Weekly Update

Hi, guys. It is coming down to the last week of my stay here, please pray for my health and focus to finish well in my last week here.

Last week I had the opportunity to meet up with some students at a park near one of the universities that I minister at. I ended up playing soccer with them at 6:30 am! Wow! It was my first real time playing soccer in my whole life, but, it went really well. The guy who allowed me to play told me that some of the people there were not saved, so that I should probably not talk about Jesus which was understandable. But, after the soccer game, God opened up a door with one of the guys, and I was able to give him my testimony and to preach about Jesus! Awesome! One side note about the soccer game that would put Americans including myself to shame was how friendly everyone was during the game. There were unsaved people playing but instead of yelling at each other, cursing, or doing other things, everyone was so polite, warm, and encouraging. I was so convicted because in America, when guys play sometimes, it gets so fleshly and it just seems so normal. I felt so included the whole game. Even though I messed up a lot, the members of my team still kept trying to find ways to get the ball to me so I could get a chance to learn the game well. It was such an uplifting experience! After the game, each team shares what their motto or theme for the game was, and they all say something positive about how they played today. You also shake hands and bow.

This week, I went out to lunch with a friend of mine that I met while evangelizing on campus. A few weeks ago I was able to preach the gospel to him. The surprising part, was that he was so open to listening to the gospel from me, and he seemed so intrigued. He was reluctant though to turn his back on his parents' beliefs. Please pray for him.

My friend Shawn that I've been ministering to.
Please continue to pray for him.

Susan, Kohei, Amanda and I going somewhere!

This is me playing to The Lord.

I love Japanese food!

I love Japanese food again!

My friends here in Japan. We eat at Coco's a lot!

Amanda and I with the rest of our friends at a pizza place

My church family at GAP!

Me teaching the children in Sunday School

Time is flying!

Hi, everyone. I am here pondering the past week or so of ministry in Japan and I am really in awe of what God is doing in and through me here in Japan. God has opened up doors to preach the gospel in ways that i would never have imagined! Please continue to pray for me in these last 2 weeks of my trip. Please pray for grace, strength and spiritual wisdom, also pray for health!

This week, was awesome, I had a going away party at my church and all I can say was that I am going to miss my church so much when I have to leave here. On Sunday, I taught the children in the morning. I led worship for the second service, and despite some glitches, things went pretty awesome, and God did some awesome things in the worship after the service. I will update some more with pictures and details of some other evangelism testimonies shortly. Sorry!

Oh sweet conviction....

Hi, everyone, I wanted to share some recent conviction that The Lord has given me and a story that happened recently. First, for the story. I was running last week and I went running through this park that I normally run through. While I was running I noticed a boy standing in the middle of the park by himself. He looked to be a teenager, and so even though it seemed odd for him to be doing nothing in the middle of the park, I ran past him. I felt that slight nudge of The Holy Spirit and I felt Him clearly tell me to go and talk to him, but, I began to make excuses. "That would be weird" or, "I don't have time, I am on a run," All of these things ran through my mind. But, I paused and started to walk towards the boy. Then I halted and started running back home. But, then I stopped again and finally managed to muster the courage to go talk to him. Well, long story short, between the boys bad english and my bad japanese, I found out that he was training for sasuke, which I found out later is a tv show here in Japan. He let me watch him train and asked me to videorecord his training. After that though, he had to go to school. After he left, I wondered why God? Why did I have to go talk to him? He didn't get saved and nothing major happened. But, The Lord showed me that all I need to do is be obedient to His Spirit. I think that one reason The Lord had me go talk to him was to give me the opportunity to sow towards The Spirit and overcome my fear of man. We have to respond to the little movements of God's Spirit, no matter how dumb they may seem.

Please, please, please continue praying for me. I am in the last two weeks of my trip here in Japan and I want the fullness of why God brought me here.

Rob

Focus...focus...focus...

Ahh...time for my update again. I am doing well here in Japan. I was getting really worn out and tired, but, The Lord has refreshed me today. Not only is God using me in some very cool ways, but, He is going to the core of my heart about so many things. He is teaching me step by step how to trust Him with my heart.

One of the most exciting things that I get to do is work with children at church on Sunday. Here in this picture are my two friends. Their mother is saved but their father is not saved yet. Please pray for not only his salvation but theirs as well. I believe that God can reveal Himself to children in incredible ways. Please join me in prayer. In addition to helping out with the children I am currently playing piano on the worship team for both services. I am truly enjoying playing on the team although I get nervous at times!

God has given me some cool opportunities to witness on both Todai's and Wadesa's campuses about who Jesus is. This week, Amanda and I went to Todai and we sat in the middle of the campus and worshipped The Lord. I played guitar and just led us in a time of ministering to The Lord. I couldn't help feeling how significant it was that we were sitting there in the middle of campus declaring who Jesus was and how Todai belonged to Him. Many people slowed down as they walked passed us and seemed curious as to what we were doing, and I saw some that seemed to enjoy it. Also, on Tuesday, I taught bible study at Todai and I taught about living life with a vision. It was so awesome, because my heart came alive as I began to talk about living life with a purpose. Jesus, please don't let my life be in vain. This is the cry of my heart...

