Introductions and such.

Greetings from not-quite-Japan-yet! I might be jumping the gun, as I'm not leaving for Japan until the end of September, but I just got back from a brief orientation to the J-3 program and the ELCA Summer Missionary Conference this past weekend and have been itching to create this blog ever since. So I'll start with an introduction to myself and the program I'll be on.

Three months in Tokyo, then 27 months in Kumamoto.

My name is Laura. I'm from a small town in the San Francisco Bay Area. I graduated from St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota last May. After a short sojourn back at home I'm headed to Japan this fall as a missionary with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA)'s J-3 program along with two other marvelous ladies I met last week. We'll spend three months in Tokyo and three months in the city of Kumamoto (on Kyushu, the southernmost major island) for orientation before starting work teaching English at one of the two Lutheran junior/senior high schools in Kumamoto in April. We will also each be assigned to a church, but the details on that are TBA. We'll all be in Japan until the end of March 2015 if all goes as planned.

In this blog I plan to share reflections, photos, and stories from my 30-month stay in Japan; keep in touch with family, friends, and other missionaries; and maybe introduce a few Internet wanderers who find their way here to the world of mission work in Japan. I'm trying not to hold too tightly to any preconceived notions about what the next two-and-a-half years will be like before I go, so I'm hesitant to say anything more than my intentions for the blog itself. God does amazing things we can't always anticipate (more than we can ever ask or imagine, as Paul says in Ephesians), so I'm inclined to lean back and let him do the awesome stuff; I'm just thrilled to be along for the ride!

A note about my "Presbo-Lutheranism": I was raised in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), but the ELCA-affiliated St. Olaf College introduced me to the wonderful, four-part-harmonious, real-wine-using world of Lutheranism. It was the first time I'd ever regularly attended services outside my home denomination. Since then, having also regularly attended Baptist church services and worked at a (super awesome) Presbyterian summer camp, I've come to really appreciate the different ways people worship the same Jesus. I'm eager to see Japan's take on Lutheranism. Ecumenicalism* is fun!

*One of the many cool words I learned at the Summer Missionary Conference, "ecumenical" means "pertaining to the whole Christian church."

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. 
Ephesians 3:20-21 (NIV)