Alone with my father

This is my first post after my father's death.

About 4 weeks ago I woke up early because it was a beautiful day.  Winter had given way to spring and I wanted to embrace the new warm weather by spending some time getting healthier, so I went for a jog.  In the middle of my run I got a message from my brother that said "I need to talk to you".

Any time someone needs to talk to you it can be scary, but my brother has been going through some difficult things in his own right, so I thought I had a good idea of what he needed to talk about.  I didn't.

I finished my jog and then called my brother back once I got home. I'm glad I was at home with my wife when he answered the phone.  Thank God for blessings like that. Yukari started crying while I was still trying to understand the words my brother said.  It's amazing how slowly and quickly your mind can work at times. When my mind did start working again I could only think about one thing: I needed to get home.

The rest of the day was a whirlwind of buying plane tickets, getting my newborn daughter a passport, packing clothes, calling students and friends, cancelling appointments and trying to get home as quickly as I could.  I've been so thankful for my wife and her family and for their generosity to me and their gracious acceptance into their family under a difficult situation for a long time, but I've never been more thankful for the family I married into than in those hours before Yukari, Rina and I were able to board the airplane home.  While I can't often speak to my new family (because I'm not very good at speaking Japanese and they aren't very good at English) I learned in an indescribable way that love surpasses language.  Sitting next to my father-in-law as he drove us to the American Embassy, back to our apartment, to the airport (for a flight we all knew we wouldn't be able to make), back to our apartment and then to the airport again the next day, just sitting and not saying anything was one of the most overwhelming displays of love I've ever received.  I hope that one day I can express just how much those moments meant to me.  If not in words, then in some other way.

We made it to Tennessee safely.  I was more stressed than I knew and said some hurtful things to the people I love.  I didn't do well in the situation and for that I'm really, truly sorry.  My wife saw my father in person for the first time in the funeral home. She said some very kind words to him and left us alone.

The rest of the week was a beautiful time with family, friends, and a multitude of people from a variety of backgrounds who were impacted by my father during his life.  His memorial service was deemed a "Celebration of Life" and for many of the people who went, it was a celebration.  For me it felt different, from the moment my wife left me alone in that funeral home my thoughts have centered on how much I've failed.

When I saw those hundreds (literally hundreds) of people who came from all over Tennessee to that small church to remember my dad and how much he loved them I thought about how I failed in understanding my father's love.

I thought about my plans to move back to Tennessee after my parents retired.  I thought about my own foolishness in planning to use my daughter to make my dad proud of me.

I thought about all of the ways I was different than what I thought my father wanted from me.  I've been thinking a lot about the ways I've failed.  A lot of people have been asking me how I am and if I'm okay, and what I want to express is a deep sense of hope, the hope that comes from believing in a God that is the author of life and gives life eternal, and a hope that comes from knowing that I'm not alone in my failures, that I'm following in the precedence of almost every biblical figure apart from Christ.  I want to show that I know these things to be true, but I also don't want to hide that what I'm experiencing now is definitely more on the spectrum of sad than happy.  I have a deep, enduring hope and trust, but the surface, the moment to moment, is an enduring sadness, a feeling of loss and regret.  While I don't feel helpless, I don't exactly feel "alright" either.  I wanted to write a message about dealing with my failures by looking at biblical examples, (I was thinking about Jacob and the way he disappointed his father in comparison to his brother; David who dealt with a deep depression in his failures to live righteously and meet the expectations of his heavenly father, and the prodigal son who experienced the joy of acceptance even though he expected rejection by his father) but even as I prepare that message for my church family, it's not the message I want to put here.  It would end up being more pedantic than honest and what I want to show here isn't as clean as all that.  I know the stories, and I know the theology, but some (if not most) problems and some sadnesses aren't erased by a lecture or a bible study lesson.

It's fitting that I would see myself as Jacob in my relationship to my father, because now I feel like I could use a real good wrestling match.

Being a follower of Christ means believing in a message of eternal hope.  The promise of life and life eternal was a central theme in Christ's message.  Usually my image of "hope" is a happy one.  Maybe it's because most of my struggles have originated internally, and this is such a different kind of difficult situation, but I'm seeing that a hopeful person isn't always a happy person.  So this is me, hopefully trudging through my failures, with both my fathers.

So pray for me.

TL;DR I'm a daddy

For those of you who have tried to keep up with my life and have wanted to be invested in me, but haven't been able to because of my extended absence from being intimate in a social setting, I apologize.  I have been blessed with many amazing people in my life and know a lot of loving and caring people, and like Neil Young, I plan to thank you each individually one of these days.   I'm sorry it's been more than a year since I've published anything on here.  One day I'll write down the stories from the last year.

As for today, I'm going to do my best to focus on one idea that has been resonating strongly with me over the last 6-10 months and I'll do my best to give you guys an idea of how I've been living; struggles, and successes.  I've been thinking a lot about the relationship of self control and self discipline.

If you've been keeping up with my Facebook statuses, you might have noticed that on November 1, I married a wonderful, strong, beautifully effervescent yet refreshingly practical, woman (well, maybe you wouldn't have known those things just from looking on Facebook) but if you've been paying REALLY close attention, (I see you, you creepers), you would know that last week, on January 3rd, my wife and I had our first baby.  Her name is Rina Jasmin and she is the most beautiful thing I have ever laid eyes on.  She has completely stolen my heart and I am beginning to understand some of what it really means to love, to know what The Father's love really means.  Her birth has for me, as I'm sure the birth of one's firstborn usually affects a person, surfaced a lot of doubts, fears, worries and weaknesses.  I am terrified of what is coming next, and part of it is because of my struggle with self-control and self discipline.

You don't have to be very good at math or physiology to realize that from November to January is definitely NOT enough time to complete a full gestation period.  That's because, obviously, my wife and I conceived Rina about 7 months before we were married.  Until that time I had remained committed to abstaining from sex, so why the change?  Where did the change come from?  It's hard to fully explain why we made the decision we did, but part of it comes from this idea of the relationship between self control and self discipline.

One of my favorite verses in the bible is 2 Tim 1:7 (to which I've just supplied the links for the ESV and NIV versions) which says that we have a spirit of self discipline, or depending on the version, self control.  For a long time I've been reciting verses I've memorized to myself without dwelling on the meanings.  Using the memory of a time when I understood better what the words meant to help me guide myself so that I don't have to wait patiently, listening.  In the same letter Paul wrote to Timothy that scripture is "God-breathed".  If I believe that God is a living God, that his breath provides life, then it falls to logic that his words are not only living, but life-giving.  By reciting a verse that comforted me without engaging with the spirit that offers understanding, I wandered away from an understanding that surpasses language, and I was limited to the words I told myself over and over again.  Effectively, I was using the bible to escape from God.

Self control vs Self Discipline

In my struggle to obtain a lazy sort of righteousness (That is doing good things separated from searching the the spirit of God) I tend to understand this verse as saying that I have a spirit of self control.  I can control my life, my thoughts and fears; I can decide the direction of my life and I can determine where I go and whether I do or do not have sex.  Self control bound by the language through which I understood (understand) the word is a demonstration of my personal power.  This understanding, however, flies in the face of one of the basic tenements of Christianity (Reformed Christianity).

Self discipline, however, is a little different, in my understanding of the language.  To me, Self discipline suggests another party's involvement, and in the case of the Christian, I believe that self discipline is not discipline that is conducted on oneself (like the priests who would abuse themselves) but rather is the acceptance of God's discipline and direction in our lives.  Instead of trying to control my desires, trying to control the course of my life like I would if I were seeking self-control (self righteousness) I step aside and let God's discipline guide my decisions.

Last year I traded self discipline for self control, and in my attempts to determine the direction of my life God gave me a reminder of how little I can control.  I honestly and earnestly believe that my daughter was a gift from the almighty.  Before we found out that Yukari was pregnant I was praying that God would show me a glimpse of his power and glory so that I could find my resolve to be self-controlled.  God answered my prayer and showed me that my desires to be self-controlled were ill-conceived.  He also reminded me of his amazing grace, though and through this whole process over the last year has shown me that truly, all things work together for good.

