I had just returned home with our friend Megumi from L.A., who is visiting with us for a week.  We had decided that Friday night dinner our family would take her for her first night back in Japan to one of our favorite local restaurants that is sort of a child-friendly food court.  The first few seconds of the earthquake did not feel very different from others in recent past up here, but as it continued we knew it was bigger than usual, and so we called Megumi and the kids from the other room.  Owen and Annie immediately got under the dining room table (excellent training they receive in Japanese schools here!), and the other two followed suit.  It was LONG.  Shortly after that, the loud sirens began, warning of a possible tsunami on the way.  In some areas it was blaring the approximate time it was expected to come:  5:40 (about twenty minutes or so after the earthquake).

In our current temporary home, we are on a cliff that overlooks an area devastated by the 2011 tsunami.  We feel high enough to be safe, and this home is really sturdy.  Our best bet was to stay put.  We were very thankful that our whole family was together, and it was good to have Megumi with us.  But as the sirens continued, there was a palpable fear in the air.  One of our daughters in particular was pretty freaked out, and just needed to be held.

Our phones were not working for the first hour or so, but we were thankfully able to text and get on the internet.  So thankful for Facebook!  That is the best vehicle for communicating our situation to a wide audience of family, friends and coworkers in times of emergency.

We heard back from a number of our local friends that they were headed to evacuation centers or in their cars headed to the hills.  I was able to get through on the phone to one of our Nozomi friends, Chi.  When I called her voice sounded panicked.  Her husband was working at the time at the local nuclear power factory, so she had loaded her kids and new poodle in the car to go up the mountain.  I have written about her before… they have built a new home where their former washed-away home had been;  it is a great home but it is close to the water.  She had a lot of anxiety about moving back, and so I thought of her right away when the sirens went off.

She said her knees were shaking as they drove up.  Then they hit a major traffic jam as the rest of the Watanoha community also headed to the hills, so when I called they were stuck in their car.  We talked a bit and then I prayed for her.  She said her heart was calmed.

A one-meter tsunami did come to some areas, but  there was no damage and no deaths.  Very thankful for that!  The warning was called off, and the loud speakers across Ishinomaki announced that it was safe to return home.

A large part of the past few days have been spent in processing that night.  It has definitely been the main theme of conversations.  Last night I was in a store and the storekeeper told me how the local residents all came to their place because they have the tallest building in the neighborhood.  She said that just as they were beginning to forget the horrors of 3/11/11, this came and brought fresh reminders and fresh pain.  One missionary friend, new to the area, shared how the reality hit her when the sirens went off that there really wasn’t time to take care of others- her main thought was how to make sure her children were safe.  One of the families we work with had to evacuate by walking up the mountain near them to the temple.  Their children panicked as the sirens blared and ended up going ahead while the parents were trying to gather a few supplies in the house. A good friend who also works at Nozomi had a fever for several days after – just from the stress.

For many of our friends, it did reopen some of the healing wounds.  I think this was a wake-up call for those of us who have moved here and did not experience the big tsunami.   I confess I have thought that a lot of people who died had made unwise choices to try and drive when the tsunami warnings went off.  I realized on Friday night how everyone in the area becomes victims to the timing and where they happen to be at the time.  For those already in their cars;  those who live in low-lying areas — there may not be good options.

One of the common advice given to us the past few days has been — keep your children close.  Several days before the big earthquake and tsunami a year ago March, there had been a similarly-sized earthquake that had shook the region.  We talked with one neighbor who showed us a retaining wall hat had fallen down in that quake, just three days before the 9.0.  No one remembers that now, because it was insignificant compared to the one that came several days later.  But many have been talking about how two often come together like this – one a precursor to a larger one.  There have been articles written about another very large earthquake due to hit northern Japan that would create an equally massive tsunami in this region.

We have a fairly complete earthquake/tsunami survival kit.  We have talked with our kids about our plans.  If we are in our new home, it will be less clear.  It is definitely in “the zone”, but our hope is that it is a strong enough home and has a good second floor where we could stay if necessary (the previous tsunami came up about 3-5 feet in that area).  There is also the nearby elementary school where we could evacuate if necessary.

