Pete and Edi Wilson
Working with WEC in Japan 
For updates and prayer letters from Pete and Edi click on links below
Peter was born in Redruth in 1962 and grew up in St. Austell where he went to school at Charlestown, Poltair and St. Austell 6th Form College. . He was converted in 1982 in Cardiff while a student (his one and only year at university!) and was baptised and become a member of St. Austell Baptist Church later that same year. He studied at the Bible College of Wales in Swansea, joined WEC International in 1988 and has been in Japan since 1990.
Peter met Edi when he worked for a year at Emmanuel Grammar School, which was attached to the Bible college. She was born in Japan where her parents were also WEC missionaries. She trained to be a teacher in Worcester and then studied at Hebron Bible Institute in Japan. She has been in Japan as a WEC missionary since 1993.
Pete and Edi with their three children lived near Lake Biwa in the centre of Japan where Pete pastors Kaori Christian Church,. The children all attended the local Japanese school where Edi taught elementary English and Pete gave English lessons to local children in the local community hall.Joanna, Andy and John, their children, were all born in Japan and attended Japanese Primary School. They speak Japanese more naturally than English and it was a constant battle to get them to speak English while they were at home. They were in a Japanese world from 7.50am to 3.30.
In 2011 the family moved to Kyotanabe. Joanna and Andy now attend the Kyoto International University Academy and John has moved to a new Japanese Primary School. Pete still pastors Kaori Church and travels back to work there three times a week and all day on Sundays. Pete with Andy and John, plays football on Sunday afternoons at .
About our work
We work as part of SCENT (Shiga Cho Evangelism and Nurture Team), planting a church (Kaori Christian Church) in an area called Shiga Cho (i.e. Shiga Town). Shiga Town became a part of Otsu, so we are now a part of Otsu city, the capital city of Shiga prefecture, located a little bit to the east of Kyoto, Japan’s old capital. We lived a few minutes walk from Lake Biwa, the biggest lake in Japan. The population of Otsu is 320,000 of which 22,000 is the old Shiga-cho. Our town had no church until 1999 when the SCENT team started working here.
As a church we rent an old shop, with a big room which we use for church meetings, and a smaller room which we use for English classes, Bible studies and as an office. This gives us a shop window onto the street and we can use this to put in eye-catching displays. “Toddler Club” is an evangelistic mothers and toddlers club, with 15 mothers coming every two weeks. Very few Japanese churches run such clubs. We find it is very popular. Please pray for the ongoing witness of this club, which has a different Bible theme each week.
Men are always very difficult to reach with the gospel because of the long hours they spend at work. Pete is a member of a sports club run by people in our neighborhood and of the “Mums and Dads” section of Andy’s football club. Although we usually just meet and do our sport, please pray for openings to share something about the Lord or to invite people to events.
On Friday mornings Edi teaches English at the local primary school where Joanna and Andy go; on Wednesday afternoons Pete teaches an English Club for local children. This sort of thing can provide good standing among the local people. Getting ready for them each week can be a lot of work. Edi also has a lot of good contacts generally with the mothers of Joanna’s, Andy’s and John’s school friends. We are also in charge of short-term workers. We have been very blessed to be involved with a lot of young people through this and to have had an input into their lives. Some have felt a call to Japan.
Please pray that others will come back as long termers. The field has a need for more workers. When new workers come to the field we are responsible for overseeing their language study. There are two women currently on full time Japanese study, one from Myanmar and one from Britain
Wednesday 25 January 2012