I'm completely smitten by my wife and daughter and have been truly blessed by much greater things than I can ever hope to deserve.  Hopefully you all will be able to see the two beautiful women I'm blessed by soon.  Hopefully I'll be able to write more blog entries this year (it was my New Year's resolution)

Thanks so much for reading, for your love and for your prayers.  Y'all are the best.

Something about powerwalking and prayer or the power of walking in prayer, or something

I must ask you in advance to please forgive any spelling or grammatical errors I might have in this post because I'm writing it from a phone.

It's 9:00 in the morning in Japan and I have an empty period before my first lesson with fifth graders today, so I wanted to post a quick update and type some things that have been on my mind.

To begin with, today is wonderful. Just an absolutely amazing day. Yesterday I had a day off and I was able to spend time with my housemates (a very rare occurrence) and have a truly restful day. Today, some of my housemates woke up early so we all had Costco muffins and breakfast tacos together. It was a wonderful start to the day. On my walk to work this morning (10 minutes to my train station, 20 minutes from the station near my job) I got the chance to compare days like yesterday and moments like this morning to what my life looked like 2 months ago, when I had little to no contact with anyone outside of my jobs. And I thought about prayer.

Several weeks ago, just before I found myself very much alone in a foreign hospital, I started praying that god would help me find community. That he would send people I can learn from and also people to teach me. I want to be able to pour into others, but I also need help from people who can pour into me, too. I had one good friend in Japan who could help me find that sort of community but we could only meet once a week at best, and for such a short time that it was difficult to actually hang out. It's been discouraging not having anyone around the last few months. My forced introversion started making me become more introverted, to the point where I didn't want to talk to people or go out of the house or do anything because it was too strenuous or troublesome (though that may have been due to the mono). However, a long time before I started praying for god to send a friend to help me he was already preparing to send someone.

My friend who was living in Japan had come here with a missionary organization called ywam. I still don't know a whole lot about the program itself, but I do know that the people I've met from ywam are wonderful Christians with hearts for changing the world. Anyway, she invited me to a ton of events the organization put on, and on a few occasions I was actually able to go. In this way I became acquainted with some wonderful people who have hearts set on seeing Japan redeemed and the people of Japan instilled with a desire to know Jesus. While I was in the hospital I was asked if one of the members of ywam could stay in my room for a few weeks. As a favor to my friend (and because I was realizing the depths of my feeling of friendlessness) I agreed.

Having this new friend stay at my house for the last few weeks has been one of the biggest blessings (so far as my limited perception can tell) I've received in many months. It was a very real answer to a very earnest prayer.

This is what I've been thinking about: answered prayers.

Recently I've been bombarded by messages from books, acquaintances and church services with either the entire theme or at least some part of the message focused on the idea of using the right words. In Matthew chapter 7 we're told if we ask then we'll be given (what we'll be given is not specified, but I think that's a different idea then what I'm talking about now). But why is it that sometimes it feels as though god refuses to give us things when we ask for them? I've heard a lot of answers to this question and the one that I hear the most frequently is also the most disconcerting to me - "maybe you're not asking the right question". Of course this statement can have several meanings, but I've often heard this used to mean maybe you're not using the right words.

I can't believe in this. If I believe in a god that knows my heart and knows me even deeper than I know myself, a god responsible for creating the world by speaking it into being, then I can not believe in a god that is subject to the constrains of human language. But following down this trail I have to ask why does god have us pray in the first place? Why should we even bother expressing out desires and needs if he already knows what we need?

The answer hit me hard this morning while I was walking to work in the heat that I can't describe any other way but "sweltering". (lucky for that, because I wiped my face with my handkerchief it looked to everyone else like I was wiping away sweat.) On an unrelated note, summer in Japan is awful. I thought, growing up in Memphis and Nashville, I'd be ready for the humidity, but it is just terrible. If you're planning a trip to Japan, I have two pieces of advice: do not come in the summer time and make sure you come to Tokyo and say hi to me.

Anyway, this morning I heard so devastatingly clearly the answer I was trying to find because as I thought about the breakfast I had with my temporary roommate I could not possibly not remember the prayers I prayed for god to send friends and community.

So the answer I felt was this: god lets us pray cause he loves us.

Weak, right? Hold up, son, I ain't finished. If I hadn't prayed for friendship, if I hadn't expressed my desire to grow and be sharpened (the iron sharpens iron) then when I discovered that kind of friendship I would of course feel happy that I had a friend, but I wouldn't feel the joy from receiving a gift from god, and my friend wouldn't receive the blessing of being seen as a gift from God. The thing is, when we get to share in God's glory with him and I mean, when we can see his work in us and the world and we can as they say, taste and see that he is good, then the whole world changes right in front of us. Our lives stop being subject to our self-centeredness that so often leads to cynicism and our inability to love and be loved. (because if you don't believe in god, how can you believe in love?) We get to be part of something else, something good, and I mean 100%, no shadow side, no faltering, good. Once we've realized our desperation (for me it was my desperate loneliness which may be better described as aloneness, desperate not because of the way i was feeling during that time, but desperate because of the divide I was creating between myself and god), and trust me, we're all desperate in a lot of ways, and we come to god, and he answers those prayers, there's no where for the glory to go but to him. He lets us see his glory, which we have no business being able to see, have no right to get even a little glimpse of, and the only reason that I can think of to explain why he would do that is that he loves us. Oh, how he loves us.

That was a lot to type by phone. Especially in between classes and on the train ride to my other job, but that's all I wanted to share. God is very good to us. Please, let's see that together.

So pray for me! I'll try to update when prayers are answered. For now, my friend is leaving Japan in less than a week, please pray for a friend, for it is not good to be alone.

Sorry for the errors, both in my fumbling attempts to understand this life and this love, and in my thumbling (get it?) attempts to type this on my phone.

working in silence

Today I am full of hope. Maybe it’s the poignant lyrics of the music that I’m listening to, ormaybe it’s the peace I’ve received from reading excerpts from St John of theCross’s “Dark Night of the Soul”, but today I feel a certain level of deliveryfrom my anxieties as to what it is I’m doing in Japan.

I came to this country because in my prayers and in mythoughts I felt so led to be here.  I don’tknow why, though.  I’ve never been muchof an evangelist; my presentation of the Gospel isn’t usually what we wouldrefer to as “seeker friendly”.  I focuson the things that my own faith has been focused on:  the idea of complete depravity, the idea thatthere will be a constant struggle that will only lessen as you grow deeper inChrist between your lower instincts (your desires of the flesh) and your higherones (the things you want to do) but to grow in Christ you have to give up oneverything that is you and what you think is your own.  This isn’t really a big selling point to alot of people who are just kind of trying on Christianity most of the time.

I’ve been reading a book recommended to me by a friend whilehere in the hospital.  It was written bya great evangelist named Mahesh Chavda. In his book he writes about the power of Christ’s blood and the millionsof conversions that he’s seen by way of his messages over the years.  Anyway, reading the way he writes and hisgeneral presentation, I can say with more assurance that I am not anevangelist, at least not in the same strain as this man.

Because I don’t typically think of myself as an evangelist Ihave to wonder.  Why did God call me tothis country?  I came here nearly 9months ago expecting to find some form of ministry or to better understand mycalling once I got here, but so far God has remained silent.  What I’ve found instead is a regimen ofspirit-breaking work.  I’m writing thispost from the hospital, because after six months of 70-80 hour work weeks (13hours a day, 6 days a week) my body finally had enough and decided to stopworking properly.  I have been blessedwith these jobs, with the ability to pay for the loans I took out in order toattend University, and for the experience of working in several differentpositions, but I also know that I have been working too much.

Over the last two months, as fatigue started to set in, Istarted wondering why.  Why did God callme here if there is no ministry for me to be involved in?  While thankful for the jobs he provided, whydidn’t he show me one with a better salary, so I could afford to live withoutworking in this manner?  Why haven’t Ibeen able to hear his guiding spirit to find out what to do next?

I have a feeling that God has been preparing me through thistime.  He’s been teaching me, I see now,how to cut out the fat from my life. This is why I’m full of hope today. Today I see how God’s silence isn’t an abandonment it’s a call: a callto come to know him deeper, to walk in discipline towards his righteousness, toseek to be filled with his spirit, not in a way that I can feel, but in a waythat changes my entire manner of living. I’ve been so reliant on feeling and conviction, that I’ve neglected theeveryday presence of the Lord, and I feel as though the last few months havebeen preparing me for a time to come closer to him in ways that I’ve neverknown before.

