Thomas Arthur Going

1. 3/13/1934 Green Bay, WI

 

Spouse/Family

Wife: Adrienne Joy (Welch) 10/17/1934 Brookfield, IL

1. 8/4/1957

Children: Diane Lynn (Katz) and Cheryl Ann (Harris) 1958; Kay (Craig) 1959; Thomas

Louis 1962; Bonnie Sue (Wittman) and Cathy Jane (Harter) 1965; Carol Joy

(Wettschurack) 1970

 

Dates of Service Field Call Assignment

1958-72 Japan Evangelistic Missionary

1998-2000 Japan Pastor, St. Paul International Lutheran Church

 

Biographical Summary

Rev. Thomas (Tom) Going graduated from seminary in 1958 with a lot ahead of him.  He and his wife Adrienne, who had trained as a teacher in Mankato, MN and River Forest, IL, had been married in 1957 and were soon called to foreign missions in Japan.  While in mission school over the summer of 1958, they also had twin girls!  In September 1958 their small family arrived in Japan.  Tom and Adrienne began with a year and a half of Japanese language study in Tokyo, but their call was to the Niigata area, where they began living in 1960.

 

In Niigata, Tom was assigned as pastor of a small congregation and supervisor of a kindergarten in Kamo, and he would also supervise a kindergarten in Tagami from the time the Goings were in Kamo until the end of their time in Japan.  The Goings stayed at the congregation in Kamo from 1960-65; after a furlough, Tom was assigned to a congregation in nearby Sanjo, serving there from 1965-69.  The final congregation at which he was pastor was in Niitsu, from 1969 until 1972.  In all these congregations, he served as pastor, holding worship services, teaching, overseeing church business, and visiting and counseling congregants.  He also visited Lutheran Hour listeners who lived too far away to come to church regularly and led the church in special outreach – “evangelical crusades” that took place primarily around Christmastime, with the goal of bringing visitors to Christmas Eve services.

 

Besides their twins, the Goings had five more children, all of whom were born in Japan, and Adrienne especially was kept quite busy with the family!  The Goings also held English classes at their home, and Adrienne ran an unofficial hospitality ministry by preparing many meals for visitors, some from abroad but mainly Japanese, who came to their home.  Adrienne was also involved with the churches Tom served, helping with music and providing a ministry of presence and care for the congregation.  Tom speaks glowingly of her service, asserting, “She probably had more of an impact or influence on the Japanese than anything I said or did.”

 

In addition to pastoral duties, Tom was involved in beginning a Bethel Bible Series in Japan.  Around 1965, a Japanese pastor in the Japan Evangelical Lutheran Church had the idea to start this work after attending a Bethel clinic in Madison, WI.  He hoped to have an LCMS missionary on the founding committee, and Tom had experience with the Bethel Series.  Tom assisted in translating materials into Japanese and conducting clinics in Japan, as well as serving as treasurer of the committee and acting as a go-between as necessary between the ministry in Japan and that in the United States.

 

The Goings enjoyed their time in Japan, and their initial service lasted fourteen years.  They left Japan in 1972 and Tom was called as associate pastor at Immanuel Lutheran Church in Madison, WI from 1973-77; he then served as pastor at St. Peter Lutheran Church in Indianapolis from 1977-80 and as pastor at Grace Lutheran Church in Columbus, IN from 1980-1997.  In 1998, LCMS World Mission asked the Goings to return to Japan so that Tom could be interim pastor at St. Paul International Lutheran Church in Tokyo.  The church serves mostly expatriates in the Tokyo area and is a joint ministry between the LCMS and the ELCA.  It was having some difficulties just at that time, and after a few months the congregation asked the Goings to stay longer, so that a one-year assignment ended up lasting for two years.  During this time, as before, Adrienne provided a ministry of presence and hospitality.  At least once a month everyone – members and their friends – would come over to the parsonage for fellowship, where Adrienne hosted and did most of the cooking.  These gatherings helped immensely in creating a sense of fellowship.  Adrienne also took the lead in getting the Sunday school up and going.  Tom says: “She’s just a gracious lady who makes people feel at home, and really I think a lot of Japanese felt she was more Japanese than American.”  By the time their two years were done, the Goings’ commitments in the United States led them back stateside, although they might have liked to remain longer were it not for other work to be done.  Through the Spirit, they hope that by the time they left things were going more smoothly. Attendance was growing, and Bible classes, Sunday school, and worship services were all going forward.