I could share many more stories of cool connections and divine appointments, but, I will just share some pictures. My heart is overflowing with both love for the Japanese people and heartbreak over how far this nation is from Jesus...

Praying for people at the student center.

I met these two at Sekei. Please continue to
pray for them.

I met Yoshi one of the first weeks on campus.
God has given me some cool talks with him.

Meet Takeshi, God has given me and Amanda
such a divine appointment with him.

Here I am worshipping Jesus with Takeshi and two girls that
Amanda and I invited over for dinner. All three are not saved.
We had a good time talking, playing games, and eating tacos.

Ok, so there is more than one way to do evangelism.
If it must be, I will stuff my face full of marshmallows...

Time to be a kid!!!!!!!!!

On Friday, I went back to being ten years old and I went to Disney Sea! It is part of Disney Land and I loved it! I went with Amanda, Yuri, and my new friend Kohei. Also, Geoff came much later and joined us for the last part of the day. We ended up spending 13 hours walking around the park and getting on rides. I must say that I truly needed this little time to just get away from all of the ministry things that I've been doing and just enjoy a good laugh. The weather was perfect; not too sunny, and not too cold. It was like The Father was shining down on me and giving me His approval for attempting to be faithful with what He has given me to do here in Japan.

I must say that I didn't ride some of the bigger rides that my friends insisted that I must go on in order to be cool. Peer pressure does not work on me!!!!!! One serious thing struck me though as I walked around and enjoyed myself at the park. I would look around and see so many Japanese enjoying themselves and looking so happy. I couldn't help but, be a bit heartbroken knowing that without Jesus, there can be no true happiness for the nation of Japan....

Be ready in season and out of season

I have one highlight that I did not share from a week ago. Well, when I was with the Carbondale team doing ministry in Machida we ended up having a very packed weekend. Saturday I led worship for a 2 hour worship set and then on Sunday I preached in the morning service. After the service I was exhausted and thought that everything was over, but, I was wrong, after some hours, the pastor of the church came to me and said since the girls were having a bible study he wanted something for the men in the church, so could I go and get my bible and teach on sex, dating, and what the Bible has to say about relationships? Whoa...talk about be ready in season and out of season eh?! I was thinking..."What???!!!"So, I went to get my Bible and was praying in tongues and asking for wisdom.

When I got back downstairs there was a group waiting for me. It was amazing because there were so many different age groups there, older men, young teenage boys, and ages in between. I was nervous, but, I committed the time to The Lord and we began. The Lord really opened me up and I tried to be as transparent on the topic of sex and relationships as possible. God gave me much grace. When I got done sharing, I nervously opened things up for questions or comments. I thought because so many seemed shy that nobody would say anything, but, I was wrong. Many shared struggles and/or their thoughts. It was such a refreshing time! Thank You Jesus.

A very cool teenager I met that came to the bible study.

Here is one of the boys I connected with during the day on Sunday.

After a long weekend of ministry. Here we are...happy!

A blur of a week!

Hi, everyone. I am sorry about the delay in updating my blog. This past week has been very busy. A team from my home church in Illinois came this past week and it was truly awesome. I was very glad to see them, and was so privileged to be able to minister alongside them. I could talk forever about all of the things that happened but, I will share some highlights now and some more over the next few entries. During the week we went to Seikei University to teach English in some of the classes. While we were there to teach English we were also able to share the gospel! It was awesome and we got the chance to minister to students in some really cool ways. God truly opened up some cool doors for us.

Wednesday we were at Waseda and we were able to make some cool contacts with students. During the evening we had bible study at Waseda and a visitor came who Sandy Payne met earlier that day while at Starbucks. The girl was not saved but had a good time at bible study it seems. Please pray for her. After bible study...eating!

The weekend was jampacked as half of the team went to Kashiwa and half of us went to minister in Machida. We got to the church and had some food. Right after some brief downtime it was off to prepare for the night. The church had us scheduled to do a 2 hour worship set. The theme of the night was basically resting in The Lord. I was scheduled to lead worship and Christa, Dominique, April, and Anna sang with me. I was so nervous because the night was such a big deal and I'm so new to worship leading. But, God was sooooooo awesome and He helped us so much. Around 8pm when we started playing after a few minutes people began crying in the room and it seemed like something just broke open in The Spirit. Ayumi, Sensei, and Sayaka began to move around and pray for people as we worshipped Jesus. There was a sweet presence in the room! People were being touched and delivered! I could feel The Holy Spirit so tangibly! As we worshipped, someone got prayed for and received the baptism of The Holy Spirit!