On Tuesday night, we had our team’s “fun night” where we spend time trying something new, and having fun, as a whole team on Mission Megumi. This time, though, the guys on the team hung out, to have some manly time. What does this involve? Silly question, clearly the answer is: eating, walking through a cemetery, and karaoke. We went to the Mountain restaurant near Yagoto station, which is known for serving rather bizzare meals. For dinner, we had chocolate banana spaghetti, followed by an Italian tomato paffe for dessert.

On our way home, we walked past a cemetery. It looks nothing like what I’ve seen in Australia. It was on a hill, with hundreds, and hundreds of graves. It looked like a maze of graves. It’s pretty likely that none of them believed in Jesus, and found hope and life in Him.

This week on campus, we tried using Soularium on campus. This involves a pile of picture cards, and using these cards to talk about our opinions and images of life, and God. They haven’t been used in Japan before, and so we brought them with us from Australia to see how they would go. So far, it seems to be pretty good in starting conversation, and creating an engaging conversation. As Soularium was designed by Western culture, we have tried to adapt it to better suit Japanese culture, by removing pictures that are not very clear.

One of the most encouraging stories for me on Gaidai is split into two parts. On one day of campus, I went with an Aussie STINTer, and a Japanese student, to go and meet students in one of the new buildings on campus. We found someone who the STINTer already knew, and we began a two-hour conversation with him. It was a really good conversation, as he was working on an English debate about capital punishment, so he asked us what we thought, to try and build his argument. We ended up talking about God, and faith, and the Japanese student was able to share his story in coming to know Jesus, and also to share the main points of the Gospel. He was very interested, and listened well, asking lots of questions.

A couple of days later, I was in the same building with one of the Japanese girls. We weren’t sure who to talk to, so we sat down to pray about it first. After we prayed, we ran into him, and this time he was with a group of friends. We started talking to them, and were talking about Christmas. On Thursday, we had a Christmas party, and so were inviting students to come to that, and also giving them Christmas CDs with music. After we invited these students, we were talking about the meaning of Christmas; why and how someone’s birthday could be celebrated all throughout the earth. The guy we had shared the Gospel with pulled out the booklet we had given him with the main points of the Gospel on it, and told his friends about it, and so we were able to share the Gospel with them, and they were also very interested!

It has been amazing to see how God has been at work on Gaidai, and finding students are so interested in finding out about who God is, and the relationship we can have with Him. And knowing that it has nothing to do with what we do, or how we do it, but that God is in charge, and is just showing us the way He has already set for us.

We now have only one week left on campus – time is going really quickly!

My poor frisbee

This last weekend marked the end of our first week in Japan; time is going by pretty quickly! My first visit to campus was on Wednesday, where I began to acquaint myself with the layout. At Gaidai, I met several of the Christian students on campus. Gaidai has seen several students come to know Christ over the past month or so, so it was very exciting to meet quite a few students at the lunch we had.

Most of the time on campus is spent meeting and talking to students, trying to build relationships, and develop community that reflects the love of Christ. One of the ways that I have tried to do this, is to find people who are interested in playing a game of Ultimate Frisbee. This is played every week at Griffith university, and I think it’s a great way to connect people, and to have fun, so I brought a frisbee with me from Australia, with the intention to try and play in Japan.

Friday saw the first attempt at frisbee, and quite possibly the last for my poor frisbee. We didn’t have enough people to play a game of Ultimate Frisbee, so we just threw around the frisbee on campus. It turns out that plastic frisbees weren’t designed to hit tables, rocks, poles, concrete, and walls. Hopefully with my tape-covered frisbee, we can try and have an actual game of Ultimate next week.

Sharing faith with the students on campus is a little different to Australia, but many of the Japanese students like the idea of Christianity, and want to have a belief in God, but if you ask them how they can, they don’t know. On Friday evening, one of the girls at university prayed to receive Christ, and we were very excited to welcome her into the Family of Christ, and to know that she has placed her trust in the love of God, and the sacrifice He made for us.

The first lesson we had to learn was how the trains work, and the system of getting onto, and off of, a train without offending the locals. Which of course, we did, by not lining up where we were meant to, and talking too loud. But the power of being gaijin (foreigners) helped us get away with it.

We settled into our apartments, but not before breaking another rule – shoes off before entering the room! The three Aussie STINTers (short-term missionaries) explained to us a few rules, and in particular the crazy rubbish system, of different coloured bags, with many categories, that needed to be not only sorted, but cleaned.

To explore the local area, we went on a “scavenger hunt” to learn to read our Japanese maps, and find the vital locations (like groceries and McDonalds – where we had our first dinner in Japan).

After much needed rest, today we will be looking at orientation into ministry on campus in Nagoya. We hope that through this, it will help to encourage, equip, and prepare us for ministering to the Japanese students we will be meeting over the next four weeks.

Please join us in prayer for:

• guidance for our team dynamics and that God will grow our heart for us to love and serve each other, and Christ, so that He might be glorified.
• the Japanese students that God would open their hearts and minds to know Him.
• our overall team vision of seeing 6 students come to know Christ personally.