This last week before HA

 This week is all about getting as much of our regular work finished as far ahead as possible. I've been doing these things this week:

• The final stages of the Summer magazine: answering questions from our designer, checking proofreading of individual articles, and hopefully before next Wednesday we'll be looking at proofreading the whole magazine (the last step before going to print).
• Deciding things about the writer's retreat I'm running in October so that I can get a save-the-date email out this month. (Exciting!)
• Writing two articles for the Autumn issue of the magazine (due end of May).
• Writing and editing OMF Japan social media posts for the coming months.
• Starting to think about the OMF Japan field conference (June 2027): I'm part of the organising work group.
• Doing the admin necessary for the editing stage of the Autumn issue: so editors and fact checkers know what articles they are responsible for and due dates.

I am starting to think about what clothes I'll pack in my suitcase...11 weeks is not a short time, but neither is it a long time. Thankfully most people will only see us a couple of times, so it doesn't matter if I don't have a lot of variation in my suitcase.

I've also been juggling my schedule to try to fit in various things in these last days: drop off my plants at a friend's house, get my hair cut, practise the piano for Sunday, drop our keys off with colleagues, and a couple of last-minute additions of conference working group meetings. And a couple of not essentials, but nice to fit them in because I have time: time for writing another chapter of my book and time to ride to the park. It's actually pretty chill, quite a bit more so than when we've done this in the past with children!

And then I ran out of time to write this because the the "whole-mag proof" landed and I'm deep into proofreading again...

Unexpected tears

More unexpected joy this week, but you're going to have to bear with me a tiny bit because there's backstory to why I was crying during a two-hour predominantly Japanese-language OMF celebration on Monday.

For a long time I've had a passion to share missionary's stories. It's stories that grab people's attention, and missionaries collectively have some amazing ones to tell, but often not the time or skill or passion to get them out to a wider audience. It's my joy to be pretty much working with missionaries and their stories most of the time these days. 

In 2017 I had a unique opportunity to start a blog for OMF Japan that has become a wonderful vehicle for getting missionary's stories about Japan out to a wide audience. I've had the support of OMF Japan leadership and the field in this endeavour and the last eight years we have published one story a week on our website...that's around 400 stories. At almost the same time I joined with one of my colleagues to start OMF Japan Facebook and Instagram pages as ways to get our website stories seen even further.

Fast forward to today and I'm working with a creative team of five on our social media, and getting stories from across Japan to share with thousands of our followers. In September this year we had the theme "Partnering with Japanese churches" and one of my team members asked one of her colleagues, AJ, for a story about the church that he is planting in partnership with their church. AJ wrote a really good story. As soon as I read it I knew this was important to share with our audience. So, I edited it and then we got it out there (you can see it here).

On Monday, we celebrated the 75th anniversary of missionaries coming to Japan with OMF and 60th anniversary of missionaries going from Japan to other parts of Asia with OMF. It was a joint two-hour gathering in a church in downtown Tokyo.

A portion of AJ's story was shared as a key part of the message presented by OMF International's General Director (GD), in fact, he used it to bookend his talk on John 3: 29, 30.

In particular, this bit:

When we first began exploring the idea of planting a new church, I sat down with our Japanese pastor from Hatogaya and admitted, “I am scared of this undertaking.” . . .

Pastor Oshima listened and I will never forget his response. He simply smiled and said, “That’s okay. I’m scared too. Let’s be scared together.” 

I was stunned, and delighted. And teary. 

Our organisation is very large, over 2,500 people actively engaged in various ways across the globe. The GD is from Taiwan and works in Singapore, I've met him only once and never had a conversation with him. Yet this story had reached him and he used it to encourage his largely Japanese audience (with translation) to push on in doing God's work.

I only had a tiny part to play in this, but somehow God took my "two small fish" and used them for his glory.

To be fair, there were other elements in the gathering that had me pulling out a tissue, before and after this surprise. Most of the talking was in Japanese and the only speech that I really understood was the one spoken in English by the GD. 

But we sang. One of the songs, "One Voice" I first encountered it in Japanese during our first term in Hokkaido. I learned it during a very difficult time in my life when I felt pretty useless and exhausted (two little boys under 5 + trying to work in a Japanese church without much language or capacity). It makes me emotional most times I sing it! Interestingly, the English version doesn't affect me at all!

English lyrics:

Father, we ask of You this day
Come and heal our land
Knit our hearts together
That Your glory might be seen in us
Then the world will know
That Jesus Christ is Lord

Let us be one voice that glorifies Your name
Let us be one voice declaring that You reign
Let us be one voice in love and harmony
And we pray, O God, grant us unity

Now is the time for you and I
To join our hearts in praise
That the name of Jesus
Will be lifted high above the earth
Then the world will know
That Jesus Christ is Lord

After the service they had some refreshments and there was much mingling amongst those gathered. The prayer booklet, Beneath the Surface, was for sale, in English and Japanese, this is another project that I had deep involvement in in 2019/20. I'm always excited to see it "out in the wild" as it's also one of my editing babies! I had just had a conversation the day before with someone from our church who's very excited about this booklet, she's sent it to her mum in New Zealand who is also excited and it giving it away to whoever she can. My friend asked me for 10 more copies!

I was exhausted by the end of Monday. It included four trains and an hour-long car journey and constant interaction from the moment I climbed into the car before 8 am. But also so much brimming with joy at God's good gifts to me that day. Though I periodically feel pretty useless and not worthy of being used by God in Japan, he continues to call me and to encourage me, and even use my "two small fish" (see the story of Jesus feeding the five thousand in John 6).

Work retreat

For most of last week I hung out with the OMF Japan social media team. We're a five-person remote team and work from our respective homes across Japan. Our role is mobilisation: we encourage people to get more involved in mission, even if that is just knowing more about the needs for the gospel in Japan. Each team member is part-time, we've all got other ministries that we're involved in. So it was a joy to get together in one place (mostly—one member didn't join us as she's on maternity leave).

