Conductors

It feels good to be loved. This week has been very busy and hectic, for in the cave, our under-ground apartment complex, we just added another 15 GoTokyo interns (high school age). This is a great addition, for we will be able to minister to more people here in Tokyo! But this also causes changes and additional confusion. We are in the process of training them - taking them to the mission sites, showing the train lines, and helping them figure our the winding streets of Shibuya, all while they are adjusting from being away from home, in a different time zone. Today, I was the only guy on my team, so after we arrived at our mission site in Tachikawa, I let the girls have their “girl time,” while I just walked around and inside the station.

I went to my favorite super market - it is hard to find, stuck in the basement of a building outside the south exit. They have amazing prices on everything, including chips, bread, sodas, and their best item, meat. I had bought my sodas, bread, and snacks from this store, but I could not buy meat, for Tachikawa is 45 minutes away from Shibuya (on a good day). As I saw a wonderful deal on meat, I flagged down a worker in the store, and through english and a spectacular display of charades to see if I could freeze the meat and come back later, he took me to an ice machine and said “free.” I had nothing to put ice in, but he changed that. After speaking to an employee, a nylon green freezer bad was brought out to me. The perfect solution to get my meat home safety. Even though he could not speak a word of English, even though I was (and have been) the only foreigner shopping in the store, he went out of his way to help me. I felt so humbled and loved by this.

My adventure continued to the gourmet food court of Tachikawa station. It is one of the most beautiful culinary sights I have seen in my entire life. Lines of perfectly lit food stands with every kind of Japanese food and more. I ended up at a cheese stand, were 3 employees greeted me and offered me samples they were handing out. As I looked over the selection, I began to name of cheeses I had previously had, and in simple English, tell them of Christmas traditions and my favorite kinds. I even told them I could not buy anything they had, they still talked to me and offered me samples of the different foods they possessed. Even though I was only able to share such a small part of my life with them, they made me feel loved beyond measure. I had a handful of other experiences such as these while I walked around, seeing what other Japanese would make true eye contact with me.

The Japanese, though having a cold and hard exterior, are the most warm and beautiful people once you are able to get inside. They have so much love to give. So much love, I have been blown away and been blesses beyond measure. I was humbled and thankful that God would let me come and serve people such as these.

Today was a reminder from God. Our call as Christians is to love people. Countless verses in the Bible speak of love - They will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another, abide in faith, hope, and love, but the greatest of these is love, love your neighbor as yourself... It is a dominant theme of the Bible. While I am here, in Japan, God has called me to love people. But today, God used unbelievers to love me. And it felt so wonderful to be loved. It truly moved my emotions. Love is powerful. But the love of God is even greater. These people, who loved on me, were only loving in part. For it is only through the love of God that true love can be made whole. This is the love instilled into our very being - the love which will radiate from us, if we are willing.

Being loved today moved my emotions. But being love to the people around us - it moves people’s lives. May we be conductors of His love.

Unglamorous

I remained in my seat, sulking in a sense of disbelief. Was this really happening to me? Today is the day when Amanda, an intern I am serving with, and I will walk onto the Japanese Technological Hosei University campus. Our goal is to enter the campus without being stopped by campus police, for the IMB Missionaries who work here in Japan are always denied access due to their age, and eat lunch at the cafeteria, meeting students and beginning to cultivate relationships.

But today, things were not going my way. I attempted to text two of my contacts whom I had exchanged information with a few days ago, but my Japanese phone kept flashing error reports I could never hope to read. It was raining on the walk over, and both Amanda and I were without umbrellas. Once on campus, we finally bought lunch and went to sit a reasonable distance from two Japanese guys, only to watch them immediately stand up, grab their gear, and leave the area.

In my heart, I was telling God this was not the way it was suppose to happen. I was here to meet people, to be the social butterfly, not to send people away. Discourage would of taken the heart of me, but Amanda, in her wisdom, spoke the message God was trying to so desperately show me.

What if our purpose at Hosei University was different from God’s purpose? I had one goal, to meet people. But God has one purpose for us all- to be the gospel. And being the gospel is not always as glamorous as we want it to be. We could be light at the campus just by being in prayer for the people who attended, and we could pray for God to soften the hearts of those who will one day hear the good news. Even if we are not the ones who receive the harvest. God called us to this place, and our God wants obedience, not results. As Paul writes in 1 Corinthians , What then is Paul? And what then is Apollos? I planted, Apollos watered, but God causes the growth.

