For a long time, I've been planning on doing a unit on the prophetic books for my Christianity Today class. I've been building up to it for maybe a year now...teaching them about Creation, the Exodus...we did some other Old Testament studies on Ruth and King David...I expected them to have the foundation for reading the prophetic books. I was excited to share them with them and struggle through the process of finding God's love in difficult places.
Last week, I brought out Isaiah 5. It seemed a good chapter because it has beautiful love language (the vineyard) along with some "woe"s. I had a college professor who was really able to open these books up for me, in part by leading me to see God in them. I felt like I could identify with many of my students struggles with an angry God--they are harmony lovers and don't like anger--and lead them through those struggles. However, we began struggling much sooner than I had anticipated. In fact, we only made it through four verses, and all involved were still confused by the end of the class. These weren't the angry God verses...these were the verses about the vineyard.
So, I'd been turning over what to teach all this week. I still hadn't made so much progress by Friday. But I ended up leaving my Bible and lesson planning notebook an hour before the class was going to start and went and sat outside for half an hour or so. I found myself thinking about the difference between knowing ABOUT God and knowing GOD. And how hard it would be to understand the Bible if one didn't know God.
It is so much easier to teach history, theology, doctrine...anything other than God Himself. Trying to talk about God's love when there are unbelievers, pencils poised to take notes and log it all into their "knowledge about Christians" bank, without ending up in tears. It is watching them sit there, calm and unaffected, while I am aware of God's intense longing. And somehow being caught in between the two. Being one who is consumed by the love He has for me all while knowing I must be the voice that communicates that consuming fire to them...to somehow put words to that which burns through me and leaves me collapsed in awe. How badly He wants them to know.
Anyway...class last night was perhaps the least structured it had ever been. They said so many things that I could have taught a whole classes on. We switched topics maybe four times in an hour and only loosely tied them together. But there's only one thing I want to communicate to them, and I told them, "We are not moving into God's anger until you have seen His love." This is the "new" mission of Christianity Today.
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Monday, September 22, 2008
*laughing really hard*
Or, I could write a whole blog entry explaining how I've searched for an hour, go look around one more time, only to find them inside my guitar case not two minutes later.
*curtsies*
*curtsies*
Just because I always have to share the joy of getting to laugh at myself
How is it possible to unlock one's front door with one's keys and then lose them inside one's own apartment?
I just spent the last hour searching for my keys / wallet. I used the same keys to unlock my front door maybe three hours ago, so I know they are in my house, unless something quite unlikely has happened such as someone climbing up to my 2nd story balcony and entering my apartment and taking my wallet without me noticing while I was playing guitar in the other room. (NOT likely)
You know you are in trouble when you are searching for something and get the sudden, excited thought: "Ah! There is one more place I haven't checked! Maybe they're in the freezer!" No luck. And then you find yourself looking through the washing machine multiple times just because you are so out of ideas.
This rather unfortunately means that I cannot legally leave my apartment (no foreigner registration card), have no money, cannot lock my front door if I chose to leave, and must figure out a way to make dinner out of what I have in my apartment. The latter being the most serious situation, naturally. ;-)
I just spent the last hour searching for my keys / wallet. I used the same keys to unlock my front door maybe three hours ago, so I know they are in my house, unless something quite unlikely has happened such as someone climbing up to my 2nd story balcony and entering my apartment and taking my wallet without me noticing while I was playing guitar in the other room. (NOT likely)
You know you are in trouble when you are searching for something and get the sudden, excited thought: "Ah! There is one more place I haven't checked! Maybe they're in the freezer!" No luck. And then you find yourself looking through the washing machine multiple times just because you are so out of ideas.
This rather unfortunately means that I cannot legally leave my apartment (no foreigner registration card), have no money, cannot lock my front door if I chose to leave, and must figure out a way to make dinner out of what I have in my apartment. The latter being the most serious situation, naturally. ;-)
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Sunday Goodness, part two
After church today, we went to put pamphlets in mail boxes, and I had another one of my lovely random street encounters that I love. I was in this neighborhood with winding narrow streets and old, wooden houses, and I came to a place where an old woman was squatting outside her house, talking to her neighbor who had just come out her door.
