Love in Morioka

ただいま！ I’m back!

The last few days in Japan was very exciting and crazy, and zapped much of our team’s energy. However, we powered through it with God’s strength and ended on a strong note.

After coming back from Iwaizumi, we were blessed with two days of recuperating and VBS planning. During this time, M’s family friends drove all the way from Tokyo (a day long trip) to visit her and the church. The couple greeted our team like we were old friends and they donated boxes and bags of food to us. I was so touched to receive such kindness from brothers and sisters who didn’t even know us and treated us like family! There was a box of mini buns they donated (it looked like a Japanese version of Chinese buns) and the couple explained that a team of disabled workers made those buns. Those volunteers worked their best on making the buns because they wanted to support missions if even they physically couldn’t go on missions. This gives me so much hope because it really shows that nothing- not disabilities, not finances, not even people- can get in the way of God using a person to be part of missions.

The next night, our team was blessed with the chance to go to the さんさ踊り (sansa odori), a festival that features traditional music and drumming. It’s unique to Morioka and happens every year during the first week of August. M and I were dressed up in yukata’s, the traditional festival wear for women, with the help of the missionary’s wife and the pastor’s wife. The yukata’s were so pretty and I was very grateful that the pastor’s wife lent them to us to be part of the matsuri (festival). Our team went downtown to immerse ourselves in the culture along with crowds of other Japanese people visiting from local towns. The main event was a sort of parade down a main street, where hundreds and hundreds of dancers from different groups danced, played instruments, and sang in celebration. It was amazing to see the talent in Morioka with people of all ages and the pride the Japanese had in the culture.

On Sunday, we heard another sermon from the pastor about the good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37). Jesus brought up this parable when a lawyer asked Him what it took to inherit eternal life. Most of us remember that the man explained what he knew already, which was, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” However, it is easy to skip Jesus’ previous question, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” It’s really interesting that Jesus doesn’t ask what have we read, but whether we’ve read it with the conviction to do what it says and to carry it out in our lives. For me, many things in the Bible becomes head knowledge, like trusting in God, loving my neighbour, and fleeing from temptation. I know all those things, but I often catch myself not believing it or acting it out in my behaviour. The pastor then encouraged us to love our neighbours like the Samaritan man did- with not 10% of ourselves, not 50%, not 90%, but with all 100% of ourselves. We become one with our neighbour so we place all the love we usually have for ourselves on to our neighbour.

What’s really cool is that the first sermon I heard after I returned to Canada was on the same passage! The pastor addresses Jesus’ response to the question, “And who is my neighbour?” However, Jesus doesn’t tell the lawyer who his neighbour is, but explains through the parable how to be a neighbour. What Jesus says is that we shouldn’t be focusing on who we should love, because he already asks us to love everyone- our friends and enemies. He wants us to focus on how to be loving. We continued on this note, where the pastor explained that a loving neighbour puts others first. This seems so simple, but it is the hardest thing for mankind to do. Throughout our whole lives, from baby to old age, we like to put ourselves first. We are most well aware of what we want, and things that deviate from fulfilling these desires frustrate us. But to love our neighbours as ourselves is to throw away selfishness and embrace selflessness. This includes throwing away what we value, such as our reputation, time, energy, strength, and finances.

It is admittedly hard to love others, especially those who don’t love us or who wrong us. But C.S. Lewis puts it best when he talks about loving our neighbours despite their mistakes:

Now that I come to think of it, I remember Christian teachers telling me long ago that I must hate a bad man’s actions, but not hate the bad man: or, as they would say, hate the sin but not the sinner. For a long time I used to think this a silly, straw-splitting distinction: how could you hate what a man did and not hate the man? But years later it occurred to me that there was one man to whom I had been doing this all my life—namely myself. However much I might dislike my own cowardice or conceit or greed, I went on loving myself. There had never been the slightest difficulty about it. In fact the very reason why l hated the things was that I loved the man. Just because I loved myself, I was sorry to find that I was the sort of man who did those things. Consequently, Christianity does not want us to reduce by one atom the hatred we feel for cruelty and treachery. We ought to hate them. Not one word of what we have said about them needs to be unsaid. But it does want us to hate them in the same way in which we hate things in ourselves: being sorry that the man should have done such things, and hoping, if it is anyway possible, that somehow, sometime, somewhere he can be cured and made human again. (Mere Christianity)

