A lot has happened in the past two weeks. It’s been a privilege to host twelve amazing partners from Cerritos, California. Here are a few favorite scenes that show some of the learning and the loving that has gone on in Sanda as two cultures have partnered together and learned from each other…

Scene #1:
Our friends Damon and Brett were hosted this past week by our Sanda friends, the Hajis. (For those of you who know the story, Mrs. Haji is our postal delivery lady). Mr. Haji and all three boy have studied the Japanese martial art of kendo, and had both of the American guys wear the kendo uniform and give it a try. Take it a look at the video of Brett giving it his best shot, and then the photo that follows to see what happened:

(Note hole in top right panel) Oh, those flimsy Japanese paper doors!

Scene #2:
One of the members, Evan, (18 years old), is a great break-dancer (see blog post of how his break-dancing caught the attention of the waiter, and what happened after that). The first video is Evan, the second is his latest protege:

Scene #3:
It’s all about relationships! One of our main prayers as we prepare for short-term teams to come and work with us is that they will build strong relationships with our Japanese friends, and help us and church members, as well, to deepen relationships. It was wonderful to see this happening on many levels over the last 2 weeks.

One of our favorite stories is about “George” (see Transformers). George’s wife, Aiko, became a Christian last fall after hosting a mother/daughter combo from our New Jersey church. George and their son and daughter are still not believers, though George has been showing more and more interest. This year, a father/son team from L.A., Mike and Evan, stayed with George and his family.

It was so neat to see the friendship develop between these Mike and George. Mike is a very talented musician, and taught George how to play the uekele. Before coming to Japan, Mike had a dream in which he was giving away his uekele to someone. He woke up, and thought what a strange dream because he could never part with it. But after a week of spending time with George, on the last evening together, Mike gave his uekele to George. After our final worship service together, I recorded the following video of the two guys doing a little Hawaiian number they had practiced all week. Aiko is on the left holding the sheet music; then George in the center, with his old touristy uekele, and Mike is on the right playing his former uekele for the last time.

Scene #4:

The team’s last Sunday we had a special combined worship. It was a wonderful few hours of fellowship, sharing, joy, and tears. We sang Jesus Loves Me over and over in Japanese, and then in English. We sang it enough times so that most could sing the chorus in either language. Amazing how much learning and loving can happen in just a few short days….