I paused, rather unsure what to do, because you can't put pamphlets in people's mailboxes right in front of them, but it also seemed odd to skip their houses all together.
She saw me looking confused, and asked me in Japanese what I was looking for. I explained I was giving out pamphlets and showed one to her. And she just kept talking to me. I liked her a lot. Within two minutes, I was squatted down beside her and she started explaining the neighborhood with wide hand gestures.
The funny thing about older people is that you tell them you've spoken Japanese for two years, and they assume you are fluent. She was very surprised when I had to pull out my dictionary to figure out her meaning of the word "air raid", but it turns out she was explaining that Ueno had been flattened by the air raids in WW2, but this area had been untouched, and so there were lots of old houses. I kept sitting with her as she talked and was amazed at how this place was different than anywhere else I had been in Tokyo just because of her presence.
Many people in Tokyo don't know their neighbors. This woman seemed to know her whole street. And a lot of people walked by. She would call out directions to lost people, greetings to people who seemed determined to just race out their door, and they would turn around and smile and greet her back. Finally, a young college aged guy came by, kind of smiling at seeing this 80 year old woman and 24 year old foreigner crouching together on the street. "Tomodachi?" he asked. "Friend?" She explained that we had just become friends. He knew her, and he squatted down with us for awhile too. He also looked at a pamphlet, saw I had lived in Minnesota and said, "Twins?" That made me smile. She checked in with all sorts of things in his life, gave him all sorts of advice...I think at one point he was talking about job searching and she started telling him, "You've got to go that way and check in with this business..." It was wonderful...this woman is an 80 year old fireball who seems to be the center of her whole street.
I hope I get to see her again!
I paused, rather unsure what to do, because you can't put pamphlets in people's mailboxes right in front of them, but it also seemed odd to skip their houses all together.
She saw me looking confused, and asked me in Japanese what I was looking for. I explained I was giving out pamphlets and showed one to her. And she just kept talking to me. I liked her a lot. Within two minutes, I was squatted down beside her and she started explaining the neighborhood with wide hand gestures.
The funny thing about older people is that you tell them you've spoken Japanese for two years, and they assume you are fluent. She was very surprised when I had to pull out my dictionary to figure out her meaning of the word "air raid", but it turns out she was explaining that Ueno had been flattened by the air raids in WW2, but this area had been untouched, and so there were lots of old houses. I kept sitting with her as she talked and was amazed at how this place was different than anywhere else I had been in Tokyo just because of her presence.
Many people in Tokyo don't know their neighbors. This woman seemed to know her whole street. And a lot of people walked by. She would call out directions to lost people, greetings to people who seemed determined to just race out their door, and they would turn around and smile and greet her back. Finally, a young college aged guy came by, kind of smiling at seeing this 80 year old woman and 24 year old foreigner crouching together on the street. "Tomodachi?" he asked. "Friend?" She explained that we had just become friends. He knew her, and he squatted down with us for awhile too. He also looked at a pamphlet, saw I had lived in Minnesota and said, "Twins?" That made me smile. She checked in with all sorts of things in his life, gave him all sorts of advice...I think at one point he was talking about job searching and she started telling him, "You've got to go that way and check in with this business..." It was wonderful...this woman is an 80 year old fireball who seems to be the center of her whole street.
I hope I get to see her again!
Sunday Goodness, part one
Last night I went out to a prayer meeting in Higashi Kurume, as is normal about once a month. I'm kind of the oddball of the group...they are five Christian adults, four of whom are married, three of whom have white hair, and all of whom attend a (as they say) "Bible Church" of some kind. We are united by a love of stories about God moving and a strong vision for united prayer among Christians in Tokyo.
Prayer meetings in Higashi Kurume often seem more like story telling sessions than traditional prayer times. At least, we often manage to spend more time cheering each other on with stories of what we're hearing in our churches, our city, or on other sides of the globe than we do praying. But the prayer is powerful, exciting, joyful as well.