But the bottom line is — we have no idea.  We really don’t know.  We need to be responsible with how we prepare for the worse, but continue to entrust our family and our friends into God’s care.  And walk through the valley of the shadow with our friends.  More than ever, I am aware of the deep sense of fear that lies all around us.  One woman said this week, “The scab that was covering my heart has just been ripped off.”

There is only One who can conquer such deep, raw emotion – He is the One of Perfect Love.  I decided over the weekend that if it were not for Jesus I could never ever live up here.  Not because of our fear of another big one, but because mere rebuilding of homes or creating jobs is not enough.  Thankful that He is something much more.

Friends who have been so patient, supportive, and prayerful as we have launched the Nozomi Project….

our English website is READY.  Please try it!  (And give us feedback).  For the next few weeks we will be offering Nozomi jewelry sets for a suggested donation of $111.  (This price will include worldwide airmail shipping, which should arrive in a week.  For an additional $11 you can have it express mailed to you, which will take 3 or 4 days).

Team Expansion mission is allowing us to use their paypal account.  Don’t be confused when you get to the donations page- Team Expansion will be “collecting” the donations for Nozomi Project and we will get all the information.

We will be adding more sets in the next day or two, so keep checking back.  We will also add more details about each piece.  In the new year we will begin making each piece available.

www.nozomiproject.com

Thanks for your support and continued encouragement.

Whatever you do – please do NOT finish all your Christmas shopping yet!  The website is JUST ABOUT almost ready – just a day or two more we hope.  Stay tuned.  (You can preview the gift sets that we are offering:  www.nozomiproject.com

There have been some challenging things the past week or so, but some really amazing things.

Last weekend we had our first official Nozomi Project business trip!  Well, sort of.  I needed to return to Sanda, where we had lived for eight years before moving here in March, to get some of our winter things out of our storage unit down there (just a few more months till our big move!).  So with some tremendous help from our Sanda Chapel friends, we had our third annual Christmas Ladies tea, but this time it featured the NP.  I took our NP manager, Yuko, with me, as well as our two oldest kids.  They had a blast seeing many of their special friends and not sleeping very much.  I had an amazing time also seeing many special friends and not sleeping very much.  Yuko made many new friends and didn’t sleep very much. It was a wonderful weekend.

At the Christmas tea, we shared about the NP, showing slides and the short video clip.  We took prepared “shards”, and each attendee picked out their favorite and Yuko taught them how to make one of our necklace lines – called the Saya.  Everyone loved this part!  Yuko was really amazing.

On the Tuesday after our return, Yuko and I were sharing with our NP staff about the trip.

I shared 2 Cor 12:9,10 with the women — how God’s grace is made perfect in our weakness. Our friends in Sanda find it rather amusing – even amazing – that this jewelry business is actually happening.  They know that I have never made jewelry before.  They absolutely know that I am not a business/finance person.  Yet look what GOD has done.  That is such the key – how God can work through our weakness to do his wonderful work.  My friend is reading a book that describes this concept so well:  God + nothing = everything.

After I shared this, Yuko was sharing how God had taught her the same thing that weekend.  When she came back, she shared with her son that she wants to not always have to be strong or perfect for him; she wants to apologize more.  And she shared with the staff that she wants us all to be able to be weak when we need to be.  I was so touched.  We ended the meeting with her praying for all of us to be able to be weak together.  I had to pinch myself to remember that I was in Japan!

An hour or two later, she and I were meeting with another member to discuss a challenging situation we were dealing with.  At one point I expressed my frustration at the situation and Yuko very gently said, “This morning I was reading my new Bible (our friends the Yamanes in Sanda had just given it to her!  her first one!!) , and I read Romans 12.  Verse fifteen has been going through my head all day…”  Wow.  No way.  God’s Word is so powerful!  God is at work in an amazing way.  In each of our hearts.

It is Thanksgiving week, and despite some challenges I wanted to share a few things I am thankful for this week with our Nozomi friends.

1)  After the meeting with the women and several Be One staff on Tuesday, our friend Ch. said to Michiko, “So the Bible is like a fish hook, isn’t it?  It gets into your heart and you can’t get it out again!”  She went on to share how the Bible reading from the previous Friday, then Monday and Tuesday had been from different places in the Bible but she was beginning to see how they are all related.  On Monday, Michiko had shared with them the passage from Matthew 6 about not needing to worry about our clothes or our food.  Chi said she always worries about what to wear because she feels overweight (she’s not!)- but after reading that she realized she doesn’t need to worry anymore and she is free!

