Why Japan?

It's been confirmed that I am going to Japan on outreach and will be based in Tokyo which is super exciting! Very looking forward to sushi! It'll be so weird spending Christmas, New Years, my birthday and Valentines Day in Tokyo though!

Anyway, I just thought I’d share a funny story about how I felt God calling me to Japan out of the choices of places we could have gone.. Before coming to Hawaii, I actually applied to the Japan Focus DTS but it got cancelled last minute so I changed to Asia Pacific, and there just so happened to be a Japan option. Then they were sharing about Japan having less than 1% Christians, which really got my heart burning.

So, when they told us our outreach options, I was praying about where to go and just felt a passion for the Japanese people, but I guess I still wasn’t 100% sure, so Shinae (the girl I came with) and I were praying for confirmation because she thought she had seen a Yen sign in her mind during her prayers. The cool thing is that she didn’t know it was a Yen sign at the time. Anyway, so we were praying for confirmation and she didn’t get anything but I felt like God was asking me why I was asking Him again when He had already told us where to go. And I was sharing that with her, and I randomly said to her, you know, sometimes when I was a teenager, I used to just flick the Bible open at a random place and see where it landed. So I did that without really thinking and scanned the page really quickly. Then my eyes fell on a certain verse:

Amos 4:1
“Listen to me, you fat cows”

HILARIOUS! Hahaha.. ok so my Bible translation is quite “freely” translated, but we just fell about laughing.. maybe God has a really funny sense of humour on the same level of mine! Either way, I thought it was hilarious and so something I would say... anyway, point is, Tokyo here I come! =)

So on a slightly more serious point, I would really appreciate prayer for the Japanese nation – that their hearts will be open to receive because they are quite a lonely and loveless nation full of strange things. So just to pray that God will prepare their hearts and ours for the team that are going! Also please pray for the team as we prepare because it is mostly made up of 18 year olds and I have a feeling God will ask me and a few other slightly older people to step up and take the lead..

Other prayer requests I would really appreciate are just for me to be able to fully focus on Him with no distractions and to really set aside more time to spend with Him everyday because even though I’m in Hawaii, I still find myself busy allll the time!

Thanks so much guys and stay in touch!!! =)

Biblemania!

Every time I write on this blog, I feel a bit overwhelmed that so much has happened that I don’t know what to include and what not to include!

The last few weeks have continued to be amazing – I am still learning so so so much! I don’t even know where to begin, but God is convicting me of so many things. In particular, I have discovered a new passion growing for intercession – praying for others, the nations, and I think for me personally, it is beginning with my family.

Secondly, God has put in me this burning passion for the truth in His Word. If I’m being honest, in London, I really didn’t have it. I barely picked up my Bible except on Sundays, but here, I am loving it and really trying to soak myself in it! I don’t know how I found it boring before – it is SO interesting!!

This sounds incredibly sad, but a few of my friends found that the Bible Studies led by the school were aimed at new believers and we had such a hunger to go deeper that we set up our own Bible Study on Saturday nights. They are being held in a young pastor couple’s room, and it is so amazing to see such a young couple (she is the same age as me, 23) so on fire! They are so wise beyond their years and really leading Godly lives, which inspires me so much!

Anyway, the first Bible Study that they held, we left so refreshed and it was just what I had been looking for, but it lasted 2 hours solid so we were like wow, that was long, we should make it shorter next time! And then the week after, it went on for FOUR hours!!!! Crazy right?! Everyone was so engaged and mesmerised by the beauty of the Bible being so simple yet so deep that we didn’t even notice the time fly by! So I will see how long it lasts next week haha! But it’s definitely something to challenge us at DCG! ;)

It was a really Spirit-filled week last week too, and it has been so great to be able to witness God’s gifts. It has been insane – like one of the older men in my class has worn a hearing aid for 8 years, and then last week they prayed healing over him, he took his hearing aid out and he could hear better than his wife all of a sudden! Crazy but soo amazing! God is so overwhelmingly awesome!

Other than the intense stuff, I have also been bumming and relaxing on the beautiful beaches Hawaii has to offer (photos making their way to facebook soon!).. we went cliff jumping, and I got to see a volcano! Actually, the entire island is basically a volcano, but I was really bummed that the day we went, the lava wasn’t flowing, so hopefully I can go back again at some point! Also managed to sneak into the Hilton here which is so huge you need a train to go around it.. lounged around in their massive pool complete with water slide, waterfall (see photo below!) and hot tubs.. finally made me feel like I was on holiday.. made me happy (some things just never change ay?) hehehehe =)