Last night we were talking about on the line pre-Christians we know. There are a lot of them in Japan. We talked about things we've heard them say for why they don't become Christian (everything from fearing that the persecutions of 400 years ago will repeat and they will be persecuted to the belief that they are too old). A pastor in the group shared a story about a girlfriend and boyfriend. The girlfriend was Christian. Someone told the boyfriend the gospel and that he needed to repent and ask Jesus for salvation. He turned to his girlfriend and said, "Why didn't you tell me?" Our response: ouch.
But I was still thinking about that line and about the way I talk to my students. I give them lots of information. I explain all sorts of things about their questions. As long as they are willing to ask, I am willing to be completely honest with them. But it's kind of like the girl in Beginner Bible last Thursday...after I have drawn diagrams, spilled my heart, shared every thought I have, they are still the ones left to make the important conclusion, "So...this means I should follow God?"
I have shared before about Takaaki--the young guy who prayed for 9 hours during 24/7, who attends every Christian event that we have when school isn't killing him, who sees Bible passages and always seems to come up with the conclusion, "If this is true...we really should be responding to God, shouldn't we?". Takaaki came to Bible Study this morning. He came to church too. And the whole service through, I was thinking..."No more talking in circles...I have got to ask Takaaki if he knows how a person becomes Christian and let him know if he doesn't." He was talking to Masujima sensei--a strong leader in the congregation for awhile at the end of the service. Finally, I got to him and rather awkwardly said, "Umm...Takaaki, I have something I need to talk to you about."
I asked him if he knew how to become a Christian and he said, "I was just talking with Masujima sensei about what I do if I want to get baptized." I tried not to dance all over the sanctuary right there. But then I told him how I'd been thinking I needed to talk to him the whole service through. He said, "That was good timing."
So, I explained to him how it seems like a lot of Japanese people think you have to understand everything about Christianity to become a Christian. To which he laughed and said, "Yeah...me too." And so I told him how I don't know everything about Christianity and Yasui sensei doesn't either and we're all on this path together. He was surprised. (Which kind of surprised me, for all the questions I answer "I don't know!" in class). Then I said that the first step of becoming a Christian is just telling Jesus that you are a sinner and that you need Him and asking Him to be in control of your life. He was shocked. Which confirmed for me that I am not being as open with my students as I think I am.
He asked me where he could get "lessons" to learn about Christianity to become baptized, and so I pointed him to Yasui sensei.
But then I was a little more bold and said, "You know...you can pray that prayer to Jesus anytime. We could pray it together right now if you wanted."
He wasn't ready yet. He said he would have to think about it and that he had to go. But he didn't make it all the way out the door but instead started a conversation with a church member with the question, "Do you like talking to God?" Hee.
Please keep him in your prayers!
Prayer meetings in Higashi Kurume often seem more like story telling sessions than traditional prayer times. At least, we often manage to spend more time cheering each other on with stories of what we're hearing in our churches, our city, or on other sides of the globe than we do praying. But the prayer is powerful, exciting, joyful as well.
Last night we were talking about on the line pre-Christians we know. There are a lot of them in Japan. We talked about things we've heard them say for why they don't become Christian (everything from fearing that the persecutions of 400 years ago will repeat and they will be persecuted to the belief that they are too old). A pastor in the group shared a story about a girlfriend and boyfriend. The girlfriend was Christian. Someone told the boyfriend the gospel and that he needed to repent and ask Jesus for salvation. He turned to his girlfriend and said, "Why didn't you tell me?" Our response: ouch.
But I was still thinking about that line and about the way I talk to my students. I give them lots of information. I explain all sorts of things about their questions. As long as they are willing to ask, I am willing to be completely honest with them. But it's kind of like the girl in Beginner Bible last Thursday...after I have drawn diagrams, spilled my heart, shared every thought I have, they are still the ones left to make the important conclusion, "So...this means I should follow God?"
