Friends and Family,

We are just finishing day 3 in Japan.  We just had our team meeting after dinner and all of were saying that it feels like we've been in Japan for at least a week--and it's only been 3 days.  Let me give you a basic summary of what we've been up to.

Our flight went well.  We had a stopover in Seoul and we nearly missed our flight because our plane arrived late.  But we made it and arrived safely in Fukuoka.  Pastor Daniel met us at the airport and we took a subway to the hostel where we're staying.  We checked in and we were definitely ready for bed.  Some of us were up straight for 24+ hours without sleep.  We were so exhausted it was almost comical...almost.

Day two in Japan was the kick-off of our VBS camp.  We woke up early, had a quick breakfast at the hostel, and gathered at the International School.  We set up for camp, and before you know it, all the Japanese campers were arriving with their parents.  After introductions, our rotations started with 3 stations, Bible, English, and Games.  The Japanese campers were so excited (shy, but excited), to finally meet their camp counselors that they heard about.  Despite the language barrier, the kids did well to mix with the Japanese kids and I thought there was good rapport.  In the afternoon, we practiced our skits, and prepped for the next day of camp.

This morning we woke up to day three, 2nd day camp.  We moved to a different campus for day two so we had all new surroundings.  Japanese campers are responding well to the Bible.  Yesterday's theme in Bible class was "There is a God."  And we spent the session talking about the "three O's"--omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent.  Eye-opening for almost 100% of these kids since they have never heard the truth of the gospel.  Today's theme was "He created the world."  We talked about how God knit each of us together in our mother's womb (Ps 139), and how He created us out of love.

Mel was sick the first day.  She had a fever so she stayed in bed for the morning.  She felt better by mid-day, and we had lunch with her.  No problems of sickness since then.  We're all good now.

After VBS, we all ate in the University cafeteria.  It was good food and very inexpensive.  Afterwards, we went bowling for our afternoon activity with the kids.  After bowling, we took off by subway for the center for children with disabilities.  We spent almost 2 hours there, visiting with the children.  We performed one of our skits there and sang songs and played games with the kids.  A lot of fun and good laughs.  Hopefully, Lena and Natalie are posting pictures from today's event as I'm typing this.

Tomorrow it's supposed to rain, so let's see how that goes.  Nobody's excited about that.  In Bible, we're covering the "sin problem", so pray for us there.  Many parents were present on day one in the Bible class and they expressed a desire to learn more.  We may set up a "Bible Teatime" with the parents, so please pray for opportunities to witness to the parents, even before the big finale on Easter Sunday.

I'll stop here, but I'll continue again tomorrow.

Thank you for your prayer support.

Mr. R