Though he died, he still speaks

Hebrews 11:4 says of Abel, “…through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.”

Tonight i met with some longtime family friends who had spent a lifetime with my dad. It was so humbling and a huge blessing. Thank God for making me raise support and meet so many loving and seasoned Christians who gently redirect me towards Jesus. 

One of the things i received from this meeting was a word about my dad. Sometimes i feel bashful to tell people about my dad because i don’t want to seem like “that guy.” But i think it’s right to share with people about how good of a man my dad was so that they can learn and be blessed as well. Good–only by the grace of Jesus, but praise God for such a Christlike man! God spoke through my dad’s friend tonight, that as i strive to become more like Jesus and seek examples of men who emulate Christ, i do not need to seek a replacement for my dad.

Right now i am seeking older wiser men who will shepherd and teach me. At the same time however, i think that God gave me the closest thing to Christ i’ll ever personally know in my own dad. For some people who know him only as the cocky brilliant alpha male of youth this might seem ridiculous. But for those who knew him the years i knew him, especially the last years, i think this is a sober statement others can attest to. Like Abel, though my dad has been dead four years, he still speaks…especially in the past three months through the legacy he left behind in those i meet with. Among the counselors God has graciously brought into my life, my dad still speaks gentle instruction to me. I pray that i can be a man with a legacy like this and that all men strive for the same.

I want to share a few things i wrote down that my dad gave me the last time we talked. They are very personal, but i don’t think they were meant to be kept private. I pray they will be a blessing to you. May you have the grace to speak like this to a lost son after cancer ravages your perfectly healthy body in six months–bright eyed, smiling like an angel, and praising Jesus to the grave. Dad is my boast in the Cross. Galatians 6:14. Soli Deo Gloria.

May 2004
“A godly man lives to give his life away.
When Kaori or John is angry or argues or anything, they just want to know that they are special. Don’t argue. Hug them. Love them.
It is better to give than to receive. Far better. Learn this, live by it.
Deep questions, ask _________ and ___________. They know dad’s heart.
Please God, and you will please me.
Obedience is learned through suffering. Don’t know why, but somehow it is.
Remember heaven.
Trust God, he will work things out. It’s all about trust.
I found my peace in Romans. Things working out better. Study hard in Romans. It’s there.
You and i have the same heart.”

Swimming in the heat

Friday we drove up to Stanwood (about an hour north of Seattle) for Mars Hill’s Men’s Advance. The country road we took off the freeway was gorgeous. We drove with the windows down and arms out enjoying the perfect 70s/80s weather. What a gift–and what a thought–that heaven will be 10,000 times more beautiful and full of bodily pleasure.

The men’s retreat was sweet. our college guys had good time hanging out and the sessions fed and led us to Jesus and Scripture. Chris and I had to leave early saturday evening to get ready for our 7am flight this morning (sunday). after a long flight across the country this morning we arrived in Orlando around 5pm eastern time. this evening we visited a local college ministry called Status. It was good to visit an established college ministry and take away practical insights.

Tomorrow my new staff training starts. I’ll be going for a week straight doing 12 hour days of training. i’m determined and praying now that God would empower me to labor and learn well so that i can run the race ahead with endurance. please pray that i would grow in competence and confidence sharing the mission God has called me to and inviting others to send me out to accomplish it. 

it’s good being here with Matt and Chris, talking about Jesus, ministry, anything and everything. Florida is humid and sunny. i’m digging the warmth. it reminds me of Japanese summers.

Mars Hill Men’s Advance @ Stanwood, WA

Some of our college guys hanging out @ Stanwood

Status in Orlando, FL

the yellow orb

well, just wanted to make a quick post. the sun finally came out in seattle. probably one of the most beautiful places i’ve ever lived. everyone is so much happier now. it’s great. anyway, this evening i’ll be off to warm beach for the Mars Hill Men’s Advance. looking forward to that. chris and i will drive back early from that on saturday night and then wake up at 4 something to get ready for our 7am flight out to Florida. i’ll get into florida on sunday and start new staff training with GCM on monday, ending on the 26. we’ll get back to seattle the 27th. it is going to be soooooo busy and draining, but good. so please keep me in your prayers and i’ll try to update some pictures and maybe youtube videos of the next few weeks.

and thank you so much to those who made it possible financially for me to get out to Florida!

providence

i got home today from a retreat w/ Eikou church. i’m glad for all the people i’ve been able to meet over the past few months. met some really encouraging people, and it was nice to be around families. i barely made it home though. i almost fell asleep on the road. i got home and collapsed in my bed around two, and i woke up at 1130. i was drained. so please pray for God to strengthen my body.

i’m attaching an email from a japanese businessman who i randomly met a few weeks ago by the providence of God. i just checked my inbox and received it, a huge encouragement to me in the midst of this support raising period.