God has also shown me his glory through prayer these monthsas several longstanding prayers have been answered.  This too, lends itself to hopefulness whichbrings joy in despair.  This is also atopic that would merit its own post, so I’ll try to work on that later thisweek.

God is again changing my heart to be closer to his own.  I know that my life will reflect his glory,so long as I have the courage to let it. Please pray for my courage, for that, now more than ever, is what Ichiefly need.

Sorry for the recent ramblings.   Thanks for your prayers and love.

I'm back! For a moment...

Dear friends and family.  I must first apologize for my longstanding absence from this forum.  It’s been almost six months, I think, since I posted on this blog, and that, I have realized is far too long a time not to share.  It’s sort of one sided most of the time, but the encouragement, prayer and acknowledgment I receive from readers of this blog is an invaluable form of community for me that I have, unfortunately, cut myself out of.

This is my ways of apologizing for the internet silence these last few months.  There are other things that I feel I could apologize for, but I’ve already mentioned the thing I wanted to post about today, so instead, I’ll just jump right in.

Recently, especially the last few weeks, I’ve been thinking quite a lot about community.  It’s a concept that has always interested me, especially when living in cultures with a different sense of community as the one I grew up in.  Anyway, community and thoughts about community have pervaded my thoughts recently because I’m really struggling to understand how community in Japan works and how that is a reflection of what community in the Kingdom of Heaven will be like.  I’ve been thinking about this topic especially as the lack of community in my life becomes ever more clear, and I’m left wondering, do I need to create community, be able to rest in the community of Christ, God and the Holy Spirit, open my heart to be able to join an already present, but as yet invisible to me, community, or some other thing?

It seems this blog is going in several directions, please bear with me, I’ll try to tie things together by the end.

I was recently talking to a friend about the high rates of depression and suicide in Japan and South Korea and whether or not the collectivist mindset of the culture in these countries has any impact on these alarmingly high statistics.  I wish I had more training as an anthropologist than the two or three classes I took while at Biola, because I’d like to do this question justice, but I’ve come to the hypothesis that the answer is a very indirect yes.  It’s not the collectivism that causes the high rates of suicide, it’s the pressure that kind of collectivism can bring on.

I’ve heard the difference in culture described like a machine.  In the west we focus on the cogs, the gears, the gemstones in the watch, but here the focus is more on the machine itself, on the actual functioning device.  I can’t say which is a closer image to what true community looks like, because they are both severely flawed and they both have their own advantages, as well.  Especially among members of my generation, there is a severe distrust of systems, at least in America, which is due, at least in part, to the focus we give to the individual.  True community, I believe, is founded under the direct leadership of the Spirit of God, but in the west, if we all want to be radical and unique and to be leaders, then who will be able to follow even the simplest of directions from the Holy Spirit?  Conversely, from what I’ve seen in Japan so far (and my views are especially limited here, as I still don’t speak well enough to enter into anything other than small talk conversations) if someone can’t find a way to fit into making the machine (society) progress and move forward then there is a lot of pressure to either remove yourself entirely from that machine or to change yourself so you can fit into it.  This sort of forced community may be where some of the anxiety that leads to suicide comes from.

I wish I knew more about culture and could see more, to have something more interesting to relay back, but what I see and my understanding of things is always so relative, so reflective, of my own life and experience that as it is, I may not have anything interesting or new to offer to anyone, but I don’t think things need to be new or interesting to be relevant, so: Today, I want to talk about the idea of viewing people in terms of their functionality.

Three years ago I felt God call me to give up on my grasp of earthly things, so I did.  I gave up all of my money, which included my rent and food budget for the next two months.  The following week I wondered if I had made the right decision, as I frantically searched for new jobs to take on so I could afford to live.  It wasn’t until recently, looking back at that decision that I can see a fraction of the way God blessed me through that bit of very difficult obedience.  One of the greatest blessings I received was the desperation for work that led me to taking a job I might not have otherwise taken.  In the fall of 2009 I started working with an adult day care center as a paid intern.  I was responsible for custodial maintenance as well as assisting full time staff while they worked.  Later, I became part of the full time* staff of the organization I was working for.  Amongst the workers I met an array of so many different people from so many different backgrounds, and among the clients I met so many people with so many different disabilities.  I had to begin overtly wrestling with the problems of viewing humans in terms of functionality here (even though I’d been wrestling with it for much longer).  If I saw my clients in terms of what they had to offer anyone other than themselves, if I saw them in terms of societal cogs, then I could not justify working where I was working.  If I tried to draw a picture of community, incorporating my clients into the picture, I had no idea what to do with them.  My clients, who quickly became my friends (and the greatest source of community I’ve ever known) have no place in a society driven by function.  Understanding this, and understanding that my view of their abilities or disabilities is irreparably contrasting to how God views them (as creations, fearfully and wonderfully made) was how I started to learn to view people not by what they can do, or even by what they do, but by how they were created.

After I left that company, in order to return to Tennessee to prepare for leaving the country, I must have forgot what I spent such a long time trying to learn.  Either that, or I stopped wearing my contact lenses, because myopia started setting in.  I began to view my own life in terms of my function.  What thing have I done?  What have I accomplished?  What has my life led to and where will it lead?  How can I make God happy?  What can I do to be a good person?  What can I do to make the people who know me proud to know me?  Admittedly, not all of these questions are terrible if you’re looking for motivation, but I wasn’t looking for motivation.  I was looking to reinforce the lie that I wasn’t good enough for God’s grace, or for anything that I was setting out to do.  This, I believe, was my greatest source of spiritual warfare before embarking on my trip to Japan.  The ideas that God would never use me because I wasn’t good enough for him, and that I have to be used in certain, specific ways for God to bestow love and grace on me permeated my thoughts and left me feeling very empty, very estranged.  I realize now that the majority of these thoughts on personal functionality are centered in pride.  I want to know how good I am so I can compare myself to others, or measure up on some “You must be this tall to ride” picture of Jesus, cut from acacia wood, of course, holding his hand somewhere by his waist or something.  I wanted to know what God thought of me, but the idea that he loves me is unacceptable at times.  If I truly accepted that he loved me, knowing what I know about myself and knowing what I know about God, then my response would have to be so drastic that at times I would just rather not accept God’s view of me and exchange it for a view of my functionality. 

I think this is where a lot of people get caught up.  I think this is where the collectivist society can add pressure, making an already difficult problem swell into an insurmountable one.  This is where my thoughts have been today.  I’m going to try to sum this up concisely (like I promised earlier):

Community, true community, is an assortment of different people (individuals) living together (in a system) under the head of one common goal (the Glory of God).  Community cannot exist when we measure ourselves against our goal because this destroys the image with which we were created, the image of God; in order to live in community with others we must accept a view of ourselves and of them that does not lie in their function (what they can do for us, what they can do to further our goal) but instead lies in the very fact that as humans created by God they bear his image and his stamp of approval.

Thanks for reading.  Please pray that God helps us to see others and ourselves for what he has created, rather than the shadow of what our function might be, and pray that Japan is receptive to the word of God.

Shake shake shake.

There was a 6.1 Earthquake this evening, well by the time this post publishes it will have been several evenings ago.

My thoughts on experiencing an Earthquake from the 4th floor of a building:

Woah! Another earthquake!
Ooooookay, it's been 10 seconds, why is the building still shaking?  Why is it getting stronger?
Alright, I think I might die today.
Okay.

I should mention, the other day I had a dream that there was an incredibly strong Earthquake while I was in a building and the building fell over.  The dream ended with me falling towards the street from 50 feet up in the air.  In my dream, though, I felt like even if I fell, it would be okay.  I ended the dream knowing I would wake up and be okay, even if I hit the ground, and then, right before I hit the ground in the dream I woke up.  And I was okay.

I don't have a death wish, please don't read this and think that.  It's not the truth.  But as clearly as I knew I would be okay in my dream, I knew today, during this earthquake, that I would be okay.  Even if I fell and hit the ground, I would wake up and everything would be okay.

