Though I am excited that I actually got to do some actual writing today (of a blog post for OMF). Most of my writing recently has been emails as I finish off the summer issue of the magazine I manage. Writing to authors, editors, designers, etc. Answering messages from people who we've stirred up with our social media posts. Chasing articles that should have been sent to me, etc. About 60 emails this week thus far.
But a lot of time has been spent editing other people's writing. It's crazy how much time that takes. Not necessarily because a writer is bad, but it includes things like checking details. For example, in the last week I've researched how jasper is created, whether "Kingdom Hall" should be capitalised or not, and sought the publishing details on several books for referencing. I've found out that you don't hyphenate "ly" adverbs before adjectives, discovered that Hawaii is discussing whether an apostrophe should be officially added to their official name (i.e. Hawai'i), and learned some interesting facts about serotonin.
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| One of the social media posts I created in May |
Last week ended up so busy that our prayer letter, that I'd intended to do, didn't get written. So I did it on the weekend instead. As a result, I didn't get as much rest then as I'd planned.
However, in the midst of all that I've managed to spend time with significant people. I find that I need time with people to keep me working effectively, but it is a real challenge to get the balance right, especially when I face daily deadlines in my editing/writing work.
However, today I can give you an extract from our prayer letter that might be interesting and explanatory about my job.
In Australia our main job was mobilisation—connecting with prayer and financial supporters face-to-face—telling you about what we’d been doing in Japan and the ongoing needs here. In doing so we hoped that you would be encouraged to continue to support us and our work.
Wendy’s job in Japan the last couple of years has included mobilisation. Mobilisation is similar, but broader than recruitment. Just like we do when we’re on home assignment, we’re mobilising people to get more involved in mission, however that looks for them. But we especially pray that more people will come to join the work in Japan, for there are still only around 1% evangelical Christians in this large nation.
But how does she do that from our dining room in Tokyo? The current mobilisation strategy in OMF Japan is to use social media to reach people around the world. Wendy manages and edits a blog by our misisonaries. This means that every week she’s putting a new article on our website.
She’s also managing our social media content, so at least five times a week posts are being shared on Facebook and Instagram about Japan, our work, and the needs here. Some are lighthearted, some are heavy. Some are calls to action, some are simply points of interest about Japanese culture or food. Most of our posts in May were seen by more a thousand people, some posts were seen by many more than that.
Each month we have a theme that guides a lot of our content. In May we focused on partnership. Partnership is a big part of being a missionary. We partner with you, our prayer and financial partners. But it was fascinating to see the various ways that OMF is partnering with individuals and other groups in Japan.
Recently Wendy helped guide a Singaporean short-term missionary she first met in Brisbane last year. Together they conceived of a short video series about the lives of missionaries, showing some unexpected backstories. We shared the first short video on May 31.
We’d love you to come and learn more about Japan by interacting on Facebook or Instagram, or to to our website to see the articles there? Maybe even sharing what you find with others?
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