It's Saturday and the world is moving at least a little more slowly than it has been. I am very ready for Monday! It is going to be a hard core sabbath. ;-)
Today began with prayer in Iidabashi. I came to the conclusion while praying about our prayer group that I had done a lot of leading structures, but not a lot of leading people and really not a lot of listening to God. So, starting today, we stopped our list making. We usually all bring in a prayer request and pray through the list. It's a good time, but something has been missing. Today we told God we were sorry for not asking him about our purpose sooner and then spent some time laying the group down and waiting on him. I enjoyed it greatly. Unfortunately, most of the time was only two of us. This gave us a good chance to get through some personal things, but we don't have new direction yet. Though it seems like the theme from both of our reactions is that more time listening for God is a good thing. So, next week will be more waiting on God. We'll see how he shapes our vision!
The afternoon was spent lazily with a friend. Lovely! We had lunch and then wandered back and sat on the couch and watched a movie on her ipod (yes, we are in the 21st century). Except that her meeting started when there were only 18 minutes left in the movie!!! Sigh for cliffhangers.
I enjoyed a free afternoon and evening completely scrubbing out my shower and bathtub. I continue to be amazed how, when the majority of my work involves teaching, listening, praying, thinking, and other mind and people sorts of things, work scrubbing a bathtub is potentially the best way to rest ever. I wish I could actually take this lesson to heart! As it is, I am still caught off guard and surprised every time a bout of cleaning leaves me feeling relaxed and ready to face the world again.
Saturday, May 31, 2008
Friday, May 30, 2008
Friday, May 30th
Since I was out in Suginami this morning, I had the rather nostalgic experience of being packed on a rush hour train this morning on the way into Tokyo. Nothing like standing so close to people that your feet are about three inches to the right of your center of gravity while you're holding a backpack in front of you with four people pressed in on every side. But it wasn't packed quite tight enough...the danger of falling over was real. ;-)
Friday mornings are a nice break from the norm...a Bible study of Isaiah with a couple friends and then Japanese class. Japanese class today was pretty difficult...our sensei has finally understood that, when she reviews concepts with us, she will find out how much we didn't manage to memorize the first time. I walked back home from Japanese class too tired to even get lunch and just read and napped for awhile.
Tomorrow is Etsuko's birthday, so I bought two special small cakes and brought them with me. We had a nice time talking over tea and cake. I've gradually come to understand that Etsuko is pretty much my adopted Japanese mother, and I am pretty much her adopted American daughter. We take care of each other.
Tonight for Christianity Today we were supposed to talk about David dancing and worshiping in front of the ark of the covenant, but we never actually managed to crack the Bible because we never got past the opening question of "What do you think worship is?" I let them talk for maybe 20 minutes in small groups because it was just too good. In the back of the room, a near retirement age Christian woman who seems to emit peace into any situation was carefully explaining the rituals of a worship service to a non-Christian woman, who was listening with a kind of fixed attentiveness that I don't usually see in her. To my left, an older Catholic doctor and a college aged girl were comparing their feelings of something beyond themselves in nature. To my right a Christian woman from Germany and two non-Christians (both so close to the line that when the Holy Spirit so much as hiccups they're going to go toppling into Christianity) were talking about the necessity for praising God for keeping our eyes fixed on Him in our daily lives. One of these "non-Christians" said, "The best way to praise God is to pray...but I don't pray very often." I praise God often for the students who bring raw honesty into my class. This same "non-Christian" said later on, "The best way to praise God must be by loving other people."
Every last Friday of the month our Coffee Hour topic is a Bible topic. This week we were talking about forgiveness. I was astounded once again at our students willingness to share very openly. Two things from the evening were particularly striking.
Our older Catholic doctor shared a story about forgiving his teenage son. He said that his son had been very upset after school one day and had gone into a room and broken something. He had been ready to be very angry with his son, but his wife pulled him aside and explained that the son was going through some really tough times at school. What really struck me was that the man decided to apologize, but he said, "I thought a father shouldn't have to do such a thing to his son [as apologize] because he should be respected by [his son]." Then he described how the apology really shocked his son, and it was the beginning of a new relationship between them that they had never had before. He said it was the first time that he really understood God's forgiveness of us as well.
I was also really struck by two of my "on the line pre-Christians" who are the pair I've mentioned before that I am trying to pray for daily. Both of them shared very independent stories, but both said the same thing. "Being forgiven means there is meaning to my existence." A gallop poll of Japanese teens found that 85% wonder why they exist...contrast that to the same poll done in America, where the number was 22%. I was fascinated by this link between being forgiven and purpose.
Friday mornings are a nice break from the norm...a Bible study of Isaiah with a couple friends and then Japanese class. Japanese class today was pretty difficult...our sensei has finally understood that, when she reviews concepts with us, she will find out how much we didn't manage to memorize the first time. I walked back home from Japanese class too tired to even get lunch and just read and napped for awhile.
Tomorrow is Etsuko's birthday, so I bought two special small cakes and brought them with me. We had a nice time talking over tea and cake. I've gradually come to understand that Etsuko is pretty much my adopted Japanese mother, and I am pretty much her adopted American daughter. We take care of each other.
Tonight for Christianity Today we were supposed to talk about David dancing and worshiping in front of the ark of the covenant, but we never actually managed to crack the Bible because we never got past the opening question of "What do you think worship is?" I let them talk for maybe 20 minutes in small groups because it was just too good. In the back of the room, a near retirement age Christian woman who seems to emit peace into any situation was carefully explaining the rituals of a worship service to a non-Christian woman, who was listening with a kind of fixed attentiveness that I don't usually see in her. To my left, an older Catholic doctor and a college aged girl were comparing their feelings of something beyond themselves in nature. To my right a Christian woman from Germany and two non-Christians (both so close to the line that when the Holy Spirit so much as hiccups they're going to go toppling into Christianity) were talking about the necessity for praising God for keeping our eyes fixed on Him in our daily lives. One of these "non-Christians" said, "The best way to praise God is to pray...but I don't pray very often." I praise God often for the students who bring raw honesty into my class. This same "non-Christian" said later on, "The best way to praise God must be by loving other people."
Every last Friday of the month our Coffee Hour topic is a Bible topic. This week we were talking about forgiveness. I was astounded once again at our students willingness to share very openly. Two things from the evening were particularly striking.
Our older Catholic doctor shared a story about forgiving his teenage son. He said that his son had been very upset after school one day and had gone into a room and broken something. He had been ready to be very angry with his son, but his wife pulled him aside and explained that the son was going through some really tough times at school. What really struck me was that the man decided to apologize, but he said, "I thought a father shouldn't have to do such a thing to his son [as apologize] because he should be respected by [his son]." Then he described how the apology really shocked his son, and it was the beginning of a new relationship between them that they had never had before. He said it was the first time that he really understood God's forgiveness of us as well.