That said, some notes on what an earthquake like that feels like:

When the walls start shaking I can always hear it before I feel it.  Then, when the building sways back and forth it feels like I've climbed to the top of a tall tree and the wind is blowing really hard.  After that feeling passes I get dizzy and I can't tell if the earthquake has ended or not, because I sort of get my quake legs (think sea legs).

Now, some notes on what an earthquake like that makes me think about:

The earth cries out.
The next big, or for many people, the last big earthquake could happen at any time.  How have they prepared?  How have they been prepared?
There will be earthquakes in various places.

I don't believe in predicting the return of Christ (he'll come back like a thief in the night, y'all) and I don't even like talking about the end times, because I don't believe that was the focus of the ministry of Christ, but it's hard not to think about it when you can feel the Earth shaking so violently, as though it was sick of being in the shape it's currently in.  As though even the very ground itself was sick and expressing it's need for the savior.

Again, I'm not trying to sound foolish or like I seek death or anything, but you gotta admit:

That's pretty cool. 

And if you don't think it sounds so cool (mom), then think about this - love transforms the way we think.  Earthquakes remind me of love and of God's love for us and his desire for us to know him, because even if we don't show him love, even if we don't glorify his name, for God's sake (literally) the Earth will!

I caught a cold

For the last few days I've been sick.  It started as a little bit of a headache and stretched to be a full blown achy-body, snot-factory, lung-hacking cold.  I feel pretty bad, but I am also, admittedly, a big baby about getting sick.  In fact, I am absolutely terrible when I'm sick.

My friends who have lived with me (God bless their patience) can probably attest to this.  When I am sick I act like a spoiled child, even more so than when I'm not sick.  I refuse to do anything for myself, I won't even get up from the couch or bed or ground or wherever I've decided to lay down to perform my normal complain, moan, complain routine until someone comes along to take care of me.  It's awful, and I don't know how anyone ever put up with it.


If you're churchgoing folk, you can probably already tell where this is headed, but be patient, I haven't finished the build up yet.


So, most of the time I'm a pretty healthy guy, but when I do get sick it takes me a long time to get better.  Mostly because when I get sick, even though my body starts to get better and heal, I start feeling worse and worse and worse.  There's no escape once I get sucked into the maelstrom of depression from sickness.  As much as people have helped me in the past when I got sick by bringing me soup or gatorade or doing my chores so I can rest or any number of other pleasant things, no one has ever been able to help me recover.  I mean, don't get me wrong, they help my body get better, but the damage my spirit takes when I'm sick sometimes feels irreversible when I'm still feeling sick.


Alright, here it comes:

This is why it's so difficult to follow Christ, but also why it isn't.
I'm not claiming to be a strict Calvinist, I don't know if I could ever make that claim and that could be the subject of a whole different sort of blog post, but I do believe in the total depravity of man.
To some degree, some more than others by way of our choices, we are all spiritually sick, and one of the hardest things to do when you're sick is to take care of yourself, or, in this case, to let someone else take care of you.

I don't think I've made much mention of this yet, but in the months I was planning and preparing to come to Japan I was feeling really sick.  I mean, I was fighting depression and wading through some stuff from the last few years that I'd been putting off confronting, and the whole struggle led me to feel disillusioned a little, and to be honest, pretty angry at God.  I kept asking myself the same question that everyone else was asking.  Why was I going to Japan?  Except for me, the full articulation of this question was more like, "Why am I doing this thing for a God that I don't even feel like I know or particularly want to know right now?"  Luckily I was raised in a family that believed that serving God transcends how you feel, so I was able to base my own answer to my question on optimism that one day I would want to be close again, and in that day I would be glad to have stuck through doing what I knew was the right thing to do, regardless of my feelings.  I guess, to a small extent, this feeling could be classified as faith.  But I'm not talking about faith in this post, because even though it's an important and (at times) difficult concept to discuss, I've got bigger fish to fry here.

Today I'm talking about grace.

I mentioned earlier that sickness, and for me the ultimate feeling of pessimism that comes with it is why it's so difficult to walk with Christ, but also, why it isn't.  It is because in these moments especially I'm like Paul in that what I would, I do not, but what I hate, that I do.  The problem with relating too much to Paul here is that sometimes this is where the comparison ends.  I don't think about the fact that there is another spirit, a holy spirit, willing to work inside me and fight this sinful flesh that I'm trapped inside of.  I don't think about the fact that Jesus still loves and was even willing to die for such a broken, dirty person.  All I see is that which I hate, I do, and in these moments, at these times, I start to see a broken (yet all too prevalent) philosophy creep into my thoughts, and even more damaging, into my feelings:

I start to think that I am the sum of my actions.


What I mean is that I start to think that the definition of who I am is just the sum of my actions.  Therefore, if I walk I am a walker, if I eat I am an eater, if I sin, I am therefore a sinner.  Now, these things are true to the extent that I have all of those aspects inside of me, and they make up part of the mosaic that is my person, but there's also more to me and in these moments of utter weakness I forget what those other things are.  I forget that this mosaic of my person is a window, not one of those stone mosaics, but a stained glass.  I forget about what I look like when the sun shines through, mostly because I've distanced myself from that source of light.  One of my favorite metaphors representing Christ came from (of course) C.S. Lewis.  He said that he believed in Christ like the risen sun, not because he could see it, but because by it he could see everything else.  This is how I often neglect to see myself, especially when I'm sick.  I don't want to see Christ and I don't want to see anything else by his light.  I don't want to know what that mosaic of stained glass looks like when his light shines through.


This is why grace and love (and how they go hand in hand in an unbelievably inseparable way) are still the central message of the gospel to me.


Now, how do I show that, in truth and power, to other people?  How do I affect the people around me so that they can feel this love, so they can experience the refreshing peace offered by grace?  How, in essence, do I show Christ?


Man, this post took an unexpected turn at the end, but it is a valid question, and as I close I should mention that I would LOVE any answers any readers might have to these questions.


Sorry for the length, and if you made it this far, thanks for reading.

fishes and bread

This week I experienced grace.  Again.  It's a hard thing to explain to someone what it feels like to feel full of power and potential and to be the strongest you've ever been in your life, but simultaneously feel helpless, weak, so humbled that everything in your life, down to the very crumbs from the piece of toast you eat for breakfast is a blessing, and a gift and not something for you to claim as your own.

Anyone who knows me well knows that I've never been good with money.  When I have money I only want to give it away, and when I don't have it, I'm happy enough not to bother getting any.  I don't mind living paycheck to paycheck, it's never been a stressful environment for me.  However, the past few weeks, maybe the past month, and probably continuing for the next month, I have been living on a budget of less than paycheck to paycheck.  I am living from day to day.  Some days I wake up and have literally no idea how I will buy food or how to afford transportation to work for that day.  I work a lot of hours at night and on weekends, but my paychecks are once a month and come at the end of the month after the month I'm getting paid for, so on Feb 25, I got paid for January's work, on  March 25, I'll get paid for February.  Because of the current conversion rate for dollars to yen and because of unavoidable one time fees that came up during my first few weeks here I was out of the money that I had raised to come in a much shorter time than I originally anticipated.

Every day I laugh at myself as a slew of you're so poor jokes go across my mind.  I'm so poor, no one had to tell me that in Japan people are expected to eat every grain of rice, I have never left a grain of rice uneaten.  I'm so poor that even in the snow and rain on days where the temperature hovers around 0 degrees Celcius, I ride my room mate's bike or walk the 4 km each way to work.  I'm so poor that I dropped an egg on the ground and scooped it back up with a spoon and cooked it for breakfast because it was the only food I had left.  Okay, so those aren't very good jokes, but they make me laugh.

And I think that's the point of today's blog.  Well, that and the other thing I'm going to get to in a little bit.  The first point, though, being that even though I'm in a less than desirous situation, or at least what would seem one to most people, I can't help but have joy outside of anything I've ever known.  I've been here for two months almost.  Two months and I can't help but smile every time I see people on the street, I walk home in the literally blistering cold (you should see my hands - disgusting) and by the time I get home my lips are chapped and my cheeks are sore because I was grinning for the last 40 minutes.  Even though I don't know how I'll eat next week, I'm so happy because I know that I will eat next week.  I'm so happy because I am constantly watching as God works in my life.  It's stunning, really.

