SEND’s Japan team offers two discipleship-focused internships: D House Tokyo and D House Obanazawa. Both D House programs offer English speakers the chance to explore God’s call while practically ministering in Japan.

The D House programs in Japan:

• Guide interns through the complexities of daily life in another culture — shopping, making meals, communicating, moving around the city.
• Help interns understand and evaluate Japanese culture — a skill essential for contextualizing the gospel, making disciples and starting reproducing churches. Exploration of Japanese culture will include observation, reading and interviews.
• Give interns opportunities to put their cultural knowledge into practice as they partner with other missionaries or local believers to reach out to unsaved people in Japan. As ministries are chosen, consideration will be given to an intern’s desires, gifts and abilities, as well as to any academic requirements. 

Being healthy — not just physically, but emotionally, mentally, socially and spiritually — is foundational to successful missionary work. D House helps interns develop and practice habits and activities, some individual and some corporate, that lead toward overall good health in the Japanese context. (Scroll down to find out how God used D House in the life of its very first intern.) 

D House Obanazawa

• Welcomes applicants ages 20 and older.
• Offers 8-week sessions, usually starting in February and October (please check the specific dates for each session).
• Emphasizes general evangelism and church planting.
• Interns will spend a week in Tokyo, observing SEND’s ministries there, and also will have the chance to meet the missionary families working in the region surrounding Obanazawa.
• Learn more: www.send.org/opportunities/d-house-ministry-japan

D House Tokyo

• Welcomes applicants, including married couples without children, who are in college or seminary or who are post-college/seminary.
• Offers ministry terms of three months, usually starting in January, May, and September (please check the specific dates for each session). 
• Is for those who want to be discipled as they disciple. Interns will be discipled by a missionary with years of ministry experience. Interns also will work with churches with junior high and high school students, and with HiBA, a ministry to high schoolers. Camp ministry will take place during the summer months.
• Learn more: https://www.send.org/opportunities/d-house-internship-tokyo-japan-youth-ministry 

To explore further, please fill out this short form, and a missions coach will contact you. 

D House testimony: ‘An amazing opportunity’ to explore your calling

Blake was the inaugural participant at D House Obanazawa (in the original location near Tohoku), serving under the discipleship of John and Susan Edwards. 

“I was the first D House intern. The experience was absolutely crucial in confirming and shaping my calling to Japan, and has given me the fuel to keep moving forward on my journey. John and Susan are incredibly down to earth, easy to relate to, candid, caring and a perfect fit for this ministry that deals with such a wide range of personalities. I think they will always be like a family-away-from-family to me. The length of the internship, 90 days, gives just enough time to get past the honeymoon phase, and together with John and Susan’s guidance, gives a good sense of the true daily life one will experience in Japan.

“Another thing I really appreciated about my D House experience was the diverse range people, places, and ministries I was introduced to. I got a broad sense of things—not just John’s ministry, not just SEND’s ministry—of what God is doing through all kinds of people, all throughout Japan. Another positive was, while they would love for you to join SEND, you never feel obligated or pressured to do so. You really feel their desire to allow God's will for your life to be revealed to you, even if that is outside of SEND.

“If you feel like perhaps you might have a calling to Japan, Taiwan, or Thailand, or to work with Muslims, D House is an amazing opportunity. Our calling does not simply fall into our lap, we have a responsibility to respond, to explore, and to prepare. A moving car can be steered easier than one that's sitting in park; I think experiences like this are what He uses to bring us to our destination. God will keep some doors open, others he will close, and still others will be revealed—but first we have to approach them.”

To explore your calling like Blake did, fill out this short form (it only takes three minutes) to connect with a missions coach. 

Click here to learn about SEND's other internships.