Month: March 2026

Hello everyone, my name is Eiro Fukuda. I am grateful for the opportunity to share my testimony with you. Today, rather than focusing on events from the past few months, I would like to talk about how God has been at work in my life over the past several years.

I have lived in Cincinnati, Ohio for 26 years. My family consists of my wife, Chisato, our three children, and one dog. I attended church in Japan for about two years, but I became a Christian here in the United States. Since then, I have been involved for about 25 years in a ministry centered around a once-a-month Japanese-language worship service.

In recent years, even though I have been busy serving in various ways, I began to feel that my faith was not really deepening. My prayers also started to feel like a list of my own wishes and needs. Perhaps I was experiencing a bit of burnout.

Through conversations with my wife, who practices spiritual direction, and through participating in C-WIT recently, I began learning to spend time in silence. At first, I couldn’t even maintain 30 seconds of silence. My mind would immediately start racing with various thoughts, and instead of becoming still, it felt like the noise in my head only grew louder.

However, as I remained quietly present—not even actively praying—within that noise, the volume of those thoughts gradually began to decrease. What initially felt uncomfortable slowly became something more peaceful. Silence has started to feel like a friend to me. If I were to describe it, it’s like becoming acquainted with a classmate you had never spoken to before, but over time, you somehow grow closer. This “friend” of silence is quiet; we don’t talk, but we simply share a sense of presence together.

A few years ago, after our three children left for college, my wife and I began spending more time talking together. One of my daily joys is having conversations with her in the morning over a good cup of coffee. Recently, she told me that I have become a better listener, and that the content of my conversations has changed.

As a spiritual director, my wife likely spends much of her time listening to others. Even in our conversations, she probably speaks about 80% of the time, while I speak about 20%. But I realized that when she was speaking, I wasn’t truly listening—I was simply not talking.

I think this has also been true in my conversations with others. Often, I wasn’t fully attentive. I would listen to the beginning of what someone said, and then start thinking about what I wanted to say next. Even when talking with my children, there were times when I suddenly brought up my own thoughts that had nothing to do with the flow of the conversation, and they would say, “Dad, can we have a proper conversation?”

Living in the United States, I think I developed a habit when speaking in English: while listening, I would prepare what to say next so I wouldn’t miss any pause in the conversation. That subtle silence in one-on-one conversations can feel uncomfortable. But instead of filling it with words just to keep the conversation going, perhaps it is important to experience that silence. To focus on truly listening when the other person is speaking—not only does that deepen our understanding of what is being said, but more importantly, it deepens the relationship itself.

In the same way, I believe my relationship with God had become one where I simply presented my prayer requests and then moved on. Even though God is always near and is trying to speak to me, I may have been passing by without noticing His presence or His voice.

Going forward, through each conversation and through learning to live with silence, I hope to become more attentive to God’s presence near me and to listen more carefully to His voice.

That is all. Thank you very much.

Luke 17:20–21

Jesus answered, “The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed; nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ For behold, the kingdom of God is in your midst.”