Missionaries to Japan
 

Name:    Gil and Norene Zinke
              50-100 Shimo Yasumatsu
              Saitama-Ken 359-0024
              JAPAN

Agency:  Baptist General Conference

Country: Japan

Fast Facts & Relationship to SVBC

Birthday: Gil (July 9), Norene (August 24)

Anniversary: June 23

Family:    Daniel (June 30), T.J. (November 26)

Relationship to SVBC:  Special support missionaries since 1990.

Primary Ministry Focus:  Evangelism and Church Planting.  Gil is the pastor of Minami Urawa Baptist Church in Saitama City, a suburb northwest of Tokyo.  Norene teaches a Bible class for Christians and English Class for seekers.

Ministry Experience:  Gil was the son of Baptist missionaries in Japan.  He graduated from Wheaton College in 1979.  In 1980 Gil went back to Japan for two years on intensive study at International Christian University.  He served as interim pastor at Tsuga Church.  In 1983 he returned to the USA to attend Trinity Seminary.  He met Norene at Trinity and they were married in 1984.  Gil served for one year as pastor of the Winnetka Japanese Christian Church. They came to Japan in 1990.

Norene graduated from University of Wisconsin in 1970 and began a teaching career.   Seven years later she began working at Trinity College and then at Trinity Seminary.  In preparation to teach English in Japan, she began taking a course in Teaching English as a Second Language and a conversational Japanese class.  She met Gil as a tutor in Japanese.

General Prayer Requests:

Pray the church will accept its new direction in ministry toward a cell church model.

Pray for the health of Gil, Norene and their son Dann.  Norene has been suffering from fibromyalgia and Dann was diagnosed in the fall  of 2006 with Type 1 diabetes.

Pray that God will supply short term helpers in their English evangelism program.