During our days together we talked about teamwork and personalities, about our mission as a team, and other team matters. But we also spent time creating together. It can be hard to just turn the creative tap on, but after working through some frustration we eventually got there. Actually, by the last afternoon I had to work hard to turn the creativity off so that we could finish our retreat and go home, even if we hadn't finished the projects we set our hands to.

My role on the team is leader, as well as writer and editor. I got to do a short writing/editing workshop with the team this year—it always amazes me how much I know about editing when I get to teach others about it (but I'm also aware that there's so much I still need to learn, especially about editing longer-form writing).

Checking out photos that one team member took.

Choosing something for lunch: yes, Japanese menus can
be huge, but (generally helpfully) include pictures.

Can you hear the creativity crackling?

Brainstorming themes for 2026

The most surprising thing to come out of the retreat was that all those at the retreat had been assessed as "NFP"s on the MBTI (our absent team member is also an "NF"). If you are my FB friend you may have seen that I was questioning my own "type" before the retreat. It's been over 25 years since I had a professional assessment of my type. At the time I was a newly wed, working as an Occupational Therapist, had no kids, and had never lived overseas. Last month I did a short online version of the assessment and came out with a different "type". I did it again a few days later and came out with yet another type. 

For the purpose of the retreat I went with my original type, but I'm left pondering how I've changed. If I recall correctly, my original type indicated that two of my categories were close to the middle. So my working theory is that because much has changed in my life that has changed me, I've grown. I've learned how to operate differently than when I was that 25 y.o., and I'm pretty comfortable with that. I'm also realising that I'm older and I don't have the same level of energy that I did before I had children. I now work a fairly "introverted" job that requires a lot of organisation skills and attention to details; I've lived for most of my adult life in a country with a very different culture and where I don't understand the language well. All these things change you. Occasionally I have opportunity to break out into my more extroverted, crazy self and that often surprises those who only know me in this context. But I love that. 

I also like that I'm able to tap into my creative side, while keeping hold of my organisational abilities. It's a sly combo of these two that have allowed me to both be part of the creative groups that attended the writer's retreat in May and the social media retreat last week, but have also allowed me to be the organiser of these retreats (something that not everyone who came are good at). The more creative part of my personality also loves the variety in my job.

Alas, last week finished and this week began and I'm back at my desk, hardly talking to anyone during the day (though I have been writing many emails). I'm glad we had the retreat, but also glad that I don't work like that all the time—by Friday night I was pretty knackered (US=exhausted). I've been catching up on all the work that got sidelined while I was away...after three solid days at my desk I'm getting there.

Lots to think about

Life has settled down again to a discernible rhythm. It's a bit of a relief, actually—I work better like this. I find it hard to concentrate and make decisions when my day-to-day routine is less stable and predictable. So when I do things like try to work and travel, even though most of my work is done remotely, it gets tricky and I don't do as good a job. But I also get bored if life is too same-same. So I'm glad for a job that always includes new challenges and has a fair amount of variety in it, even if, like last week, I sometimes get overwhelmed by it all.

Magazine matters

I'm glad that the Autumn issue of the magazine I manage has gone to the printer and we get to mail it out next week! I've been working fairly solidly on this since we got back to Tokyo in early August. 

I've been working on this magazine for around 15 years, and I can tell you that some "issues" are harder than others. There are all sorts of reasons for that. It can be team challenges, a difficult issue-theme, unexpected random obstacles, author difficulties, or at times when my own transitions or travel interfere with my ability to concentrate on the work needed. 

This issue was particularly difficult for some of these reasons, and has required "above and beyond" over the last few months. I hope that it was all worth it, and pray that God will take it and use it for his purposes.

This month is our magazine "annual meeting" month. Because our remote team works across several different time zones it's hard to hold meetings. I've never been a fan of meetings, they can easily be a waste of time! I'm in a position to have been able to shape my work in so many ways, both with the magazine and with the social media work, and I've tended towards setting up processes that mean we don't have to meet often, though I have been called out on that!

Our magazine team gets together once a year to talk about team and magazine stuff, to pray, to have fun, and to plan. In the last few years that has been achieved with four 1½ hr meetings. I really enjoy this team. We have fun when we get together, even online. They are passionate about the mission of this magazine and that makes them easy to lead. And the four shorter meetings are actually a lot easier to manage than a single one-day event, like we used to have. (I've written about this meeting/ these meetings before, here's one back in 2016 when it was an in-person meeting: https://mmuser.blogspot.com/2016/08/energising-meeting.html)

What have I been thinking about recently?

Well, if you know me, you know that there's usually a lot going on in my brain! This week I've had time to listen to some podcasts and I've been trying to be disciplined about continuing to gradually (usually a short portion over coffee in the afternoon) work my way through non-fiction books that are on my to-read list.

I listened to John Dickson's Undeceptions (my usual go-to for lunchtime listening), an episode about the boy Jesus. It gave some interesting historical background to the life Jesus lived.

I came across an OMF US podcast interview with a new worker I met last week. She was effusive last week about the social media work I do and how that had been a pivotal part of her coming to Japan, so I was curious about her larger story (if you ever get into the position to ask, find out a missionary's "call story" they are usually fascinating and never the same as any other missionary's). The 45 minute interview was well done and I loved the bit where God led her to look at Instagram, just after she'd surrendered her desire to go to Japan...and she saw a post from OMF Japan!

I also listened to a podcast from Moore Bible College about Neurodiversity and the Christian Life (part 1 of 3). I wasn't so impressed with their format, it's a bit academic, although there were some redeeming interview clips. Yet it's a topic that is close to our hearts, so I'll go back later and hear what they have to say in the next two parts.