I was also really struck by two of my "on the line pre-Christians" who are the pair I've mentioned before that I am trying to pray for daily. Both of them shared very independent stories, but both said the same thing. "Being forgiven means there is meaning to my existence." A gallop poll of Japanese teens found that 85% wonder why they exist...contrast that to the same poll done in America, where the number was 22%. I was fascinated by this link between being forgiven and purpose.
Thursday, May 29th
Thursday morning is another class made up of older women, and, for whatever reason, also one college aged student. The college aged student in this class is a Korean grad school student who knows one of the top producers / director of Spiderman, a professional baseball player, and several important business executives. At one point, he was on track to become a CEO himself, but decided the dog eat dog world was not one he wanted to be in. So, now he is back in college. The ladies find him fascinating.
My Thursday morning class is the hardest class for me to connect to. They tend to talk about the kinds of topics that I usually don't discuss. I have no idea how to have a meaningful conversation about shopping, Tokyo sight-seeing, or the latest ladies' social event. They have no idea how to have a discussion about religion, justice issues, what-if scenarios, or a series of other things that are on my "I can participate in a discussion about this" list. The surest sign that the class has begun moving into an area that I actually feel comfortable leading is that one or more of the students will begin mumbling "I want to escape", "Why are we discussing such things?", or "We shouldn't really be talking about this." And they even mumble in English, so I know it's for my ears.
Today, however, we happened to stumble on a topic of mutual "interest" (for lack of a better word). One of my students has a sixth grade daughter who recently became sick. She stopped eating and was throwing up the whole weekend. Her mom took her to the doctor, who said that it was psychological, not physical. When the mom questioned her daughter, she learned that she was feeling stressed about her social group at school, and was tired of worrying about whether people were getting along and the like. The stress from this (probably also combined with regular school, cram school, and upcoming entrance exams for middle school) have landed her daughter at home every other day this week. She sleeps almost the whole day and doesn't eat.
As we talked about it in class, many of the other women (moms past and present) assured her that it was normal. That girls that age tend to have troubles like that. They urged her to take good care of herself because she needed to give a lot of love to her daughter right now. I scribbled out a prayer for her and her daughter while Aaron was leading Bible study and gave it to her. It felt good to be included even in a small way in her worries.
I had an hour to kill after class and I sat catching up with emails and blogs and the like. While I was sitting there, two women came in to have lunch. I know I had seen one of them before, but I can't remember where...she might be a church member, but she's not at Hongo so often. They asked me if I had eaten lunch, and I said I was meeting a friend for lunch in 45 minutes. Then they proceeded to give me two inarizushi (rice wrapped in...how to describe it...sweetened and vinagered tofu that has been cooked in some way), asked me how it was, and when I gave the standard "it's delicious" proceeded to give me another one. And then offer me tea thirty minutes later. Then, when I tried to leave to go have lunch with my friend, the lady who I don't know asked if I would please come out to her house sometime, even though it's about an hour away, and asked me to let her know when I have time. I am always a little confused by these kinds of interactions...are they trying to be nice to me or thank me or are they actually trying to get to know me?
I feel pressure in these kinds of situations...whether I have figured the cultural ideas surrounding them yet, I don't know, but my inner interpretation of them is as follows: the people are offering me food and invitations because it is polite to do so, but as we have never had a successful time interacting, it would be extremely awkward for me to actually take them up on the offer. However, giving is important to Japanese people, and so it seems like the polite thing to do would be to take them up on it. Which would land us in a situation where she was having me over only to be polite, and I was coming over only to be polite, and so the entire thing would be 100% for politeness' sake. I think that might make sense to them, but it doesn't to me. At any rate...Thursday's tend to be culture shock days. You'd think culture shock might end after one had been in a country for a year and a half...and maybe the "shock" aspect does end...it's the cultural confusion that is left lingering.
My second lunch was with Ken (Kentaro), a new Christian who has been attending Hongo for 9 months or so. He is overflowing with ideas, and has really picked up on the idea of having some fellowship activities to connect our young students with young Christians and our young missionary community. We're planning a hike on Takao mountain soon. He's made a flier, and a schedule, and was asking about doing songs or a Bible study. Then he gets out his computer and shows me a cd he's been making for our English students. It has a number of Christian worship songs, and he's printed out the lyrics and Japanese Bible verses to go along with them. He also discusses our worship book for the English service and how he wants to add some songs to it and put translations of difficult English words at the bottom of the songs. So, we are tentatively planning to get together some Sunday and tear our songbooks apart, take out the songs we never play, bring in new ones, and make them more accessible to beginner English students.
In the afternoon we made a group discovery between the Hongo staff about the story where Saul is converted on the road to Damascus. The katakana for Saul is サウロ (Sauro) when the narrative is talking about him, but when Jesus stops him with the bright light and calls his name, the katakana is サウル (Sauru). After much guessing, Etsuko finally figured out that this is because Jesus speaks to Saul in Aramaic, while the rest of the text is in Greek. Which makes sense, but really stumped our poor beginner students who were convinced the story was about two different Sauls.
In Beginner Bible class we started reading the Gospel of John. Every week after Beginner Bible class I go out to dinner with students, and we had been planning to go to a special restaurant this week, but I was rather surprised that every single one of them canceled. The guy who knew about the restaurant had forgotten about the engagement, another guy who has come out every single week told me he couldn't make it, the final guy who was in class said that he didn't have time that night, and the guy who was planning to come and meet us specifically for dinner sent me an email canceling. This was a pleasant surprise, because I had a friend I really wanted to have the time and energy to spend time with that night. I called her cell phone, and she almost didn't hear it because she'd put it away in her bag and was listening to music, but she felt like she needed to turn the music off and hear the tail end of the buzzing.
It was one of those small God presents...small in the sense of the world's perspective, but really cool for us. I know it was a big deal to my friend that I was able to come out and it was lovely for me to spend the evening one-on-one with a close friend being deep and real. Definitely worth the hour on the train to get out to her and the lost sleep. :-) God is really good to take care of the small "optional" things along with the huge ones.
My Thursday morning class is the hardest class for me to connect to. They tend to talk about the kinds of topics that I usually don't discuss. I have no idea how to have a meaningful conversation about shopping, Tokyo sight-seeing, or the latest ladies' social event. They have no idea how to have a discussion about religion, justice issues, what-if scenarios, or a series of other things that are on my "I can participate in a discussion about this" list. The surest sign that the class has begun moving into an area that I actually feel comfortable leading is that one or more of the students will begin mumbling "I want to escape", "Why are we discussing such things?", or "We shouldn't really be talking about this." And they even mumble in English, so I know it's for my ears.