I have shared before about Takaaki--the young guy who prayed for 9 hours during 24/7, who attends every Christian event that we have when school isn't killing him, who sees Bible passages and always seems to come up with the conclusion, "If this is true...we really should be responding to God, shouldn't we?". Takaaki came to Bible Study this morning. He came to church too. And the whole service through, I was thinking..."No more talking in circles...I have got to ask Takaaki if he knows how a person becomes Christian and let him know if he doesn't." He was talking to Masujima sensei--a strong leader in the congregation for awhile at the end of the service. Finally, I got to him and rather awkwardly said, "Umm...Takaaki, I have something I need to talk to you about."
I asked him if he knew how to become a Christian and he said, "I was just talking with Masujima sensei about what I do if I want to get baptized." I tried not to dance all over the sanctuary right there. But then I told him how I'd been thinking I needed to talk to him the whole service through. He said, "That was good timing."
So, I explained to him how it seems like a lot of Japanese people think you have to understand everything about Christianity to become a Christian. To which he laughed and said, "Yeah...me too." And so I told him how I don't know everything about Christianity and Yasui sensei doesn't either and we're all on this path together. He was surprised. (Which kind of surprised me, for all the questions I answer "I don't know!" in class). Then I said that the first step of becoming a Christian is just telling Jesus that you are a sinner and that you need Him and asking Him to be in control of your life. He was shocked. Which confirmed for me that I am not being as open with my students as I think I am.
He asked me where he could get "lessons" to learn about Christianity to become baptized, and so I pointed him to Yasui sensei.
But then I was a little more bold and said, "You know...you can pray that prayer to Jesus anytime. We could pray it together right now if you wanted."
He wasn't ready yet. He said he would have to think about it and that he had to go. But he didn't make it all the way out the door but instead started a conversation with a church member with the question, "Do you like talking to God?" Hee.
Please keep him in your prayers!
Thursday, September 11, 2008
And we're back...
My first Beginner Bible class was today!
There's something about new terms that always makes it very, very clear how little about Christianity is in the culture of the country I live in. And it is both frustrating and satisfying...satisfying because I realize how much my students have really learned about Christianity in the course of the last term, and frustrating because I have new students and must return to square one all over again.
Today there were two new students at Beginner Bible class...they are my favorite kinds of students, aka, the ones who ask difficult, honest questions. We read the creation of humans today, and I got way ahead of myself (because they didn't have the appropriate background info to actually understand the answers to their questions) and in the course of an hour and a half ended up drawing pictures and charts on the board to explain authority, the fall, the trinity, why God became a human, what it means for us, and what happened spiritually when Jesus died and rose again.
One of the new students is really observant. And I felt like she had a knack for picking out the parts of the text that cause disagreement among Christians interpreting. So, she immediately picked up on God saying "create them in our image" and asked about the "our". She also looked at what humans had originally been told to eat and asked if eating meat was considered a sin.
The other new student, on the other hand, while studying the "trinity diagram" asked if Jesus and the Holy Spirit existed at the same time.
I think they kind of got the important points, though. But man!! I was reflecting during this whole thing how good it is that God uses multiple people to share the gospel, because many of these students I don't see more than once, or at least not so consistently. But it's so impossible to explain only the important points! At least in a way that would have meaning. I could tell them simply that Jesus died for their sins...that his death set us free from slavery to sin and Satan. But that has never seemed to get through...it gets stuck in questions like: who is Jesus? Are you saying *I'm* a sinner? What is this sin thing anyway? What does that have to do with my daily life? Who is Satan? If Jesus death set us free, why is the world still screwed up? Why are you insisting that there is one God and then talking about three different parts?
But by laying the entire thing out, it makes sense. You have God's command from the moment of our creation to rule over the earth, the devastating decision to turn that authority over to Satan, and then the brilliance of God...not to keep shouting down from heaven to try to get us to get it right, but clothing himself in human skin to fix what only a human had the authority to fix.
Somehow, something worked. At least, by the end of all my board diagram, one of the new students summed it up very well: "So...we should follow God?"
Please pray for my students...the new ones are Naoko and Hirano-san.