And there it was, did you see it?  The other point of today's blog.

Even though I can't always pay for food, God has fed me.  Last time I wrote about the church up the street.  I wrote about traveling with them to feed the homeless.  What I didn't read about was how they fed me, also.  The day I met the people from that church was also the day that I completely ran out of money and food.  I had nothing left to eat and no promise of money coming in for quite a while.  I only had a little bit of money left on my train pass, but I decided to go with them anyway.  The day I went was a bad day.  It was cold, it was rainy, and there weren't many homeless people that were willing to go the park on a day like that and sit through a message, even if there was the promise of food.  So at the end of the day there was a lot of extra food that was going to get thrown away.  Like I said before, I couldn't communicate with anyone, so even if I wanted to, I couldn't have asked for them to give me any food.  But the woman I met from the church kept giving me the extra food to take home with me, and I couldn't say no (mostly because I don't know how to still). 

I know that this story, that this entry seems strange, maybe it seems irresponsible.  I realize what my life looks like to a lot of people.  The point isn't how crazy stupid I am, though.  The point is how crazy awesome God is.  Each day I witness his mercy both in how he provides for me, and through his love for someone as broken as I am.  Every day he is teaching me how to love by showing me his incredible love.  He's giving me strength through the knowledge of his power.  I'm being taught to serve by realizing how little I deserve the things he gives me and experiencing how much he loves those around me.  I'm being molded, I can feel it.  Some days it hurts, those days I have to suck up my pride and accept the 2000yen offered to me by the pastor of a church across town because otherwise I wouldn't be able to get back home or eat dinner, or every day I have to decline going to dinner on my break at work because I can't afford to eat fast food.  Those are the days that I also feel the presence of the Lord the strongest, so I can't help but smile.

It's a hard thing to explain to someone what it feels like to be helpless, weak, so humbled that everything in your life is a blessing, and a gift and not something for you to claim as your own but simultaneously feel full of power and potential and to be the strongest you've ever been in your life.

From homeless to work. I love this day.

I just realized how long it's been since I put an actual update on here.  For that, I apologize.  I have like 4 drafts that I never published for various reasons, but I'm going to do my best to put this one up, no matter how short it is.

Let me start with a brief analysis of what my day to day looks like, just for the curious.

I started working on January 18th as a full time private instructor for English.  I love this job because I have the opportunity to meet so many people, and while the focus of our time is on studying English, the format of the lesson allows me to get to know people and for them to get to know me.  I've worked every day, with the exception of an unexpected day off last Friday, since the 18th.  I know it sounds strange, but I actually enjoy working every day.  Because I'm working so much, though, I've been able to meet around 100 new people in the last few weeks, just through work, and while I'm not able to explicitly express my faith (through strict company rules) almost every new client I have asks the same question: "why do you came to Japan?" or some other variation of mixed up grammar. 

I think that this blog entry will be on that question.  Why did I come to Japan?

Recently, I was talking to one of my best friends, who's heart has also been incredibly moved for Japan, and we talked briefly on the subjects of love and joy.  The conversation actually went like this:

Robert: From homeless (we'll get to that later) to work.  I love today.
Robert: Who am I kidding, I love EVERY day.
Friend: You're so Genki* all the time!
Robert: How could I not be!? I feel the favor of the Lord, I feel like I'm walking in his will.
Robert: Do you know what kind of joy that produces?
Friend: Yes.

*Genki is a Japanese word often used to mean energetic or enthusiastic

It's been a strange month (I've been in Japan for 1 month and 3 days now), but I can't shake this joy.  Every day on my walk home from work (at like 11 pm) I look around the streets I live on and I can't help but smile.  I feel so blessed that God has brought me here, and I have faith (read: hope) that he's already using me in ways I'll never understand.

So, the first answer to the question "why did I come to Japan?" is, simply put, to walk in God's will, and by doing so, to walk in joy.  I'm not talking about a small measure of joy here, either, i mean, crazy awesome, peace-bringing, not even earthquakes shake me, joy.  I mean, the kind that people not only notice, but notice enough to have to comment on.

I have more to say on this, but it's getting too late to post more about it right now.  Because I promised earlier, though, I'll quickly mention what I meant when I said, "from homeless to work".

There's a church that meets down the street from my house.  The only church in like 3 square kilometers is a one minute walk from my house.  God does amazing things.  Anyway, I NEVER see people at this church, probably because I walk past at like 11 pm at night, but last night there just happened to be some lights on and I noticed some people inside, so, like a creepy foreigner I searched for the door so I could knock, but all the doors looked like windows, so I had to just stand outside the window where I saw people moving inside and while I was trying to figure out if i should knock on the window or just go home they noticed me standing there, all creepy like.  So, caught off guard a little I sort of waved my hands frantically as if it silently say, "I'm not creepy! I swear!" Somehow, I guess it worked, because after a few seconds I saw this little woman walk away from the window, and a few seconds after that I heard one of the door/windows opening.  I went over to the door and the first thing I asked was, "do you speak English?".  They did not, and the first thing they asked me was "Kurisutan desu?" which means "Are you a Christian?"  Somehow, with my shady Japanese and their less than elementary English (and I believe much assistance from the Holy Spirit) I found out that the church was started by Korean missionaries and that the next day at 12 20 they would be going to a nearby neighborhood to feed the homeless.  So, today at 12:20 I walked the one minute walk over to the church and we went to Ueno to feed the homeless before I had to go to work.

I sang a song last week that I haven't thought about since I lived in Memphis and went to Raleigh Christian Church, later named New Hope Christian Church.  The song was Step by Step and I had completely forgotten about it, so while I was singing it at church I got so caught up with reminiscing about the days I used to sing that song that I didn't really pay attention to the words, but now I can't get them out of my head.

I will seek you in the morning, and I will learn to walk in your ways.  And step by step you'll lead me and I will follow you all of my days.

I'm walking one step at a time right now, so while I can't totally answer the question of why I came to Japan I can say in confidence that this is where I'm supposed to be, and I'm so excited to see what the next step will be.

I feel the blessing of the Lord, and recently I've been reminded of the power of prayer, so thank you for your prayers to this point.  I have been blessed.  Thank you.

not an update, more of a promise.

I realized today that I've been in Japan now for a week.  I have already been incredibly blessed by the amazing faithfulness of the Lord and there are a few things I will need to make updates about soon:

My trip to Meiji Temple in Yoyogi Park.
My first experience with Mustard Seed.
The way I think I'll be blessed through challenges with my new job.

Hopefully, I'll be able to get to at least two of these topics this weekend.

Sakura House 101, 1-12-8 Kosuge, Katsusika-ku, Tokyo 124-0001

Wow.  I'm sorry I haven't been able to get to this before, but I just bought a power converter from the "hyaku en" shop for my laptop today.

Oh, in case you don't know what I'm talking about, let me fill you in:

I'm in Japan.

I started typing out a detailed explanation of everything I've done since I've been here, but decided that there was something else I wanted to talk about instead.  If you want more minute details of my life that I'm trying to get used to, I would love to talk to you about it.  Skype is probably the best way to reach me (Skype: robert.bolgeo) but here, in this medium, there's something else I want to express.

When I first landed in Japan, I knew that I would have to take the train to get to the head office for the company from whom I'm renting a room.  I brought my iPhone with me to use as a wifi device in Japan, so that I would be able to get around and wouldn't get too terribly lost, but that didn't work.  For some reason, my phone wouldn't work on the wifi connection in japan, so I was in the airport trying to figure out where I was supposed to go, and maybe, if I'd slept at all the night before, or even on the flight (but I couldn't) I would have been able to better reason, but in the state I was in (in the country I was in) I had a mini panic.

Something I've mostly forgotten about, but remember in times like this, is that when I was a kid, shortly after I moved to Fairview from Memphis, I suffered from minor anxiety issues.  I mean, it wasn't anything serious, I was never put on medication for it, but sometimes when I'd go out around large groups of people or sometimes randomly I would have mini anxiety attacks.  Sometimes I still feel that way, like, the first time I went to Disney Land, and the first time I went to a concert in LA, but for the most part I'm really easy going about things, and get excited by the prospect of doing something new.  Still, the fact remains that I can be overtaken by anxiety at times, and its something I've spent a lot of time and prayer dealing with so I know a little better how to handle it now.  I was on the verge when I wasn't sure how I would get from the airport to my new home, but, at the same time, I felt like everything was okay.

