"God did not bring you to Japan for the Japanese, He brought you to Japan for you."

Fuji-san

For two days we had our intern retreat at Lake Yamanaka right at Mt. Fuji. It was absolutely beautiful! I praise God for holding off the rain for a few days! We had a very relaxing time, we rode bikes around the lake where all you had to do is turn your head and there was Mt. Fuji. It is huge...I can't believe I am going to be climing that in just a few weeks! We had times to worship together and laugh together. Last night was amazing, we took the Lord's Supper together as a team and we had a wonderful time of prayer where we begged God for the salvation of Japan.

It was a time for us to pour out our hearts to God for the nation of Japan, But just before we began our prayer time we sang a song that says, "Ruin my life, the plans I have made, Ruin desires for my own selfish gain Destroy the idols that have take your place for it's You Alone I live for." We asked God to ruin any plans of ours that were not of Him. I trust He heard our prayers and will be faithful!

God showed me in these past few days what He wants to teach me this summer. The past few weeks have been very difficult for me in every way possible. Satan decided he wanted to weasel his way in a find any foothole he could, and I was not trusting the Words that God was trying so hard to get through to me. But this past two days God revealed to me what He was trying to teach me last week as I began reading through Isaiah. I started reading in chapter 40 and the same thing kept standing out to me "Do not be discouraged, Do not be dismayed... I have chosen you." I kept telling God I am trying so hard not to be discouraged, but satan continued bringing things to my mind that were discouraging.... I kept asking God why did you put me in this position I am inadequate, I am quiet , I am not a bold person, satan was using any lie he could dig up, the sad thing is they are all lies I have heard before (he never uses anything new). But this weekend God revealed to me through one of the missonaries Bible Study, that "God did not bring me to Japan for the Japanese people, He brought me to Japan for me." God was reminding me that when He showed me in His Word that He chose me (Isaiah 44), it wasn't just that He chose me for the position of the Lead Ladies Intern, but He chose me to come to Japan, He, the Creator of the universe, they One true God, Jehovah Jireh, chose me to be an instrument for Him here in Japan. He is also teaching me how to speak up for what is right, and not just think that because I am a quiet person my opinion doesn't matter. He has given me plenty of opportunities to speak up. I love when God reveals you a little glimpse of His intentions!

Please continue to pray for our team. God has brought about a sense of community and unity, and it is an answer to prayer! We have 19 new team members (high school interns) that arrived this past week and so pray that we can all get to know each other and that we all mesh well and can work together well!

Praise God for what He is doing and what He is going to do!

Pictures

We rented Bikes! Yay so much fun!

Amy at a Recycling fair we found

A FUNNY sign! Read carefully

Me and Rachel

The Girls on the Leadership Team

Amy, Sonya, Audrey, Jessica, Birmy and Lindsay

*Audrey and Sonya are journey girls

GIRLS NIGHT

The Kunitachi Team.(Lindsay, Amy, PJ, Jessica)

God is the God of peace and comfort and restoration

This past week has been very difficult in many ways. Satan had weasled his way into our team through internal struggles, conflict and many different areas he tried to prevent unity among our team. But I praise God that He is so much bigger than any of satan's schemes.

Yesterday was missionary day. We had all the tokyo missionaries out on the field with us. It was a good experience to get to serve along side them. The missionary at our station had us go like Paul yesterday to evangelize. As we were going (do things that interest us) and try to meet people. Amy and I met this man who was so confused. He had taken things from like 5 different religions and picked what he liked and put it altogether. He told us about parables from the Bible, he talked to us about reincarnation... all kinds of things. We were able to explain the parables to him and share what they meant, because his interpretation was way off. Please pray for Y-san. He works there in Kunitachi and so hopefully we can see him on a regualr basis, even if it is just to stop in to say hi. We are praying that he will want to do a Bible study and we can help him to understand the Bible.

All last week, when I was really discouraged I want to praise God for His Word, I am so thankful for how He spoke to me through is Word. My journal is full of "Don't be discouraged" "Do not be dismayed" and "Ihave chosen" Isaiah was the prefect book to be reading through this past week!

Thank yall so much for your prayers.

In our Karaoke church on Sunday, we had two new Japanese Christians that attended. Y-san and o-san. Y-san is so enouraging, he is so interested in the Bible and is he is teaching us things from the Bible. O-san was baptized yesterday, so give God all the glory for how he is changing hearts and lives! Pray for these believers as they grow in their relationship with the Lord. Pray for boldness.
Thank you for your prayers, Keep on praying! We leave for our intern retreat on thursday. I am excited about the time of relaxation! But it starts getting busy as soon as we get back!

So I haven't written a blog in several days, sorry about that. Things startin to pick up with teams comin in. We have new team that came in yesterday. The high school interns are preparing to come next week. The get in on wednesday and we leave on Thursday for our intern retreat at a cabin by the lake, so hopefully that will be nice and relaxing. Our prayers have been answered for our station (Kunitachi). Our station is very small and it is difficult to do things like 5 Minute English because the station and our campus (Hitsosubashi University) are close together so we don't want to risk being noticed at both places and being kicked off. But we had gone for two weeks just covering that station in prayer, and last week our two week team met 3 girls and Friday night we got to have dinner with them. L-san, K-san and Y-san, and we ate dinner with them and were able to share the Gospel with them, so a seed was planted, so please be praying that they will contact us to hang out again.