God’s Word is alive and powerful and at work – and yes, it’s a fish hook that gets into our hearts and doesn’t let go.  Thank goodness.

2) Yesterday during lunch I shared from Matthew 18, and ended with the verses in which Jesus says that where two or three are gathered, He is in our midst, and if we ask anything…. and I asked my friends there if they had any prayer requests.  It was quiet for a minute, so I shared that this week of Thanksgiving is the time when I tend to get the most homesick and miss my mom.  Then my friend, Festival Y. said that she had had a dream about her mom the night before (who had died in the tsunami) and that she was feeling especially sad and lonely without her.  I asked our friend T. to pray for us.  To my knowledge, T. has never prayed aloud before.  She was nervous and not sure what to do, but her prayer was so heartfelt and beautiful for us!  It was amazing.

3) My good friend Reiko had read on the blog a month or so ago where I wrote how some of the Nozomi women had been talking about the approach of winter and how they were dreading it because it reminded them of the cold of the tsunami.  She said it broke her heart…. She went out and bought about 15 pair of soft fuzzy socks and mailed them to me to give out.  Yesterday at the end of lunch I read her letter, and there was such joy as we all picked out our favorite colors and put them on, everyone commenting how warm they had become.  We then took pictures with our feet in the air – it was great fun!

4)  Tonight I was with our Be One team enjoying turkey and all the trimmings.  (I have never gotten the apple pie quite right, but today I made an Apple Kuchen that was really quite delicious.  Check out the recipe here. It is like an apple pie baked inside of cheese cake on top of a shortbread cookie- what’s not to love about that?)  We had a time after dinner of each of us writing on a cut-out leaf something that God has taught us this past year (the kids wrote down something they were thankful for) and then a friend read from the Bible lectionary for today.  As he was reading, a text came in from my friend Yuri.  I have written recently about her – her three year old Kousei died in the tsunami.  This is what she wrote: “Dear Sue – Right now, I’m guessing your mom is teaching Kousei English up in heaven.  I think she is holding him and talking to him.  I love your mother and Kousei.”  Wow.  What an amazing message to get.  I feel very thankful for God’s active and amazing work in each of our lives.

Thanks for those who read my latest post and prayed for us.  (CD – thank you for your encouraging words and the idea to do this post!).  We had a really good meeting today in which I really sensed the work of the Holy Spirit in all of our hearts. It was a special time together.  Thank you – really! – to those who prayed and have been praying.  I asked the women what our most expensive line of jewelry is – they all looked at our board with the different lines and prices and said the “Aiko,” which is made of pure silver and selling for $120.  But I said no- the line with the most value is the relationships between me and each one of them, and their relationships with each other.  This is what needs to be strong;  this is what needs to last. I have been convicted of the need to pray daily for each of these women and our mutual relationships.

I have been so encouraged by the reception of those who have ordered and received Nozomi jewelry!  On a very limited basis, we have sent out large orders ($1000-1500) that churches or individuals have paid for up front and then are selling at bazaars, jewelry parties, or to friends and family.  It has been exciting to sort of “test market” our products and to get such wonderful responses.

We VERY much want to get some jewelry into the hands of friends and family who have been asking how to buy it.  Our biggest hold up right now is setting  up a payment system.  We are trying to become nonprofit, and that will change everything about how you set up a bank account, paypal, etc.  We don’t want to get into tax trouble by not doing it correctly from the beginning.  We also don’t want to jump right into internet sales and find that we weren’t ready.

We are preparing a short internet trial for those of you who would like to buy Christmas gifts.  Our hope is to have a limited number of $111 packages of jewelry over the coming few weeks – where you can choose your package, pay for it online, and we will mail it to you.  This amount will include shipping (express shipping will cost a bit more) and depending on which package you choose, you will receive 3 – 5 pieces of Nozomi jewelry.  We are hoping this will streamline the process enough for us to handle it at our end.  Those of you who are READING this are the very friends for whom we want to make this available.  I will let you know as soon as we are launching so our Takameter blog/Nozomi fans can have first divs. 🙂

In the meantime, a friend of Be One, Sandra McCormack, has been helping us tremendously with our logo and website.  She’s done an amazing job –all as a donation to our work.  The website is up and running and I’m really excited about it.  Even though you can’t buy products there yet, you can see our various designs  and find out more about the Nozomi Project and Be One.  We will keep you posted about when sales will begin.

