11 March, 2018

Seven years on and recovery that has happened

Today, seven years ago Japan was hit with one of the largest earthquakes recorded, which triggered an enormous tsunami, and which also flooded a nuclear power plant and caused it to overheat. A triple disaster. A day that thousands died. And thousands more have died since March 2011 due to post-disaster stress.

It's not a day that we're likely to forget in a hurry. Here's a post I wrote the day after the earthquake. We received no damage here, but the psychological effect of being in the same country as such a disaster is not to be ignored. You see a little bit of that in this post 11 days after the earthquake and this one about unexpected emotions.

There's a part of me that doesn't like the way media dwells on past disasters, but I can see how this comes about. We don't want to forget those lost, indeed forgetting a disaster like this is dangerous because it leads to bad decisions about the future. However, recycling the horror of that day isn't necessarily helpful.

I'm glad, therefore, to be able to show you the following video, about hopeful things that have happened in the disaster zone. This is not a video about the hope that Christians have brought to people in the area, though there is also plenty of that too. 

Praise God that as people across the world prayed for this nation in 2011, God called some to serve here, both in the short- and long-term. It's now not unusual to hear the triple disaster included in the testimony of how someone has come to serve in Japan in the last few years.

Praise God that his name has been heard by many in the area who had never heard of him before. 



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