Today, however, we happened to stumble on a topic of mutual "interest" (for lack of a better word). One of my students has a sixth grade daughter who recently became sick. She stopped eating and was throwing up the whole weekend. Her mom took her to the doctor, who said that it was psychological, not physical. When the mom questioned her daughter, she learned that she was feeling stressed about her social group at school, and was tired of worrying about whether people were getting along and the like. The stress from this (probably also combined with regular school, cram school, and upcoming entrance exams for middle school) have landed her daughter at home every other day this week. She sleeps almost the whole day and doesn't eat.
As we talked about it in class, many of the other women (moms past and present) assured her that it was normal. That girls that age tend to have troubles like that. They urged her to take good care of herself because she needed to give a lot of love to her daughter right now. I scribbled out a prayer for her and her daughter while Aaron was leading Bible study and gave it to her. It felt good to be included even in a small way in her worries.
I had an hour to kill after class and I sat catching up with emails and blogs and the like. While I was sitting there, two women came in to have lunch. I know I had seen one of them before, but I can't remember where...she might be a church member, but she's not at Hongo so often. They asked me if I had eaten lunch, and I said I was meeting a friend for lunch in 45 minutes. Then they proceeded to give me two inarizushi (rice wrapped in...how to describe it...sweetened and vinagered tofu that has been cooked in some way), asked me how it was, and when I gave the standard "it's delicious" proceeded to give me another one. And then offer me tea thirty minutes later. Then, when I tried to leave to go have lunch with my friend, the lady who I don't know asked if I would please come out to her house sometime, even though it's about an hour away, and asked me to let her know when I have time. I am always a little confused by these kinds of interactions...are they trying to be nice to me or thank me or are they actually trying to get to know me?
I feel pressure in these kinds of situations...whether I have figured the cultural ideas surrounding them yet, I don't know, but my inner interpretation of them is as follows: the people are offering me food and invitations because it is polite to do so, but as we have never had a successful time interacting, it would be extremely awkward for me to actually take them up on the offer. However, giving is important to Japanese people, and so it seems like the polite thing to do would be to take them up on it. Which would land us in a situation where she was having me over only to be polite, and I was coming over only to be polite, and so the entire thing would be 100% for politeness' sake. I think that might make sense to them, but it doesn't to me. At any rate...Thursday's tend to be culture shock days. You'd think culture shock might end after one had been in a country for a year and a half...and maybe the "shock" aspect does end...it's the cultural confusion that is left lingering.
My second lunch was with Ken (Kentaro), a new Christian who has been attending Hongo for 9 months or so. He is overflowing with ideas, and has really picked up on the idea of having some fellowship activities to connect our young students with young Christians and our young missionary community. We're planning a hike on Takao mountain soon. He's made a flier, and a schedule, and was asking about doing songs or a Bible study. Then he gets out his computer and shows me a cd he's been making for our English students. It has a number of Christian worship songs, and he's printed out the lyrics and Japanese Bible verses to go along with them. He also discusses our worship book for the English service and how he wants to add some songs to it and put translations of difficult English words at the bottom of the songs. So, we are tentatively planning to get together some Sunday and tear our songbooks apart, take out the songs we never play, bring in new ones, and make them more accessible to beginner English students.
In the afternoon we made a group discovery between the Hongo staff about the story where Saul is converted on the road to Damascus. The katakana for Saul is サウロ (Sauro) when the narrative is talking about him, but when Jesus stops him with the bright light and calls his name, the katakana is サウル (Sauru). After much guessing, Etsuko finally figured out that this is because Jesus speaks to Saul in Aramaic, while the rest of the text is in Greek. Which makes sense, but really stumped our poor beginner students who were convinced the story was about two different Sauls.
In Beginner Bible class we started reading the Gospel of John. Every week after Beginner Bible class I go out to dinner with students, and we had been planning to go to a special restaurant this week, but I was rather surprised that every single one of them canceled. The guy who knew about the restaurant had forgotten about the engagement, another guy who has come out every single week told me he couldn't make it, the final guy who was in class said that he didn't have time that night, and the guy who was planning to come and meet us specifically for dinner sent me an email canceling. This was a pleasant surprise, because I had a friend I really wanted to have the time and energy to spend time with that night. I called her cell phone, and she almost didn't hear it because she'd put it away in her bag and was listening to music, but she felt like she needed to turn the music off and hear the tail end of the buzzing.
It was one of those small God presents...small in the sense of the world's perspective, but really cool for us. I know it was a big deal to my friend that I was able to come out and it was lovely for me to spend the evening one-on-one with a close friend being deep and real. Definitely worth the hour on the train to get out to her and the lost sleep. :-) God is really good to take care of the small "optional" things along with the huge ones.
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Wednesday, May 28
On Wednesday morning, I have a class of older ladies and one college aged guy. One of the church members is a student and she immediately puts me on the spot (without having any idea she was doing so) by sharing with the class how she is a Christian and therefore surprised her friend by still being willing to visit a statue connected with the Buddhist tradition that is connected with healing. She's about retirement age and her husband has cancer. I have taken to asking Japanese people 'Where does the power come from?' in these kinds of situations. Usually they don't really have an answer, but in this case they explained that, at one point awhile back, a person had swallowed a fish bone that had become stuck in his throat, and praying to the statue had caused the fish bone to dissolve.
Wednesday afternoon is free time at Hongo and I used it to read Punk Monk. It was *so* exciting. I've been wondering for a little while what the next step life (not the next big step, but the next step towards the big step) is, and it seemed like the way to set up a boiler room is to keep organizing 24/7 prayer weeks. It is to get people to fall in love with prayer by praying. I like how practical the 24/7 movement is...it's not a lot of theory about prayer or a lot of people who have all the answers. They're people who put faith into action. It's the idea that, when we hear God saying pray, we pray. When we hear Him saying, 'love your neighbor', we leave our houses and go out and love as best we can. This is becoming an increasingly important concept in my life...living who I want to be now rather than waiting for perfection to go out and love.
Wednesday evening my first class is three women, all Tokyo University College or Graduate students. M. is a Mathematical Engineering student, K. is in some sort of developing countries study, and L. is getting a Ph.D. in history. M. has volunteered abroad in Kolkata with Missionaries of Charity just like I did last summer. K.'s parents were Christian and she's been attending a church for 1-2 years (she confessed this to me when the other two students were absent last week), and L. is a Korean Christian who gets very nervous if you talk to her about Christianity at all and will quickly say, "Well...as you know, it's really hard to stay a Christian in Japan..." None of these three knew each other before this April, so the challege has been getting them to interact, but we're starting to get there.