Dear Hiroshi
We hope everything is fine with you.
It has been about two weeks since we met you. Time flies fast !
It was really wonderful for us to meet and talk with you a lot in
spite of a short of period time. If it were not for my wife’s request
that she’d like to have a cup of coffee at that Starbucks shop, there wouldn’t be an unexpected encouter with you. And we were also surprised to know you’ve visited Japan before and you’ve stayed at the place (Musashisakai) we’re very familiar with ! 
Now we understand you have a dream to engage in mission work in Japan and try to meet people in more easier way which is different from that of Japanese, open to everyone.
We do hope your dream will come true. You can do that in the very near future ! 
We’re back in Japan safe and sound with a lot of good memories
during our stay in the US. We’re still suffering from jet lag a little, but we’ll adjust to everyday life.
Finally we really hope we’ll be able to see you again in Seattle or Japan in the near future ! We’ll be in touch with you. Please take care of yourself.
And please don’t forget learning Japanese in order to talk with  Japanese people and my wife who never try to study English !
P.S. Attached is the picture of us at the Starbucks coffee shop.
Best wishes,
Toshiko and Yutaka Iikura

A good leader…

Tonight a lot happened. i’m still reeling. after i write this i’m going to go up to my bedroom and get on my knees and pray. why is God allowing me to be a part of this and watch Him do work on guys’ hearts? i’m not worthy, a million times over. why does He let sinners draw near Him? why did He go to the cross? so unworthy. I LOVE THE GOSPEL. i love Jesus. such a great and wonderful God, such a worthy King and loving Shepherd. i just want Him, and i want to live to please Him and obey Him. i want to see as many men as possible give Him the glory He deserves–NOW. i want my brothers to meet Jesus and fall in love with Him; to love Him like the men love their captain. i want to people to MEET Jesus, to really MEET Jesus for real and have new hearts and new lives that cry out for more of Him and can’t help but change their lives to please Him. i’m going to a Japanese retreat this weekend and there’s a guy who’s seeking. PRAY so hard that God gives him a new heart of faith and repentance THIS WEEKEND, and that i faithfully and patiently explain the Gospel to him and love on him. PRAY that the Holy Spirit will give me words and that He will regenerate Yohei’s heart. PRAY that next week i will post that God brought one of the elect into the family, into the fold. PRAY, i am begging you, PRAY. really really PRAY.

Tonight i want to honor my leader. Matt Jensen is a man among men worthy to be followed. It is all Jesus working through him, but He is a soldier and a commander. I am so privilged to be working with and under Matt. His leadership and friendship has been so huge in growing me. Please pray for Him that God would strengthen Him and refresh him. And praise God that i can serve under him and that Matt has a heart for all peoples to know Jesus–that’s how i first even got into this staff position–he wanted to help me reach as many Japanese people as possible. in the manliest of ways, i love him and am so grateful for him and want to honor him here. 

When God uses chumps like me

Today was such a good day. We had an awesome CSLT meeting in the morning where God turned the ship in a new direction. super excited about that. i went for a run with Chris at Discovery Park. about 4 miles. it was overcast, but the surroundings were gorgeous. Seattle is such a beautiful city where you can be five minutes from obvious city and feel like you’re five hours from a city. 

i bought a camera from Costco so that i could take pics of the ministry stuff i’m doing and keep people up to date. it’s cheap and i might end up returning it. i don’t like it too much right now. the quality of pics are sooooo bad compared to my nikon that got stolen. oh well.

Tonight we did TFC (Theological Fight Club) at The Ram, a sports bar in U-village. for TFC we get our guy leaders together and go through a chapter or two of Biblical doctrine in Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology. We spend about two hours talking about how the Bible blew our mind, worshipping over how awesome God is in so many ways; debating over tons of stuff and bringing everything back to Scripture; and challenging ourselves to the implications of lifechange if we really believe all the stuff we’re so excitedly talk about. tonight we talked about glorification and the return of Jesus. after we worshipped over how gracious God is, we were sobered by the converse fact that Hell is real, and people are going there to pay for sin and the belittling of God’s glory–like we should be, except that God’s sovereign grace saved us. seeing such fruit begin to come out of that group of guys. usually it’s been around 15, but we killed it for the rest of the year and made it more of a student led activity now. i put a pic of some of the guys below so y’all can see.

be so encouraged. Jesus is building HIS college ministry.

miracles

i want to give praise to God for an amazing work i’ve been seeing and honor the faithfulness of my friend Chris. In the last two months God had changed everything. last night we were sitting down over a good drink talking about the ministry and all that God had been doing in our lives. we probably looked like fools sitting at the bar waving our hands excitedly about God. oh well.

