Letters From Grandpa #543

• LETTERS FROM GRANDPA
• 543

Dearest grandchild,

Today’s letter will summarize a gospel pamphlet published in the December 1970 issue of Campus Life Magazine. At the time there were 30 million copies of the pamphlet in print in twenty different languages. The pamphlet is titled From Pearl Harbor to Calvary. It was written by Mitsuo Fuchida. He was the Japanese pilot who led the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. At that time Fuchida was the most experienced pilot in the Japanese Navy with over 10,000 hours logged.

On the day of the attack he arose at 3:00 a.m. Four days before he had celebrated his 39th

birthday. Six Japanese aircraft carriers were 230 miles north of Oahu. Fuchida led 360 planes toward Hawaii at 3,000 meters. At 7:49 a.m. they were over Honolulu and Fuchida keyed his mike and ordered the attack. They destroyed 5 of the 8 battleships there, killed 3,077 navy personnel, and 226 soldiers. 1,272 were wounded. At the time this was the most thrilling exploit of Fuchida’s career!

During the next four years Fuchida tried to improve on what he did at Pearl Harbor. He saw action in the Solomon Islands, Java, and the Indian Ocean. Just before the battle of Midway, June 4, 1942, he suffered an attack of appendicitis and was unable to fly. As you know, the defeat of Japan at Midway was the turning point of the war. Perhaps Fuchida’s appendicitis saved his life! Later, God providentially saved his life again at Hiroshima. On the day before the A-bomb was dropped Fuchida was ordered to leave Hiroshima for Tokyo.

After the war Fuchida got off the train at the Shibuya Station in Tokyo. There was an American missionary there distributing literature. His name was Jake DeShazer. He handed Fuchida a pamphlet entitled I was a Prisoner of Japan.” DeShazer had been in a POW in Japan for 40 months. He was an atheist and hated the Japanese just as much as Fuchida hated the Americans. That is, until DeShazer was loaned a Bible for three weeks. When DeShazer gave his heart to Christ, Jesus transformed his hatred for the Japanese into love. This converted atheist loved the Japanese so much that after the war he spent 30 years as a missionary to Japan. Mitsuo Fuchida was one of his many converts. Despite Fuchida’s Buddhist heritage, DeShazer’s testimony caused him to buy a Bible for himself. After reading the Bible he too was transformed by the love of Christ.

Fuchida was especially touched by the love of Jesus for those who were killing him. “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do!” (Luke 23:34) Suddenly Fuchida remembered all the men he had killed because he did not love them. He wrote: “Right at that moment, I seemed to meet Jesus for the first time. I understood the meaning of His death as a substitute for my wickedness, and so in prayer, I requested Him to forgive my sins and change me from a bitter, disillusioned ex-pilot into a well balanced Christian with purpose in living. That date, April 14, 1950 became the second day to remember in my life. On that day I became a new person. My complete view on life was changed by the intervention of the Christ I had always hated and ignored before.”

When the newspapers in Japan learned of his conversion and the headlines screamed: “PEARL HARBOR HERO CONVERTS TO CHRISTIANITY” His old war buddies ridiculed him and tried to get him to discard this “crazy idea.” Others accused him of embracing Christianity only because America won the war. But time has proved them wrong! Fuchida teamed up with DeShazer and spent the rest of his life traveling throughout Japan and the Orient introducing others to the love of Christ.

Fuchida said: “I would give anything to retract my actions of twenty-nine years ago at Pearl Harbor, but it is impossible. Instead, I now work at striking the death-blow to the basic hatred which infests the human heart and causes such tragedies. And that hatred cannot be uprooted without assistance from Jesus Christ. He is the only one powerful enough to change my life and inspire it with His thoughts. He was the only answer to Jake DeShazer’s tormented life. He is the only answer for young people today!”

Prisoner Napoleon Bonaparte once mused: “Alexander, Cæsar, Charlemagne, and myself founded empires. But on what did we rest the creations of our genius? Upon force. Jesus Christ alone founded his empire upon love; and, at this hour, millions of men would die for him.” Sadly, Napoleon spent the last years of his life as a prisoner on the Island of St. Helena and died of stomach cancer at 51 years of age.

Fortunately, God allowed the prophet Micah, who ministered in a time of war, to look into the future and write: “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the temple of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths.” The law will go out from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He will judge between many peoples and will settle disputes for strong nations far and wide. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore. Everyone will sit under their own vine and under their own fig tree, and no one will make them afraid, for the Lord Almighty has spoken. All the nations may walk in the name of their gods, but we will walk in the name of the Lord our God for ever and ever.” (Micah 4:2- 5)

God has given many spiritual gifts to bless the world, but the greatest gift of all is love!

I love you,

Grandpa Boyce