The class after this on Wednesday is a class of all non-Christians, but a non-Baptized church member (A.) attended the class last night, and I realized just how far this Wednesday class has come. The visitor said to me afterwards, "But...those two women were Christian, weren't they?" This is the same class that I shocked maybe 10 months ago when I told them Christians believe Jesus is God. One of the same women who said at that time, "I never knew Christians believed that!" is one of the women that A. was convinced was a Christian.
In that same class, N. had returned from a trip to Ireland. N. is one of two people that I have specifically chosen to pray for every time I intercess...with a goal to pray for both of them everyday. The part about her trip that she chose to share with the class was visiting a church in Ireland and feeling (in her own words) a kind of 'holiness' there that she said, 'you cannot find in Japan'. I had dropped a New Testament and a letter for N. in her mailbox a few weeks ago, but she got it tonight because of her trip to Ireland. She was so excited to get a Bible, and she declared that she was going to read in her own Bible instead of on the class Bible study sheet...which only lasted until I told her that the English was different, but it was so fun to see her excitement!
I was realizing as I was walking home after class on Wednesday just how many on the line pre-Christians God has been sending me. And with that was the self-realization that my favorite people in the world to work with are seekers. It doesn't matter if they're Christian or not. Discipleship with pre-Christians and with Christians isn't so different, and I find myself most drawn to the people who are very close to the line on either side. The people who are looking for encouragement that God is real, and who have real deep questions that they are still willing to voice outloud.
Wednesday afternoon is free time at Hongo and I used it to read Punk Monk. It was *so* exciting. I've been wondering for a little while what the next step life (not the next big step, but the next step towards the big step) is, and it seemed like the way to set up a boiler room is to keep organizing 24/7 prayer weeks. It is to get people to fall in love with prayer by praying. I like how practical the 24/7 movement is...it's not a lot of theory about prayer or a lot of people who have all the answers. They're people who put faith into action. It's the idea that, when we hear God saying pray, we pray. When we hear Him saying, 'love your neighbor', we leave our houses and go out and love as best we can. This is becoming an increasingly important concept in my life...living who I want to be now rather than waiting for perfection to go out and love.
Wednesday evening my first class is three women, all Tokyo University College or Graduate students. M. is a Mathematical Engineering student, K. is in some sort of developing countries study, and L. is getting a Ph.D. in history. M. has volunteered abroad in Kolkata with Missionaries of Charity just like I did last summer. K.'s parents were Christian and she's been attending a church for 1-2 years (she confessed this to me when the other two students were absent last week), and L. is a Korean Christian who gets very nervous if you talk to her about Christianity at all and will quickly say, "Well...as you know, it's really hard to stay a Christian in Japan..." None of these three knew each other before this April, so the challege has been getting them to interact, but we're starting to get there.
The class after this on Wednesday is a class of all non-Christians, but a non-Baptized church member (A.) attended the class last night, and I realized just how far this Wednesday class has come. The visitor said to me afterwards, "But...those two women were Christian, weren't they?" This is the same class that I shocked maybe 10 months ago when I told them Christians believe Jesus is God. One of the same women who said at that time, "I never knew Christians believed that!" is one of the women that A. was convinced was a Christian.
In that same class, N. had returned from a trip to Ireland. N. is one of two people that I have specifically chosen to pray for every time I intercess...with a goal to pray for both of them everyday. The part about her trip that she chose to share with the class was visiting a church in Ireland and feeling (in her own words) a kind of 'holiness' there that she said, 'you cannot find in Japan'. I had dropped a New Testament and a letter for N. in her mailbox a few weeks ago, but she got it tonight because of her trip to Ireland. She was so excited to get a Bible, and she declared that she was going to read in her own Bible instead of on the class Bible study sheet...which only lasted until I told her that the English was different, but it was so fun to see her excitement!
I was realizing as I was walking home after class on Wednesday just how many on the line pre-Christians God has been sending me. And with that was the self-realization that my favorite people in the world to work with are seekers. It doesn't matter if they're Christian or not. Discipleship with pre-Christians and with Christians isn't so different, and I find myself most drawn to the people who are very close to the line on either side. The people who are looking for encouragement that God is real, and who have real deep questions that they are still willing to voice outloud.
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Tuesday, May 27
One Tuesday a month is a mama and baby event at Hongo, so we are invaded by about ten moms and their babies, this week including my pastor's new baby Aki (he's only a month old!), a set of twins, and Yuki (my pastors 3 year old son who is suffering greatly at the moment from "I am not the center of the universe anymore! syndrome").
I spent a lot of time with Yuki, trying to give him some attention. I've been working hard to only speak English with Yuki, but he's really struggling with it (I didn't see him for 2 months while his mom was having a baby). So, today I gave in and used Japanese. Our relationship was greatly renewed. We played a piano duet, I spent a good quanity of time being used as a tree, and we took out a globe and had fun pointing to different countries (I am pretty sure Yuki thinks he lives in Mongolia and that I live in Canada...but I suppose that isn't too far off. ;-) )
Mama / Baby days are pretty much the only time I talk to my pastor, and today was a particularly good discussion. We started out with awkward Japanese about how their baby wasn't sleeping at night, wondering when Shizuka (pastor's wife) got to sleep, etc. I can ask okay questions, but since I don't always have the ability to understand their answers, conversation tends to be a little difficult. But Shizuka asked me about what I wanted to do after Japan, and so I had the opportunity to tell her about boiler rooms. Which was difficult. But it turned into a wonderful conversation with Yasui sensei about churches without locks and without walls. He talked about how much he likes the idea about a church that is always open for prayer and a student center in Nagoya that does much more than English.
My Tuesday classes begin around dinner time with a group of advanced students. We always share about our weeks, and the highlight of this week's conversation is a student who has just returned from the island of Saipan (Saipen? Some island I've never heard of that is apparently a U.S. territory) where he and his wife tried scuba diving for the first time. Another older student usually travels to Okinawa, but vows to go to Saipan for his next trip. This class is made up of a young housewife, two students at the Tokyo University Agricultural College, a retired businessman, and a middle aged set designer who's currently working on a play that they hoped might go to Broadway, but it hasn't been popular enough.
I spent a lot of time with Yuki, trying to give him some attention. I've been working hard to only speak English with Yuki, but he's really struggling with it (I didn't see him for 2 months while his mom was having a baby). So, today I gave in and used Japanese. Our relationship was greatly renewed. We played a piano duet, I spent a good quanity of time being used as a tree, and we took out a globe and had fun pointing to different countries (I am pretty sure Yuki thinks he lives in Mongolia and that I live in Canada...but I suppose that isn't too far off. ;-) )
Mama / Baby days are pretty much the only time I talk to my pastor, and today was a particularly good discussion. We started out with awkward Japanese about how their baby wasn't sleeping at night, wondering when Shizuka (pastor's wife) got to sleep, etc. I can ask okay questions, but since I don't always have the ability to understand their answers, conversation tends to be a little difficult. But Shizuka asked me about what I wanted to do after Japan, and so I had the opportunity to tell her about boiler rooms. Which was difficult. But it turned into a wonderful conversation with Yasui sensei about churches without locks and without walls. He talked about how much he likes the idea about a church that is always open for prayer and a student center in Nagoya that does much more than English.
