Third JCF Mission Trip on Tsunami-hit Cities in Miyagi
0 comments // Categories: JCF News // Tuesday January 31st, 2012
The JCF mission team composed of four volunteers from different parts of Japan has worked hand in hand with Hope Miyagi for a three-day tsunami relief effort on January 4th-6th.
The third mission trip since the March 11th earthquake was focused on community rehabilitation in the areas greatly affected by the tsunami , such as Higashimatsushima and Ishinomaki in Miyagi prefecture. Volunteers gathered donations and shipped them up to Shiogama Bible Baptist Church.
“I am convinced that God is behind this activity,” said Perlan Alatiit, an ALT from Osaka. “It was my last lesson for the term when there was a little time left so I just started asking the class where they would spend their winter break. Finally, a student asked me the same question. I said I will go to Tohoku to visit my friends in Fukushima and then help a little in Miyagi.”
“Then everyone just started cheering and went wildly excited. I wondered why even the JTE was so excited! After the class the JTE explained to me that the students have been looking for a chance to send their letters and messages to the children of Tohoku but couldn’t find contacts to bring them there.” Perlan ended up bringing more than their letters because they also donated books, some school supplies, gloves and socks and toiletries.
Tin Lok Shea, a CRI from Toyama drove for the team with his churchmate from Australia, Danny Hung, who is currently an exchange student in Hokkaido.
Hope Miyagi is an organization aiming to bring moral and spiritual uplifting through helping the community recover from the tsunami devastation headed by Yukimasa Otomo, associate pastor of Shiogama Bible Baptist Church.
The mission trip was coordinated by Deborah Ruth Trotter and Hiroe Komatsu, supplies and volunteer coordinator for Hope Miyagi and the members of Shiogama Bible Baptist Church, Yu Ito, Shinya Bukawa and Takao Hayasaka.
Happy New Year, Happy Island!
0 comments // Categories: Sharing //
While almost everybody was taking the chance to get away from Japan’s ‘hot zone,’ I had decided to spend the first three days of the 2012 in Fukushima. I had many reasons why I wanted to go back. But what was supposed to be only a selfish motive of visiting my friends became a big, unexpected blessing for me.
2011 was promising. After more than four years of living in Fukushima City, I had finally managed to move to a big, new apartment just a couple of days before the onset of 2011. I remember how I spent almost all the days of my winter break setting up my stuff, having meals under my very own kotatsu for the first time and just loving the winter and the freshness of the new year. As a personal tradition, I spent the New Year’s Day laying down my plans to God. I wrote them in a big notebook and prayed about them. 2011 was so exciting with lots of new things to look forward to! Then the unexpected happened.
I was able to enjoy my new apartment for only two and a half months then I had to go back home to the Philippines after the earthquake and the nuclear disaster that greatly affected my area. In one day, everything had changed. I was at a loss. I had to make a series of big decisions such as whether I would still go back to Japan; would I continue working and living in Fukushima; or should I just stay in the Philippines or try to find something else in a different country and so on. Suddenly, everything that I had anticipated for the new year was not going to happen anymore. I had to start over as the rest of 2011 stretched before me like a long, cold tunnel.
But God is gracious. He didn’t leave me without friends to support me by praying for me and giving me constant encouragements. Then God clearly put it in my heart that I should go back to Japan. So I went back to Fukushima after the Golden Week in May and started picking up the fragments of the life I still have left after the quake. It wasn’t easy but God’s love is more than enough. For the first time in my life, I knew what it meant to have ‘the peace of God, which transcends all understanding’ (Philippians 4:7). The shakings went on as I lived alone in a big, empty apartment with high levels of radioactive materials lurking sporadically all around me but I was never more peaceful in Fukushima than during those difficult times. That confirmed that I did what God wanted me to do. Then He opened doors for a new job in Kansai. So I left Fukushima, and hopefully left my friends and acquaintances with glimpses of God through the friendship and times we shared.
And so at the beginning of this year I went back to where I’d thought my life would end, (literally and figuratively). Everything else looked the same except it wasn’t the same anymore. I met former students and friends with kids who still go to school everyday as if there is no threat. It broke my heart to hear some of them deny the fact of high levels of radiation surrounding the area and I couldn’t argue for I came to understand why they feel that way. Suddenly, I felt so blessed to have a new job in a new place surrounded by wonderful new friends. I realized that many of them would also like to leave but because of their families, jobs and properties, they had chosen to stay.
