The Japan branch had moved from Tokyo to large new facilities in Numazu in 1972. There was further major expansion in 1975. By 1978 another property had been obtained, at Ebina; and work on a factory more than three times as large as that at Numazu quickly got started. This was completed in 1982. It was still not enough; more buildings were added by 1989. Would it not have been possible to build just once and make it large enough? No. The number of Kingdom proclaimers in Japan had doubled again and again in a way that no human could have anticipated. From 14,199 in 1972, their ranks had soared to 137,941 in 1989, and a large proportion of them were devoting full time to the ministry.

As long as people are imperfect, there will be problems, but those who work on these projects try to resolve these on the basis of Bible principles. They know that doing things in a Christian manner is more important than efficiency. As a reminder, at the construction site in Ebina, Japan, there were large signs with pictures of workers in hard hats, and on each of the hard hats was inscribed in Japanese characters one of the fruits of God’s spirit: love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faith, mildness, self-control. (Gal. 5:22, 23)