Paul Nakamura was born in Waialua, a small sugar plantation town on the north shore of the island of Oahu, Hawaii. Nakamura was ordained in Los Angeles in 1955. Originally a Congregationalist, he attended Gustavus Adolphus College and then Augustana Lutheran Seminary, Rock Island, Ill. After ordination he worked with Dr. L.S.G. Miller, former missionary to Japan, among the Japanese community in Los Angeles. In 1975, with the assistance of a layperson, Yoshi Hokama, Nakamura initiated a ministry with Japanese-Americans in the Torrance and Gardena area of Los Angeles. In 1979 Lutheran Oriental Church, Torrance, became the first Japanese-American congregation in the Lutheran Church in America.

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