Chris is our admin guy who’s going to make sure all our big ideas get done. such a blessing to us. he’ll also be key in discipling guys in the ministry as well. we were talking about our respective callings to be a part of this work God is doing at UW with Mars Hill, and sharing the sacrifices that had led to being a part of this team. A week ago Chris was undecided on whether to come on staff or take other job offers. God worked on his heart and convinced him to come on staff. he had sizable offers from companies to come work, but he turned them all down to work 20 hours a week making $12,000 a year so that he can give our ministry 30 hours a week. the crazy thing is that as we talked about this and laughed over how crazy it is, i couldn’t think of two happier guys in the world. we both said, “There is absolutely nothing in the world i would rather be doing than this.” That is a miracle. Praise God.

In two weeks i’m headed to Florida for new staff training with Matt, and, as of today, Chris also! I’m so excited for this time haha =D. thanks to everyone who’s financial partnership is making this possible and prayers are moving mountains. don’t stop!

One day…

Read this. It’s Mark’s reflection on what happened Easter 2008. and watch the video too. you’ll be blessed.

Whenever i read this or experience it in service, two things happen to me: 1) i think that this is the coolest thing in the world and i want to stay here forever 2) i just about always have a thought for Japan and break over the fact that nothing like this is in Japan, and i pray that God would let me see and experience this in Japan with my brothers and sisters.

One day, i pray in my lifetime, we are going to see Japanese responding to the Gospel in tears coming up to the front saying, “I want to become a Christian. Can you pray with me.” I don’t know if there’s anything i want to see more. It would make all the trials and sacrifices worth it, 10,000 times over and over.

please join me in earnestly praying for droves of Japanese to come to Christ, and watch God answer =)

a good night

just got back from a night of hanging out with nozomi and taka. i met with nozomi earlier to talk about japanese ministry and stuff, and then taka met up with us at tully’s. it was awesome. he’s studying in Seattle at BCC for a year, until next march. he’s about 6′3, just shy of me, and played football at his university in japan (WR) and volleyball during high school (MH). we had so much in common that we talked about regarding sports. it was like meeting a brother, literally.

i guess that’s the best way i can describe my relationships with japanese people. it feels like family to me. we went to a “talk time” at Northshore Baptist Church after Tully’s where we met some Japanese girls who are studying English at Edmonds CC. it was a good time. with them, i felt like they were my little sisters. this probably sounds strange since people who know me know that i’m very American and can’t speak Japanese…so why do i talk like this? i think that the root of it comes from the fact that they are, more or less, my mother. i love hearing japanese and love being able to help people learn english. everything japanese ultimately reminds me of growing up with my mom, even though she speaks english. i think this is a huge part of how God has pulled my heart to Japanese people.

in any case, praise God that i was able to meet Taka. we hit it off really well and will hang out again. pray that i would be able to communicate the gospel to him well through our relationship and that God would save him.

IMPORTANT, please read…

i’ve told a decent amount of people that my mission with GCM and Mars Hill is to reach Asian American students at UW. there is definitely a huge need here, upwards of ten thousand Asian students at UW. but in the past week, through my multiple encounters with Japanese people and opportunities to share the gospel, God was laying on my heart a heavy burden that i’m not called to Asian American ministry. Last night was decisive in my thoughts. i became convinced that i am called to reach Japanese nationals. right now, i am called by God to be here in Seattle, not Japan, working with Japanese students studying abroad in Seattle.

I communicated this to Matt (college ministry director) today. he had a baffled look on his face because he thought that’s what he meant when he said he wanted me to reach Asian Americans. after teaching him about the HUGE difference in terms and the people they correspond to, we were totally agreed that the reason he approached me to serve at Mars Hill in the first place was, is, and always has been to reach Japanese nationals. THIS IS SOOOOOOOOOO HUGE. I am being commissioned to reach Japanese people, NOW!

The opportunities and strategy for the salvation of Japan are vast. i’ll be working on putting it into a document that i post as a separate page on this website. give me a week and it should be up. but everyone, this is so AMAZING!!!!!! i had been struggling with being called to Asian Americans. i think there’s a huge need for that, and i want to see them reached, but God has not called me to that mission, he has called me to Japanese nationals.

I wish you guys could see my face right now. this is probably the most exciting encouraging thing i’ve encoutnered since God called me to reach Japanese people last spring. And it was right there all along!! Wow have i learned the importance of terms and being clear in definitions. hahaha. And God completed our core team for the College Ministry next year. Chris Balt is giving 30 hrs a week to drive the logistics/admin–God provided work for him to support himself and do ministry (YESSSSSSSSSS!), Stuart is going to be able to stay involved as a grad student next year because he got FULL funding for grad school TODAY (YESSSSSSSS!) Jesus is answering our prayers left and right. we need to pray MORE, because He’s answered everything we prayed for!!!!!