Splash! It hit me like a jolt of electricity. I turned and saw the cup in her hand and realized this was my wake up call. Everything from the week had been building and culminated into a heated exchange that ended with me standing at the bottom the stairs drenched in water.
[Read more…] about First Things
We Can't Hide From God
Last Saturday, I got my green card! It was a super long and expensive experience. Yet, now I can do everything that a US citizen can do except for voting.
On top of that, we finally started living in our new apartment. Ever since we moved to Columbia MO, we have been living in a guest room. Josh and Laura Rice, members at Karis Church, were gracious and allowed us to live withh them and help remodel their basement into a downstairs apartment. Now that we have more space, we can unpack our suitcases and Christmas gifts, and we can live with all our stuff. I am so excited!!
Although we were getting used to living in someone’s guest room because it’s been like that more than a year, it is always nice to have own private space!
I had an interesting experience through waiting for my visa approval and moving downstairs.
Since I wasn’t sure that I would be able to stay in US and when Drew and I could live downstairs, I felt unstable all the time. I wanted to be settled down as soon as possible but had to wait for 8 long months. Even though the Rices would say their house is my home and I should feel comfortable to live in their house, I was struggling with the frustration of everything.
I wanted everything to be certain, so I could make plans, and I know what’s going on. However, nothing ever went the way I wanted it to and I felt everything was not making any progress, even though God is sovereign and he is taking care of everything. I was trying so hard that I could handle this frustrating situations. However I couldn’t.
Finally about a month ago, I realized that I needed to quit looking for ways to can handle this, I needed to ask God to help me to handle this. I prayed and repented.
Then over the next 2 weeks there were lots of snow fall. Because of snow fall, we couldn’t go out nor use our internet, so we were able to make huge progress on the downstairs renovations. I was thankful for that!
Then the next week, I got a letter from USCIS which told me that my visa was approved and I would get green card soon. I was more thankful for that!!
Then last week, Drew and I finally started living downstairs and I got my green card! I am super thankful for that!!!
Feels like God was waiting for me to realize my sin, repent and go back to God. When I realized it, he was like “Ok Megumi, finally! I was waiting so long!! Now you can have what you were asking for” then he gave me. I really felt that we can’t hide our feelings from God and that He knows everything!
I pray that I can always ask God’s help and I will not try to handle situations by myself, even when I’m in a hard situation that I can’t focus on God very well.
My Crazy but Great Life
Ever since I got married, my life has become crazier and crazier.
I was born and raised in Tokyo. I went to kindergarten, primary, middle, high school and university like most Japanese people do. I hung out with friends a lot like most Japanese people do. I worked for Japanese company like a slave like most Japanese people do….
My mom wanted to name me “並子Namiko” which means “average person”. (I am glad my parents didn’t.) As my mom’s desire, I grew up like average person in Japan only the difference from most people was that I knew Jesus.
I got married in 2010 and then Drew and I moved to Saku city which is two hours away from my home town. It was the first time for me to live outside of my parents house. Somehow we started our own language school, my husband became a wedding pastor to non-Christians. The ministry we wanted to do didn’t go well, huge earthquakes occurred The many needs for Christ to be known everywhere in Japan was so overwhelming that we lost our direction. We decided to go back to America to start over, so we got rid of everything we had except for what could fit into 4 suitcases. We struggled with how we would start over. But, God led us to plug into Karis church…. This is what happened to me over past 2 years. I probably couldn’t explain how crazy it was with this short paragraph….
Yet, now here I am in Columbia MO, with no visa(I’m in the process of obtaining it), No driver’s license(My international driver’s license expired and I can’t get one without visa), No job, No money, No house (we are living in a guest room of our awesome friend’s house, and we are planning to move to downstairs as soon as renovation finished.) No Japanese environment, a little bit knowledge of living in America and English.
However I have Jesus, and friends and family who care and love me a lot. This makes my life great in the midst of chaos.
Even before Drew started his internship, he and I learned and grew a lot by serving Karis church.
God gave Drew the opportunity to be in a leadership position of a Missional Community Group. I can see he has been changing to be more humble and patient person. I love it!!
I have been learning about the Bible, growing deeper and deeper in my understanding. For example I learned that everything in the Bible points to Jesus even in the Old Testament. I knew there were prophecies about Jesus in the Old Testament, but Old Testament and Jesus are more connected than I ever knew. Though I need to study more to explain this well, it’s good to at least know that. I am also learning how to lead people to Jesus, care and love people like Jesus as much as I can. I feel much closer to Jesus compared to one year ago. As I grow closer to Jesus more and more, I realize my sins more and more. It is really hard but also great at the same time.
Drew started his internship January 22nd. Now he has more responsibility and also has more stuff to serve and learn.
I am so excited to go through God’s plan for us in 2013!
I’d really appreciate if you keep checking on us and praying for us and Japan.