My Tuesday classes begin around dinner time with a group of advanced students. We always share about our weeks, and the highlight of this week's conversation is a student who has just returned from the island of Saipan (Saipen? Some island I've never heard of that is apparently a U.S. territory) where he and his wife tried scuba diving for the first time. Another older student usually travels to Okinawa, but vows to go to Saipan for his next trip. This class is made up of a young housewife, two students at the Tokyo University Agricultural College, a retired businessman, and a middle aged set designer who's currently working on a play that they hoped might go to Broadway, but it hasn't been popular enough.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Monday, May 26
Monday is normally my day off, so usually my week starts calmly and quietly. This week, however, I was committed to praying for some friends and their church on Monday. So, the day was spent in intercession (which is not restful prayer), and a little bit of cleaning.
I left home a little before five to meet a friend and pick up an exciting new book: Punk Monk. Punk Monk is all about Boiler Rooms in the 24/7 Prayer movement. Which is to say, the book is pretty much about what I want to do with the rest of my life.
I had a little bit of time to chat with my friends and then we prayed our other friends through a meeting they were having. We prayed for about two hours as a group, which meant a lot of silent time. But the whole time, it was nearly impossible to focus. A thought kept nagging at my mind that we were not really together to pray for the meeting, or at least that there was something else God had for us. We finally began discussing, and it turned into an entire discussion about our prayer group that gathers on Saturdays, our community in general, etc., etc. We went out to a cafe to keep talking until close to midnight. I finally dropped said friends off at two different train stations and returned home around 12:30am.
This leaves me a little concerned about the rest of the week...things do not tend to go well if I don't rest on Mondays!
I left home a little before five to meet a friend and pick up an exciting new book: Punk Monk. Punk Monk is all about Boiler Rooms in the 24/7 Prayer movement. Which is to say, the book is pretty much about what I want to do with the rest of my life.
I had a little bit of time to chat with my friends and then we prayed our other friends through a meeting they were having. We prayed for about two hours as a group, which meant a lot of silent time. But the whole time, it was nearly impossible to focus. A thought kept nagging at my mind that we were not really together to pray for the meeting, or at least that there was something else God had for us. We finally began discussing, and it turned into an entire discussion about our prayer group that gathers on Saturdays, our community in general, etc., etc. We went out to a cafe to keep talking until close to midnight. I finally dropped said friends off at two different train stations and returned home around 12:30am.
This leaves me a little concerned about the rest of the week...things do not tend to go well if I don't rest on Mondays!
Sunday, May 25, 2008
Sunday, May 25th
I'm going to make an effort to get a blog up for every day this week for good communication purposes! Please pay no attention to the fact that it's already Thursday but I'm only now posting Sunday. ;-)
Every Sunday morning at 9:30, about six of us gather for English Bible Study. This week, the highlight was a student who has been coming regularly who had a large ah-ha moment. The Bible passage was about us being the light of the world, and he noticed at the end how it says "They will see your good works and praise your father in heaven". He talked to the group about how he normally is disappointed if people don't seem to notice when he does good things, but that he was understanding how God was supposed to get the credit anyway. It was a good moment. :-)
From English Bible Study, we go straight to Sunday worship. I spend the service either studying Japanese by looking up words I don't know or by writing prayers down in my notebook. This week it was a prayer writing sort of week. I was grateful for the time to rest and pray. This past Sunday was also 'sohji' day, or cleaning. Twice a year, we split into two groups. We younglings form a band to furiously slide pews all the way to the back of the sanctuary and then use a combination of sweepers, a vacuum cleaner, wet rags, and finally rags wet with wax to beat the floor into shiny submission.
Then, half an hours rest, and then all the pews go to the front of the sanctuary and the attack is repeated on the back half. Everyone helps out however they can. Aaron's daughter Cassidy went at it with a wax rag as well, and was gently corrected when her wax was making smudges against the grain of others' waxing rows. Yasui Sensei's (the pastor's) son, three year old Yuki, helped us in the second half by shouting out 'orai orai orai' (back up back up--used for cars, usually). We couldn't quite figure out where he was trying to get us to back up to, though. ;-)
I was almost successful in convincing Takaaki that he needed to dust every page of the Bible on the front alter individually, but in the end my merciful side got the better of me and I told him I was joking.
In between Japanese worship and our evening English worship, I head a few blocks over to a local Assemblies of God international congregation. Their afternoon worship is a diverse group of young people from America and various Asian countries. I love having a place to worship in English where I don't need to lead anything. The music is loud, and it's easy to be free there. This Sunday, there was a guest speaker from America who commanded us in the name of Jesus to not waste our time in Japan. Usually I have to slip out before the end of the message, but I would have had to step on various people to do that. Turns out I was really glad I was able to stay. They opened it up to free prayer time, which is always my favorite time to be in an Assemblies of God church. Everyone just starts praying...some in their own languages, some in tongues, some with tears. One girl nearly always begins to sing, and the melody lifts sweetly with the prayers. Hands are raised, people fall to their knees. I love being able to switch from speaking to listening for God to singing all without attracting attention.
I had to slip out in the middle of the prayer time, though, and race back to Hongo to prepare for the English worship I was about to be leading. I never thought I would be good at giving sermons, which was the big reason I never wanted to become a pastor. Now I find that I am not so bad at them, but the stress level is still out of this world. I don't really plan what to say...just a topic. Sometimes I talk for a long time, sometimes only a few minutes. This Sunday, still very much in a prayer mood, I only managed to talk for a few minutes and then announced I was just going to pray for them. Sometimes people understand me better when I'm talking to God than when I'm talking to them anyway...I might do it more often.
We gather after Evening worship to have tea downstairs and chat. By that point, I was worn out. I stayed for a little while, but then escaped for the evening.
Every Sunday morning at 9:30, about six of us gather for English Bible Study. This week, the highlight was a student who has been coming regularly who had a large ah-ha moment. The Bible passage was about us being the light of the world, and he noticed at the end how it says "They will see your good works and praise your father in heaven". He talked to the group about how he normally is disappointed if people don't seem to notice when he does good things, but that he was understanding how God was supposed to get the credit anyway. It was a good moment. :-)
From English Bible Study, we go straight to Sunday worship. I spend the service either studying Japanese by looking up words I don't know or by writing prayers down in my notebook. This week it was a prayer writing sort of week. I was grateful for the time to rest and pray. This past Sunday was also 'sohji' day, or cleaning. Twice a year, we split into two groups. We younglings form a band to furiously slide pews all the way to the back of the sanctuary and then use a combination of sweepers, a vacuum cleaner, wet rags, and finally rags wet with wax to beat the floor into shiny submission.