My little rant on this amazing passage in the Bible has really extended this post, so I’ll continue the rest of my Japan stories (VBS and post-thoughts) in my next post. I’ll just ask for your prayers for me to be a loving neighbour. It’s always easy for me to find faults in others and ignore my own faults. But pray that I can be aware of what others need and to love on them unconditionally and intentionally. When I say that, I mean loving not because of bubbly feelings or because I will get something in return, but making a choice to love.

ありがとうございます！

Love,

J

Prayers for Iwaizumi

ともだちたち、ひさしぶり！

'Tis the night before VBS! However, we've spent our last week well, preparing for the VBS as well as spending 3 days in Iwaizumi. We teamed up with 3 other girls from Japan and America to help out a local missionary who has been working alone building churches in the Iwate prefecture for 15 years. Iwaizumi is an area near the coast that was damaged by the 2011 tsunami. It is absolutely beautiful there but unfortunately houses people who have lost their homes and families so they have to live in kasetsu (temporary homes).

While we were able to stay at a traditional Japanese home, called akerakan, we witnessed kasetsu communities that families could call a house, but not a home. On our first day in Iwaizumi, we set up a cafe and kids activities so people of all ages could gather to talk or play games or enjoy snacks. The kids loved all the activities we had for them and the old obaachans enjoyed having our artistic team member draw a caricature of them. What stood out to me the most was a girl, probably 8 or 9 years old, looking out for the kids and babies younger than her. She seemed to know if they were sad or needed help and was very willing to take time to make them happy. This really made me wonder if she had to look out for herself or younger sisters in her family as well and I realized that it was quite possible in kasetsu families that parents are too busy or were lost in the tsunami.

The next day, I was blessed with the opportunity to visit two kasetsus, the first having an entirely different atmosphere. Only one ojiisan (grandpa) showed up to the cafe. The kasetsu community was eerily quiet and no one was outside. The kasetsu from the previous day was full of life, where men were chatting and smoking outside, people passed by and greeted one another, and a man was out for a walk with his dog. However, at this kasetsu, it felt like hope was lacking. The ojiisan was very happy to talk to us and shared a bit of his life with us. He said that his home was very small and narrow and that the walls between each house was very thin. This caused people in kasetsus to keep to themselves, because they were afraid of bothering others by talking too much or having the TV on. The missionary shared with us that this group-centered culture of pleasing others may have been why the turnout to cafes was so low. She mentioned that because the room was small, people who may have wanted to attend were afraid they would cause discomfort so they would let others go instead. It saddened my heart that people like the ojiisan had to live so cautiously like this without knowing for how long. The ojiisan said he had been living there for 2 years and expected 2 more years in the kasetsu before the government was supposed to kick them out, but he didn't know what would happen then. People have already been slowly moving out of the kasetsu into permanent homes, but unfortunately that was changing the community feel in the kasetsus and making some families feel left behind.

In contrast, the kasetsu community room we visited in the afternoon was covered in walls of encouragement for Japan's recovery. It was much more joyful there and we had a lot of fun with 3 very cute kids! One boy named Fumia-kun was such a good kid, listening well and being kind, and he was so happy to be with us. At the end, our teammate was pondering which drink he wanted from the vending machine after depositing his money. Fumia-kun quickly yanked the cancel button, saying that our teammate should save his money and watch out because the machine would keep the money and cancel the transaction if it took to long before a drink was chosen. This kind of selflessness is so rarely seen with kids Fumia-kun's age and he was one of our favourites.

