to be honest, february was a weird month. i had just gotten used to the routine of ministry, i was chugging away like the little engine that could, i was sharing the Gospel more than i ever had in my life, meeting tons of new people, then we go to Thailand for two weeks and while it was amazing, it really screwed up my rhythm. i spent basically the whole first week back just re-adjusting and recovering, and while i did get to have some awesome appointments with students, i felt like i wasn't really that productive this past month. it was a slow month for ministry since almost all my contacts are now either not in Tokyo or working/searching for jobs 24/7. it's like staying at your university over the summer after freshman year of college- no one's really around.
positive side:
we had an amazing Valentine's party for our girls, i got to catch up on a ton of skype appointments, re-read the Chronicles of Narnia (i swear- every time i read those i get something new out of them....aaaah so good), watch 8 Ghibli movies in Japanese to practice my Japanese listening as well as become more knowledgable of Japanese pop culture (for the record, all of these are fantastic and you should watch them, but watch them in Japanese with English subtitles: Kiki's Delivery Service, My Neighbor Totoro, Ponyo, Ocean Waves, Castle in the Sky, Howl's Moving Castle, Tales from Earthsea and my FAVORITE, Whisper of the Heart), started putting my New Year's resolution of cooking into practice, and my friend Brandon from USC came to visit for a couple days. i was also still doing the homeless church ministry and Student Impact's dance ministry. we've been having prayer meetings every morning and planning a lot for our Student Conference coming up in 2 weeks as well as Shinkan- the start of the new school year, a crazy busy time when we're trying to have as many outreaches, parties and ways to meet new freshmen students as possible. you see, new freshmen are not yet attached to any club or activity that takes up their whole life, therefore they are wonderful because they have that Thing that eludes all other university students in Japan: TIME. that is, they have Time before they get plugged into a club that literally eats away every moment. so Shinkan is the most important, crazy, busy, rewarding time of the year in terms of ministry.
the guys gave us roses and made us heart pancakes for Valentine's Day! it was so sweet!
Valentine's Day party with some of our girls!we've also started a couple new projects- we want to start doing some sort of homeless ministry for the homeless people around Waseda University, our main campus. last friday we made a ton of spagetti and put it in 12 take out boxes and gave them out to homeless people in a huge park near campus, along with a book in Japanese about truth and God's love. we're hoping if we keep coming back they will start to recognize us and want to talk to us more. ideally we'd love to see it grow into something we can invite both Christian and non-Christian students to help with, as a way to connect our Christian and non-Christian contacts as well as give them opportunity to see God's love in action. the other vision project is Waseda Unity. some missionaries from YWAM also work at Waseda, and we've been talking with them about ways to unify the Christians on campus. they hosted a Waseda Unity Night, a time of prayer, worship and fellowship- it was so cool! 6 different ministries were represented, and it was awesome to see peoples' passion for revival at Waseda. apparently the kanji for Waseda mean something along the lines of "first harvest" in Japanese, which i don't think is a coincidence. also, KGK, a campus ministry that is found on a ton of universities in Japan, was STARTED at Waseda. God is moving at Waseda U. and we want to use Waseda Unity as a way to strengthen our influence on campus-- after all, it's not about CCC or YWAM or KGK or IHOP or any other ministry, it's about GOD and GOD's work and how can we best serve Him where He's already working. we've gotten to have a couple potluck dinner/hangouts at the YWAM house and talk a bit more about vision for more Unity things, that will hopefully take into effect soon. as a STINT team, we've also started working on starting up our own homeless ministry around Waseda University. last friday we made food and passed it out to homeless people who live in a big park near Waseda along with books about God's love and truth. hopefully they will start to recognize us and want to talk to us more in the future.
Waseda Unity Night worship time
one of the areas homeless people live in the parki've been kind of frustrated lately though- i've been feeling really exhausted the past couple weeks, and i feel like this whole month i've just felt so lazy and unorganized and unmotivated and undisciplined. it's not a fun place to be if you've ever been there, especially when i'm here specifically for an intense 10 months of go go go ministry, where we've got to make every best use of our time or else we may miss an opportunity, where every missed opportunity could be a lost opportunity...it's easy to feel like you aren't doing enough, especially when not a lot is really happening and you wonder if it's because of something you're not doing.
last night we saw Voyage of the Dawn Treader as a team. while it did really frustrate me how much they deviated from the book, they did add a couple things that i really did love. one was the way they did the scene where Lucy says the spell to make her more beautiful, and she realizes it's not what she wanted and Aslan comes to her and tells her not to doubt her worth. it actually made me cry. i never cry in movies. seriously. but it really hit me- probably because i doubt my beauty and worth a lot. but lately God's just been showing me how much He loves me and how that's enough. that He thinks i'm beautiful because He made me. that He's equipped me exactly how i'm supposed to be equipped. and after all, we can do ALL things in Christ. i've been reading a book lately called Captivating that talks about how Satan was jealous of Eve and when he told her to eat the apple he created doubt- he made her doubt that she was good enough without the knowledge from the tree. since then, Satan's been tormenting women ever since with self-doubt and insecurity. unfortunately, he's good at it. he knows exactly the things to say to take away our confidence. but i've started to realize that the times i'm most insecure are the times i'm focusing more on myself than God. so my goal is to, simply put, focus on God more than myself.
i watched a video a week or two ago that made me cry 4 times (that's seriously a big deal): John Lynch at Biola University- he spoke exactly what i needed to hear apparently. i highly encourage you to watch it- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7azfoonNqpc
prayer requests:
- energy
- discipline/focus
- for our Student Conference that is coming up in 2 weeks -- we will be training 113 students on growing their relationship with God and sharing their faith, but we also have a few non-Christian students coming. please pray that their eyes would be opened to the Truth!
- for more of God's vision for what He wants us to do for the new semester
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