There's something about new terms that always makes it very, very clear how little about Christianity is in the culture of the country I live in. And it is both frustrating and satisfying...satisfying because I realize how much my students have really learned about Christianity in the course of the last term, and frustrating because I have new students and must return to square one all over again.
Today there were two new students at Beginner Bible class...they are my favorite kinds of students, aka, the ones who ask difficult, honest questions. We read the creation of humans today, and I got way ahead of myself (because they didn't have the appropriate background info to actually understand the answers to their questions) and in the course of an hour and a half ended up drawing pictures and charts on the board to explain authority, the fall, the trinity, why God became a human, what it means for us, and what happened spiritually when Jesus died and rose again.
One of the new students is really observant. And I felt like she had a knack for picking out the parts of the text that cause disagreement among Christians interpreting. So, she immediately picked up on God saying "create them in our image" and asked about the "our". She also looked at what humans had originally been told to eat and asked if eating meat was considered a sin.
The other new student, on the other hand, while studying the "trinity diagram" asked if Jesus and the Holy Spirit existed at the same time.
I think they kind of got the important points, though. But man!! I was reflecting during this whole thing how good it is that God uses multiple people to share the gospel, because many of these students I don't see more than once, or at least not so consistently. But it's so impossible to explain only the important points! At least in a way that would have meaning. I could tell them simply that Jesus died for their sins...that his death set us free from slavery to sin and Satan. But that has never seemed to get through...it gets stuck in questions like: who is Jesus? Are you saying *I'm* a sinner? What is this sin thing anyway? What does that have to do with my daily life? Who is Satan? If Jesus death set us free, why is the world still screwed up? Why are you insisting that there is one God and then talking about three different parts?
But by laying the entire thing out, it makes sense. You have God's command from the moment of our creation to rule over the earth, the devastating decision to turn that authority over to Satan, and then the brilliance of God...not to keep shouting down from heaven to try to get us to get it right, but clothing himself in human skin to fix what only a human had the authority to fix.
Somehow, something worked. At least, by the end of all my board diagram, one of the new students summed it up very well: "So...we should follow God?"
Please pray for my students...the new ones are Naoko and Hirano-san.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
How to see beyond?
We had another English book club today. It's been interesting and frustrating to read The Heavenly Man with people from my church. At the beginning, the book causes a big explosion. There are two non-Christians in the group, and all the others are church members. One of the non-Christians went on a rant about how he didn't want to read a book that was just full of miracles. A church member went on a long processing train of thought about how this book was like reading the Bible and he couldn't figure out why the Chinese people became Christian. Multiple people were confused about why the main character became Christian (his father had cancer and was cured overnight when prayed for...the whole family followed Jesus from then on).
The way people respond to miracles often confuses me. When I read about miracles...real miracles, mind you...those things that are inexplicable aside from God existing...they make me starving to see Him in real life. Reading about them always makes me go slightly crazy...that is, I end up in my room in tears begging Him not to hide from me and not to keep His face turned from the places I live. I watch many people (Christian and non), however, hear about miracles, shake their heads, and say "I can't believe that." To me, when I read these stories, I think not believing them requires a greater leap of faith, and a much more detailed argument, than believing them. The number of things that would have to be true for this story to be anything other than God touching China with a magnificent show of power is unbelievable to me.
Anyway...we had another meeting today. I really appreciated the church member who is leading the club because he has put a tremendous amount of work into getting us maps and putting together time lines and looking up Bible verses to go along with the story. It definitely adds to the story when you see where some of the places are, and just how far they were willing to walk to carry the gospel.
What I have realized, though, is how much suffering can steal our eyes away from God in the times when He is often most visible. Today, they decided that we will read chapter eight next month, and after that we will probably skip to chapter 22 because everything in between those two chapters is pretty much "just persecutions", the leader claimed. I was not sure how to respond.
Partially, I am a little relieved. I know that this book has stirred up some of the thoughts that needed to be stirred up, and I'm not sure the church members need to read it for the next year and a half, which is about how long they would be reading it at the rate they're going. They've purchased the book, so if there are people who God is nudging to see a bigger picture of Him, they can always read it on their own.