I've just finished one non-fiction book (after several months) and have started another. The first I've read before, and will probably read again. Gentle and Lowly is deep and full of many things that will take a lifetime for my heart to absorb. It's about the heart of Christ for us and what small amount I can grasp, even though I've been a Christian since I was a child, it still breathtaking.

The new book I've just picked up, Life interrupted, by Susan Chapman, an OMF colleague, starts out on a similar line: understanding that we are loved by God. It's something that is easy to say, but hard to live. I'm only just starting this short book, but am already challenged by what she says next: "we need to be totally content in being finite". She goes on to quote Ruth Hayley Barton who says:

Living graciously within the boundaries of our life as it has been entrusted to us gives our life substance. Oddly enough, something of the will of God is contained in the very limits that we often try to sidestep or ignore. Living within limits is not in any way an acquiescence that is despairing, passive or fatalistic. Rather it honours the deepest realities of the life God has given us. Life in this body at this age and stage. Life in my family at its age and stage. Life in this personality. Life with this community. Life in the midst of this calling. (Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership: Seeking God in the Crucible of Ministry), p12 in Life Interrupted. 

It's this that I need to continue to learn as I settle into this phase of my life. What does "life in this body at this stage and age, with the gifts and calling that God's given me?" look like. And how can I be content in that? I think it's something all of us probably need to think about at various ages and stages!

Craziness plus encouragement

This week has felt overwhelming (last week did too, but for different reasons). I could have seen it coming. It tends to happen four times a year when several things collide in my schedule. The overlapping of the end of one magazine issue and the start of the next is the main culprit, though this has been less so in the last couple of years since I handed off some responsibilities to another person in my team. However that person has left our team and I've been helping two people take his place. You don't need to know the details!

On Monday of this week I spent much of the day travelling to and from meetings on the other side of the city. It's a usual monthly gathering of missionaries from our organisation, and almost always worth being at, but it takes out an entire day from my week and often leaves me feeling behind when I sit down at my desk on Tuesday.

I'm usually writing our prayer/newsletter in the week leading up to the first Sunday of the month...that happens to be the first week of September, rather than the last week of August this year! I tried to start last week, but didn't get as far as I'd have liked to have.

My social media ministry team has also had increases in responsibilities as we cater for a team member going on maternity leave tomorrow. I've had to learn some new stuff!

On top of all that I had email troubles. One of my three work emails stopped working yesterday. That always flusters me as I rely heavily on email, and I'm not the most confident when dealing with tech stuff.

Those are the main things that have all landed on this week and I found myself jumping ever more rapidly between one thing and another. I usually work quite well juggling various responsibilities, but this week hasn't been so good.

I put this out there, not because I want you to feel sorry for me, but because I'm trying to be real here.

But God has also given me different pieces of tangible help through the week:

• On Monday I heard the story of someone who has come to serve with our organisation who was prodded by our social media work to get involved. Exactly what we're trying to do and such an encouragement to see someone in front of me who probably wouldn't be there if I didn't do what I do.
• We booked flights to go to Australia for Christmas to see our new grandchild (due end of November)!
• We've located a good spot and good days to go camping with our friends next month.
• I flipped the calendar to September and was reminded that we have tickets to the World Athletics Championships, which are in Tokyo this month. The session includes the 200m finals, which might include a young man from Queensland who has been making headlines in recent months: Gout Gout.
• Last night we attended, as usual, our church's online prayer meeting. I was able to share briefly in a small group that I'd been feeling overwhelmed at work and they prayed for me! Such an encouragement.

Bit by bit I've made it thus far through the week, and that I'm able to sit here and write about it is proof that things are calming down a little. 

I'm thankful, too, for a cooler day today (28C, current humidity 81%). It's been grey with some showers, which is really encouraging. The length and intensity of the Tokyo summer has been close to the top of almost every conversation that we've had recently—we're all longing for the cool that autumn brings.

Be strong and do it

This week has been full of many words, most of them written. I've done a lot of editing, at times I've really struggled with the editing work I had to do, which included a lot of reading and making decisions about author's wishes as what I thought readers could read and understand. When people think of editing they often first think about grammar and spelling, but the work I have done this week was at a much higher level than that. It was really hard work, work that sometimes had me wondering if I was any good as an editor at all, and people in my vicinity have heard me call myself a "bear of little brain". In any case, I'm glad for respectful, gracious authors who were patient with me as I tried my best to do the work.

Be strong and do the work

Mid-way through the week I was also reading the end of 1 Chronicles, where King David was preparing for the end of his life and handing over reign to his son Solomon. The big thing that he didn't get to do in his lifetime was build a temple in Jerusalem. He really wanted to, but God said no. However he did a lot of preparation. 

In chapter 28 he is talking to the leaders of Israel. He charged the leaders as well as Solomon with the task of continuing to follow the commands of the Lord. 

He particularly addresses Solomon with the charge to "acknowledge the God of your father, and serve him with wholehearted devotion and with a willing mind, for the Lord searches every heart and understands every desire and every thought. if you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will reject you for ever" (v. 9 NIV). Then he moves onto the task of building the temple and then he says the words that have resonated in my head all week: "Be strong and do the work" (v. 10).

I think I'm going to have to start calling this
Maidenhair Fern "Lazarus" because once again
it has nearly died and it's coming back to life again!

After a whole lot of detail about the plans for the temple, he says again to Solomon, 

Be strong and courageous, and do the work. Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord God, my God, is with you. He will not fail you or forsake you until all the work for the service of the temple of the Lord is finished. (v. 20, my emphasis)

The phrase "be strong" actually appears 33 times in the NIV version of the Bible, most of them are exhortations from God to his people. Often it's "be strong and courageous", but also "be strong and take heart" which is similar.

Now of course I am not doing anything like building a worship building for God, I am not taking on massive leadership challenges, and nor inheriting a reign over a people chosen by God. So the parallels are a little hazy, but I do feel like it's applicable to our lives as Christians. Often we struggle with motivation or distraction or other things. Sometimes it helps to be reminded "be strong"—because God is with you and has promised to give you strength—and "do the work"—just get on with doing the hard thing, the next thing because it's what God's given you to do this day.