Something I read today: "The Spirit of glory and of God rests on you"

When I read this I thought about how much that Spirit weighs, I thought about, so to speak, the weight of glory (which I shouldn't reference seeing as though I haven't read that book yet).  Thinking now, about my near anxiety attack in the airport I can't help but remember that weird weight of the counter-anxiety, that feeling that everything was okay that was as foreign to me as I was to this country.  So when I stumbled across this phrase in my reading I couldn't shake it.  Only now, I'm thinking about what this means moving forward.  What does this mean as I try and make an impact here?

Something else I read today:  Foundation and salvation

Already, I've gone through so many things here that maybe I should be freaking out about, but I feel the sturdiness of my foundation (which is Jesus Christ) and the strength of what has been built on it (which would be the prayers and support of friends and family).  I think in the next few weeks I'm going to see some of the fire that refines.  I hope that when it comes I'm not too stubborn, or ignorant, or lazy to see what it burns and seek to repair it properly.

Before I close out this entry I want to write down a thought I had shortly after leaving the airport.  After my almost-anxiety in the airport, I decided to take whatever train was going towards the city I knew I had to get to in order to pick up my keys.  I was so excited to take my first train ride in  Japan, I almost didn't care if it got me where I was supposed to go or not.  However, by the time I got on the train, it was already dark outside, or at least, it was getting darker.  The trains are lit inside, though, and they stay pretty bright, so the darker it gets outside the brighter the inside seems to get, until you almost can't see outside anymore because the light reflects the inside of the train, making windows more like mirrors.  There are two things I thought about this.

First, I want to be like the train that is so bright on the inside that the darkness outside is nearly invisible.  I don't have much to say about this, except I'm afraid I'll never have the sort of illumination necessary.  I'm afraid I'll try to hold on to some of that darkness out of a perverse sense of self-preservation, making the light seem dimmer.

Second, as I looked at the window turned mirror I thought about how strange it was to be looking out towards Japan but to only be able to see myself.  I was so clearly superimposed over all the buildings that it was as though they barely existed.  So I thought about all the ways I've already been doing that.  How have I been taking Japan away and putting myself in its place?  The answers are humiliating; humbling.  I don't remember if I've mentioned this story before, but even if I have, this seems like a good spot to reiterate it (and I'm not too worried about redundancy): When I was an orientation leader for Biola some of us took a spiritual retreat in order to prepare ourselves for the new students and in order to center ourselves before we had to give so much in service.  While we were there we met with a student from the Institute of Spiritual Formation who taught us an interesting way to pray.  She taught us about the idea of mantras.  The idea is to create a name for God, one that has a lot of meaning to you, then to express a need.  My mantra is something I've been trying to live ever since the moment I made it that day.  Sometimes I'll go a while without saying it, but I don't think I'll ever forget it, because I don't think I'll ever stop needing it:

"Good Father, teach me to serve."

That's been my ardent prayer since I arrived.  I came here to serve, but sometimes I don't know how to do that.  Sometimes I can't look past my face in the mirror long enough to realize that it wasn't a mirror at all but a window; a window looking out on people who need to feel the Spirit of glory and of God rest, people who need foundations and building materials, people who need to be served.

So pray with me.

Jump on 3. 1... 2..

I am less than a week away from leaving my family and my home in Tennessee to begin the first leg of my trip to Tokyo.  It is normally my habit to spend a lot of time thinking about the things I'm going to write before I post them here, but I don't feel like I can do that this time.  I've been struggling to update because for the last month I've been trying to avoid the thoughts necessary to produce something that even passes as coherent work.

I've been bungee jumping once in my life.  I love the memory and I loved the reasons I had to do it (it's a fun story and I can tell anyone who wants to know about it), but actually doing the thing is a different beast entirely.  It was one of those crane style bungee jumps, so I had to climb a ton of stairs to get to the top, and I remember nearly running up the first 4 or 5 flights because I was so excited to jump, but as I started getting higher, closer to the end of the stairs, I started feeling a little more heavy, a little less anxious to get to the top and a little more to get back to the bottom.  At the first step of the last flight of stairs the real doubts started coming; I kept seeing images of cords splitting, of knots slipping, I couldn't help but imagine the ground rushing towards me and not being able to stop.  At a certain point I had to pretty much turn my brain off and use my eyes as cameras, nothing more than tools to record a memory that I could hold onto later, because if I tried to interpret what I was seeing myself do I wouldn't have been able to do it.

Obviously, bungee jumping is not something that is directly correspondent to moving to Japan, while I have similar feelings and I'm coping with fear in a similar way, they are very different things and the fears I have about moving to Japan are very different from the ones I had about free falling from the top of a metal crane.  There are a lot of things to be afraid of, from a more outside perspective:

I've never truly lived alone before, and in Japan I will very much be alone.  The house I'm renting a room in has space for other tenants, but there's no telling when people will live with me or for how long.  What kind of dangers are there in living independently?

I don't know Japanese.  I've been learning, but I'm pretty sure my eighteen month old nephew speaks better than I can in Japanese (and he's just now saying "bye-bye" consistently).  Languages are hard to learn, especially if they are as different as Japanese from English.

I don't know what my diet will look like.  I don't know what kinds of foods will be available or how expensive food is.  I mean, I have an idea, but it's hard to realize this sort of thing until it's happening or has happened.

I've never taught English before.  What if I can't hack it? What if I'm a bad teacher?

Even if I recognize these things as real, though, they don't really scare me.  What really scares me is the ever present, most daunting fear of all:

What if I'm not good enough for this?

What I mean is, what if I'm not right for this?  What if I'm not supposed to do this?  What if I'm wrong about all of this?  What if I'm a disappointment?  What if God doesn't want to use me the way I want him to?

These fears are the hardest to combat, these can't be settled with planning, with reasoning or through any other natural mental or emotional process.  These are the sort of spiritual questions that have to be dealt with in an unnatural manner.  I've never really understood why Jacob had to wrestle an Angel at Peniel, but I've also never really had to question it.  Please understand here that I believe that God is searchable and that discernment is important in faith.  I don't mean that I've never questioned why Jacob had to wrestle an angel, I mean that I've never questioned it's necessity.  I know that may seem like a strange and somewhat paradoxical thought process, that is, to be clueless and understanding simultaneously, but that is, I think, the only possible state when it comes to most things, but especially when it comes to theology.  It's finding the right balance of the two sides that becomes the biggest struggle, though, and right now I'm on the more helpless side of that stick.

I'm at the last flight of stairs now.  I've had enough reason, enough confirmation, encouragement, reassurances to make it this far.  I'm to the point where all I can see is the cord breaking, no matter how irrational the thought is.  I know it won't, but.  But what if it does?

I used to have this sort of mantra when I was younger and cared much less about rationale.  I used to say it to myself for practice, just to remember it, whether I needed to hear it or not:  "If you're afraid to do a thing; eff it.  Do it anyway."  Later, to sort of hone in on what I was really getting at with that mantra I started reciting 2 Timothy 1:7.  Power/Strength, Love and Sound Mind/Self Control are the ingredients for courage, the thing I fear I lack the most, and so wrestle for the most ardently.

Right now I'm running on the fumes from all of the events of the past year that have led up to what's happening in the next week combined with a steady stream of reminding myself of the spirit God has given me.  I know it's enough to get to the top of the stairs, and enough that I'll be able to jump off, eyes open, watching the pavement rush to meet me only to gently bounce back up and safely disengage, fear subsided.

I just wish that I could close my eyes and imagine that cord without it snapping under pressure.  So pray for me!

