NAGASAKI, Japan — Early in 1966, missionaries were given a two-week assignment in Nagasaki, Japan, to search for a place to hold group meetings. During their brief stay, they spoke to a man on a bus and gave him a copy of a pamphlet, "Joseph Smith's First Vision."

Photo courtesy Asia North Area

The new Nagasaki Branch meetinghouse is nestled in a hillside neighborhood.

The young man, who taught flower arranging, changed his schedule for the day so he could show the elders around Nagasaki.

From that first contact, Hatsuhiro Ohira became, it is believed, the first convert to the Church in Nagasaki. Since then he has seen gospel growth in his own life and witnessed the growth of the Church in his home city.

The growth reached a pinnacle in Brother Ohira's mind with the construction by the Church of a meetinghouse for the Nagasaki Branch. Dedicated last January, the building "we do desire, will greatly help expand the Lord's work in Nagasaki," Brother Ohira said.

From the late 1960s, he has been a stalwart in the work. Included in his Church service are large photos of him arranging flowers displayed in the Mormon Pavilion at Expo '70 in Osaka, Japan, and he created flower arrangements for the open house of the Fukuoka Japan Temple in 2000.

The history of Christianity in Nagasaki is long and rich, according to Brother Ohira. It is believed that Christians have for centuries lived, been persecuted and martyred in the port city on the southern tip of the Japanese island of Kyushu. Even during times of Japanese isolation, Nagasaki, which itself is somewhat isolated from the rest of Japan, remained open to outside trade and influence.

Beginning in the mid-19th century, Japan started reopening it doors. "A few ports, including Nagasaki, became import centers where foreigners were permitted to reside," Brother Ohira said.

With the building of the Oura Cathedral in 1863, many Christians who had been hiding their faith came forward. Roman Catholicism is stronger in Nagasaki than anywhere else in Japan, he said, with about 30 Catholic churches throughout the city.

Elder L. Tom Perry, now of the Quorum of the Twelve, may have been the first member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to set foot in Nagasaki, Brother Ohira said. Elder Perry was with the U.S. occupation forces that entered Nagasaki, a land that had been reduced to ashes by the atomic bomb, at the close of World War II.

Photo courtesy Asia North Area

Hatsuhiro Ohira and his wife, Kiyoko, are among the longtime branch members who have rejoiced over the building of their meetinghouse.

But it was those missionaries sent in 1966 on a temporary assignment to Nagasaki by mission President Adney Y. Komatsu, now an emeritus member of the First Quorum of the Seventy, who made the difference in Brother Ohira's life.

The young man was trying to find the purpose of life, but without much satisfaction. However, he did find many answers to his questions in the pamphlet about Joseph Smith that the missionaries gave him.

Although overjoyed with the knowledge that "a church does exist which God leads through living prophets," there was nothing he could do about it because "that church did not exist in Nagasaki."

A short time later, he received a letter from Elder George M. McCune, one of the missionaries he met on the bus. They exchanged letters from then on, including one in November 1966, in which Elder McCune wrote that missionaries had been assigned permanently to Nagasaki.

When Brother Ohira saw the missionaries, he ran up to them asking, "Aren't you Elder Hill and Elder Fillmore?"

Surprised that not only did someone call after them, but that the person also knew their names, the elders asked, "How do you know us?" Brother Ohira told them about his letter and they told him they also had a referral to visit him.

A meeting was held that evening where the missionaries were staying. In December, a Sunday School was held, attended by the missionaries; Brother Ohira, a convert from Tokyo who lived three hours away by bus; and three investigators.

Brother Ohira was baptized in a public bath on Jan. 4, 1967. Throughout the following year there were more baptisms and a family of six Church members moved to Nagasaki. In February 1968, an independent branch was formed.

Members of the branch immediately began hoping for a permanent meetinghouse, but land in the mountainous city was expensive. Two floors of an apartment complex were purchased by the Church in 1982, but rules prohibited placing of a sign on the building and many people coming to Church for the first time couldn't find it. The branch members, including Brother Ohira and his wife, Kiyoko, wondered if they would ever have a regular meetinghouse.

President James A. McArthur began service over the Japan Fukuoka Mission in 1997 and, as a former missionary in the nation and later companion to Elder McCune, he felt a strong connection to Nagasaki and began working to provide the branch with a new meetinghouse.

Branch attendance had at one time been good enough to qualify for a building but then dropped off. Brother Ohira said the members were worried low attendance would prevent the branch from qualifying to see its dream fulfilled. A critical attendance-reporting date fell on the New Year's holiday and some members would be traveling to other places at that time. But the branch members did all they could to build attendance and then left the matter in the hands of the Lord. When the Sabbath day arrived, God performed a miracle, Brother Ohira said. Less-active members, friends and acquaintances invited by branch members boosted attendance to the exact number required.

Nearly 35 years had passed since the first missionaries arrived in Nagasaki when the day came that President Mark A. Gottfredson of the Japan Fukuoka Mission dedicated the building on Jan. 6, 2002, bringing great joy to branch members.

When Brother Ohira traveled to Fukuoka in the spring of 2000 to help prepare for the open house, he created 10 elaborate floral arrangements in five hours. That surprised others working on preparation for the open house because it would be expected to take as much as three days to do that work. But for the pioneer convert from Nagasaki, remarkable work in helping build up the Church had long been a way of life.