But it brings up an interesting point to me...the sufferings that Yun goes through are horrible. But they are not the whole story, or even close to the whole story. They are going to miss stories of unbelievable transformation within prison walls...of a complete fast that lasted longer than 40 days...they'll miss Yun learning about his service to the Lord becoming an idol and how he brought his focus back...they'll miss efforts to unify the house churches in China...they'll miss seeing the amazing good things that happen because Yun stands up for the truth boldly, and the way God cares for him constantly while he is inside prison walls...and stories of God warning Yun ahead of time about what will happen through visions so that he is prepared and can continue to honor God through everything that happens to him.
But hearing from the people who have read the whole book, it's almost like they didn't see any of this stuff anyway...my non-Christian student who attends this book club described the book after she finished reading it as "a book where the man suffers through the entire thing." She made it sound like every page was nothing other than reading about a man in agony.
Perceptions are interesting things...it's interesting to me that, in a book where I see God's power overcoming in the most dramatic, awesome ways possible, others see nothing more than a man tortured around every turn.
It's something I experienced myself, especially with the prophetic books of the Bible. I remember reading Amos for the first time as a college student and feeling physically sick. When I read Amos, all I saw was God's anger, God's threats of violence, people being killed. It took until the fourth time reading it (in the course of a week...it was for class) to see the verses "They sell the righteous for silver, and the needy for a pair of sandals. They trample on the heads of the poor as upon the dust of the ground and deny justice to the oppressed." (2:6-7). That was all I needed...my view of God at that time involved a God who mostly cared for the poor, homeless, etc., and seeing that the reason he was angry was because serious, serious injustice was happening was my gateway into being able to see Him in those books...but I had to have that opening first. That one view of His goodness in the middle of verses like "For three sins of Israel, even for four, I will not turn back my wrath" (which caused my stomach to ache) was all it took to begin the journey of seeing Him other places in the prophetic books.
I wonder what the opening would be for these church members. I wish I could help them see God and be inspired by this story.
The way people respond to miracles often confuses me. When I read about miracles...real miracles, mind you...those things that are inexplicable aside from God existing...they make me starving to see Him in real life. Reading about them always makes me go slightly crazy...that is, I end up in my room in tears begging Him not to hide from me and not to keep His face turned from the places I live. I watch many people (Christian and non), however, hear about miracles, shake their heads, and say "I can't believe that." To me, when I read these stories, I think not believing them requires a greater leap of faith, and a much more detailed argument, than believing them. The number of things that would have to be true for this story to be anything other than God touching China with a magnificent show of power is unbelievable to me.
Anyway...we had another meeting today. I really appreciated the church member who is leading the club because he has put a tremendous amount of work into getting us maps and putting together time lines and looking up Bible verses to go along with the story. It definitely adds to the story when you see where some of the places are, and just how far they were willing to walk to carry the gospel.
What I have realized, though, is how much suffering can steal our eyes away from God in the times when He is often most visible. Today, they decided that we will read chapter eight next month, and after that we will probably skip to chapter 22 because everything in between those two chapters is pretty much "just persecutions", the leader claimed. I was not sure how to respond.
Partially, I am a little relieved. I know that this book has stirred up some of the thoughts that needed to be stirred up, and I'm not sure the church members need to read it for the next year and a half, which is about how long they would be reading it at the rate they're going. They've purchased the book, so if there are people who God is nudging to see a bigger picture of Him, they can always read it on their own.
But it brings up an interesting point to me...the sufferings that Yun goes through are horrible. But they are not the whole story, or even close to the whole story. They are going to miss stories of unbelievable transformation within prison walls...of a complete fast that lasted longer than 40 days...they'll miss Yun learning about his service to the Lord becoming an idol and how he brought his focus back...they'll miss efforts to unify the house churches in China...they'll miss seeing the amazing good things that happen because Yun stands up for the truth boldly, and the way God cares for him constantly while he is inside prison walls...and stories of God warning Yun ahead of time about what will happen through visions so that he is prepared and can continue to honor God through everything that happens to him.