 

During and after this second stint in Japan, Tom was doing Japanese outreach ministry in the U.S., mostly in the Midwest.  The Goings had known a Japanese pastor and evangelist named Shigeru Masaki during their initial mission service in Japan, and Tom reconnected with Rev. Masaki during a trip back in 1985.  Shortly after, Rev. Masaki was thinking of coming to the U.S. for a sabbatical, and Tom convinced him to come to Indiana and study at Fort Wayne Seminary.  Rev. Masaki returned to Japan after his sabbatical, but about a year later, at Tom’s urging, he returned to the United States, and with support from the Indiana District Mission Board they began a Japanese Mission Society in 1994.  Since then the Goings have been involved with Japanese ministry in Indiana, Michigan and other surrounding states, doing Bible classes, ESL classes and other outreach work.  Making use of her training, Adrienne has been very involved with teaching English classes.  This work has continued even after their official retirement in 1997.

 

Nota Bene

Phase 2 Information

Biggest missiological issue faced?

The Christian church in Japan has more women than men as members, and this creates problems for women who hope to marry a Christian husband.  Tom found that many women in his congregations had to deal with this issue, and he recalls the counseling and prayer he undertook with them.  Sometimes these prayers were answered, but simply because of demographics, the issue remains.

 

The Goings also note how important the witness of their family was, since it can be very difficult in Japan for Christian families to express their faith together.  So much is going on in people’s lives, including on Sundays, that time is limited, and children can feel set apart from their friends because of their Christianity, which can lead to resentment.  As much as possible, the Goings’ hosting people in their home and showing love toward their guests, as well as love and shared faith in their own family unit, was a major part of their ministry.

 

Most significant contribution during missionary service?

Although the work seemed discouraging at times, the Goings were blessed to contribute to the spread of the Good News of Christ among the people with whom they worked.  While in Japan, the Goings observed that many people’s response to the Gospel message was a lack of conception that each person is a sinner and in need of repentance.  Sometimes mission work seems to bear little fruit.  When they have returned, however, they have realized that what people remember is their family life together – sometimes the Gospel is spread in unexpected ways!

 

Mission work can also take a long time but still bear fruit.  Tom recalls the mothers of kindergarten students who took Bible classes, and even when they began to realize that God’s word was speaking to them, they were often still reluctant to consider baptism.  However, when the Goings returned to Japan later on (particularly their two-year trip in 1998-2000), they went up to Niigata a couple of times and learned that several women who had been in those early Bible classes had by then been baptized.

 

Another way the Goings and their fellow Christians were able to contribute was through music: when they worshipped or held classes they would always try to sing, and it was often music that seemed to touch people’s hearts in the best way.  When they went back to Japan, the area churches had a gathering for them at a hotel, and those who were present decided to have some music.  The congregations sang some familiar hymns, and some of the ladies who had attended Bible classes twenty-five years before were moved to the point of tears.

 

Tom: “Who knows really what we did; only the Lord knows; our work was just sowing the seed as we could.”

 

Connection to today’s mission?

Tom’s work on the founding committee of the Bethel Bible Series in Japan was both gratifying and a lasting contribution to mission work in that country.

