When Ps David Gabriel Lim and his wife Ariel Tay, both 47, started their ministry in Okinawa, they discovered that the need was greater than they had imagined.

Many churches were ageing. Young adults were leaving. Pastors were carrying enormous responsibilities with few people to help them.

Yet amid these challenges, the couple also began seeing signs of hope and the first fruits of the vision God had planted in their hearts a decade earlier.

(Read Part 1 to see how God gave the Lims a burden to launch their own mission agency, which was incorporated in October 2025.)

Sowing into the next generation

Rather than planting churches, the Singaporean couple sensed that God was calling them to come alongside existing congregations, strengthening the local Church through discipleship.

Today, Alive Generations seeks to equip the next generation of leaders in Okinawa so that churches will proclaim Christ in Japan and participate in God’s wider mission to reach the nations. 

Since moving to Okinawa last year, Ps David has been stepping up engagement with local Pastors, visiting congregations to conduct surveys to understand the spiritual needs and realities on the ground.

Due to relationships that he had already established while serving in the Asia Pacific Baptist Federation (APBF), Ps David felt prompted to reach out to local Baptist churches first.

Ps David was formerly an Associate Pastor at New Life Baptist Church (NLBC) and the Vice-President of Asia Pacific Baptist Youth, the youth arm of APBF. 

Ps David on a visit to Yokatsu Baptist Church last year.

“Our ‘Jerusalem’ are the Baptist churches, but we will eventually move beyond that because Alive Generations is an interdenominational ministry,” he clarified, alluding to how Jesus exhorted His disciples to be witnesses in Jerusalem, then Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8).

Among the more than 30 Baptist churches in Okinawa, Ps David has visited 15 so far. He and Ariel have also been learning Japanese faithfully, spending multiple hours a week in classes so that they can become fluent in the language.

“Not knowing the language makes it quite challenging when you meet people that you want to share Christ with,” he noted. “It really is a doorway to dialoguing with people and daily living.”

Inspired by bi-vocational missionaries they have come across, the couple have embraced a similar ministry model in this season, with Ariel shuttling between Singapore and Okinawa while continuing her work as a financial advisor.

While David focuses on church partnerships and leadership development, Ariel serves in the marketplace, viewing her profession as both a calling and a platform for disciple-making. Her work has enabled the couple to personally invest resources into Alive Generations too.

Currently mentoring the next generation within her marketplace ministry, Ariel is passionate about helping believers discover that their workplace can be a place of worship and witness.

Due to her experience in financial services, Ariel has also been invited to share with young adults in Okinawa on biblical stewardship, and the integration of faith and work, among other topics.

When they are not in the same country, the couple do regular morning calls so that they can continue to update one another.

Over the last nine months, Ariel has travelled to Okinawa four times, staying up to a few weeks at a time.

For the time that they are apart, the couple also try to keep in close contact, making it a point to video-call every day. They have no children.

“I joke with others that we are the ‘red flag missionaries’,” said Ps David with a laugh.

“We go without a mission agency, we start out on our own and the wife is not with the husband — all the red flags that we usually watch out for as mission Pastors or mission agencies.”

Seeing first fruits

Despite their unconventional model of ministry, Ps David and Ariel have seen their efforts paying off.

“Our initial thought was that we would take around two years to develop Alive Generations as an agency and take time to study the language and churches here, but the Lord in His wisdom has moved us to expedite some of these areas,” shared Ps David.

“When we saw the needs of the Church, it’s almost like when the Lord Jesus saw the needs of the sheep (Matthew 9:36). Not that the sheep here are without shepherds — but Jesus had compassion for the sheep; He saw the need for the sheep to be discipled.”

Ariel (right) speaking at the Okinawa Baptist Convention’s youth camp last year, where she shared on work and destiny.

Having met young adults who were on the verge of leaving their churches, the couple are also filled with a sense of urgency.

“Many of the Pastors are already in their 70s and 80s, so sometimes there is that generation gap between them and the younger generation,” said Ps David.

“Intentional succession and discipleship are major issues in most churches here.”

Feeling the burden, Alive Generations has already begun rolling out some discipleship modules piecemeal. However, the long-term goal is still to help churches in Okinawa develop a holistic roadmap so that their members will grow from disciples to disciple-makers.

Taking a leaf from Pastor Rick Warren’s five purposes for the Church — worship, fellowship, discipleship, mission and evangelism — Ps David is crafting discipleship modules contextualised for local Christians.

Thanks to the support of NLBC’s Senior Pastor, Rev Dr Philip Huan, co-founder of ChurchLife Resources, Ps David is also collaborating with the consultancy on training modules that would be suitable for Okinawa.

“He uses us even in our weaknesses”

Less than a year in, Ps David is grateful for the breakthroughs they have had.

Sharing that their concept of a discipleship journey has been well received by the local Pastors they have spoken to, Ps David said the next step is to develop and implement modules in a way that does not further stretch each church’s tight resources.

