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Within some six years, however, Sergius had to contend with a different and difficult world. With the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the subsequent takeover by the Bolsheviks, funding for the Japanese mission was cut off. Although this meant that the archbishop had to cut the activities of the mission severely, it nonetheless survived.
On [[September 1]], 1923, Tokyo was hit by the Great Kanto Earthquake. The earthquake caused serious damage to the [[Holy Resurrection Cathedral (Tokyo, Japan)|Holy Resurrection Cathedral]] (Nikolai-do) at the mission's headquarters in Surugadai Kanda in Tokyo. The main bell tower collapsed onto the central dome severely damaging the building and the subsequent fires burned much what was left of the interior. Thus, Sergius had inherited adversity greater than would be expected. Rebuilding Nicolai-do became central for Sergius and in this he did not give up. He toured throughout Japan asking for donations. He asked a young musician, [[Victor Pokrovsky|Victor A. Pokrovsky]], a refugee of the defeated White Army, to develop and lead the cathedral choir which toured Japan to raise money for the re-construction of the cathedral. Through these extraordinary efforts Nikolai-do was re-built and re-consecrated in just a little over six years. The re-consecration was held on [[December 15]], 1929 with 5,000 guests present including Abp [[Nestor (Anisimov) of HarbinKamchatka]] from Harbin. Then, in 1931, Sergius was elevated to ''Metropolitan of All Japan'' by the [[Holy Synod]] in Moscow.
[[Image:MetSergiusJapanGrave.jpg|thumb|left|200pxl|Grave of Metr. Sergius in the Yanaka Cemetery, Tokyo, Japan]]