Pearl Harbor and Reconciliation

December 7, 2011 marks the 70th anniversary of the brutal Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, a day which would “live in infamy” as President Franklin Roosevelt called it while urging Congress for a declaration of war. American casualties were unequalled until the savage attacks of 9/11.

Lost in the obscurity of the years are two figures whose lives would intersect miraculously in the will of God.

Captain Mitsuo Fuchida led the Pearl Harbor attack, exulting in the deadly carnage done for his emperor-god. He was the solitary Japanese officer to survive World War II despite breaking both legs in a sea accident and browsing the radiation-contaminated ashes of leveled Hiroshima. His post-war days were spent farming, but his soul was empty.

In the surprise retaliation attack on Japanese cities led by Lt. Col. Jimmy Doolittle in April 1942, Jacob DeShazer dropped his bombs on Osaka from plane #16, the last one off the carrier Hornet. He was captured after parachuting into Japanese-held territory in China and imprisoned by Japan for 40 months. Hatred for his torturing captors turned to love when he read in the Bible of Christ’s forgiveness through the Cross. His love abounded when he pledged that he’d return to Japan as a missionary if he survived the war.

Jake kept his vow, starting over 30 churches in Japan and preaching the Christ he once ignored. One day, after reading a tract telling DeShazer’s story given to him by other American missionaries, Mitsuo Fuchida bought a Bible, read of Christ’s death for him, and accepted Christ as his Savior. He went to meet Jake DeShazer to publicly profess Christ. As a team, they evangelized Japan seeing thousands come to Christ, and they are now together in Heaven.

The full story is on our website, but for now I emphasize the stirring truth of 2 Corinthians 5:17-19.

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation.”
Dave Virkler