I don't know what hard thing God's given you for today. I'm anticipating my mental load today will be less than it's been for the last couple of weeks, merely because I did the hard work and those particular tasks are done, and the ones I anticipate doing today are probably easier. But I better get on with "doing the work", trust that God will give me all the strength I need to do all he has for me today.

Library, lamington, and love

Raspberry lamington that
one of the library assistants
gave me for helping them this week.
The school has an Aussie chef
in their cafeteria and he regularly
makes his own lamingtons for the students.
Yum!
For those who don't know: these
are Australian, in fact from
Queensland (though origin stories
differ as is common with food). They are
sponge cake chunks covered
on all sides with icing and coconut.

This week school started. It's a marker in our lives, even though I am not employed there and have no kids there, and David's already been back at work for nearly two weeks. I've enjoyed seeing CAJ-related friends over the last week. On Friday we had the staff-and-families dinner at school. On Monday I had lunch with a US friend who lived in Brisbane for a number of years. And then I went to school two days for an hour or so to help with shelving books in the library. They are understaffed at present (no librarian-teacher), so some help was appreciated. I always love spending time in a library and this one has been a special place for 20 years now! The social interaction was also fun. I love working at home, but sometimes it gets a little lonely.

At my desk I've been working with text and authors to get the next Japan Harvest magazine into the "Design phase". Sometimes this is easier than others. This time there have been some tough challenges that I'm still trying to find my way through.

As usual, I'm juggling the magazine work with the social media team work and in the background have other projects that are waiting on my finding some spare time and brain space.

My office is a great space, except in the midst of the worst of summer—it has no air conditioning or ceiling fan. When the days have been over 35 C for the last week or so, I've been able to funnel the air con from the main area down the hall to my office using a couple of standing fans. Yesterday I didn't start doing that until I got back from school at lunchtime and my office stubbornly remained over 30C until we had a fierce storm that cooled things off. I'm a Queenslander and don't mind low-30s too much if I'm just relaxing, but trying to get my brain to work on complex editing and writing matters when the room is stifling is hard. It's amazing how much clearer my head is at 28/29 C!

One of the exciting things this week has been to get some big details sorted for another social media team retreat. Venue and dates have been up for debate for a few months, but we've finally nailed that down and I can get to work on the finer details prior to our end-of-October retreat.

It's no surprise to you that I spend a lot of time reading. I read for pleasure and I read for work, if I'm on my own I read while I'm eating and while I'm relaxing. My work is in the space of mission and Japan, and my reading reflects those spaces. I also read to grow in my spiritual life. This week I saw a blog post called "More than enough" published by Thrive, a largely online ministry to Christian women working cross culturally. You can see it here: https://thriveministry.org/connection/devotional/more-than-enough2

One of the things I've struggled with in Japan is comparison. Actually I think it's a universal problem that women experience, but somehow doing what we do and where we do it, cross cultural workers end up with very high expectations of ourselves which we inevitably fail at. 

It's something that maybe I've gotten better at—I'm more comfortable in my skin now than I was 25 years ago...but still every now and then those cursed comparison thoughts shoot through my head and I feel useless and unlovely. So this little article was a good reminder. The author writes:

I stumbled upon John 15:9, that says, “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love.” The lightbulb clicked on. Jesus loves me the way the Father loved Him. I am loved completely, without surprise, without reservation, and without disappointment. I had no business comparing myself to anyone but Jesus. I would never measure up to the fake standards I could put on myself. But since God loves me, I could throw those standards away and rest in His love. 

"I have no business comparing myself to anyone but Jesus" and those standards I have set up are fake. I don't know who needs to be reminded of this today, but I did. And I need to go forward into the rest of the day resting in God's love!

Rowboat, sentences, and driver's licence

This has been an interesting week, and not as quiet as my written schedule might lead you to believe. I think I'd been settling just a little into a "quieter" life. Time to read, to go a bit slower than usual. But this week has been a little different. For starters, I've picked up my editing pen again. OMF Australia has given me a spot as a guest editor for one of their publications. It's been good to brush up those skills a little.

A local park, a place that's helping
us stay a bit grounded here.

I wrote our monthly prayer letter on Monday and sent it Tuesday. A pretty usual end-of-month activity, but one that always involves a little reflecting on the month gone and looking at what the month ahead holds. It definitely showed that October was considerably quieter than the several months that had gone before it, and I guess that has shown up in my musings on this blog.

Over the last few weeks, on quieter days, I've been trying to invest more in reading about writing, as well as taking up a few small opportunities to write. I've spent many Tuesdays mornings at our local library writing. I haven't had a huge output or a big project that I'm working on, but just setting aside time on a set day to write in a different environment has been helpful. 

This week I finished a book about sentences: First you write a sentence by Joe Moran. It wasn't the easiest book to read, but that kind of helped it to feel like I was doing "work" i.e. professional development, not just reading for pleasure! Here's one helpful quote:

‘It’s necessary to write as if your sentences will be orphaned, because they will be.’ (Evelyn Kinkenborg)…Once our sentences are written and sent out into the world to be read, they are on their own. Most of us cling to a residual belief that we will still be there, hovering over the reader as she reads, to explain, when she stumbles over our words, what we really meant. We won’t…Writing a sentence is …hard because you have to arrange them in such a way that they can be deciphered in your absence” (p. 24–25 First you write a sentence, Joe Moran, 2018).

Later he qualified that statement about orphans by saying that sentences really need to be read in context, that "the sentence you are reading needs the already read and still unread sentences around it" (p. 161).

