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4 Weeks to Go!

Our departure date is less than four weeks away! It’s hard to believe that it’s coming up so quickly, and even as we race through this final period of support raising prior to departure, God continues to provide, opening doors, strengthening relationships with supporters and sending churches, and introducing us to new partners. It has truly been a blessed, though somewhat frantic time!

Over the last month we’ve shared at five different churches, and one Bible Study, and we’re scheduled to share at three more churches before our departure in just four weeks time. This month alone we’ve had 25 new people become prayer partners, which brings our total up to 180! They have all been a tremendous blessing and encouragement and we cannot thank them enough. If you would like to become a prayer partner and recieve our weekly email updates, click here. We’re excited that in a few short weeks we’ll start sending you prayer updates from Japan to let you know what God is doing there, and to ask you to pray for Him to work in the prefecture of Iwate.

On Saturday, March 9th we’ll have our final support raising event before we leave, click here for the details on Facebook. Everyone is invited! If you haven’t gotten a chance to hear in person what God is doing in Japan, and what part we’ll be playing, you’ll definitely want to come. If you haven’t heard an update from us in person in awhile, this is a great opportunity to see what God’s been doing in Iwate over the last two years, and what we pray He will be doing in the coming years. If you know someone who is interested in missions, or interested in Japan, please consider inviting them to come with you. And please keep the event in prayer. We are praying that God will provide a good portion of our remaining needed support through this event.

 

Praises

  • Our biggest praise this week was that we were issued my certificate of eligibility to receive a spousal visa to live in Japan. The visa has not been officially approved yet, but there’s no reason to expect that it would not be at this point. Still, pray that things continue to go smoothly. It is in the mail right now on it’s way to us from Japan, we’ll then take it to the Japanese Consulate in LA to apply for the Visa, and if everything is in order and the Visa is approved we’ll go pick it up a week later.
  • We had one new financial partner this week, 14 new prayer partners, and a number of people tell us that they intend to support us and are praying about how much they will give. Praise God!
  • The Dollar to Yen exchange rate has improved remarkably over the last six months. We had set our budget to be very tight in order to keep costs down, but in doing so we had very little margin for error, so we were a little nervous about it. However since the exchange rate has been going in favor of the Dollar, every Dollar of support given will now go a little bit further, and Lord willing allow us to minister more effectively with having a little bit less stress from worrying about our financial needs being met.
Prayer Requests
  • Unofficially we’re down to about $985/month in needed support. There’s still some things that are up in the air, so be praying for God to work them all out, but it looks like that’s the number that we’re down to. Please pray for God to provide that monthly support before we go.
  • We just bought plane tickets this week, and are beginning to make the rest of  our travel arrangements. Our itinerary will involve flying into Tokyo, arriving Mar 26, taking a train into the city to stay at a hotel overnight, and catching a bullet train to Iwate the next day. From there we will be staying either at the church we’ll be working with or at the volunteer center, and hope to find an apartment quickly and get moved in before language school starts on April 8.
  • The language school I’m going to attend begins on April 8th. Pray that God will open all the doors for us to be able to purchase plane tickets, move to Japan, find an apartment, and get settled in all before April 8th.
  • Pray for language learning for me now. I’ve been trying to cover three months worth of prerequisite material in about 8 weeks in order to try to get into the group language class I’d like. If I can’t get through it I’ll probably have to start with individual lessons, which wouldn’t be a bad thing, but I think I would do better in a group with the added pressure and competition to keep me engaged.
  • Pray for God to provide the perfect place for us. We’re looking for an affordable apartment or home that the three of us can comfortably live in, preferably with an extra bedroom for guests to be able to come stay with us. Ideally it would also be within walking distance to either the church or the language school. Tomo is scouring the Internet right now, and we’ve been told that a lot or places open up in March. It would be great if we could find a place before we depart so that we can land, sign the papers and move in.
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Prayer for Iwate

The prefecture of Iwate, where we will be moving in less than two months to begin ministry, continues to face many challenges. I read a recent report about the survivors in the Tohoku region (of which Iwate is a part of) that said that there are still 305,000 tsunami survivors that are essentially homeless, living in temporary housing. Reuilding has been going very slowly over the last 2 years, and the government has only completed 40 out of a planned 23,000 houses that were supposed to be built for the survivors. Meanwhile the Japanese Churches located in Iwate, though few in number, are continuing to minister to these survivors, even as many NGOs and short term missionaries begin to pull out.

As noted in the slide above, there were 0 missionaries working in Iwate prior to the Tsunami. For now, there are about 20 missionaries seeking to help reach Iwate’s 1.3 million people, over 99% of whom have no relationship with Jesus Christ. As thousands in Iwate continue to live day to day in temporary housing situations and an uncertain future, pray that many will turn their hearts towards God, and find in Him the peace and security that only a relationship with Christ can provide.

Prayer Requests

  • Pray for the churches and missionaries ministering to these people, that they would have wisdom, sensitivity, boldness and compassion to meet their emotional and spiritual needs.
  • Pray that churches will be started in each of the 17 unchurched towns.
  • Pray that all churches in Iwate will shine brightly and become visible, attractive presences in their communities.
  • Pray that God will provide for all of our needs as we prepare to go and join with the Japanese and international Christians in Iwate who faithfully proclaiming the gospel of salvation through Jesus Christ.
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One Step Closer to Departure

I had a talk with JEMS missions director this week, and we have some exciting news to announce. Because our outgoing funds have been completely raised, and additional funds have continued to be given by our generous supporters, we have been officially cleared for a departure date of March 27, 2013! 

What this means is that JEMS has given us permission to depart on that date, and it will be up to us to make the final decision on whether or not we will go. Even though our outgoing one time costs have been met, we still have around $1,700/month in monthly commitments that needs to be raised to meet our full budget. We will prayerfully make our final decision at the beginning of March when we see how many people have begun supporting by the end of February.

We are very encouraged by all that God has done to provide additional support over the last few months, and also by the many promising avenues through which He seems to be working even now. He has always provided for all of our needs, and we are continuing to trust that He will do so in the future. Please pray for us that God will give us wisdom to know His will, faith to trust Him, and for His provision of new monthly financial partners this month.