 

The Lutheran mission in Japan has become a national church, the Nihon Ruteru Kyodan (NRK), which was established in 1968 and is a partner church of LCMS.  LCMS missionaries continue to support the work of the Japan Lutheran Church in the areas of Lutheran school education and theological education at the seminary. The LCMS Volunteer Youth Ministry (VYM) program has also brought more than 200 volunteer missionaries to Japan during the last 45 years

 

Lessons Learned

• Tom notes that when he relied on his own power and skill in his work, he went nowhere.  He had to learn dependence on the Holy Spirit and the importance of staying in the Word in order to do God’s work.  “What you are in the privacy of your prayer-closet is what you’ll be in public, and if nothing is happening in the prayer-closet, you’re going to end up being empty in public.”  Finally, he just had to give in and say “Lord, I can’t – you have to do it.”
• Tom often wasn’t aware of the best or most important things that happened during his time of ministry; the Lord often worked in ways he didn’t even notice until later, if at all.
• During their service in Japan, the Goings learned to appreciate Christians of denominations other than their own.  Tom had a mostly Lutheran background, but in Japan he got to know people from all different denominations and observed their great faith, meanwhile discovering that he didn’t know everything.  The Goings were pleased and edified to be part of a community of Christians, even if there were denominational differences among them.

 

Best Practices

• Fellowship between missionaries was very important in their work in Japan.  The school the Goings’ children attended also had children from other mission families (of various denominations), and these families became friends and prayer partners.  With LCMS missionaries in particular, the Goings felt that they were with family.  Their children called other LCMS missionaries “aunt” and “uncle,” and all the missionaries developed a close fellowship that saw them through their work.  This way of relying on one another and working together was also a good example for the Japanese community around them who could see in them something of the fellowship of the faithful.
• Tom: “If you go with a servant heart, I don’t know where you can’t go in the world.”  The best practice is just to go and serve the people, asking what one can do to help.  With this attitude, people’s lives open up, and there are all kinds of opportunities for ministry.

 

Phase 3 Information

Inspiration for entering foreign missions?

Tom grew up as a pastor’s child in Wisconsin; his father had a heart for mission although he never went overseas.  A couple times each year, their church had missionaries come to speak, and since the pastor’s family lived next door to the church, Tom had to go to everything that happened at the church (like it or not!).  One evening he went to listen to a missionary from Africa who had come to speak, and Tom found (somewhat to his surprise) that he was really listening to what the missionary was saying.   He remembers this as the first time the Holy Spirit touched his heart to indicate that missionary work was his calling.  He decided that he would go to seminary, and when it came time to discuss placement, he told the placement committee that he would like a call to a foreign mission field.  Because he had been inspired by a missionary working in Africa, Tom thought he might go to Africa or possibly Papua New Guinea, but the call to Japan came and he accepted it.

 

Adrienne, meanwhile, had always wanted to be a missionary.  Tom and Adrienne went to grade school and high school together, and at some point he found out that she had had a desire for mission from an early age.  When they got married the year before he graduated from seminary, they prayed about going abroad together.  Soon her prayers were answered as well as his.

 

Quotation by/about or brief story:

• Tom recalls a Christian couple living in Kamo who had no children, though they had wanted children for some time.  The couple hosted a Bible study at their house and wanted to talk about their sadness over not having children.  The group discussed the story of Hannah, and then everyone prayed together for the Lord to give this couple a child.  Almost a year to the day after that, they had a little girl.

 

• Another miracle story is that of a single Christian lady who went through a crisis of faith regarding her hopes for a Christian marriage.  Her non-Christian mother was especially pressing her to marry soon, but the young woman continued to hope for a Christian husband.  Finally, she submitted to parental pressure and was engaged to a non-Christian.  Sometime later, the young woman was helping at church with some work after the service, and Tom offered her a ride home because she was concerned that her fiancé was waiting for her and would be upset that she had been at church so long.  As they approached her house, they saw her fiancé’s truck leaving, as he had gotten tired of waiting for her.  That prompted him to give her an ultimatum: him or the church.  She broke off the engagement but was devastated, and though she still wanted to marry a Christian, there seemed little prospect.  She prayed, and the Goings prayed with her, that God would help her in her dilemma.  About a year to the day those prayers were answered.  God gifted her with a marriage to a man who was a committed Christian and shared her Lutheran faith.