Another gem from the book: "Reading a sentence should never be a grim duty. . . Most paragraphs are longer than they need to be, likewise most chapters. Most books go on for fifty pages longer than they should. We forget all this because it is less effort to speak than to listen . .  at some point, sooner than we think, we should stop. no one is ever as interested as we are in what we have to say. They need to eat, or catch a train, or go to bed because they have work in the morning. The courteous actor says his lines and leaves the stage with no encore." (p.199)

Unfortunately the author didn't really take his own advice. This book could have been considerably shorter! What kept me reading, though, was the gems like I've quoted. One of the reviewers on Goodreads said "About 96% twaddle. Which is annoying because the 4% has some really good ideas and observations." Ironically, a good developmental editor would have been a big help!

Aside from reading interesting books, and writing and editing, we've been walking alongside our sons as they continue to settle into life in Australia. This week that's meant:

• helping our middle son finally get his learners licence again (he had a Japanese learners, but that journey was interrupted by a seizure nearly two years ago)
• helping facilitate communication to allow our sons and one other missionary kid to apply to take over a lease from four other young men (two of whom at least are missionary kids themselves) 

Both the above are part of long complex journeys, and it was satisfying to complete a clear step in each one this week. Two more tangible steps towards our twin goals of them living independently as adults and us returning on our own to Japan to continue work there.

A strange thing, but I also did two things that I've been postponing. I bought three new t-shirts (as we approached downsizing and moving to Australia, I pretty much stopped buying anything that wasn't consumable or an immediate desperate need, so it's been a long time since I bought a t-shirt). I also made an appointment with a physio for a problem that's been bothering me for many months (years?). These seem like small things, but they felt big, like I was settled enough to do them?

We've also had car trouble, which has meant the first driving lesson got cut short yesterday. And more money will be paid than we want to. The car is at the mechanic and we've had to borrow a car this weekend to fulfil our ministry commitments.

This week we also started talking to our families about Christmas plans . . . this is something we only do a couple of times a decade! And noted that it's getting gradually more complex as our kids get older. Our families live a whole day's drive apart, so it is always a bit complicated to factor in everyone's needs, desires, plus the sheer practicalities of travel. On top of that we have other people (long-term friends and supporters) wondering if they can catch up with us during the Christmas holidays (roughly Dec–Jan), but we can't set dates until we've settled on dates with our families. 

Yesterday evening I felt like I was a little row boat that had had a number of ripples pass underneath me: unsettled and rocked, not by any one thing, but by the various life things going on, some of which I've mentioned above. When this happens I can be quite harsh on myself, wondering where my faith in God my rock is. After all this is what King David wrote:

Yes, my soul, find rest in God;
    my hope comes from him.
6 Truly he is my rock and my salvation;
    he is my fortress, I will not be shaken.
7 My salvation and my honour depend on God;
    he is my mighty rock, my refuge.
8 Trust in him at all times, you people;
    pour out your hearts to him,
    for God is our refuge. (Ps. 62:5–8)

I will not be shaken? I'm not sure exactly of the meaning here. I know that houses in Japan are built so that they can be shaken by an earthquake, but still remain standing and undamaged. Perhaps that's it?

So, a rowboat, sentences, and a driver's licence, and a myriad of other things that have made up this week, including a really hot, but dry day of around 37C, and a much cooler, yet more humid day today (around 26C). Tomorrow we put on our "missionary" hats again and, all things going well, we will present at an OMF meeting and then have lunch with friends from uni days.

Transition reflections

We are inching closer and closer to home assignment. It's less than five weeks till we fly out of Japan and while I know there is a lot yet to be done, I'm also getting impatient for it all to be over! I feel a bit overwhelmed by all the anticipation! 

This week I've been slowed up considerably by the miserable cold I mentioned last post, complicated as usual by my chronic asthma. I've gotten a lot less done than I'd expected, but nonetheless, I don't appear to be terribly behind, which is a great relief.

Yesterday morning I had my last "handover" planning meeting. Gradually the puzzle that I've been working on is being solved. The question that's been heavily on my mind for months now was how I was going to take leave from my various roles in Japan for 12 months without having those ministries collapse (not because I'm indispensable, but because I have been a key leader of both my main ministry teams). 

The goal I've been working towards is officially finishing most of my roles next Friday. After that we have our OMF field conference for a week in Hokkaido and then three and a half weeks to pack up our house, pack our bags, move, go to final medical appointments, say farewells, dispose of stuff, and hop on an aeroplane.

Forgive my unbelief

One of the stresses of moves like this one are all the unknowns compounded by many, many decisions. Most of the unknowns for us now are problems to be solved in Australia: like where we're going to live and how we're going to get around. 

We sent out our June prayer letter this week and in that we made an appeal to borrow furniture. We don't know where we'll live, but chances are that it will be unfurnished. We have only a very small amount stored in Australia and almost none of that is furniture, so each time we've got back for home assignment, we've asked our network to help us out. They've never failed in 20 years and I can't remember ever having to buy any larger (or even medium) household goods. God's provided in the past. But I still succumb to anxiety, which, I realise, is basically rooted in not believing that God will supply our needs (despite what I say with my words). In the case of the furniture, only an hour or two after I sent out that prayer letter, a good friend messaged me with news that she can supply most of those needs! Wow. Thank you Lord, but please forgive my unbelief! And help me to apply that faith to the other needs we have!

Quietly rebelling

What most people don't realise is that we really do like what we do in Japan. The essence of home assignment is that we have to give up what we really like doing here to become public speakers in Australia. And neither of us really enjoys public speaking.

I find myself quietly wanting to rebel against what we’re required to do over the next twelve months. Most of what we do in Japan is usually in the background. Neither of us feel comfortable being in the limelight. But home assignment puts us firmly there. We morph into speakers, workshop leaders, and Japan experts. My quiet rebellion is because I don't really want to be considered an extraordinary human being, one that needs to be pointed out as something special, someone who we invite to speak about their amazing experiences. That sub-text is contrary to what I want to communicate: that we are just ordinary humans, doing pretty ordinary stuff (just in an extraordinary place). We appear "special" because not many people do this, but it's not because we are inherently special. All we have and are is from God. It's because we serve an extraordinary God that we can do this, and keep doing it.

