Overheard at my house

We’ve been back from our trip for over a week now and I still don’t know how to even begin to share about all that we saw and experienced and felt.  But, alas, the memories probably won’t get fresher as time goes on so here’s a tiny bit, mostly in photos, from our trip:

We arrived in the big city on Sunday afternoon.  We left the airport with a cloud of begging children following us to the van, and they only dispersed when rifle-armed soldiers came to chase them away and practice their limited English phrases with us.

Honestly, my first impression was that this city is the dirtiest, trashiest, ugliest, poorest, hottest place I have ever been in my life.

And that’s still my impression.

But even in those first few hours, amidst all the this-is-totally-like-nothing-I-have-ever-seen-before shock, God showed us the beauty even there.

Like the smiles on these kids’ faces to see something new and different from their ordinary: white people!

Like learning that even though we have not one word in common, we can share a walk together and learn about each other.

Like seeing the balance of people who are busy at work…

… but not too much to have a moment to just stand and watch the people around you.

Even in the city, God started to work in my heart a love for these people and this country and, while I was certainly overwhelmed, made the possibility of our family serving Him there an exciting and thrilling prospect.

But, I was happy when we boarded a plane (that I swear has been in service since the 70’s) and went to a smaller city later that evening, and were one step closer to our final destination of the Hill Tracks.

Now, the Hill Tracks… WOW! They were beautiful.  I couldn’t snap enough pictures to give you an idea of the lush, breathtaking, scenes that we took in day in and day out as we toured the village churches in this, some of God’smost beautiful (in my opinion) handiwork in creation.

This is the view from one of our hotels:

But the beauty of the greenery doesn’t even come close to the beauty of how the Holy Spirit is working amidst the His Church in this place.  Stay tuned for more from our trip in the weeks to come.

And please pray for us! The countdown in on and we have 15 days left here in Japan.  I’m not even going to try to tell you how I feel about that, but we would really appreciate your prayers.  Thanks!