We sat there in silence, praying for His work to be accomplished, not our own. As we were taking our trays back to the kitchen, I was stopped by a Japanese guy who wanted to talk. I did not initiate the conversation, I did not even make eye contact with him, he stopped me. And he was not the only one. By the end of the hour, I had five new contacts, all wanting to talk and hangout outside of the University. God provided people for me to begin relationships with as soon as I surrendered my will and began to seek for His. After a few cell phone pictures and many laughs, Amanda and I walked off of the campus, seeing how the not so glamorous work pleases our faithful God.

The Japanese woman who helped me get to Shibuya on my first night has finally contacted me! I will meet her for dinner on Saturday or Sunday night with one of the Journeymen, Sonya. Pray for the meeting to go well! God is faithful!

The Pursuit of Perfection

Its a compliment - really. The fat rich man, a common japanese card game, clearly portrays the culture here. This game is played with 4 or more people, and all the cards in the deck are dealt. The goal of the game is to get rid of all the cards in your hand. At the beginning, the person with the 3 of spades (3's are the lowest card) starts. He will lay down a single 3, or a pair of 3's, or if he has it, three 3's. Then going in clockwise order, the next player must lay down a higher card than the one on the table. So if a single 3 was laid down, the next person would lay down a single 4 or higher, a pair of 3's, a pair of 4's or higher, ect. If you cannot play a card (either you do not have a high enough card or the right number of cards) you say "pass." Once everyone "passes," the person who laid down the highest card then starts the entire process again. It is a game of strategy, between laying down the right cards at the right time. The first person to get rid of all of their cards by this process becomes "The fat rich man." The rest battle it out for second, third, and fourth.

Now here is the catch - The "rich fat man" will take the head of the table, and everyone will sit in order of their position. Then, after the cards are dealt, the rich fat man will take the highest 2 cards of the person in fourth place, giving them their 2 lowest cards, and the second place person will take the third person's highest card, giving them their lowest card.

This is the mentality the Japanese are born into. Those who rise to power stay in power, and those who aren't "good enough" are continually bashed into the ground. This is in all aspects of life - from academics to sports. For these reasons, the japanese students push themselves beyond all reasons. Their entire worth in life is how they can succeed, how much money they can get. But the pursuit of perfection can have drastic ends.

Japan has the highest suicide for any nation in the world. Business men who do not get the job, students who do not make it into a select school, or even those who get trampled in the rush for success all decide there is nothing more to live for. They become jumpers - throwing themselves in front of the fast moving trains. And the saddest part of all is the way the Japanese view this. The loss of a life is not disheartening to them. No, they are now late to work. There is an inconvenience. They are more worried about the stopped train system than the stop of someone's existence.

We come with a message of Hope.

Jesus.

Continue to pray as we make contacts here. I have a new contact thanks to the CBU Music team - Y. He is struggling between choosing Buddhism and Christianity. Pray God will use me to reach him for the glory of Christ.

Cilantro

I finally found meat. Because of the expensive food costs in Japan, we normally have to eat one meal a day from the cave (the place we stay). Because of some really delicious and expensive meals, we may go for a few days packing sandwiches and such. I bought what I thought was ground beef for some hamburgers, but I’m not sure what kind of meat it actually is. Maybe ground pork? None the less, the price was right, 105 yen for 100 grams. But the chicken breasts, well, not sure of that, but it was chicken, cooked nicely.

One of my other food adventures was to find the ingredients for the world famous dish, guacamole. I went to 3 different stores before I found the cheapest and best quality avocados I could find (128 yen), some, not many tomatoes (138 yen), white onions, for there are no onions on the island so it seems (198 yen), and the hardest ingredient to find, cilantro. In previous weeks I had found the garlic powder, the salt, the pepper, but nowhere could I find my precious cilantro.

I was at a speciality food store I had stumbled upon on a different trek, and thought I had seen cilantro there before. But this time, there was none anywhere. After a through search, I began to attempt communication with one of the employees, to no avail. Laugh if you must, but next time you play sharades, I want to see how you act out “cilantro.” But thankfully, there was a local who spoke wonderful English to help me. She translated for me, as we soon found out they only receive one packet of cilantro a day, and even helped me call another store close to my station to see if they would have it. This whole process took over 10 minutes, and after she finished on the phone and had bought a few things, offered to walk with me as far as her path home would take her.

