The last month has been the most active and intense period of support raising I’ve been in yet. We’ve been meeting with individuals, pastors and soon speaking at churches as well. God’s been gracious thus far and we’ve seen a lot of our needed support come in. As always I’m excited about going to Japan, but for the first time I feel like I can see it coming up on the horizon.
Our goal is to leave for Japan next summer, in 2011. In order to do that we’ve got to find enough churches and individuals to partner with us by committing to give on a monthly basis and supply our total budget set by SEND which will enable us to live and minister full time in Tokyo. We also have an outgoing amount that needs to be raised up front to cover moving expenses, the cost of getting set up in Japan and to pay for 2 years of language school for me. Normally however the outgoing amount is largely supplied by the generosity of our monthly financial partners, most of them have already begun supporting us and the money that they send in each month goes straight into our outgoing fund.
We have about 20% of our monthly support committed right now. Our goal is to reach 60% by January. This will allow us to start receiving a salary from SEND so that we can spend the final 6 months doing nothing but support raising and preparing to leave for Japan, in anticipation of being fully supported by July 31 2011.
Right now our strategy is focused almost exclusively on finding the people that God is leading to partner with us in prayer and monthly giving. We’re meeting with individuals and couples, sharing our vision and inviting them to be a part of something spectacular that God is doing. We’re also looking to meet new people, asking for the names of people’s friends that might be interested in hearing from us, and looking to speak at churches and Bible Studies for 5-10 minutes to see if anyone would be interested in meeting with us one on one. Next Sunday, the 25th we’ll be speaking at two Churches, so please keep us in your prayers.
I’m excited that God has called us to be a part of full fulling the great commission, by being a part of His plan to take the gospel to the people of Japan. You can share in this endeavor as well. This is not something that we’re doing on our own. Already dozens of people have partnered with us, and together we are seeking God’s glory, committing our time, our finances, our prayers and our lives to the spread of the gospel.
Reading update
Just finished “What is Reformed Theology?” by R.C. Sproul. Call it Calvanism or Reformed theology, whatever, my theological understanding has been bent in that direction for awhile now, but I never took the time to actually read a book outlining all it’s beliefs. I wouldn’t say I’m 100% there yet, but I don’t think I know of a better explanation of what the Gospel is all about. Charles Spurgeon once said:
“I have my own private opinion that there is no such thing as preaching Christ and Him crucified, unless we preach what nowadays is called Calvinism. It is a nickname to call it Calvinism; Calvinism is the gospel, and nothing else.“
Probably sounds shocking, but I think he’s got it right, because Calvanism (or Reformed Theology) is simply an explanation of God’s plan to bring about the sure and certain salvation of His people.
In my year through the Bible reading program, I’m in Leviticus, Psalms and Proverbs, and up to 1 Timothy in the New Testament. Also I’ve still been spending time in Jeremiah in my devotions, but haven’t been nearly as consistent with that as I need to be.
For fun I’ve been reading Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series, and Douglas Adams Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
On the horizon I think I’m going to tackle a biography of Hudson Taylor, and to keep up on the latest heresies, I picked up a copy of Rob Bell’s “Velvet Elvis” for 50 cents at the friends of the library book store. I definitely don’t agree with the beliefs of the “Emerging Church” but I try not to be too critical of something till I’ve examined it first hand. Once through Jeremiah I’ve got this ambitious (and from what I’ve read so far of Mr. Bell’s book, foolish) idea to try to understand every single verse of one book of the Bible. I think I’ll start smallish with something like Philippians.