Then on Tuesday Amy and I met a woman, who had wonderful English, she was like 74 years old and she stopped us on the road to talk with us. She was so happy, she told us how she loved country music, and she especially loved Willie Nelson. Her name is K-san, and she is a Christian. When she was 14 years old she began studying English with an American Missionary, and she studied the Bible and she learned English. When she was 17 she was baptized, and she attends church even now. She was so encouraging to us. It was our first contact that we made at Kunitachi. Amy and I hope to meet with her soon, to have coffee, we want to be an encouragement for her, because she even told us it was so hard to be a Christian here. Please pray for K-san, also her daughter and granddaughter.

Please be in prayer for C-san and S-san that became Christians last week, pray that they will have free time to meet next week or the week after! They weren't able to meet this week, so pray that God will just bind the enemy from them.

A huge praise, M-san, my very first contact this summer, it had been a few weeks since I had heard from him. I was nervous if we would be able to meet again. And at a point when I was really low, God blew my mind! M-san called me on Sunday and came to church and dinner, and he told us that he wants to study the Bible, so Praise God for that. Please pray that our schedules will work out and we can meet for Bible study.

Please continue to pray for our team here, pray for joy, peace, and renewed spirits!
Thank you for your prayers, God is working in mighty ways and He continues to amaze me and He reminds me that He doesn't need me at all, He will work around me. But be encouraged that He chooses to use me!

Today is the day of Salvation!

Praise God, we have two new sisters in Christ! Thank you so much for praying for C-san and for Y-san. Last nite after 3 hours of Bible Study, they prayed to receive Jesus Christ as their personal Savior! they told us " I want to accept him" Praise God! We will continue to meet with them for Bible study! Next wednesday we will begin talking with them about baptism! God is moving in a mighty way here. Even though some things here have been difficult, God continues to show us that He is so much bigger than that! May God receive all the glory!

Before meeting with these women, I received a message that 2 others had prayed to receive Christ. That was 4 people just yesterday! Please pray that God's power continues to move in a mighty way here in Tokyo. Please pray for God to bind satan from our team, from the Japanese and for God to break the strongholds here in Japan!

I am currently listening to they hymn, The Blood will Never Lose its Power. That is so true, it reachest to the highest mountain and the lowest valley! I thank God for the words of this song!

Please keep praying! Satan knows God is at work, and he is not happy at all. God is stronger!

In the valley, there are still glimpses of Sunshine

If I were to tell you things here were great, it wouldn’t be true. It is very difficult here, in many ways. But since my last blog (Sunday) we have 3 new brothers in Christ. Praise God! He is at work here. I met a Christian today, his name is Kazuo. He is going to disciple Yoshi, who has been a Christian since Friday.

Things here, within our team, are difficult, we are really crying out to God to unify us. We all get along for the most part, but the way the team is split up into train station teams, it is difficult, we have some teams really struggling. Please be praying for that us in that situation. We want unity, but most of all we need community, all throughout Acts you see the apostles doing everything together! They had a community. We all have one purpose and that is to tell the Japanese about Jesus Christ. We have had several teams kicked off campuses so far (I think 3). That is so discouraging for some teams.

Today Justin and I will be meeting with C-san and Y-san for Bible study. We met with them this past Sunday, so please please be praying for these two women! I truly believe C-san will become a believer before the end of the summer! We will be talking about Jesus from beginning to end. She emailed Justin this weekend, asking questions about the 10 Commandments. So he answered that so we may be going over that as well!! Please pray for their salvation!

Prepare the Way, Prepare the Way, Prepare the Way of the Lord

Well this week, it has been full of ups and downs. But we have 7 new brothers and sisters in Christ in the past 10 days. So I praise God for that.

Please be prayin for C-san and Y-san! These are two women, one who has studied the Bible for a year with a journeyman who was here and left a few months ago. Justin met her on the bus last week and she said that it must be God's will that she continue to study the Bible because she met him. We met with both women today and C-san knows a lot about the Bible, but she still has some questions. So please pray that we can answer their questions clearly!

Today at our Karaoke church in Tachikawa we had our first Japanese Christian come, so we were very excited. Y-san was so encouraging, he shared with us what he had learned from God's Word since he became a Christian on Friday, he said he understood that he had been made complete in Christ, and he has new life. He was so encouraging. He is very excited to continue studying the Bible, and wants to learn much more. Pray for him as he continues to be discipled. Pray for boldness and courage for him to boldly share his faith. Pray for him as he makes a decision about his dream of being an actor.

Pray for our other new believers.

Pray for our team for unity, for spiritual warfare to end, for strength as we continue and it gets busy with teams coming in.

Thank you for your prayers this far! God is at work here!! He is goin to do some amazing things!

This is my prayer in the desert, when all thats within me feels dry, this is my prayer in hunger and need MY GOD IS THE GOD WHO PROVIDES...

So Friday night Justin and I met with A-san and we shared the Gospel with her. We went into great detail with her, she said it was difficult for her to understand, but she was understanding some of what we were saying. She wants to meet with us again but we think her mom is telling her not to meet with us because she is very hesitant. She wants to meet with us but she doesn't want to study the Bible. So please continue to pray for her, that God will soften her heart.

So these past 4 days have been very difficult for me. Satan is trying anything and everything he can to discourage us. The ILT (Intern Leadership Team) is really getting hit hard with a lot of the logicstics. All the small details we feel are really getting in the way of what God is trying to do here.

It is very difficult to explain everything, it is just really hard, so I ask you to please pray for us, please pray for me! I am having a hard time, confrontation is not my thing at all and God is really testing me in this area.

Please pray for us to constantly, moment by moment seeking the Holy Spirit, and seeking His guidance and direction.

Please pray that Justin and I can meet with Miki sometime soon. Our schedules have had a difficult time getting on the same page.

Please pray for unity among our team.