Hello from Makoto, Danielle, Kenzo, and Kylo!
We have had the honor of living life as full time missionaries since 2019. When we first got married, we moved to Huntington Beach, CA to work with Circuit Riders for two and a half years. Then we moved back to our home state, Colorado, and were the campus leaders of YWAM Denver for three years. During this time we welcomed our beautiful boys Kenzo and Kylo into our family. While serving with YWAM Denver our team led five training schools and four outreaches to Costa Rica, Mexico, and Japan. Now the four of us are entering into a new chapter of missions…moving to Japan to be missionaries in Yokohama!
If you know us, you know we’ve had a heart for Japan since the beginning of our mission's journey. Our first experience with Japan as a married couple was our honeymoon, where we got to explore some of Makoto’s family’s hometown. A couple of years later we felt the nudge towards Japan and it was one of the reasons we transitioned out of Circuit Riders. We wanted to prepare for a move to Japan but did not know when or how that door would open. Then God directed us to work with YWAM Denver, which we joyfully said yes to, but had no idea how Japan would tie into that. While serving there we were able to lead two outreaches to Japan with two of our discipleship training schools. Being able to serve ministries already operating in Japan gave us such a heart for what God was doing there. On our most recent outreach, we partnered with YWAM Yokohama and fell in love with the location and team there. We transitioned out of serving with YWAM Denver in the summer of 2025 and are preparing for an international move to Japan in the spring/summer of 2026.
With your donation, our family will be able to serve the nation of Japan. Less than 1% of the population believes in Jesus, which means it is a major unreached nation. Less than 3% of all missionaries go to unreached people groups, which means that you are also supporting a minority missional family.
We’ve been praying over the years that God would send workers to the fields of Japan and recently we’ve seen so many missionaries grow a heart for Japan. Now it’s our turn! We are so excited that Japan is our next step. We hope our move will inspire others to reach the unreached and will allow us the ability to connect with laborers who have been faithfully plowing there.
If this is your first time donating, thank you for believing in us and what God is doing through us. If you’ve donated before, thank you for making our past, present, and future plans possible!
Makoto, Danielle, Kenzo and Kylo Butler