Then, half an hours rest, and then all the pews go to the front of the sanctuary and the attack is repeated on the back half. Everyone helps out however they can. Aaron's daughter Cassidy went at it with a wax rag as well, and was gently corrected when her wax was making smudges against the grain of others' waxing rows. Yasui Sensei's (the pastor's) son, three year old Yuki, helped us in the second half by shouting out 'orai orai orai' (back up back up--used for cars, usually). We couldn't quite figure out where he was trying to get us to back up to, though. ;-)
I was almost successful in convincing Takaaki that he needed to dust every page of the Bible on the front alter individually, but in the end my merciful side got the better of me and I told him I was joking.
In between Japanese worship and our evening English worship, I head a few blocks over to a local Assemblies of God international congregation. Their afternoon worship is a diverse group of young people from America and various Asian countries. I love having a place to worship in English where I don't need to lead anything. The music is loud, and it's easy to be free there. This Sunday, there was a guest speaker from America who commanded us in the name of Jesus to not waste our time in Japan. Usually I have to slip out before the end of the message, but I would have had to step on various people to do that. Turns out I was really glad I was able to stay. They opened it up to free prayer time, which is always my favorite time to be in an Assemblies of God church. Everyone just starts praying...some in their own languages, some in tongues, some with tears. One girl nearly always begins to sing, and the melody lifts sweetly with the prayers. Hands are raised, people fall to their knees. I love being able to switch from speaking to listening for God to singing all without attracting attention.
I had to slip out in the middle of the prayer time, though, and race back to Hongo to prepare for the English worship I was about to be leading. I never thought I would be good at giving sermons, which was the big reason I never wanted to become a pastor. Now I find that I am not so bad at them, but the stress level is still out of this world. I don't really plan what to say...just a topic. Sometimes I talk for a long time, sometimes only a few minutes. This Sunday, still very much in a prayer mood, I only managed to talk for a few minutes and then announced I was just going to pray for them. Sometimes people understand me better when I'm talking to God than when I'm talking to them anyway...I might do it more often.
We gather after Evening worship to have tea downstairs and chat. By that point, I was worn out. I stayed for a little while, but then escaped for the evening.
Saturday, May 10, 2008
24/7 Prayer at Hongo
We were spread out around the office space at Hongo, stuffing things away in backpacks, the last of the pizza boxes having been thrown away and the dishes dried and shelved. Kat reminded us that we had planned on closing the week of prayer with prayer, and we all turned to Takaaki. We all bowed our heads, and Takaaki, not used to Christian customs, after a slight pause asked, "Do I start now?" Smiles and nods all around.
"Our Father in heaven..." He paused often as he recited the Lord's prayer, but said it with confidence. Only one small chuckle from him when he got to the last line. "The kingdom...For the kingdom, and the glory...and the power are Yours. Now and forever. Amen."
The past three weeks have been a crazy blur of excitement. Three weeks ago, I got up the guts to tell Yasui sensei that what I wanted more than anything was to run a 24/7 prayer room at Hongo during the 10 days of prep for Global Day of Prayer. Two weeks of emails flying off my fingertips, of conversations with every Christian I knew, of leaving my shyness in the gutter and running into Assemblies of God churches, Kristo Kyodan churches, random Christian offices. Of trying to commandeer every Christian and leaning towards Christian person I know into spending at least one hour with God this past week.
There were so many surprises during these three weeks.
-A friend calling me right when I was struggling about the thought of whether God was really calling me to do this and whether I could really do it or not to say, "Did you ever notice in the story of David and Goliath that God never speaks to David? That David just trusts God and goes out to fight?"
-Sitting down in the Assemblies of God church after having failed to connect with the pastor only to have the leader of a campus Christian group say, "Hey, would you come to our party on Monday night?" Me: "Umm...I'm not a college student...is that really okay?" Her: "Absolutely!" And proceeding to get connected with a great campus group where the leader really supported my idea and agreed to forward all my emails to the group.
-Walking into the Christian Center in Ochanomizu, getting shuffled to the Navigator's office, and then to the JEA office so that I walked into their meeting about the Global Day of Prayer that I didn't know they were having. They actually reported my information on a flier that went out to not a few churches in Tokyo. Yasui sensei was very surprised to see us listed on it! ;-)
-Going to the YMCA without really knowing what I would do there only to meet two of the four YMCA people I know right in the doorway because they arrived at the same time I did. One of them ran door to door and told his entire dorm.
It was the strangest thing once we actually started praying because my workload went way down. I would pause at different times of the day as I realized that someone was *always* praying in the little room my friends and I had put together. And it was amazing to think that it would flow without me doing a thing. Though there were still so many prayer hours open at the beginning that I was pretty nervous.
When I woke up Monday morning, so far as I knew, there were eight hours open on Monday and no one signed up to pray at night any night of the week (people had only signed up for Sunday night and Monday morning). There was also a huge gap Tuesday afternoon and other huge gaps later in the week.
Another huge surprise was arriving at Hongo Monday morning to look at the prayer schedule, only to find that a mysterious "Atago" had signed up to pray from 12am-4am every, single night.
We also got to meet Takaaki Monday morning. Takaaki is one of my non-Christian students who has been coming to church, English Bible study, Beginner Bible Class, and Christianity Today class for about six months now. I hadn't asked him to pray, but when he saw my schedule and all the empty blanks, he signed up to pray from 2-6 the very first night. I managed to negotiate him down to 2-5. And even after that, he saw there was an open slot from 8-9 the next morning and he signed up there as well. And later for two hours Tuesday afternoon. Then another hour on Friday and another two on Saturday.
My friend Jenae was praying from 7-8 that morning, and apparently he came right into the prayer room when it was his turn and informed her it was time for her to leave. I had been teasing Takaaki about his 2-5 prayer slot, telling him that sleeping did not count as praising God or praying. He told me very proudly when we came to take over for him at 9:00 that he had not fallen asleep.
There were still open prayer hours all day Monday, though. And I could not fill four of them. I sent out a desperate email, and by 10:00 on Monday morning I had the four hours I couldn't fill filled. Then I had some cancellations in the afternoon and had six open hours there. I was able to fill those and thought, "Well...Monday is usually my sabbath anyway..." but then I went to hang out at Carol's and Carol and Charity both signed up for two hours each. So, I thought I was at two hours of time in the prayer room. Then I got an email while I was in there praying that said, "I hope you saw on the schedule that I signed up to pray!" I only got one hour with God!!!
