Japan!

Hey all,

sorry for the delay after being called out!  my internet connection has been horrible >_<

anyhow, Japan has been lots of fun but I definitely feel like i'm missing a sense of community here.  I've been going to church at Tokyo Baptist Church with Taiei (Mark Bocanegra also goes there!) but I've been living alone and I think that's been tough.  The Church is really big and I've been getting to know a few people but I don't have much of a community there yet.  There are 5 services with more than 100 people (one over 300!) each service, so it's hard especially when I've been going to different services based on when Taiei can go.  

Things are just a lot different from the rest of summer and I think it's been hard transitioning.  The intense mark study I've been doing with Jason and David and Jeanette from the summer preceded by Summercon has suddenly moved in a very different connection where I don't know very many Christians here, and have barely had a chance to discuss anything outside of the message after service.  While I finished reading Mark on my own, not having anyone to dig deeper with I think has made it hard to feel like I'm getting that much out of it.  I think I've really come to see the value in seeking Christ in community and I think it's scary how much easier it's been to give less than a full measure here, especially when I feel like I was able to give so much more just a couple weeks ago.  I think maybe it could be better if I could develop more of a community at Church but it's hard since I'm just here for a month.  

I think in many ways it's been a blessing to learn a lot of language and enjoy lots of culture and have a time to rest, but I think it's also been hard being by myself.  

However, I think I see potential for a lot of work to be done in Japan.  I've made some Japanese friends and for the most part, none of them are Christian.  Most people in Japan aren't religious.  They may believe in or occaisionally practice rituals honoring different gods at different temples and such, but religion isn't a central part of their lives.  I feel that theres a lot of ministry to be done in Japan but I think it's been hard so far in my attempts to talk about God in Japanese still...

Anyhow, I think I've come to rely on prayer a lot more, but even still I think it's hard sometimes...I miss community! I miss you guys! but yeah, hopefully I'll be able to rely more on God to sustain me though!  :)

Arigato,

Kevin

Teaching Science at Camp was.. interesting

I taught at a church-sponsored camp in Milpitas for the last two weeks, and I taught science to middle school and high school students. It was interesting in the sense that the middle schoolers and high schoolers were mixed together, so in some classes, we'd have 6th graders and 12th graders, which made it tremendously hard to teach because well, that's a really really large age gap. Anyway, I initially didn't fully agree with the things that I was teaching because I was teaching creationist science, which is basically science that proves the super conservative viewpoint of Noah's ark and the fountains of the deep. It's kind of hard to explain in this blog, but basically, I didn't know if I could teach something that was telling the kids that this was the right way of thinking. Keeping in mind that at least half of these kids are not Christian, I didn't think it was the most life-giving thing to be teaching them, so I chose to teach from an objective of a perspective as I could. There were basically five periods in a day, and I TAed the first three and taught the last two.

I stayed at Stanford during those two weeks since the commute from Stanford to Milpitas is only 40 minutes one way versus the 2 hour one way trip from Elk Grove to Milpitas. I stayed in Deanna's (she's a rising sophomore who lived in FroSoCo) room in Rains and also spending a large chunk of my time in Mirrielees with Kevin, Sango, Bertram, and Jason (who by the way are very hospitable people. two of the four are also amazing cooks!). I commuted every day to and from work, leaving Stanford at around 7am and getting back when free parking started at 4pm. We'd also do Mark Study in Mlees in the evening, and we'd eat chips with chopsticks while drinking tea. I'd have to say those two weeks were definitely the highlight of my summer so far because I got to teach and be in community and study the Bible.

Coming back to Elk Grove is kind of a shock because I don't have that kind of structure anymore (between work schedule, eat dinner, mark study, cook lunch for me and deanna) so I'm allowed to sleep and catch up on some sleep debt. Sadly though, I slept for 14 hours two days ago, and for 10 hours yesterday (that was the norm before I went back to Stanford for the two weeks). I wonder if all this sleeping is even healthy because I'm definitely sleeping at least half of my day away...

Since Karis called me out earlier, I'm going to call out Kevin, who should be in Japan by now.

Sarah is in VA

Hey everyone!
I am now in Virginia doing an internship for a small concrete business. I'm here with 13 other interns, mostly grad students from Stanford, and we're basically upgrading the company's system for estimating cost.
well at least that was what I was told during the interview. But everything has been really crazy. Our mission changes almost daily, one week we were shipped to Texas to meet with someone important, and we often have to volunteer to work on weekends.

Now we are building a small section model of a parking structure in the owner's storage yard. But since the landlord didn't let him pour concrete, he signed a lease for a completely new yard up the road, where he wants to build more models. A group of us, including me, are in charge of recording productivity and managing these projects. We leave every morning by 5:30 to get to the yard by 7. But actually my job is so much easier than construction workers.
Observe construction workers for a day and you will feel exhausted (just watching and standing around) in three hours. These guys only have 1/2 hour lunch break and the rest of the time (7-5) are non-stop working. Its unbelievable: you wouldn't guess how much stamina it takes to be working all day, not even counting the heat. Reminds me how blessed I am to have opportunities in higher education.

This past week has actually been really nice since our boss is overseas. All of us are so much more relaxed when he's gone. Even our supervisor agrees that everything gets messed up when he comes into the office. I had actually been really worried because I learned that most of the employees in the office have been here less than 2 years (the lay-off/firing rate is abnormally high cause our boss fires people left and right, which reminds me of that one officer you were writing about, Steve)

It strikes me now as amazing that we have such an unbelievably loving master as Jesus. After working under such an unpredictable boss for only two months ( who over-utilizes intimidation as a management strategy), I am just starting to realize (and be very grateful for) how much Jesus is the complete opposite. Jesus treats us far beyond the average servant, actually loving us like his own children. Jesus gives us second chances (even after we mess up really bad), we don't have to hide things from him, He values us far beyond how useful we are to Him, He listens to us when we confide in Him, and His presence gives us (not stress), but peace.

Now I am just going to pray that God sees me through the end of this internship. especially once our boss comes back after next week. Hope you're all having fun!
-Sarah