Japan 2011

Hello, brothers and sisters in the Lord! We are going to use this blog keep everyone informed and praying while the team from Calvary Chapel Pocatello heads out to the mission field. As many of you already know, we are traveling to Japan to come along side the believers who have been working very hard for more than two months within the destruction of the earthquakes and tsunamis. We have been preparing to leave (with the help of many) for about a month now, and have been sooo blessed! It has been great to see how the Lord has orchestrated everything in His perfect timing. Our schedule was a mystery during our planning. We bought our tickets, so we knew our departure times, but that was all we knew. The phrase, “blessed are the flexible, for they will not be broken” rang true. During the last week of planning, we received most of our instruction, with the direction that our plans could change at a moment’s notice. This is to be expected, especially since we are the first group of outside help to meet and help the Calvary church in that area. So, our (tentative) plans are as follows. This Sunday, May 15, we depart from the church at 3:30am and drive to the SLC airport. From there, we fly to Los Angeles, and from LA we fly to Tokyo, Japan. The longest portion of our flight is the leg to Japan (obviously) and it will last about 12 hours. From Tokyo, we will take a road trip up to Sendai, which is considered the northern capital of Japan. Sendai is a city of over one million people, and will serve as our base of operations. From Sendai, the team will travel to Ishinomaki, which is a coastal city that was devastated by the earthquakes and tsunamis. Ishinomaki is where we will work with the Japanese citizens to help clean out the devastated houses. They call it, “mucking” out houses. We leave early Sunday morning, and will be back the following Sunday. We plan on preaching the Gospel of Christ the entire time we are there, and if necessary, we will use words to do it. Much of our Gospel “presentation” will be the work we do and the help we bring. However, we will be partnered with the local believers who will be ready to translate for us, and will speak as much as the Lord wills. We are very excited, and we covet your prayers as we head to Japan. God bless you!

A picture of the team as we meet for the last time before our departure.