The last day was one of the best days for me. We went to a home where mostly old obaachan (grandmas) came out to the cafe. One obaachan asked to sing karaoke and was happy to see us try. She was too shy to  sing on her own at first, but after a while, she abandoned all pride and sang loudly into the microphone even though she couldn't get the words or the rhythm right! We also helped provide a craft for the obaachan's, giving them beads to make a bracelet. I helped out the singing obaachan and she was so funny! She didn't hold back and try hard to be extra polite, like most Japanese people. She pointed out a weirdly shaped bead on the bracelet I had finished for her and said it didn't look right. I asked a teammate to cut it off for me and he did. However, she then pushed the beads around and pointed at the bracelet. She said something like, "There's a hole here! It's alright, you don't have to make the bracelet again... but there's a hole here! ... I'm really sorry, really. Don't need another bracelet... But there's a hole! It looks weird!" I was laughing so hard that I didn't have the heart to tell her that she could just even out the beads so there was no hole. I just made her another one and she was really happy. It made me happy too because she said there was no need to be polite because we were friends. That was the first that someone called me a friend because most people hold back knowing my Japanese is terrible and that I'm mostly smiling and nodding. I loved this obaachan and really hoped that in the future, her openness and transparency would allow her to be open to Christianity one day.

Another woman at the kasetsu came by and showed us all these cultural items that were featured in the upcoming Bon festival in the Tohoku/Iwaizumi area. She taught us about the flutes and cymbals and dances and explained that were used to commemorate ancestors and family members who have died. Originally the dances and music were performed for the gods but they were now more used simply as celebration. However, a teammate commented later that he felt a lot of spiritual warfare when she had come. The missionary explained that the specific kasetsu area was very closed from Christianity and that the women who came to the cafes knew it was a Christian group. She felt as though the woman sharing her culture was not only because she had pride in the things in her community, but because she wanted to bring her Buddhist background into our Christian-run cafe.

Therefore, as this blogpost title is called, Iwaizumi needs your prayers! It takes almost 20 years on average to build a church in this rural area (15 years for urban Japanese cities) and the area is not very open to Christianity. The mission field will also be changing, because kasetsus will be emptying out and new communities will be built. All these changes may dampen the hope of Japanese people who don't want more change and who dislike constantly adapting to new atmospheres. The local missionary may have to change her cafe structure and may lose connections with people who must move away. So please please pray for this area!

Lastly, VBS tomorrow will need your prayers!
- Thank God for a decent turnout of 25-35 kids each day along with 10-15 parents who will stay with them
- Pray that the camp won't only be about fun games, but lessons about God and what God asks us to do
- Pray for the team to be in unity as we may be tired and worn out during the long day
- Pray that the language barrier won't be an obstacle for us non-Japanese speaking
- Pray that connections with the parents and families will be built so the church can grow through this camp

ほんとうに、ありがとう！

Love,
J

Pocari sweat

みんな、こんばんは！

Why Pocari Sweat? Because I've been sweating a lot these past few days! Japan is the land of vending machines and one of the most popular drinks they sell is Pocari Sweat, similar to Gatorade. Although the days get hot and humid, God has really blessed us with a cooler summer than usual.

The past few days in Morioka has been amazing and exciting and has made me so full of joy! Today I really couldn't stop smiling and was the first day I had so much energy all day long. I'll try to share as much as I can of what has happened, but with blogging, I can only say so much.

After a long ride to Japan where we lost a day (about 11 hours of time zone and 12 hours on the plane), we arrived safely and stayed at a local hotel for the night. Although everyone was exhausted by 8pm, we did our best to stay awake to adjust to the time zone. It was really neat to experience a traditional Japanese hotel because they provided all the toiletries and even pajamas! I loved bonding with people during that plane ride and especially got to know the girls my age when we stayed in a room together.

Us girls in Japanese pajamas!

I really admire one girl (R) who has only finished grade 11 because she is such a mature Christian already and obeying God's calling! I don't think God was important in my life at all when I was her age and it made me realized how much I can learn from people who are younger than me. The other girl (M) is a Japanese American who is a little older than me and I look up to her so much! She is only my team to Morioka while R is going to another city and the past few days with M has developed such a great sisterhood between us. I've been able to share my struggles, weaknesses, and excitements with her and she's also been sharing so much of her wisdom. I'm very very blessed to have her on my team, especially as she translates for me whenever I get dumbfounded by a stranger talking to me in Japanese.