But hearing from the people who have read the whole book, it's almost like they didn't see any of this stuff anyway...my non-Christian student who attends this book club described the book after she finished reading it as "a book where the man suffers through the entire thing." She made it sound like every page was nothing other than reading about a man in agony.
Perceptions are interesting things...it's interesting to me that, in a book where I see God's power overcoming in the most dramatic, awesome ways possible, others see nothing more than a man tortured around every turn.
It's something I experienced myself, especially with the prophetic books of the Bible. I remember reading Amos for the first time as a college student and feeling physically sick. When I read Amos, all I saw was God's anger, God's threats of violence, people being killed. It took until the fourth time reading it (in the course of a week...it was for class) to see the verses "They sell the righteous for silver, and the needy for a pair of sandals. They trample on the heads of the poor as upon the dust of the ground and deny justice to the oppressed." (2:6-7). That was all I needed...my view of God at that time involved a God who mostly cared for the poor, homeless, etc., and seeing that the reason he was angry was because serious, serious injustice was happening was my gateway into being able to see Him in those books...but I had to have that opening first. That one view of His goodness in the middle of verses like "For three sins of Israel, even for four, I will not turn back my wrath" (which caused my stomach to ache) was all it took to begin the journey of seeing Him other places in the prophetic books.
I wonder what the opening would be for these church members. I wish I could help them see God and be inspired by this story.
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Fun Registration TImes
Yesterday was a good afternoon at Hongo. Classes will start next week, but this week we come and hang out at the center from about 2-7:30 to register new students. Sometimes things are pretty slow...our old students usually don't register until classes start, and we don't usually get dramatic rushes of new people. Today our first new visitors of the day were two girls who came in at 7:30 just as we were picking up our bags and getting ready to flip light switches.
But yesterday was really busy! We had something like eight people stop by. My favorite, however, was a guy named Amar. He looked Japanese to me, so when he first tried to tell me his name, I automatically tried to make it into a Japanese sounding name. "Amaru?" But no...he corrected me. And then told me his full name, which I made him write down and teach me how to pronounce. He is from Mongolia.
Normally we go pretty easy on our registering students...Etsuko gives an explanation of our free Bible classes and strongly invites people to attend those as well, even if only to get more English practice. But when she asked Amar any questions, he told her that he had seen on the internet that we were a Lutheran organization, and so he had looked up the history of the Lutheran church and Martin Luther and wondered if Etsuko would tell him more about it.
I love seeing Etsuko get the chance to do what she really loves doing. She wanted to be a pastor, but has ended up a church and English school receptionist. The days I come in when she has had to shove letters in envelopes all day I see how much it wears on her. But give her anyone who will give her the chance to talk and encourage and teach and she lights up.
This Mongolian grad student was completely engrossed in her explanation of papal bulls, sola scriptura, and salvation by faith. I was a little afraid she was overdoing it, but once she stopped he just pressed on with the questions. She had a Bible out soon enough and was showing him through that as well. Only when two more prospective students walked in the door did he jump to his feet, a little embarrassed, and apologize for taking so much of our time. We assured him he had been no trouble at all, and he assured us he would be back with more questions.
A little while later, we had a Korean guy stop by who is only in Tokyo for a few weeks, but asked if he could pray in our church.
I have a cool job. :-)
But yesterday was really busy! We had something like eight people stop by. My favorite, however, was a guy named Amar. He looked Japanese to me, so when he first tried to tell me his name, I automatically tried to make it into a Japanese sounding name. "Amaru?" But no...he corrected me. And then told me his full name, which I made him write down and teach me how to pronounce. He is from Mongolia.
Normally we go pretty easy on our registering students...Etsuko gives an explanation of our free Bible classes and strongly invites people to attend those as well, even if only to get more English practice. But when she asked Amar any questions, he told her that he had seen on the internet that we were a Lutheran organization, and so he had looked up the history of the Lutheran church and Martin Luther and wondered if Etsuko would tell him more about it.