Translators?

I'm reading a book at the moment called Uncommon Ground, a collection of essays brought together by Tim Keller and John Inazu with perspectives from people thinking deeply and working daily to live with these times. What I didn't expect was to gain some perspective on what our role is during home assignment.One of the authors, John Inazu, calls himself a translator, though he is a lawyer and teacher. He says each of us is called to the task of translation: making words and ideas accessible to audiences unfamiliar with them. He describes his role as translating for and to each of the two worlds he occupies: the church and the university (he teaches law). "My vocation of translation means translating the university to some of my church friends and translating the church to some of my university friends." (p. 115)

In the case of a missionary on home assignment, we have to "translate" overseas mission and Japan to Australians. In general people we encounter there don't clearly understand what we do or where we do it. If you've followed my blog for a long time, you'll know that our work in Australia is composed of answering a lot of questions.

Much patience and diligence is required in translation. Much attention to detail as well as sensitivity to the wider picture. My work as an editor is also translation to some degree. I have to ensure that the writer's intent is accurately and appealingly translated into words that the audience will understand and not stumble over. And of course, as a writer who writes about cross-cultural life, I am translating my experience, life in Japan, and missionary life, into words so that others can understand. Pretty similar, in a way, to what we do on HA, except that as a writer and editor, I can hide behind my screen, rather than have to engage people face to face, or stand up in front of an audience with no time to edit my answers.

This is an interesting, helpful new thought for me. The author's thoughts on how we all need more humility, patience, and tolerance, are challenging, but helpful as we head into a different season of translation.

Change is in the air

The dominant theme in my week has been transition planning at work. Yes, I know, I've been thinking about this for months, and rightly so, it's more than one complicated problem that I've been trying to solve. But this week I feel like I made it past a tipping point in the planning and was able to get some plans rolling. Each day I've been juggling my usual work with communicating with people (via email or video call) about jobs I'm going to hand off to them, or how their particular job will change with me stepping back. 

It's exhausting and has come a bit to dominate my thinking over the last months. And, while I'm happy to be making visible progress, I think I'll also be happy to make it past the planning stage into the execution stage and see a visible reduction in my workload on this side of the ocean, to make room for new things.

End-of-senior-year pressure cooker

I'm very happy this is my last time as mum of a senior at high school. It's a lot of pressure and life is moving like a rocket for these kids at the moment. There is so much going on in these final weeks of school (graduation is two weeks from today), that it's hard for us parents to keep up. 

I'll be very glad for these two weeks to be over, but there's a bitter-sweet note too, as these friends with whom they have forged something very special, will be scattered around the earth, literally. Kids growing up outside their passport culture find "home" amongst other people like them, so at an international school the bonds are often stronger than you'd usually find in a school. During times we've spent in Australia it's their school and friends from CAJ that they have missed the most, even more than Japan itself. This is a much more "permanent" goodbye to that relatively safe place. Our youngest has been at this school since kindergarten, barring three home assignments, totalling 2 ½ years. During his life he's said goodbye to a lot of good friends, but usually one at a time, this time it's much bigger. So grief hovers below the surface of the craziness that abounds at present.

My experience of orchestral concerts has 
always been people dressing fairly formally.
It wasn't so on Saturday, but we had fun
nonetheless!

Something different

David and I did something totally unusual on Saturday night. We went to a symphony orchestra concert downtown. It was a suggestion I gave him for my birthday present. This is something really enjoyed doing when I was much younger: I have fond memories of my mum taking me to concerts as a young teenager. It's not something David has done much of, in fact, we have only once before done this as a couple, way back when we only had two kids, nearly 20 years ago! 

The concert was held in NHK Hall, which has a
capacity of 3,400! It was about ¼ or ⅓ full. NHK
is the national broadcaster in Japan, and the 
concert was recorded for TV and radio. Not sure
when they'll broadcast it. And yes, we were 
towards the back (there was a tier above us).

It proved to be a great experience, one that is very accessible in Tokyo. We can see concert-going in our future. We're definitely thinking about how life will be different as a couple and pondering how we can make that a rich and full experience, rather than the rather negative "empty nest" tag that it's often given.

Surprised by a book

I'm currently reading a book as research for writing an editorial for Japan Harvest on a topic I know little about: singleness. The book is called Sacred Siblings. Two people recommended that we publish a review for it in the upcoming magazine, but no one volunteered, so I decided to use it to help me write an article that I feel incredibly ill-equipped to write.

The book is not what I expected. It is very applicable to all people in ministry, but especially overseas ministry (their stated audience). I've been surprised to find that my experience as a married mother has come up many times in it. Married women with young children and single women have very different stories on the mission field, and not always in ways that you might imagine if you've not lived as each. It's interesting to have that written out in black and white, I'm not sure I've ever seen it acknowledged in print. 

I was struck by a story shared by one of the authors about two teams she was part of: one had a majority of married couples and the other had a majority of singles. She noted how the majority (no matter the makeup of that group) had a lot of difficulty seeing and accommodating the minority.

I'm nearly halfway through the book, but am already glad I've picked it up and hope that by writing about the book in the magazine it is picked up by others in the missions community too, especially the majority in leadership (largely married men with children).

My role is about to change in this area too with the remainder of my children leaving home, I'll soon be a married woman without children in Japan. I guess we've been living in the middle-ground for nearly six years now: with one of our sons living in Australia. I expect that this change to just the two of us here will give me a different perspective from that which I've had up till now—I've never been in Japan without children at home.

And such are the thoughts that are rushing around in my head at the end of this week. I'm also keeping an eye on the weather. I usually do a grocery run on my bike on Fridays and we have a rain front approaching us, so if I want to do it and stay relatively dry, I need to hop on my bike very soon! In fact . . . it's already raining, which is not what the forecast said . . . so do I don rain gear, or wait a little, or take the car?

