danger of falling into habits of formalism and of forgetting to show mercy”. – Ellen G. White, Prophets and Kings, pages 326, 327.

Image © Stan Myers from GoodSalt.com

“I have been instructed to refer our people to the fifty-eighth chapter of Isaiah. Read this chapter carefully and understand the kind of ministry that will bring life into the churches. The work of the gospel is to be carried by means of our liberality as well as by our labors. When you meet suffering souls who need help, give it to them. When you find those who are hungry, feed them. In doing this you will be working in lines of Christ’s ministry. The Master’s holy work was a benevolent work. Let our people everywhere be encouraged to have a part in it”. – Ellen G. White, Welfare Ministry, p. 29.

Discussion Questions:

Summary: 

While the prophets were concerned about evil in the land, they were particularly focused on the evil committed by people who claimed and worshiped God as their own. For the prophets and for Jesus, worship is inconsistent with injustice, and such religion is hypocrisy. The real worship God is seeking includes working against oppression and caring for the poor and needy.

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