I love seeing Etsuko get the chance to do what she really loves doing. She wanted to be a pastor, but has ended up a church and English school receptionist. The days I come in when she has had to shove letters in envelopes all day I see how much it wears on her. But give her anyone who will give her the chance to talk and encourage and teach and she lights up.
This Mongolian grad student was completely engrossed in her explanation of papal bulls, sola scriptura, and salvation by faith. I was a little afraid she was overdoing it, but once she stopped he just pressed on with the questions. She had a Bible out soon enough and was showing him through that as well. Only when two more prospective students walked in the door did he jump to his feet, a little embarrassed, and apologize for taking so much of our time. We assured him he had been no trouble at all, and he assured us he would be back with more questions.
A little while later, we had a Korean guy stop by who is only in Tokyo for a few weeks, but asked if he could pray in our church.
I have a cool job. :-)
You know what kind of pray-ers you're getting involved with when...
You tell them the prayer time is from 9-11 and you receive an email in response that says:
"hey is it 9am to 11am, 9pm to 11pm, or 9am to 11pm?"
Personally, I think 9pm to 11am would have been more likely than 9am to 11pm, but you know. To each his or her own. ;-)
"hey is it 9am to 11am, 9pm to 11pm, or 9am to 11pm?"
Personally, I think 9pm to 11am would have been more likely than 9am to 11pm, but you know. To each his or her own. ;-)
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Ah, the Tokyo Life
As of checking my email this morning, if I did everything I have been invited to that would be potentially good and cool this weekend, I would be:
-Leading an overnight prayer meeting for Japan praying at the same time as a Hong Kong group from 9pm Friday to 6am Saturday.
-Taking off to meet the GAPers (Gospel Assembly of Praise) people at the beach at 1pm Saturday afternoon.
-Either making it back at 7pm to go to Tokyo Baptist to watch a girl who found me on the 24/7 site on the internet but who I haven't met yet sing in a gospel choir there (how's that for a run-on sentence?)...or going to watch the same thing Sunday morning at 9am. She didn't find me to invite me to the choir concert...she's looking for a group that prays for the nations...I'm excited to meet her someday hopefully soon!
-Hongo for morning worship at 10:30am
-And reading Brother Yun with the English Book Club at Hongo from 2-4
-And worshiping with the GAPers in the afternoon at 4:00 and hanging out with them through dinner.
I'm in one of my super-hyperactive excited phases...so I look at all this and say...yay! Nothing overlaps! That might be doable! *laughing at self* Someone hit me over the head.
So...any of you Tokyo folks want to pray for Japan overnight, come to the beach with some cool people, or go watch a gospel choir with me? Come to think of it...oh man. This might be the Saturday my revival prayer group meets as well...wow. Never mind about nothing overlapping. Happy back to regular schedules, everyone! ;-) (I am *so* excited to be moving again!)
-Leading an overnight prayer meeting for Japan praying at the same time as a Hong Kong group from 9pm Friday to 6am Saturday.
-Taking off to meet the GAPers (Gospel Assembly of Praise) people at the beach at 1pm Saturday afternoon.
-Either making it back at 7pm to go to Tokyo Baptist to watch a girl who found me on the 24/7 site on the internet but who I haven't met yet sing in a gospel choir there (how's that for a run-on sentence?)...or going to watch the same thing Sunday morning at 9am. She didn't find me to invite me to the choir concert...she's looking for a group that prays for the nations...I'm excited to meet her someday hopefully soon!
-Hongo for morning worship at 10:30am
-And reading Brother Yun with the English Book Club at Hongo from 2-4
-And worshiping with the GAPers in the afternoon at 4:00 and hanging out with them through dinner.
I'm in one of my super-hyperactive excited phases...so I look at all this and say...yay! Nothing overlaps! That might be doable! *laughing at self* Someone hit me over the head.
So...any of you Tokyo folks want to pray for Japan overnight, come to the beach with some cool people, or go watch a gospel choir with me? Come to think of it...oh man. This might be the Saturday my revival prayer group meets as well...wow. Never mind about nothing overlapping. Happy back to regular schedules, everyone! ;-) (I am *so* excited to be moving again!)
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