She was a single mother who had a son about my age. She lived in LA for 5 years, but later came back to Tokyo. Once finding out my purpose in Japan, she was very respectful and open to conversing about religion. Shinto is her religion, and she believes because her family before her also believed. The walk was short, and we were not able to get far into the conversation. She was a very polite and nice woman, and I hope I will be able to meet her again to talk about the differences in our religions. I pray that through the adventure for finding a simple food, the Lord will continue to bring more to Himself.

Japan Video Update 1

double click for better viewing

Chronicles of the First

We serve a huge God. A God not built by human hands, a God who loves us, and a God who has sent us out to share His love. Here are the stories from Day 1 of being on our (my teams) part of the field. Acts 3:12 "Men of Israel, why does this surprise you? Why do you stare at us as if by our own power or godliness we had made this man walk?” May God always receive the glory. [and im having an AWESOME and FUN time here!!]

My first real day. Well, as in doing what I will be doing for the rest of the summer. We are all split into our teams of 3 (until the HS inters arrive), and today was Amanda, our student leader, day off. So Melanie and I get to hop the trains from Shibuya to our mission site at Tachikawa. It was a really good trip, even if we caught the slow metro. While in line at Shibuya, I looked behind us, and there was a girl who was looking at a folded piece of paper, and I saw english words on it. Perfect!

I was able to ask her if she was studying English, and thus start the conversation. She was going to school 7 days a week only for English. Even though she has only been learning for 3 months, her comprehension and her ability to understand was astonishing. Melanie was able to give the girl her contact information. We then eventually made it to the right station to meet our missionaries, Julia and Martin. They are an older couple who have lived in the area for 8 months, and they are amazing! We distributed Hope packets, which they could mail in for a free DVD about Christianity (which is very cool movie indeed). We then rode the tram across the town (45 minutes round trip) to pray for the city and the people. On the way back, a young Japanese guy sat by me, and we engaged in conversation. He knew nothing of Christianity, but was so interested. Even to the point where I brought out the books of Luke and Acts in English and Kongi, he excitedly said “Is that the Bible?” I was able to get his information, and left him with a Hope tract that he could fill out to send in for a Hope DVD. I was so happy for what God had done! After an awesome lunch and exploration of the station, we began 5 minute English.

This is where we hold signs which say 5 minute English, written in Kongi and English, so the Japanese can read it. We also put it is free. So we stand there, asking people who walk by if they would like to practice their English. It took awhile, for the Japanese are a shy people, but I had 3 conversations while we were doing it. First girl was flirting with me. Or so Melanie claimed. But she received a Hope track from me, so ha. I win.

The second person I talked to was an older gentlemen, who after reading the sign, asked me for the number of the university so he could become a teacher there. I explained to him how we were not from the university, but how there were 20 of us college kids around Tokyo, who were all Christian, who wanted to make Japanese friends and share our faith (the word religion is more commonly understood there, so I use it more) with the people we meet. He was a religious Buddhist who was going to a cleansing ceremony tonight, but was greatly interested in talking to be about the differences of our faith. I throughly explained to him how we would have a discussion, and not a debate. He gave me his number, and I hope to meet with him on Sunday! Pray for the conversation!

The third person I met was the best. He was a student in America for a year, and loved to practice his English. But as the conversation turned to why I was here, and eventually to Christ, this man was a clean slate. No religion, because he was too busy. Then we began to talk about why we work - to get more money. To buy things that in the end, do not make us happy. To re-cap the entire conversation would be next to impossible. But we spoke of many topics of Christianity, and I was able to give him a Hope tract (I hope to bring him a hard copy of the DVD when I go to meet him) and I gave him the gospel of John in his own language. After I had spoken of Jesus for a while, he said he has seen “The Passion.” Thank you Lord. I told him how the story was real. And he could hardly take it in. I hope to meet with him sometime soon, I have his information, and he will text or call me. Pray for him and the conversations we will have in the future!

Pray for what has already happened, what is happening, and what is to come. From ancient work to predestined appointments, God is amazing.