Exciting and scary

I think I'm pleased to report that we booked more plane tickets on Saturday. I have to say that after our journeys last year, I wasn't keen, but I'm also glad that it's done. At least this time there are no passport or visa dramas, and no Covid regulations either! I've also booked accommodation in three different locations (one in Japan and two in Australia) that will help us have places to lay our heads between July 10 and August 2. After that, only God knows!

This transition represents the next stage in our journey: the start of our 5th (!) home assignment. It's also a significant journey as we take our sons back to Australia for good. As I keep saying, we're not bringing them back to Japan next year.

I'm also pleased to say that this week I was able to submit the 4,500-word project I'd been working on since November last year. That felt both very good, but also nerve-racking even though it was something that I'd been commissioned to write. I'm glad to have gotten it to this point and to shove it into someone else's hands for the time being. I think all editors should periodically take a turn at being writers whose work is submitted to editors, I think it would help us all to have a good deal of insight into what writers feel.

Then on Wednesday, I found enough free space in my schedule to ride to the park—my usual haunt—to spend time with the blooming sakura (alongside hundreds of others). Last Friday we sent the latest magazine to the printer, and this week I only had one meeting on my calendar and no out-of-the-office responsibilities during work hours. So, from several years of experience, I knew that this week I'd have a little extra time and that a ride to the park was viable. It was a shock to realise I haven't done that in five months! It was definitely time and yesterday everything lined up: time to spare, beautiful weather, and sakura blooming. Ah, it was a blessed couple of hours. I relaxed enough to even lie down and read a book under one of the pink trees!

This week it's been delightful to have more time to think about home assignment preparation . . . though I need to stop writing now! I've probably already got sufficient "story modules" written for our rounds of speaking. Noting that we're often only given 10 minutes between us to talk about Japan and our ministry over the last 4 ½ years, and we rarely speak to the same audience, it's not too hard. Because I love to write and "stories" are my hobby horse, it's the easier part of HA preparation for me. The hard work of upending our lives and moving will be much worse.

So, now, I think, a story is warranted. Smile! Writing for publication can be a scary thing, but it's also an exciting thing. For the same reason: you never know where your words are going to end up. Editing and publishing are the same. I feel a little like a midwife, sometimes, in the various publishing that I'm involved in. 

A couple of weeks ago at the women's retreat I went to I saw one of my "babies" on a table. I think it was for sale. "Beneath the Surface" is a prayer guide I spent several months working on in 2019 and 2020. I wasn't a writer, but I laboured over the editing! Oh, I did write the initial draft of the "From the editors" at the beginning, but it was heavily worked over in one of the most intense "team editing" sessions I've ever been part of.

I've just done some intense searching, and I can't believe that I never wrote here about this big "baby". It was a huge project (that involved a lot of collaboration across organisations) to undertake on top of the other day-to-day responsibilities I have at work. Probably one reason that I never wrote here about it was that it happened in the middle of the pandemic, at least the end part did. We had planned a post-publication party for the three of us editors who conceived and worked together on the project, but we never ended up being able to do anything. In the end, in November 2020, the only thing that marked this going out into the world was an online launch party for the contributors. 

In any case, I'm still very happy with this amazing booklet and feel a little possessive whenever I see it around somewhere. I'm unsure how many copies have been sold around the world, but it's many thousand. And it's been translated into a few other languages as well. The Japanese version is currently being worked on.

I think the unique thing about the booklet is not only that it is not about the work of any one mission, but also that it delves into some really deep and difficult topics, but makes them accessible to many people because as much as we could we tried to utilise stories. Oh, and you can buy it here.

But that actually wasn't the story I was planning to tell you. I've got another one. I received an email early in March from someone in the UK. He's a Christian student worker (IFES), and specifically, he works with music students. One of the authors in the Winter issue of the magazine that I manage Japan Harvest happened to be in the UK and gave a copy of the magazine to this man. (This issue was themed "Arts in Ministry.") This man in the UK read the whole thing and wrote: 

"I found [it] fascinating—I've known for quite a while that using the arts in mission is something that is done to particularly good effect in Japan, and so it was eye-opening, encouraging, and inspiring to read so many articles documenting the thought and practice of so many missionaries in Japan."

He was particularly taken by one of the articles and wanted to reprint it on this website. https://musicnetwork.uk/.

The website is the "chief online resource for equipping music students here in the UK to live for Christ in the world of music. We are always trying to give them deep theological foundations for their musical practice, as well as actively trying to encourage them to think globally and missionally, and the article certainly did both of those things I feel."

You can check out the article that's now been republished here.

I was so encouraged by this little exchange. The magazine is primarily for people ministering to Japanese people, so to think that this went halfway around the world into the hands of someone working with quite a different audience is pretty cool.

I like my job. It is indeed both scary and exciting. Who knows what God's going to do with my words or the words I help into publication?

I'm also excited because we've got a camping trip planned for next week! So my next blog post might be a camping one!

Telling stories and being heard

I've had more time to write this week than I've had for some time. It's been lovely. One of the things I've been writing is my regular column about writing for the upcoming Japan Harvest magazine. But the topic is convicting: stories. I'm passionate about telling true stories, but, like many people who write non-fiction, I often fail to use them. Stories often aren't as direct and take up more space. It also takes attention to notice some stories. Others, like my hair-braiding story, told here just are begging to be shared.

So, I feel compelled to write a blog post this afternoon, but am struggling to find a story to share with you, because as an editor so much of the time I'm working with other people's stories and not having experiences that can be told...but it's good to struggle sometimes. Here are some stories from the last couple of weeks that I hope you find encouraging:

Talent Show

On Tuesday evening we went to the school's Senior Talent Show. This has been a tradition for many years, but of course this tradition has been interrupted in the last couple of years. It's a fundraiser put on by the senior class in preparation for their overseas ministry trip in March. It is usually a mixture of fun and serious acts, but there are also a reasonable number of acts that just make the parents and teachers feel old because they are based around current pop culture that we're not familiar with. 

