On the second Japanniversary.

Can I confess something to you all? You can probably already tell, but I'm very, probably overly, conscious of what I think other people think of me.

If you look back at especially the earliest entries on this blog, you'll read stuff about about how much I've studied Japan, how I'm endeavoring not to make assumptions or overgeneralizations about the culture, and how much I want to emphasize that I'm here for God, not myself (even though Japan's been part of my life goals for over eight years now).

Here's an entry that I wrote back in September 2012 (but never posted) that sums up my self-consciousness pretty well:

I won't be in Japan for another two weeks and I've already made all these plans for the blog. (Talk about jumping the gun, right?) Over the past few weeks I've been struggling to write entries that are:

• meaningful
• insightful
• not potential cause for concern
• not accidentally offensive

But I couldn't bring myself to post them, because I wasn't sure if they conformed to those standards. Did this one make me look unpretentious enough? Did this one adequately express my cultural sensitivity in contrast to many people's conceptions about Christian mission being just another form of cultural imperialism? Did this one make me look good?

I was completely missing the point. It's not about me, it's about God. All I can do is witness and testify. And then I just need to let go and let God do his thing. God can and will work through or despite me.

So here's another intention for this blog: honesty.

Now let's get me over to Japan before I write anything else.

Praying with the JELC Kyushu parish in
Hakozaki, Fukuoka. (June 2013.)

In various ways, a large part of being a missionary is PR--not necessarily just for God in the field, but for the "folks back home." I want to make good on (what I perceive as) everyone's expectations of me, to earn an A+, a gold star. This is why I don't write about how once when I rode my bike face-first into a giant spider web I shouted words that missionaries probably shouldn't even know. What I want to write about is how I (and my Japanese brothers and sisters and fellow missionaries, because I want to once again emphasize how this is not about me) have reached so many souls for Christ and how the church is flourishing and growing in visible, tangible ways.

A student paper. No idea how much I
had to do with the content of this paragraph.

But, as I've mentioned before in this blog, the truth is not nearly as exciting--at least on the surface. Things are happening, yes, but not crazy exciting inspiring-email-chain-letter kinds of things. And it leaves me wondering--am I doing enough? Shouldn't I be stepping it up? But I don't know how!

If there's anything I've learned here in the past 24 months, it's that it truly--truly--is not about me. This doesn't just mean that this J-3 journey is not my own personal TV drama all about and starring me (though the fact that it is not is very true), but also that I can put down this burden I've been hauling around for two years (or more). It's not mine to bear.

Some days are just like this.

God's glory and power is not diminished by my weakness and failures. If anything, the myriad weaknesses I've found in myself in Japan have only magnified how amazing God is. In the midst of a foul mood I find unexpected grace and blessings, or I catch myself expecting the worst of people only to discover God has been working through them the whole time, and I am once again humbled.

I've been meditating lately on how Christians are called to lead a life of radical sacrifice. I think of the J-3s that came here only six or seven years before I did, before the age of Skype and Google Hangouts, who had to depend only on written emails and IMs to communicate with their families on a regular basis. I think of one former J-3 (now a theology professor in Tokyo) telling us about how, when he was a J-3 in the '70s, a rep from AT&T came to visit and gave everyone a wildly generous three free minutes of international calling. I think of John Manjiro, a Japanese fisherman who in 1841 at the age of 14 was shipwrecked, rescued by an American whaling ship, and taken in by an American family for several years at a time when leaving Japan was a crime punishable by death. And here I am in an apartment with heat and A/C, electricity, and clean running water, living what I openly declare to have been my dream.

But then in the Bible, when it talks of the sacrifices of God:

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart
O God, you will not despise.
Psalm 51:17 [NIV]

Psalm 51:10-12 is the offertory response in the Japanese Lutheran church, and it wasn't until I came to Japan and sang these verses every week that they became more and more real to me.

Create in me a pure heart, O God,
and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
Do not cast me from your presence
or take your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation
and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.
Psalm 51:10-12 [NIV]

My whole life, but these past two years especially, God has continually shown me the true weight of His power, might, love, and wisdom--ultimately made manifest in his Son, that is enough to break through the sin, fear, and death rampant in this world--and in my own life. I can only pray that for the next five months in Japan (as well as the rest of my life) God let me reflect His light wherever I go and whatever I do, regardless of whether I realize it or not. Amen.

Still one of my favorite purikura (photo booth) photos we've ever taken. (February 2013.) Happy Japanniversary, guys!

He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all--how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died--more than that, who was raised to life--is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.
Romans 8:32-34 (NIV)