“We’ve been visiting churches to share about our ministry, and we have a bilingual project staff member that comes with us who helps to translate.”

Language challenges aside, they have also been able to win over the locals by overcoming any initial mistrust.

“Most of the missionaries they’ve met are usually Caucasians, so they’re still getting to know what to expect from Asian missionaries,” explained Ps David.

“They are also very concerned that if we’re going to plant a church, we will draw away their youths. So this is why our model of not doing church planting helps to assure them.”

“What God has done is really amazing. Whatever broken Japanese that we have used seems to allow them to glimpse our heart for them.

“While we cannot speak Japanese well, the churches could sense our genuine love, just by the time we have spent with them.”

Ps David and Ariel with Elon318 Community Church, their home church in Okinawa.

Ps David describes Okinawa as “Japan Light”. “‘Light’ as in not that things are easier, but rather that they’re differences in culture. If you want to know what Japan is like but not be overwhelmed by the Japanese culture, Okinawa kind of sits in between. 

“The people are cautious, much like in mainland Japan. But when they warm up to you, they really, really warm up. That’s a little bit different from the other mainland Japanese that we’ve encountered, where sometimes it really takes a long time to have that breakthrough.”

So far, Oroku Baptist Church has engaged Alive Generations to conduct worship training, and the church will likely be the location of their first Youth Hub, a place where youths from different churches can gather for regular discipleship.

The church that Ps David and Ariel are worshipping at, Elon318 Community Church, has also been the test subject for Alive Generations’ evangelism module, which draws ideas from Dave and Jon Ferguson’s book B.L.E.S.S.: 5 Everyday Ways to Love Your Neighbor and Change the World.

Next February, Alive Generations will also conduct a four-session leadership workshop at the Okinawa Baptist Convention.

This year, Ps David invited his Japanese language teacher (second from right) to church with her two sons, along with Ariel’s language teacher (far right).

Although it is still early days, Ps David is encouraged by how God has helped them make inroads into this new mission field.

“If there’s something that I’ve learnt, it’s that He uses us even in our weaknesses. Even in our weakness, God’s power is really made perfect,” he said.

For example, despite Ps David’s limited Japanese proficiency, his language teacher became so curious about his faith that she visited his church, bringing along her children and friends.

“She’s not a Christian, but when she talks to me and we practise the language, I would use what I do as a missionary to form my sentences. So bit by bit, I’ve shared with her about my life.

“These are moments in which God is just reminding me that I might be struggling with the language, but the language of the Gospel transcends everything.”

The vision: Japan as a sending nation

In the same way, Ps David hopes that though the churches in Okinawa may face challenges, they will see themselves as a small mustard seed placed in the hands of a big God.

“We hope that the churches don’t see themselves as too small to the point that they don’t do missions and evangelism. I still believe that there is a place, a calling and a destiny for them to advance God’s kingdom,” he said.

Case in point: The church with three elderly members went on a mission trip last year for the first time. Having met another small church in Thailand that has problems of its own, they returned inspired to keep pressing on.

“We hope that Okinawans can go into inland Japan because they already understand the culture and have mastered the language. They will do way better preaching and teaching than some of us who are missionaries.”

Ps David with his project partner Maki Matsumoto who has been helping with translation work for Alive Generations.

Sharing how they hope to be in Japan for the next 20 years, the couple believe that the discipleship work they are doing today can help raise the country’s next generation of leaders, Pastors and missionaries.

Alive Generations is also open to collaborating with other mission agencies that share the same heart to nurture the next generation of leaders to continue the work of the Gospel in Okinawa and beyond.

Trusting that God is working in the background even when they do not always see it, Ps David takes comfort in Romans 8:28, “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”

The verse has become a fitting reminder of the journey that brought the couple from Singapore to Okinawa, one marked by a season of waiting and unexpected confirmations.

Today, as they walk alongside churches in Okinawa, Ps David and Ariel are also believing that God can once again breathe life into congregations that are struggling.

After all, strengthening Okinawa’s churches has never been the end goal.

The burden that God placed on their hearts 10 years ago was not simply to help churches survive, but also see them thrive and, in time, become a blessing to others.

It has always been about helping the local Church come alive, so that Japan will not only receive missionaries, but also send them.

“We have a sense of urgency, but we’re not in a rush,” Ps David told Salt&Light.

“That’s something I have to learn – to not be in a rush. Restedness is to rest from work, and to work from a position of rest.”

READ MORE:

“If the church is dead, where would the youths go?”: Why this Singapore couple obeyed God’s call to Okinawa

Why Christians should be going to Japan, and not just for sushi

Land of the Rising Son: Singapore churches are catching the vision of God’s kairos time Japan

“What step will you take to see God’s Kingdom advance in Japan?”: Ps Jeremy Seaward