A (Not so) Brief Update

It's been a while since I've updated.  I've been meaning to, seeing as though there have been several reasons for updating both in regards to my upcoming journey and in regards to my continuing journey (that's a euphemism for life(or maybe a dysphemism, depending on how you look at journeys.))  In any case, I'll start with how things are going with Japan, and in order to get the story straight I'll start at the beginning:

About a year ago I contacted an organization that goes by the name of ITPS about travelling to Japan with their help.  My understanding at the time was that they would be in communication with schools, churches and the immigration bureau, working in my favor so that when the time came for me to leave I would have a job, a ministry and a visa.  I must give pause here because I don't want anyone reading to think that I am displeased with ITPS, on the contrary, I am more disappointed in myself.  It seems that I had fallen prey to the zeitgeist of my generation, something that I've talked to my older friends about on several occasions, and something I've done my best to fight, which is an enormous sense of entitlement.  I felt as though the steps to leaving the country should all have been taken for me, while I just waited for it to happen.  In the last six months, though, I realized that ITPS wasn't an organization that would take all the steps for me, but one that would walk alongside me as I took those steps myself.  They have been diligently praying for me, helping me gather and keep support and have supplied me with resources to learn about Japan, Japanese culture, missions and christian discipline and spirituality.  While I haven't used these resources to the extent of their full potential still, I have appreciated very much their accessibility.

In lieu of the staff at ITPS finding me a job in Japan I began to look for one for myself.  I searched for two or three months, and applied to fifteen or twenty different positions all over the country before I finally heard back from one company, the Gaba Corporation.  After extensive research into the company, the locations of their learning studios, and the nature of their employment (as well as much prayer into the situation) I decided to take a job with them.  The job I took is in northern Tokyo, though there is still the option to transfer to Osaka after a few months.  Since taking a job with Gaba, I have been contacting churches and ministries in the area near to where I'll most probably be living.  This has been the most blessed, or blessing part of the whole endeavor.  I have been finding contacts in the most unlikely places.  It seems that all of my friends have friends with friends or family who are working in a ministry or who have worked in a ministry in Japan, and they all have information and encouraging words for me.  I've met people at weddings, in restaurants and churches, and there's people I've never met at all, but have been in contact with via facebook or skype.

Right now I'm about two months out from leaving for Japan.  I visited the Japanese Consulate here in Nashville in order to receive my entrance visa, meaning that I have 90 days from today to get myself out of the US and into Japan.  My job as an English instructor starts on January 6, and I've been in communication with an apartment building to reserve a (super-cheap) dormitory-style apartment for a year.  My contract with Gaba is for one year and so is my visa, however I'm open to where God will lead me after this first year.

I appreciate all of the support that everyone has given me, both monetarily and through prayer and encouragement.  This period of waiting and wondering has been trying, but I can already see, even in the midst of it, how necessary this time was.  In the last few months I have wrestled with things that I should have been dealing with for a long time.  I have prayed in earnest, and while I am still struggling, I can see so much clearer God's plans for me and my life.  I have, for the first time in a long time, a sense of clarity and throughout the last few months (especially the last few weeks) I have had to come to a realization of my worth in Christ.  I've had to think of myself (and the people around me) in terms of ontology instead of in terms of function (thank you Dr. Thoennes!)  These are things I wouldn't have been ready to deal with outside of this special, trying time of waiting.  Thank you again, for everyone who has prayed for me.  I have been humbled by your love.

This post is already waxing prolix, so I'll end it there.  Thank you for travelling with me, and as always thank you for praying for me.

I'm going to Japan.

I don't have much time to write this, but I just wanted to update anyone keeping up with my plans for Japan.

The other day I received an email from the Gaba corporation (the one I was interviewing with) offering me a job in the Kanto region of Japan.  Kanto is where Tokyo is located.  I was hoping to go to Osaka because I have contacts with a church there, and Tokyo is a very long way from Osaka.  But, I have several friends and acquaintances that have lived and worked in this area, many of whom I trust would send me good information as to where to go to church, or the people to meet in order to be involved with several different ministry opportunities.  So after a lot of prayer and serious consideration I decided to take the job.

I'm going to Japan.

In the next few months I'm responsible to get a visa, find housing, and set my life up so that I can live on literally the other side of the world.

So pray for me!

Pottery 101

I arrived in Nashville, Tennessee earlier this evening.  No, I'm not in Japan yet.  I'm still waiting on a work visa.  Well, I'm still waiting on a job, then, once I have one of those I'll be waiting about 3 months for a visa.  In the meantime, though, I'm going to look for work while I spend time with my family in good ole TN.

I will miss my home in southern California (homes, really, as I've been wandering from house to house the last two or three months).  I'll miss my friends, as well.  I've had the privilege of getting to know many wonderful, godly people over the last five years in CA.  I've been blessed by friends pouring into my life, teaching me how to love God and walk with Christ.  In recent months these friends have been a great source of support.  One of my friends acknowledged, through that spirit of support, this sentiment:

"Oh my gosh, Robert, this truly is a trying time in your life."

My friend is right.  This is a trying time.  I think, though, with everything happening in rapid succession like it is, that I'm beyond the point of feeling tried.  For a while I felt stretched, I felt nervous to the point of exhaustion.  I was really starting to feel attacked.  Now, though, it's a little different.

I want to begin this next part by saying that I love Tennessee.  I love my families (biological and church) and my friends very much.  That's why it was so difficult to think about coming back here a month ago.  I am no closer now to getting to Japan now than I was last time I was here and asked for support.  I have nothing to show to the people who have been praying for me.  I have no progress to report.  I don't have a job still and I'm starting to lose heart for the job I interviewed for last week.  I care very much about the people here, and I don't want to be a source of disappointment for them.  It is very difficult to see coming home to Fairview as anything other than a failure at this time in my life.

Like I said earlier though, things are not as dark as they may seem.  I have what looks like naive hope or foolish optimism for the future.  I always have.  I blame my parents for teaching me that no matter what happens God will be there with me.  I've never really been afraid for the future.  For me it's always been the present, the here and now, where cowardice has shown its ugly head most frequently.  Normally I get so caught up with how crummy my current circumstances look that I forget to look at it from the bigger perspective.

I flew through a storm cloud today in the plane ride.  The thing about flying through clouds that I've always found interesting is that from the ground, and even from the air above them, or flying by next to one, clouds look so beautiful and peaceful.  When you're inside a cloud, though, your visibility is almost nothing, I could barely see the tip of the wing of our plane; all I could see was a shroud of semi-transparent gray.  It was not the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen, nor was it the most peaceful, it was a storm cloud so we hit a lot of turbulence.  I sleep a lot on planes, but for some reason I was awake from before we entered the storm until after we left the clouds on the other side.  The point I'm trying to make by using the illustration of the clouds is this:  Sometimes we enter periods of time in life that look like they're going to be breezy, peaceful, even, but once we get into the thick of it we realize that maybe things aren't quite as soft and fluffy as they looked earlier.  What I realized, passing through that cloud, was that for me, it is easy to think about the other side.  You know, the return of the fluffy perspective, when you can see the sun shining on the back of the cloud you just came through.  In retrospect the gray of the inner cloud looks white, the turbulence makes shapes like faces and elephants.  It's hard to see those things from the middle, though.

This is what I started thinking about today on the plane:  How can I appreciate what God is doing with me while I pass through storm clouds?  My working theory, birthed from being stretched to a point beyond any reasonable amount of elasticity for a human, is something I'm calling the clay theory.  This is an old analogy, as old as the old testament (which is pretty stinking old).  The idea is that I can be clay.  Clay doesn't have a definitive shape.  I've been thinking of being stretched, to this point, as akin to the way a rubber band is stretched.  You pull on it, and you can make neat shapes like the Eiffel Tower, or mini slingshots, but when you quit stretching a rubber band, unless you've stretched itself too far and snap the thing, it returns to its original shape.  That's the way I've been thinking about being stretched as a person, or more specifically as a follower of Christ, but I realized that maybe I'm not being stretched and pulled just to snap back to an older form.  That's why clay is the proper analogy, or more specifically, since I've done very little work with clay, play dough.  When you stretch out play dough, or change it's shape, it doesn't snap back.  It continues to be what it is.  It doesn't snap if you change it's shape too much, it just sort of retains a new shape.

If my spiritual life and my understanding of Christ were elastic, like a rubber band, I think I would have snapped in twain by now.  I guess it is a good thing that we were already told to be like clay.  I guess now it's just a matter of letting the potter do his thing.

So Pray for me.

Interview number 2!

