Hannah's Summer

Hey everyone who reads this blog! This is Hannah today. I decided I should let y’all hear from me before I head back to the States. This summer has been awesome. Dad was so kind as to spend the money to bring me home (to the Philippines) for the summer and then he has kept spending on me as I toured parts of the Philippines and Tokyo. And every time I go to the mall he wonders where the spending money goes. Oops. Like I said, he has been very generous!

This summer began when I spent a few days in Texas with Sara before heading home. And I had somehow convinced my friend Allie to come with me. We had some great times in Palawan, Boracay, and around Iloilo before she left in mid-June. Then we had a month that flew by where I studied for some CLEPs and was generally lazy. Mid-July rolled around and we headed off to Tokyo. Expedition was amazing. There were MKs from South and Southeast Asia on this mission trip. Not only were we able to minister together, but we also got to learn so much about other countries by listening to these kids tell about their homes.

On Expedition we would usually spend the morning in Bible study time, worship, and team building. In the afternoon we headed out and would do 5 minute English (standing on the street corner advertising free English lessons, and hopefully get a conversation started that would lead to a gospel presentation), distribution (stuff mailboxes with Gospel of Johns and a flyer, in Japan it is perfectly legal to stuff mailboxes), and either rainy day evangelism (where we had gotten rained out of our normal location and went to the mall to try and strike up conversations) or park evangelism (we did this one day and we did face painting, a skit, some played the violin, and generally just tried to interact with the Japanese). The week was challenging as many of us, myself included, had to step outside of our comfort zone and be bold while advertising English or going up to people and trying to start conversations. But it was really cool to see how throughout the week God answered prayer. Each of us were able to talk to some Japanese and I was able to witness to one.

Japan is a tough place to minister. Many of the Japanese had never heard of the Bible or Christianity at all. Many of them were focused on success, material things, or doing good and many could not see that they needed Christ or how he could be of interest. The Japanese were always polite but many of them quickly let us know when we were sharing that they were not interested. Please be praying for the missionaries in Tokyo. They have a huge task. Tokyo is the largest city in the world with 27 million people. To stand in Tokyo Tower and look out in all directions and realize that the city never seems to end is a sobering experience. If it were up to humans alone, we should give up Tokyo for good. But we serve a God who is greater than the lostness of 27 million people.

After Tokyo, Martha and I stayed a few extra days with a missionary family, the Bennetts. They were so kind to host us and take us around. One day we met some relatives for the first time. My aunt, Mie Joness, is Japanese and she gave us the contact info for her parents. We called them up late one night and the next morning they appeared at our door and spent the whole day taking us to touristy spots and treating us to really fancy Japanese restaurants. One meal took almost 2 hours because of all the courses! They were so kind and sweet and were the best tour guides we could ask for.

At the end of July Martha and I came home and now it’s time for me to turn around and leave. This summer has been fantastic. God has blessed me so much. A family that loves me and that I love a lot, good friends, new places to see, and many many many other things. I am so thankful I got to come home this summer. Now I go back to school to be a prayer leader where I will be responsible to pray for and possibly disciple five girls. And I’ll also be working as a teaching assistant for the history departments. So I’ll have a lot more responsibilities than I did last year. Please pray that I will be able to fulfill them. And please pray for me as I leave home. It’s just tragic every time I go. And please pray for Martha and Jonathan, that they find things to do so that they don’t mope too much when I’m gone. A little token moping would be OK, just don’t want them getting depressed. :)

Thanks so much for your prayers!