It became almost funny, because the same thing happened on Tuesday. There were three hours open, and I was hoping to get them, and then people signed up and left me with just one again.
Wednesday we had our first person who forgot to come. The woman before her had already been praying for two hours and was ready to go home. I was in the middle of English class. The Hongo receptionist grabbed me during our class break to explain the problem. But maybe three minutes later, she came and grabbed me again. "Harui just came! You have to go up to the prayer room and see him!"
Harui is one of my non-Christian Beginner Bible Class students. He had originally signed up to pray with a church member at six in the morning, but he had overslept and not come. He had just randomly stopped by to ask if he could pray right then. He was the only person the entire week to do that and it just so happened that it was right at the only time when a student forgot to show up. God is too good!!!
So, I went upstairs to check on Harui. He was already sitting on a cushion, the "Seek His Face" prayer guide clutched in his hands. He started to stand up when I came in and apologized for not showing up earlier. I assured him it was fine and pulled up a cushion beside him. He said, "I don't know how to pray." I gave him the best 1-2 minute set of prayer pointers I could, let him know he could talk to God however he wanted, and then demonstrated by praying for his prayer time. I asked him if he would be okay and he said, "I want to seek His face alone." I ran back down to my class.
Wednesday was the day filled almost completely by Hongo church members. It was good to see all of them. They all made a point of coming to tell me, "I prayed." Or to wave to me from the window on their way up the stairs. One woman who I have never talked to before this (in fact, I once heard Yasui sensei tell her to ask me how many people were at Bible study and she went and had Etsuko ask me instead) came down to talk to me and said, "It's hard to pray for an hour at home, but it was so easy here!" It was a short, but real conversation.
Wednesday night I had only a short period of time to actually get food before I was supposed to get food, but I never made it because a man named Toshiyuki had returned to the prayer room (after 10:00 at night, I might add) just to check the schedule and see if he could get in to pray again. He had come the very first night and come an hour early just to plan out what he would pray for that night. Then he had signed up to pray again. Now he was back for the third time, even without a slot that was his. He started telling me how much he had really liked praying the other day because the day's topic was about children, and he had so many things to pray because of his recent trip to Indonesia. He was now considering signing up for an open 5:00am slot just to get back in the prayer room. He did. :-) And then he sent me an email telling me how sorry he was not to get to pray Saturday afternoon too.
On Friday as we were leaving Coffee Hour, yet another of my non-Christian students came up to me and asked if she could spend an hour in the room. I reminded her, "This isn't an English school event. It's a Christian event. Do you want to pray?" She turned back sideways, almost as though protecting herself. "Can't I just sit quietly in the room?" she asked. I told her only if it was praying and offered to come and pray with her if she wanted some guidance. She told me that idea was scary, but somehow agreed anyway.
So, at 10:00 this morning I found myself going off to pray with a non-Christian. I wasn't sure how I would lead her, but we ended up following a prayer guide in the room. I tried to give her as much freedom to pray as possible. We spent some time reading a Psalm and discussed it a little bit. We spent some time listening for God. We spent some time singing. We spent some time praying about her needs. I asked her what she would ask God for if she could ask him for anything, and she went right from sounding as though she were explaining it to me to asking God for it. It was for her mother to be able to get hearing aids so her parents could have normal conversations again. She entered the room pretty scared and left it thanking me for the time and how much she had enjoyed it.
Rather ironically, I finally got my long period of time in the prayer room. I think it was God's special gift to me...I needed those three hours in the prayer room just to be there and realize, "Here it is...the end." I spent a lot of time pleading with God...the scariest thing about running 24/7 prayer for the week is that a lot of people will think it's extreme, when really it should be the norm in Tokyo right now. I have left the week with a longing to do it again. But it's not time yet. Now I have a better idea how to build relationships so that it will run smoother next time. It's time to do some more of that, and to rest, even if I don't want to.
We sat around boxes of pizza tonight. There was lots of laughter. The mysterious "Atago" who had been my guardian angel for filling prayer slots turned out to be a man who had been praying at Hongo at night every once in awhile for two and a half years now. He said, "I felt a difference as soon as I walked into Hongo Monday night. It was easier to connect to God and much easier to stay awake." One of the VYM girls also said, "Yeah...I got into the room and countries kept popping into my head to pray for."
Takaaki prayed us off, friends scattered, Atago said, "Mata upstairs!" Which is kind of like, "Until upstairs!" "We'll see each other upstairs praying again soon!" I cleared off the table outside the prayer room but I couldn't bring myself to take apart even one part of the room itself.
This week has been a magical week of doing what fulfills me the most. I love leading people into prayer. I love watching them fall in love with God in a way that isn't academic but is about finding Him in that secret place where our heart goes out dancing with His. This week has been a small taste of what I want to spend my life doing. And as the taste has still been pretty small, it's grown both my longing and my faith that it can happen.
"Our Father in heaven..." He paused often as he recited the Lord's prayer, but said it with confidence. Only one small chuckle from him when he got to the last line. "The kingdom...For the kingdom, and the glory...and the power are Yours. Now and forever. Amen."
The past three weeks have been a crazy blur of excitement. Three weeks ago, I got up the guts to tell Yasui sensei that what I wanted more than anything was to run a 24/7 prayer room at Hongo during the 10 days of prep for Global Day of Prayer. Two weeks of emails flying off my fingertips, of conversations with every Christian I knew, of leaving my shyness in the gutter and running into Assemblies of God churches, Kristo Kyodan churches, random Christian offices. Of trying to commandeer every Christian and leaning towards Christian person I know into spending at least one hour with God this past week.
There were so many surprises during these three weeks.
-A friend calling me right when I was struggling about the thought of whether God was really calling me to do this and whether I could really do it or not to say, "Did you ever notice in the story of David and Goliath that God never speaks to David? That David just trusts God and goes out to fight?"
-Sitting down in the Assemblies of God church after having failed to connect with the pastor only to have the leader of a campus Christian group say, "Hey, would you come to our party on Monday night?" Me: "Umm...I'm not a college student...is that really okay?" Her: "Absolutely!" And proceeding to get connected with a great campus group where the leader really supported my idea and agreed to forward all my emails to the group.
-Walking into the Christian Center in Ochanomizu, getting shuffled to the Navigator's office, and then to the JEA office so that I walked into their meeting about the Global Day of Prayer that I didn't know they were having. They actually reported my information on a flier that went out to not a few churches in Tokyo. Yasui sensei was very surprised to see us listed on it! ;-)
-Going to the YMCA without really knowing what I would do there only to meet two of the four YMCA people I know right in the doorway because they arrived at the same time I did. One of them ran door to door and told his entire dorm.
