Blizzard of Blessings

Because I didn't get my November report out in the midst of the holiday craziness, I am going to combine it with my December report. So much good stuff has been going on here though, so I am going to do it a little differently, in order to share with you the highlights without writing a novella.

First, the best parts:

Joel and I attended the Church Planting Institute conference at the beginning of November. When we arrived, there were conference staff members at the door to welcome us -- the first thing that they said to us was, "thank you for serving in Japan." Maybe that seems small, but I still feel so grateful and touched, even now, by the commitment the conference staff had to encouraging and loving all of us and to supporting God's work in Japan.

Another main focus of the Church Planting Institute is that, as Christians, we not only need to preach the gospel to those who have not heard it, but we also need to preach the gospel to one another -- Christians need to hear the gospel, too. I was really touched by this idea. One of the most nourishing things that I heard at the conference was a talk about our ministry of reconciliation (from 2 Cor. 5:16-21). I was especially moved by the realization that in verse 20, Paul tells us that it is our job to "be reconciled to God" -- we, ourselves, cannot reconcile others to God and we cannot share the message of reconciliation without it being written in our own hearts.

Another highlight was the weekend mini-retreat that our cell group hosted on the weekend of November 21st. We invited the Hitachi cell group up for some fellowship and some time to focus on prayer. On Saturday evening we had a prayer stations activity at the church. I think we were all blessed and encouraged by our time together. Since it was a three day weekend here, a couple of our friends from Hitachi stayed through Monday to do some sightseeing and extra hanging out.

In December, the main highlights were, of course, the holidays. Joel and I spent a ton of time preparing to host several friends for our Christmas celebration. And it was totally worth it! We had an excellent Christmas, which I think was as much of a blessing for our guests as it was for us. On the 26th, we traveled down to Mito to attend a worship workshop led by Keith Lancaster, and we worshiped at the Mito church on Sunday before heading back to Sendai.

And to close out 2009, Joel, Gaku and I traveled down to Gunma prefecture to spend a couple of days with Gaku's family. We got to visit with his parents and his three younger brothers (his two older siblings didn't come until after we had already left, so we hope to meet them the next time we visit). It was a great blessing to have such a relaxed New Year's celebration, as well as an opportunity to build relationships with Gaku's family -- they were wonderful hosts!

Some of the other things that happened in November and December:
(Click on the underlined ones for pictures)

November 2-4: Visited our friend, Yoshinori, in Shizuoka
November 6-8: Visited Mito Church of Christ
November 9: Combined preachers' meeting (our region and the Tokyo area) in Tachikawa
November 28-29: Visited Hachinohe Church of Christ
December 1-16: Joel traveled to Southeast Asia to do some more work and planning for the work going on in Siem Reap, Cambodia, and to serve at a retreat that the Bedok Church of Christ held in Malaysia
December 6: Took the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (results will come in February)
December 20: Christmas worship and church Christmas party
December 21: Debi's parents (Ron and Cindy) arrived in Sendai to visit for the holidays
December 23: Christmas party/Reception for Debi's parents



Please pray with me . . .

~a prayer for Gaku's grandfather and the rest of his family. Gaku's grandfather is in the final stages of lung cancer. Fortunately, he can be at home, because Gaku's mother, who is a nurse, can go to his house often to care for him and handle his pain management; however, this is also a difficult burden on her and the family.

~a prayer for the Sendai church. It has been a challenging year for our church family -- please pray with me that, as we all make decisions that will effect the future of our family this year, we will be full of God's wisdom and discernment.

~a prayer for my financial support. I was blessed this past summer to receive enough funding to last the rest of the year. However, as that money is just about used up, God is challenging me again to trust in him -- I feel strongly that he still wants me working in Japan, so I am asking you to pray with me for my faith in his provision, and also pray that those who are called by God to support this work financially will respond faithfully, swiftly and generously.

~a praise to God for all ways that he blessed me at Christmastime. If blessings were snowflakes, we would have had a white Christmas -- I was overcome with thankfulness for the blessing of being surrounded by friends, and the opportunity we had to rejoice together, encourage one another and bask in God's love, while we enjoyed our holidays.

~a praise to God for the time of worship we had in Mito with the Lancaster family. I felt so filled and refreshed by the worship as we all put our whole selves into the worship on Saturday afternoon and again on Sunday morning. Thank you God for giving us a way to praise you, because you are so good and so mighty and so worthy of praise.

~a prayer of thanksgiving for 2009. Personally, I have experienced more challenges and blessings than I can count or remember in this past year, but mostly I am just thankful for another year walking with our Father.

May God bless you and guide you through this new year!

Thank you, as always, for your faithful love, support, encouragement and prayers!