Fukushima holds so much precious memories for me and most of my cherished friends are still living there. Leaving it every time was never easy. It was the first place I ever lived while abroad and I immediately fell in love with it when I first set foot there in the spring of 2007. But even if at some point in my life I had planned to live there long-term, I know I made the right decision to let go and move on. God tells us when to go and where. He tells us what we should do. And our hearts should be soft enough to listen to him and do so no matter how painful leaving the things and people we came to love is.
As I left the ‘happy island’ for a three-day mission trip in Miyagi, I could hear a still, small voice saying, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there you heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:19-22)
The train was moving farther and farther away from Fukushima while the snow was falling. I whispered a small prayer for Fukushima and for all the people there, especially the ones I care about. And as for me, I am “forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 3:13-14 (NIV)
Perlan Alatiit, 大阪
’Twas the Year of the Census
0 comments // Categories: Poems Sharing Uncategorized //
by John Popp
’Twas the year of the census and all through the region
the people were scared of the great Roman legion.
The emperor was bored; he breathed with a sigh.
Then he had a great thought, a thought that was sly.
“Have the people all counted, close, far, and wide,
to increase their taxes, my fortune, my pride.”
“This is bad news,” said the advisor to the king.
“There are too many. How could we do such a thing?
We can’t count them now! We don’t know who they are.
People have moved, some close, but some far.”
“To keep the count true, the people must travel
back to their homes,” said the king with his gavel.
“They must be counted in families. Only that will suffice,
so no one is missed, counted once, but not twice.”
Joseph’s ancestor was David. King David the Great.
So he hurried to Bethlehem. He couldn’t be late.
His simple possessions a donkey would carry
and on top of it all, Joseph placed his wife Mary.
The passage was hard, Mary being with child,
but the sure-footed donkey made the trek mild.
Arriving in Bethlehem, Joseph hoped that they might
find a comfortable inn to rest up for the night.
The inns were all varied from humble to exotic.
With the streets full of travelers, all was chaotic.
The crowds were so vast and the lines so deep.
Joseph feared there’d be no place to sleep.
“I must have a room for my wife, if you’re able.”
“There’s no room here. Take her down to the stable.”
The stables were caves cut out of a hill.
How terrible! Joseph thought. Lord, can this be your Will?
But the caves were warm, the animals few,
surprisingly clean and the straw fresh and new.
Mary’s baby was born, the midwife a stranger.
They named the boy Jesus and laid him in a manger.
In the Bethlehem fields, on the hills in the land,
some shepherds looked up and saw God’s mighty hand.
Angels came down and shone through the night.
They surrounded the shepherds, who were filled with fright.
But the angels assured them, “You have nothing to fear.
It is Good News from God that brings us here.
The Savior of the world you’ve all waited for
is born in Bethlehem. You need wait no more.
And this is God’s sign,” the angels began to sing,
“In a manger, wrapped with swaddling cloths, you’ll find the infant king.”
Then the sky was filled with the angels’ enchantment,
singing praises to God around the shepherd’s encampment.
When the angels departed and went on their way,
the head shepherd jumped up. He had something to say.
“Let’s see this great thing, of which we’re delighted.
We can’t sleep now; we’re much too excited.”
So they ran to Bethlehem, searching in haste.
They wanted to find him. There was no time to waste.
The shepherds found Jesus and Mary his mother.
“May we come in, if it isn’t a bother?”
“Everyone’s welcome!” Joseph said.
“Come one, come all,” as they each bowed their head.
They beckoned the shepherds in from the cold
and were amazed by the story the shepherds then told.
How the angels sang of the new child’s birth,
that Jesus came to save all people on earth.
Of the shepherd’s news, this was the best part
and Mary held it tightly, close to her heart.
And now, children, you’ve all heard the story
of a child born like you for God’s great glory.
Whether born in a hospital, a house, or a stable,
God has a plan for you. Listen if you’re able.
Learn from the Christ child, who out of darkness was born,
to teach us, to love us, to give us hope when forlorn.
For Jesus brings light so that we can see
that the face of God is on you and on me.
And if you accept him as King and Savior,
you too can have life, with heavenly favor.
We can all sing now what the angels sang then:
Peace on Earth, Good Will toward Men.