Morioka Minami Church has graciously welcomed our team of five (3 guys, M and I) and we've been staying there since Saturday. We were able to meet and connect with the missionary family there as well as the pastor's family. Both families have two kids that are just bundles of energy! Through playing with them, I realized that having weak Japanese doesn't matter with kids. The universal sign of a big bear chasing them around the room is enough for them to squeal with delight and have a lot of fun. This made me more excited about working with kids during the VBS program because I felt so much joy making them happy and didn't feel nervous about the language barrier anymore.

On Sunday, I got to hear a message in Japanese, and that was truly difficult! We studied a passage from 1 Samuel 25 and I had to ask M to translate for me after what the pastor was preaching about. In summary, the passage was describing David's anger towards Nabal, who turned away David's servants when they came to reap some harvest. David was upset because he had treated Nabal's servants well under his care and expected the same from Nabal. He was all ready to kill for revenge, but God sent Abigail, Nabal's wife to stop him. She knew that Nabal was wrong and selfish, but she asked David for mercy and wanted to give him food and goods as atonement. The pastor explained that this passage could apply in our lives where we face enemies while doing God's work. Many times, we may feel that it is our battle and will fight in response with our own abilities, but instead, we should trust God and consult Him first as it is really His battle. Just like in this story, we may feel the right to feel angry and get revenge, but God may ask us to show mercy instead. I learned that I must be willing to give my battles to God, no matter if it involves conflicts with team members, frustrating children, or unwelcoming Japanese people.

Another great thing that caught my attention was the little sermon for the kids. Because the church is small, there is a message for the kids that is about 5 minutes before all the adults hear the sermon. I was really happy to be able to understand a lot of the Japanese and felt like a kid who was amazed by the story of David and Goliath. I guess learning a new language makes me feel young again!

We had more bonding time with the church members during lunch and after, when we headed to go bowling! It was great to laugh and talk with them, as well as get to know their kids. The kids were super silly and decided to wear bowling pin suits. I couldn't stop laughing when they jumped around, knocked each other over, and needed me to pick them up again. In the evening, our pastor took us to a gym where we played indoor soccer with another missions team that was doing a music tour in Japan. Other people who were not part of either missions group but wanted to play soccer joined us. It was awesome seeing how connections were being made by the pastors and local soccer players through something as simple as an intramural game.

Popsicles are the best after sauna
and soaking in hot tubs at the onsen!

Today was very much a planning day and preparation day. We spent much of the morning going over schedules and delegations for VBS as well as our trip to Iwaizumi tomorrow. There is some music that the missionary in Iwaizumi asked us to prepare, so we started practicing after lunch. This quickly turned into a worship jam session and we spent a few hours playing all the worship songs we had on our hearts. It felt like it had been so long since I was able to worship God in English that it was so comforting and easy to just let my heart out. I also loved that bonding time with my team as we were all chipping in with our voices, even though some were shy. After a little bit of shopping at the mall nearby and another daily shower at the onsen (public bath), we debriefed and prayed over melon/watermelon popsicles, and now we're ready for bed!

Here are a few prayer requests I'd like to ask of you:
- our time in Iwaizumi for the next few days, where we will be connecting with older people at cafes and doing a few kids programs
- discomfort for both of my ankles and M's knee after the soccer game
- registration for the VBS as the church reaches out to neighbourhood families

今、ねむいだから、おやすみなさい！

Love,
J

All is well with my soul (and foot!)

Hi everyone back at home!

きのう、LAでトレーニングをして、日本語をたくさん練習しました！準備ができています！

Yesterday was a looooong day of training and preparing in LA, SoCal. We spent our time bonding with our teams, learning about Japan, making a conflict resolution covenant, studying the Bible, and packing away gifts, food, and craft supplies.