I'm about 15 minutes away from my second interview with the Gaba Corporation in Nagoya, Japan.  I am so nervous that I really may puke.  After this interview there is a short deliberation process and then, hopefully within the week, I'll know whether they want to hire me or not.

This job is not exactly what I was looking for to make it to Japan, it is in Nagoya, which is a one-hour, 100$ trip, each way, from Osaka, which is where the church I have previously been connected with is located.  However, they are offering to sponsor my work visa which means in just over three months I could be in the country, and the relative area of where I feel God sending me.  Not only that, but the corporation has told me that after three or four months I may transfer to one of their studios in Osaka Japan.

The other concern I have with this job is that my classes are not guaranteed.  I send the company times when I can work and they send me back a list of clients that can meet me during those times.  I am responsible to work for approx. 23 hrs/wk like this.  I'm a bit worried that I may not be able to find enough work at first, but  throughout this process, God has been teaching me the importance of trust - repeatedly showing me sparrows.  Why should I doubt his power in this?

All in all, this isn't exactly the way I thought I would be going to Japan, but then again, this journey has been nothing but outside of what I expected.  If it wasn't, how would God get all of the glory?

So Pray for me!

Will work for Christ.

Man, it has been way too long since I posted an update.  It hasn't been for lack of things going on, oh, on the contrary, there has been goings on, and it hasn't really been for lack of time (I've had plenty).  So, no excuses, I must apologize for my truancy from blogging, but I commit to post more frequently.

I just finished filling out another application for another job.  I think I've filled out more than twenty of these things in the last few days.  It is difficult to find places that will sponsor an American to come teach so late in the year, though, because the visa application process is much more arduous for US citizens than people from other English speaking nations.  I have found a few that are willing to sponsor, but I figure it's probably not a bad idea to put applications into the companies that aren't, you know, just in case.  Plus it feels like I'm doing something, which brings me to the point of the post:

God gives us work to bless us.

Ask my parents, ask my friends, I guarantee the shock of my recent revelation is jaw-dropping.  If there is one person that complains about working more than I do, I have not met them.  However, due to my current state of unemployment I have started thinking about the concept of work and productivity.  God doesn't need me to work.  He doesn't need me to do anything.  If he did then he wouldn't be self-sufficient and wouldn't be a God worthy of worship or devotion.  However, God created man to work.  I mean, look at Adam.  First thing God does after his creation is put him in the garden to work (ESV Gen. 2:15).  So I have to conclude that God gave us work as a blessing.

Now I'm just praying that God will bless me.  So Pray for me!

Lazaro, el soñador

There are two things that never cease to amaze me.  Thing number one:  How good and loving God is.  Thing number two: how shortsighted and foolish I am.

Last week I spent a few days at the house of my friends, David and John.  I always enjoy spending time over there because their father, a Cuban expat, always talks to me.  If you know me, and many of you reading do (and that is, in fact, the reason you read) you know that I love to talk.  I love ideas and I love free exchange of those ideas.  So I love being at their house.  Also, I love being around Cubans.  Always have.

During my last conversation with Mr. Gonzalez I learned about his new job (or maybe he said it was a hobby), which is to write devotions for The Gideons.  He told me about one of the devotions he had just written on Lazarus (here's the good part), paying special attention to focus on the fact that Jesus didn't come when he was called to heal Lazarus.  He didn't even make it back in time for the dead body to be prepared.  He finally came in after Lazarus died.  I saw the immediate connection between that passage of scripture and my life.  I could easily see, that day, how my situation in waiting, in a sense, for God was nothing like Lazarus's.  Even though things sometimes look dim, I thought, I'm not about to die, and even if I were, what of it.  Jesus showed up right when he was supposed to, four days "late".  I get it man, Jesus shows up when he's supposed to so that we may believe.  I know, I know.

I forgot.

I spent the majority of the day receiving bad news.  Getting a work visa to Japan is not the easiest thing to do, especially for US citizens.  I don't suggest trying it unless you absolutely have to.  It's disheartening work, too; calling every company I can find just to have them tell me systematically that they don't sponsor workers but will hire anyone who already has a visa (you have to have a company or relative sponsor you in order to get a work visa to Japan).  The three or four companies that were willing to give me sponsorship all told me that if I had called a month ago or two months ago I would be a very good candidate because they would have had time to secure a work visa before the school year starts.  A month or two ago I was still under the impression that work was going to be found for me.  It all felt so unproductive and discouraging.  I spent most of the day near-wallowing in self-pity.

But just now I remembered Lazarus.  If I die before I wake, Jesus will be glorified, and that's really the whole point of it all anyway, right?  Thinking about Lazarus makes the whole situation seem just a little less terrible.

God's timing is so much better than mine.  I don't always remember it though.

So Pray for me.

Graciously, not Gracefully.

Sometimes following God is painful.  Sometimes He makes us watch as everything we’ve known is dissembled and cast to the wind.  The Israelites knew about it.  They watched as Jerusalem was “the cauldron” and their families “the meat for the stew”.  Hosea knew about it.  All of the disciples, including Paul knew about it.  Sometimes following God hurts.  Sometimes a lot.  Sometimes almost more than we can bear.

I don’t think that it is a coincidence that so many people, friends, family, even people I’ve never met before, have been sending encouragement my way right now.  God knows what is happening and what will happen, and I believe that he has influenced the people within (and without) my life to help me through a very difficult time.

So thank you.  Thank you to Hannah, John, Justin, Patrick, Angela, my parents, the entirety of the cowboy church congregation, Maegan, Jason, James, Megumi, Tom, Dakota, Elizabeth, Sarah, Rebecca, Savannah, Kyle and everyone who has sent me encouragement.  Thank you so much.  You all are impacting my life right now more than I could possibly express through words.  Thank you very much.  I feel God’s hand and I know it is from your supplication.  Thank you all so much.

Please, continue to pray for me.

Chests and doors.

The other day I wrote about how I've been feeling discouraged.  Things aren't working the way I had hoped they would up to this point in my endeavors to serve God and the people of Japan.  My mom asked me a really insightful question the other day, that I kind of put off thinking about until (of course) I read something in Proverbs during a quiet time that brought the question back to my mind.

What she asked me was, "At what point are these things that are going wrong demonic interference, and at what point are they God closing doors?"

Initially, I pushed off the question.  Not that I didn't have an answer.  I did: God has put a passion for the people of Japan in my heart for a reason and every time I pray or read scripture I feel a level of reassurance.  I believe that these are good reasons, but maybe I'm putting too much stock into how I feel about everything.

I've been giving some thought recently to the balance of living somewhere between how I feel and what I know.  While I was thinking about it I remembered reading "Men without Chests" the first chapter from C.S. Lewis's The Abolition of Man.  I packed all of my books up and sent them home when I moved out of my house in Southern California a few weeks ago, but luckily someone posted the whole book online, so I was able to read through what C.S. Lewis had to say.

I hope anyone reading this has had a chance to read that book.  If you haven't, it is short, it took me less than an hour to reread the first chapter and there are only four chapters total to the entire book.  The link provided has all four chapters, please, if you have time, read or reread the book, it is worth it.  Here's a small piece from the end of "Men Without Chests" that struck me more severely:

"The head rules the belly through the chest—the seat, as Alanus tells us, of Magnanimity, of emotions organized by trained habit into stable sentiments. The Chest-Magnanimity-Sentiment—these are the indispensable liaison officers between cerebral man and visceral man. It may even be said that it is by this middle element that man is man: for by his intellect he is mere spirit and by his appetite mere animal."

Throughout the chapter C.S.Lewis refers to two grammarians who wrote a book on preparatory English for children in elementary school.  The problem Lewis has with the Grammarians is that they suggest that man would be better off ignoring sentiment altogether, rather than finding what emotions are just for which responses.

I wonder if I pay more attention to my appetite than I do my intellect.  I wonder if perhaps I let my stomach supersede my head, bypassing my chest.  Whether my head look larger, or my stomach, the result is the same, my chest is atrophied.  Maybe I should think more about what my mother told me.  Maybe these things happening aren't just interference designed to get my discouraged.  Maybe they are doors closing.

In any case it's worth thinking about, which I guess is what I need to do more of so that I don't look like the troll from the first Harry Potter movie, with a tiny head and chest and a great big belly.

So pray for me!