I did enjoy most of the evening, but it did go on a little too long (2 hr 40 min). Or perhaps I'm just getting old and unused to going out in the evening? I have to admit to still feeling a little exhausted by large groups of people.

It was fun to have one extra senior staying at our house that evening because he lives far away, and to chat with our son and his friend the next morning . . . but they're tired. I keep reminding myself that I was the same way at the same age and that it's just for a limited time. This will be all over in less than four months!

The importance of people-focus

Twice in the last few days I've had unexpected conversations with team members. Members of teams I manage. The teams I work with are quite task-focused—we're teams with specific outcome objectives: publishing a magazine and social media posts (for the purpose of mobilising for mission in Japan). So, I'm not sure I do a great job at caring for the people in my teams because I spend a lot of my time taking care of many tasks with deadlines. I often measure how I'm going in my job with how many tasks I've been able to tick off my list. Because both teams work remotely, I often go weeks without talking to any team members directly. We communicate a lot via text, email, and other online tools. 

So, spontaneous opportunities this week to connect (via video calls) with two team members who are struggling in different ways was unusual, but also good. 

I also led an online prayer meeting with about half the magazine team and it was good to not just pray for magazine matters, but to pray for one another and the things that are on our hearts and minds also. I felt heard and I hope they felt heard too.

Being heard

Last week I had another online prayer meeting with some expat mums in (or with a recent connection to) Japan who have kids with special needs—various needs, various ages. I'm new to their group, but I already had met most of the mums in other contexts. I'm starting to feel like these are "my people", and I find myself telling them things that few other people know. 

Recently I've found that what we've dealt with as parents over the last few years in terms of mental health and neurodiversity has meant I've found it harder to connect closely with many people. There is an experiential gap, one that's hard to define. People who don't have an experience with such parenting challenges can find it hard to understand, or simply don't want to, and I feel constrained in what I feel I can share with them. I wrote a bit about this with a great deal of emotion, back in October. There is great power in feeling like you're understood, and that people want to hear about what you're deeply struggling with. I'm so thankful I was "found" by one of these ladies last year and welcomed into their midst.

It's hard to literally see hills from our location
in Tokyo (Mt Fuji is visible from certain 
points, but not our house). This is a view
of mountains from a wrestling venue back
in December, a place I'll be returning to
next month for a Track and Field meet.

I lift my eyes to the hills

At the magazine prayer meeting I'd decided to help us focus by listening to a song based on Psalm 121, which starts, "I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth". 

Most of the team, it turns out, are labouring under some heavy burdens, so this was indeed God going before and leading me to use this psalm and song in our time together. Maybe this song will help you as you struggle with something today too: Psalm 121 (I Lift My Eyes) Lyric Video • Kristyn Getty • Jordan Kauflin • Matt Merker

Pondering COVID's impact on life and ministry

One of my jobs with our mission's social media is to come up with media posts, especially the text-parts. That sounds easier than it sometimes is. Our goal is to raise awareness of the need of the gospel in Japan and getting people more involved, which is a bit different to how most of us use our personal social media accounts. I guess it's a close relative to "marketing".

We use a monthly theme to help fuel our creativity. Some themes are easier than others. Next month's theme is "How COVID has impacted life and ministry in Japan". That sounds like a good theme . . . but how did we find engaging content for that? 

Our team met early last week and brainstormed. One of my ideas was to do a short survey of our missionaries. But putting feet on that is harder than I thought. This afternoon I found some space to think about what I'd actually ask people. I shifted some ideas into a draft survey format, and then I have moved away to other things (like this). 

That is my usual way of operating with creative things: it's how I write, and edit, as well as work on tasks like this. Letting an idea drift around in my brain while I do other things is a brilliant way to find my way forward. I hate it when someone asks me to do "live editing" at a meeting. I prefer to read something and let it sit for a while before I do anything with it, and even when I do start to work on it, I want to do it without an audience, I want to play around with ideas in my head (and on the screen) before I decide anything. Actually, it's how I do shopping too. I hate shopping with (most) other people, I need space to think about options and decisions.

But anyway, what do I ask missionaries about how COVID has impacted their life and ministry?

My own ministry hasn't been majorly impacted by COVID. I worked from home and online for years before everyone else was doing it. The biggest impacts COVID had were more personal things like the inability to travel to see family in Australia (and them unable to come here) and watching my boys suffer as they lost opportunities and had to deal with online classes. 

Wearing masks hasn't been my favourite thing, but I've been able to avoid much of that as I work at home. 

Emotional distress probably rates fairly highly too. We've just passed the two-year anniversary since one of our young friends lost her battle with depression and died by suicide. We've had our own mental health battle in our own household during the pandemic and because I was isolated from good person-to-person contact with people for months at a time, I've found it difficult at times to find ways to interact with others and know how to talk about my own struggles. I wonder if I've gotten worse at "small talk".

Life is getting back close to normal now, though attendance in-person at our church is still lower than it was pre-pandemic. And we are still wearing masks indoors and in crowded public spaces in Japan. There is talk that next month the government recommendation for wearing masks will be lifted, but we wonder what that will look like. Life in Japan is very influenced by not causing discomfort for other people, and will not wearing masks create problems?

I can identify some positives that came about due to COVID: regular walking and talking with David. And the acquisition of a stand mixer (given it by a missionary who had to leave). Also, the increased tendency of people to have some meetings online and thus meaning less time is taken up with travel, even some opportunities to meet online with folk who we'd never otherwise have done so because we all live so far from one another.

But back to my question: What would you like to know about how COVID has impacted life and ministry for missionaries? If you are a missionary, what would you like others to know?