In particular, we studied Colossians 3:1-17 to find how God wants us to work together as Christians in a team. The passage contains many commands and asks us to take off our "old self" of sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires, and greed, and to put on a "new self" like clothes of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. These attributes and behaviours are how God wants our teams to interact. Most importantly,

And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. (Colossians 3:14)

Teams that are driven by love are teams that work together best and are able to resolve any conflict. Our teams created our own covenants based on this passage in Colossians and found practical methods to confront conflict. I wish I knew this before my third year in university. The business school this year emphasized heavily on teamwork through 48-hour reports and 24-hour reports. Although I experienced both "successful" and "unsuccessful" team processes, I feel that if I had approached the group work with God's love as a priority, each project would have been successful.

I wanted to share this old hymn with you because of how I felt before leaving home. I didn't feel at peace with God a few days before leaving, mostly because of personal desires that were battling God's desires. Letting go of things I wanted selfishly was one of the hardest decisions I had to make but I knew it would not be good for me! I didn't want to use the Japan trip to help me ignore the issue, because then I would be going to Japan for the wrong reason. So after much prayer, I decided to give up this burden of temptation to God. WOW, did that give me so much joy! I finally felt at peace with God so I could focus on how to serve Him best in Japan. My mom was practicing this hymn on the piano that night and I couldn't help but join in and sing with her because all was truly well with my soul! There was so much peace in my heart when I fell asleep and I had the best sleep ever.

What I learned from this was how important it is to listen to God when He talks to us. It is rare to find that God will talk physically or audibly nowadays, but He uses methods that speak loudest to us. In this case, my troubled conscience and sleeplessness was the Holy Spirit tugging on my heart. He was saying, "Justina! You know there is something wrong and you know what's right! I'm letting you make your own decision and I will love you no matter what choice you make. However, I want you to make the right choice so you can better understand my love and receive my blessings so much more." God is really the perfect parent!

In addition to this victory, I have another reason to be grateful! Some of you may have heard, but the morning before I was to fly to LA, I twisted my foot badly. For some reason,  (much to the inconvenience to my parents), I always wonderfully injure myself before leaving for something important, such as a competition or first year of university. I had to hobble on my foot all day to run errands and even attend a dance class. By the end of the day, it was all swollen, purple, and quite painful. The next day, I rushed around to see a doctor, get an x-ray, and pick up anti-inflammatory pills. God helped me get on the plane on time but when I arrived in my first stop in Toronto, my foot was still causing me to limp. However, after the 5 hour flight to LA, the swelling had gone down by a lot and I didn't have to limp anymore. It is much better now and could only have been a miracle from God!

fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. (Isaiah 41:10)

I realized that praying a lot and trusting God would be in control was all that was needed, and God would take care of the rest. :)

Along with these praise items, please continue to pray for:
- my foot to heal fully and no more injuries
- something unknown that caused my right eye to be puffy last night and unable to wear contacts
- a safe 12 hour flight to Japan today and smooth time zone transition
- our team to continue bonding and growing in God together

ありがとう！

Love,

J

Passion to serve

When we look at the world, it seems to be full of problems. There's political issues overseas, extreme poverty in many countries, bombings in neighbouring nations, and even conflict in our cities and communities. Sometimes watching the news is overwhelming and disheartening and is much easier to simply ignore. However, Jesus calls us to serve Him by addressing these problems. It is not enough to meet physical needs, as secular organizations do through good works. It's more important to give what Christ has given us, which is hope of eternal life and forgiveness of sins. But exactly where and to whom do we start serving?

Our church fellowship just started a series called, Outlive Your Life by Max Lucado. It challenged us to become aware of the physical needs around the world and to think about how we can make a difference. In our discussion, we talked about with whom our passion lies or to whom we felt an urgency to witness to. The advice was to look for the people whose language made the most sense to us. This didn't just mean linguistics, but the type of people we connected to. This would be our area of fluency.