It was the strangest thing once we actually started praying because my workload went way down. I would pause at different times of the day as I realized that someone was *always* praying in the little room my friends and I had put together. And it was amazing to think that it would flow without me doing a thing. Though there were still so many prayer hours open at the beginning that I was pretty nervous.
When I woke up Monday morning, so far as I knew, there were eight hours open on Monday and no one signed up to pray at night any night of the week (people had only signed up for Sunday night and Monday morning). There was also a huge gap Tuesday afternoon and other huge gaps later in the week.
Another huge surprise was arriving at Hongo Monday morning to look at the prayer schedule, only to find that a mysterious "Atago" had signed up to pray from 12am-4am every, single night.
We also got to meet Takaaki Monday morning. Takaaki is one of my non-Christian students who has been coming to church, English Bible study, Beginner Bible Class, and Christianity Today class for about six months now. I hadn't asked him to pray, but when he saw my schedule and all the empty blanks, he signed up to pray from 2-6 the very first night. I managed to negotiate him down to 2-5. And even after that, he saw there was an open slot from 8-9 the next morning and he signed up there as well. And later for two hours Tuesday afternoon. Then another hour on Friday and another two on Saturday.
My friend Jenae was praying from 7-8 that morning, and apparently he came right into the prayer room when it was his turn and informed her it was time for her to leave. I had been teasing Takaaki about his 2-5 prayer slot, telling him that sleeping did not count as praising God or praying. He told me very proudly when we came to take over for him at 9:00 that he had not fallen asleep.
There were still open prayer hours all day Monday, though. And I could not fill four of them. I sent out a desperate email, and by 10:00 on Monday morning I had the four hours I couldn't fill filled. Then I had some cancellations in the afternoon and had six open hours there. I was able to fill those and thought, "Well...Monday is usually my sabbath anyway..." but then I went to hang out at Carol's and Carol and Charity both signed up for two hours each. So, I thought I was at two hours of time in the prayer room. Then I got an email while I was in there praying that said, "I hope you saw on the schedule that I signed up to pray!" I only got one hour with God!!!
It became almost funny, because the same thing happened on Tuesday. There were three hours open, and I was hoping to get them, and then people signed up and left me with just one again.
Wednesday we had our first person who forgot to come. The woman before her had already been praying for two hours and was ready to go home. I was in the middle of English class. The Hongo receptionist grabbed me during our class break to explain the problem. But maybe three minutes later, she came and grabbed me again. "Harui just came! You have to go up to the prayer room and see him!"
Harui is one of my non-Christian Beginner Bible Class students. He had originally signed up to pray with a church member at six in the morning, but he had overslept and not come. He had just randomly stopped by to ask if he could pray right then. He was the only person the entire week to do that and it just so happened that it was right at the only time when a student forgot to show up. God is too good!!!
So, I went upstairs to check on Harui. He was already sitting on a cushion, the "Seek His Face" prayer guide clutched in his hands. He started to stand up when I came in and apologized for not showing up earlier. I assured him it was fine and pulled up a cushion beside him. He said, "I don't know how to pray." I gave him the best 1-2 minute set of prayer pointers I could, let him know he could talk to God however he wanted, and then demonstrated by praying for his prayer time. I asked him if he would be okay and he said, "I want to seek His face alone." I ran back down to my class.
Wednesday was the day filled almost completely by Hongo church members. It was good to see all of them. They all made a point of coming to tell me, "I prayed." Or to wave to me from the window on their way up the stairs. One woman who I have never talked to before this (in fact, I once heard Yasui sensei tell her to ask me how many people were at Bible study and she went and had Etsuko ask me instead) came down to talk to me and said, "It's hard to pray for an hour at home, but it was so easy here!" It was a short, but real conversation.
Wednesday night I had only a short period of time to actually get food before I was supposed to get food, but I never made it because a man named Toshiyuki had returned to the prayer room (after 10:00 at night, I might add) just to check the schedule and see if he could get in to pray again. He had come the very first night and come an hour early just to plan out what he would pray for that night. Then he had signed up to pray again. Now he was back for the third time, even without a slot that was his. He started telling me how much he had really liked praying the other day because the day's topic was about children, and he had so many things to pray because of his recent trip to Indonesia. He was now considering signing up for an open 5:00am slot just to get back in the prayer room. He did. :-) And then he sent me an email telling me how sorry he was not to get to pray Saturday afternoon too.
On Friday as we were leaving Coffee Hour, yet another of my non-Christian students came up to me and asked if she could spend an hour in the room. I reminded her, "This isn't an English school event. It's a Christian event. Do you want to pray?" She turned back sideways, almost as though protecting herself. "Can't I just sit quietly in the room?" she asked. I told her only if it was praying and offered to come and pray with her if she wanted some guidance. She told me that idea was scary, but somehow agreed anyway.
So, at 10:00 this morning I found myself going off to pray with a non-Christian. I wasn't sure how I would lead her, but we ended up following a prayer guide in the room. I tried to give her as much freedom to pray as possible. We spent some time reading a Psalm and discussed it a little bit. We spent some time listening for God. We spent some time singing. We spent some time praying about her needs. I asked her what she would ask God for if she could ask him for anything, and she went right from sounding as though she were explaining it to me to asking God for it. It was for her mother to be able to get hearing aids so her parents could have normal conversations again. She entered the room pretty scared and left it thanking me for the time and how much she had enjoyed it.
Rather ironically, I finally got my long period of time in the prayer room. I think it was God's special gift to me...I needed those three hours in the prayer room just to be there and realize, "Here it is...the end." I spent a lot of time pleading with God...the scariest thing about running 24/7 prayer for the week is that a lot of people will think it's extreme, when really it should be the norm in Tokyo right now. I have left the week with a longing to do it again. But it's not time yet. Now I have a better idea how to build relationships so that it will run smoother next time. It's time to do some more of that, and to rest, even if I don't want to.
We sat around boxes of pizza tonight. There was lots of laughter. The mysterious "Atago" who had been my guardian angel for filling prayer slots turned out to be a man who had been praying at Hongo at night every once in awhile for two and a half years now. He said, "I felt a difference as soon as I walked into Hongo Monday night. It was easier to connect to God and much easier to stay awake." One of the VYM girls also said, "Yeah...I got into the room and countries kept popping into my head to pray for."
Takaaki prayed us off, friends scattered, Atago said, "Mata upstairs!" Which is kind of like, "Until upstairs!" "We'll see each other upstairs praying again soon!" I cleared off the table outside the prayer room but I couldn't bring myself to take apart even one part of the room itself.
This week has been a magical week of doing what fulfills me the most. I love leading people into prayer. I love watching them fall in love with God in a way that isn't academic but is about finding Him in that secret place where our heart goes out dancing with His. This week has been a small taste of what I want to spend my life doing. And as the taste has still been pretty small, it's grown both my longing and my faith that it can happen.
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