One Life

We leave on Friday back to Nagoya (7/13) and our lives and ministry there.

There is a sense of both excitement and dread – we’re ready to return “home” and do the work the Lord has called us to. There are many in Japan eagerly awaiting our return. At the same time we’re really not looking forward to the plane-ride with our four girls. Elliot especially will likely be a handful for the 15 hours of flying time. Please pray for the travel and also jet-lag. The goodbyes will be very painful. It’s been a wonderful furlough these past 9 months. The girls have so enjoyed school and family. I never believed in the whole concept of being “in love” – but seeing my father with Elliot I think I believe.

This is a reminder of the sacrifices we have chosen to make in this calling. Not so much just the language, food, nature, and all the comforts of life in America (there is no nation on earth like America – but unless you’ve lived elsewhere you probably don’t know it) – but much more so the very great blessings that the Lord gives to us – family and friends. That’s why I’ve always thought of missions as a fasting of many of the blessings of life. When we normally fast – we abstain from food – something so seemingly essential to life – to remind us of what is even more essential – our relationship with Christ. We fast because there is urgency of some other matter – more urgent than eating. In missions, we fast the blessings of family, friends, and all the blessings and opportunities of life in the US – because there is something even more essential to life – our relationship to Christ whom we follow and seek to make known. And we fast these blessings – because there is something more urgent than even our family and friends – the Gospel going to the perishing among the 2.5 billion who have little or no chance to hear the Gospel.