And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. Now there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven. And at this sound the multitude came together, and they were bewildered, because each one was hearing them speak in his own language. And they were amazed and astonished, saying, "are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we hear, each of us in his own native language? ... we hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God." (Acts 2:4-8, 11b)

This passage talks about the apostles gathering as the first church in history and how the Holy Spirit was sent to them so they could proclaim the Good News of Jesus in different languages. Notice that each apostle was fluent enough in another language that foreigners were amazed that they could actually understand the apostles in their own language. This is the fluency that is unique to each of us so we also can witness to a unique type of people. We do not have this fluency on our own, but like the apostles were filled with the Holy Spirit, so we have the Holy Spirit working in us and gifting us too.

What do I really mean by looking for people we connect to? I'll give you a few examples that our fellowship talked about and then share my own.

One person is an occupational therapist and she has been so blessed because her language of fluency lies with the clients she works with. They are people who have suffered from chronic injuries that are suffering both physically and emotionally. Those are the people she has a passion for. Those are the people to whom she feels the burden to share Jesus with.

Another friend has a passion for international students. She never really seeks out these students on her own but for some reason, God sends them to her. She connects with them well because she understands their feelings of being lost or loneliness. She loves to introduce them to a loving community by inviting them to church or fellowship and that has become her fluency.

My sister has a heart for inner-city kids. While studying to become a teacher, she has spent her summers working with missions that cater directly to inner-city kids coming from low-income families. She has found a love for those kids and hopes to teach in schools in their area. She's able to "speak" their language and finds her passion with these people.

As for me, I may still be looking for my language of fluency, but I feel I have a heart for survivors of natural disasters. My first experience was in New Orleans in 2012, where I built houses with Habitat for Humanity. It was 7 years after Hurricane Katrina, yet there was still such lack of development in the hurricane-hit area. I was able to meet a man who lost his home in the hurricane, moved away, but inevitably returned to New Orleans. We were there when he finally gained property of his new backyard and this small thing made him so happy! I realized that although the people there were surprisingly happy (this may have been because it was Mardi Gras week), they could receive so much greater, everlasting joy if they knew God. I want to bring this gift of joy and hope to the Japanese as well, especially as I will be visiting people on the coastline. They will be the people who have lost their homes in the tsunami and are still restricted to living in temporary homes. However, I think I'll only be able to confirm whether or not I have a passion for these people after this missions trip.

With these examples, it is important to note that we all have a different passion. Just because we don't feel equal burdens doesn't mean we don't care about other people who don't speak our language.

For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. (1 Corinthians 12:12)

As God tells us in this verse, we as Christians are different parts of the body of the church and therefore have unique gifts for different ministries. However, together we are one body, so our purpose for ministry should be the same, which is to testify the gospel of the grace of God.

As you think about your passion, it might be hard to really know or define where it is. But as evident in the examples above, no one starts by choosing their passion first and then going out in the world to make it come true. The passion is found after going through experiences and discovering where God wants you to be. So what should you do? Get experience! Find those opportunities, pray, and pursue them! God will help you find your passion and you'll have so much joy serving God! I'll cheer you on! :)

Love,
J

Everlasting God

みんなさん、こんにちは！今日は本当にあついですね！

So I have an exciting announcement today. I've raised over $3,200 from friends and family, getting a surplus over the $3,000 I was responsible for raising! I am soooooooo thankful and blessed for the contributions and I never could have raised so much money without God's help. He is faithful! ありがとうございます！(Arigatougozaimasu!) Those extra funds will be going to the missions trip to help out other participants if they need the money and to continue the work of the Japanese Evangelical Missionary Society.

What is more exciting is the prayer support I've been receiving. I was given the opportunity to speak at my church during our Sunday service and share about the missions trip. After, the congregation prayed together in groups, and the pastor prayed over me at the end. It was a little awkward standing on the stage while those around me were praying, but I closed my eyes and I could hear the whispers and mumbles of prayers. It was then that I thought, "Wow, God, you love me so much that I don't know what to say. You've blessed me with a loving church and such loving brothers and sisters. How great you are!" I really felt the presence of the Holy Spirit in the sanctuary and it filled me up with so much joy.

