Hokkaido

The super typhoon changed directions and we are now able to take a 3-day trip to Hokkaido!! There will be 14 of us. Please pray that we get to have good conversations with the students!

Last Bible Discussion

Tomoe thinks that reading the Bible this past year has broadened her horizons. She wants to get to know Jesus "little by little".

Samika used to think that the Bible was a collection of stories. Now she thinks it is historical and true. She thinks that Christianity is a relationship, not a religion.

Mami says that she now believes in invisible things because those are the things that do not change. She was afraid of losing herself or someone stealing her soul if she believed in a religion. She said that her point of view is changing and that she wants to read the Bible with us every day.

Anna says that she now believes that things she cannot see might be real, including God.

The following girls have attended our Bible discussions:
Anna
Nana
Mami
Nami
Minami
Tomoe
Samika
Rie
Honoko
Miku
Chihiro
Naoko
Akari
Naomi
Riho

PLEASE pray for these girls! It is amazing that there have been so many girls who have been interested in coming twice a week to talk about Jesus with us. We have seen God work so much in softening their hearts.

Cow tongue

Tried it!!

Shirts

For your entertainment, here are some more shirts that make no sense:











Also, a health update:
Thank you for your prayers! I am feeling so much better and am no longer in danger of having to go to the hospital. Wooooo! All the medication and rest has helped and I'm back to being active and enjoying time with the team. :)

Onsen

We went to the public bath. The infamous "onsen". Naked people everywhere. What an experience.


Some of the students went with us. There are several baths, saunas, and hot rooms with rocks. One room was 200 degrees! It was super fun to be a part of something that is so uniquely Japanese.

'Merica

We celebrated the 4th of July with a cookout. We made mini burgers and hot dogs with watermelon. We even had fireworks! There were about 40 students that joined us:




We had a day of shopping with the older girls! We stopped for a lunch at a tea shop:




We did the classic purikura:




We are always on the lookout for shirts that don't make sense in English:




We road-tripped and hiked with some students to a beautiful waterfall in Akiu:

We got to share the Gospel!

We had by far the best girls' Bible discussion so far this summer! Ikuko (the Nav staff woman) was not there to translate, so we talked with Mami, Tomoe, Nana, Rie, Samika, and Anna without an interpreter. God really broke down the walls in communication. It was amazing to see how easy it was to understand one another because usually there is a pretty high level of difficulty. We talked about Matthew 18 and the parable of the unforgiving servant. We asked them some questions about forgiveness: Is forgiving easy? Why do we forgive? Have you ever had to ask for forgiveness?

Samika asked us what happens if we do not forgive someone. She said that if you sin in her religion (Buddhism), you go to hell. She asked us if the same thing happens in Christianity. We had the opportunity to share the Gospel with all of the girls while answering her question! When we told her that in Christ we are forgiven of all our sins, she said that she was jealous that we can believe in a God who is so generous. We explained that God is available to anyone and that he came into the world as Jesus and lived a perfect life. When Mami found out that Jesus is God, she freaked out. She had never heard that before. A lot of them take a Bible class in college, but they didn't understand these basic things about the Christian doctrine.

They asked a lot of questions about Heaven and we got to share with them a passage in Revelation that talks about people from every nation gathered around the throne of God. When we are in Heaven, we will hear people speaking Japanese! They loved hearing that. We asked them some questions about their belief in life after death, and a lot of them had truly never thought about it before. They are also afraid of punishment, so I asked them who they think will punish them for their sins. They were unsure. It is so interesting to hear about their fear, but they have no idea who to be afraid of.

At the end, they thanked us for sharing with them and agreed to meet again on Monday. Tomoe said that when she thinks about religion, she thinks about fear. But when she thinks about the Gospel, she is not afraid. HOW AWESOME IS THAT?

Here is Mandy sharing an illustration of the Gospel to the girls!