We welcomed MTW Vision Trip Team to our house yesterday. As you can see, our small living room was full of people! (14 people!) We have welcomed many people since we moved here, but it was the first time for Eri and me to host such a large number of people! We had a good time getting to know each other and talking about the Bridge International Café, which they will help us with, this coming Saturday, May 31st. I appreciated their enthusiasm for traveling to Japan and getting to know the country. I gave them a presentation of our Bridge International Church plant at my house. I pray that God sends at least one of the team members in the future to Kaneda, Kisarazu, and joins our Bridge International Plant Team.

I trust the Lord saying, “Harvest is plentiful but the workers are few; therefore, pray earnestly to the Lord of the Harvest to send out more workers into His harvest.” (Luke 10:2)

Eri and I spent three days this week with our team, the Chiba AO Team, in Kujyukuri, Chiba. We focused on team building, resting, playing, and praying together. You can see the Pacific Ocean behind us. It was beautiful. The hotel we stayed at was located alongside the ocean, so we often could spend time on the beach to walk, talk, and pray.

Through the retreat, I once again realized that it was good not to be alone. Spending three days with my team made me think about it. I believe that one of the dangers of working for the gospel is the risk of isolation. Working with godly people keeps me from such danger. I learned that we each on the team were different in many ways: ages, experience, gifts from God, and nationalities. However, God can use us as a group for the gospel for His glory.

It took us a month to finish furnishing our living room! We purchased most of the furniture online, assembled each piece after it was brought to our place, and put the national flags of many countries on the front door, forming “B.I.,” i.e., Bridge International, with them. Our townhouse is a part of a big building where eight other families live. As far as I know, our neighbors are unique and international-minded people. For instance, our next neighbors, Eiji and Sakiko, with four small children, hope to immigrate to Holland in the future for their children. Another neighbor who lives in the same townhouse building is Tomoyuki and Ayako, with a tiny child. Tomoyuki is a former Olympian in Snowboarding who travelled a lot in the world for the competition. Another neighbor is Anri and her Turkish husband – I don’t know his name yet- with a small child. They are an international married couple. I would love to invite them to our place to get to know them!

I made a new flyer for my English conversation club today. I now have a group of 20 people who regularly participate in my club. I hope that more local people join it so that I could get to know them and love them!

We finally moved to Kaneda, Kisarazu, on the 16th of December, about two weeks ago.

We brought our stuff by ourselves but a couple of furniture such as a fridge and a laundry machine moved by a moving company. We still need time to furnish rooms especially our living room as our hospitality place for our neighbours. We would love to welcome our neighbours or our friends not only in Japan but also from all over the world.

A week ago, our friends from Toronto, Rommel and Enrica, fley to Haneda Airport. So, we picked up them at the airport and took them to Kaneda, including our mission house. They were the first guests at our new place. We shared our vision and passion for Bridge International church plant with them.

Since we moved to Kaneda, Mitsui Outlet Mall has become our place to walk around and meet people. We are often able to see Mt. Fuji over Tokyo Bay and Tokyo Aqua Line when we walk every morning. We are excited about what we can do for God’s glory here!