After that church service, I left a little early to help set up Coffee Corner, where I would be accepting donations and talking to people. However, as I was leaving, an auntie that I had never talked to before stopped me. She told me in her broken English that she was so grateful to hear me share about my trip and she felt my passion when I was talking about Japan. She gave me a donation, saying that it was a small gift, but it came with her love for God and her joy that I was going to Japan. I was so touched and speechless! I couldn't do anything but give her a smile and a hug and say thank you!

This was only one of the moments where God has showed His love through people as I have been raising support. I could keep writing of many other stories but that would take forever. (Talk to me though, and I'll share!)

Oh! One more awesome moment. Last week, I was invited to share again during my church's prayer meeting. It was similar to the sharing at the church service. What was new, however, was at the end, I sat in the middle and everyone there laid their hands on me as one person prayed. I really felt like they were lifting me to God in prayer. In the Bible, there was a man who was paralyzed, so his loyal friends found a way to get him to Jesus by carrying him on his mat to the roof and lowering it. They loved their friend so much and had so much faith in Jesus that they went through all that trouble. In the end, the man was healed by Jesus and walked away celebrating with his friends. (The story is from Mark 2:1-12) That kind of love is what I felt, and it's a feeling you won't know until you experience it!

With all these experiences, all I can do is praise God! Please continue to pray for me, my prayer warriors (prior worriers for the ACF friends)! I will need it during these days of preparation as our full team hasn't met yet on Skype to discuss children's program planning. As well, please pray that I have discipline to continue spending time daily with God so I can go to Japan as spiritually strong as possible. Thank you!

OH MY GOODNESS. I was listening to Everlasting God by Chris Tomlin while writing this and it was background music until I paid attention to the words. This song is actually about my theme verse, Isaiah 40:31. What is this amazingness!?

One last thing. I have a prayer schedule in a Google Doc set up so there will be prayers every day of the missions trip for me, my team, and the Japanese people. If God places this in your heart, could you please type your name on one or more days so I can praise God for you and thank you for your prayers? Thank you!

Sorry for such a long post, but as you can tell, God is too good for a short post!

Love,

J

Are you on fire?

Are you on fire? Or are you lukewarm? I know for myself that I'm terribly lukewarm.

I came across this video while researching on hope and prayers for Japan. I never realized how disgusting I must be to God when I talk about my own lukewarmness to others, ask if they are also lukewarm, but don't do anything about it. I remember when I first had the conviction to do missions. I was talking to a friend who asked me, "Isn't there more to a Christian life than this? More than just going to church, doing the daily devos, going to prayer meetings, going to fellowship? There must be something more!" I slowly thought about it and realized that to be a Christian means that our lives should look completely different if we weren't following Christ. But so many times, I fall into the materialism of the world and try to live my life out like a "normal" person. But I shouldn't be normal! I should have God, the Holy Spirit, actually living inside me guiding my life.

I admit every day is a constant struggle between living life the way I want and the life the way God wants for me. In my selfish mind, I don't see why God should hold on to the control over my life. But, when we think about ourselves, we are little, itty bitty specks on earth in this giant universe. We are nothing compared to God, who is greater and more powerful than all things and created us. Therefore, why shouldn't we trust that God knows the best for us and has greater things planned for us than we can ever imagine on our own? That should be reason enough to live life on fire.

But, what does it mean to live life on fire? I believe this is different for everyone, but when we are on fire, we'll know. It may be small things in life, like boldly starting conversations about God with our friends and colleagues. It could also be handing out sandwiches to the homeless and refusing to ignore the poor when we walk by them. It could mean following God's call to go to seminary and becoming a pastor. It could even mean dropping everything and moving to another country to minister to people who don't know God. The most important aspect to this life on fire is where we no longer can trust in our own skills or knowledge or pension plans or whatever we have to make sure we're in control. Instead, we place ourselves in a vulnerable position where we can't do anything except trust that God will take care of things.

That is my hope for this missions trip. That I will drop everything that allows me to believe in my abilities and turn to God so He can show me His power. I want to be on fire for God!

Love,
J