www.nozomiproject.com

These past two weeks  we have seen some of the “honeymoon” phase of the Nozomi Project wearing off and the realities of ten or twelve women working together in a small space on a daily basis rubbing in.  Add to that some of the especially challenging issues that these women are facing and the cultural issues unique to Japan, and it is not surprising that we have experienced some uncomfortable kickbacks and realities.  I have spent numerous hours over this weekend talking, crying, and praying with a couple of the women.  There have been some issues of miscommunication, mistrust, and talking around that have been troubling.

God has been speaking to me about the need to better clarify our vision and values, and continue to not just share these but illustrate them.  We are trying to do a pretty challenging thing — create a God-honoring business with staff who have no concept of a Christian worldview.  It is not an easy task but I’m convinced it is a God-ordained one. And  I am convicted of what I need to do differently/better.  Tomorrow we will have a lunch-hour meeting with all the women and talk through some of this and some of the challenges that have come up.

This morning Jonathan Wilson (CRASH) shared on Facebook the verse that he read every morning before going into the CRASH Center during the early days after the tsunami:  “Write the vision:  make it plain on tablets, so that a runner may read it”  (Habakkuk 2:2).  Our vision and values need to clear and repeated and illustrated.  I’m hoping our Be One team can more concisely write out our vision and values for the NP together so that we can hang it up in the workshop and refer to it often.  I just heard a story of a server at a restaurant who was asked the restaurant’s mission statement – if they couldn’t recite it word for word to customers they were automatically fired!  This is really important for us in setting the right tone and helping to ensure that we are not just making beautiful jewelry but cooperating with God in working in hearts and lives.  Please pray for us!!! I have much to learn and need to keep my heart submitted to God for His leading and counsel.

In a different kind of rearranging, Jennifer and I worked a lot over the weekend in rearranging the Nozomi Project/Be One guest house.  Trying to figure out a good layout that will accommodate the kinds of work that we need to do (grinding the shards into pendants;  gluing the bails onto the smooth shards; making the jewelry around a table; storing the jewelry, printing cards and mailing jewelry), as well as an area for a small kitchen and coffee/hangout area that volunteers can use when they are here during the day.  After a few different tries,

we came up with a plan that we hope will lend itself better to these different needs.

And one of our hopes is to have more space for the little ones who come in with moms on some days.  Here is one of our favorites — I would rearrange just about anything for this little one!

Please pray for us.  Pray for God to break through in areas that need to be changed.  Pray that despite the language barrier that I feel daily that we would be able to communicate clearly, boldly, humbly.  Pray that we would know what to say and what not to say;  that each staff would leave encouraged and wanting more than ever to be a part of this community that God is creating.  Thanks much.

Our lives since moving seven months ago up to Ishinomaki have been full and fruitful.  But there are also a lot more factors that can make our days more challenging than the challenges we have had in the past – and these can accumulate.  This past weekend I had some pretty discouraging moments.  On Sunday morning, with the kids buckled into the back seats, I drove to our new home’s ground-breaking with tears flowing.  It was one of those mornings/days/weekends where everything just felt hard (can you relate??).

We arrived at the property that Asian Access has purchased and it was fun to see a tent, tarp, and tables being set up.  And then to see the ground already being broken!  It was the first day of work on the property.  We’ve been very thankful for Phil and Jordan Foxwell and their hard work to make the impossible happen (Jordan is in second photo below, second from right).  We don’t expect to be able to move in until January/February sometime, so we are making plans for me to go down and get some of our winter things out of storage to hold us over until then.

Two of the young people were looking through the clover patches, and they actually found a four-leaf one on our property!

Three of the Nozomi women were able to come, and that meant the world to me.

On the  left and far right is Tomoko and her mom Reiko.  Reiko’s daughter-in-law was killed in the tsunami, trying to make it home to her husband and her three year old.  Now Reiko is essentially raising Yuga. I love this little boy. It was so fun to have him part of our event as well!  We are excited to move into our home and live close to them and many of these families.

(In the photo above, our home will be in the center and back area of the green).  About thirty of us gathered, and we opened by joining hands in a big circle and inviting God’s presence.  The Japanese almost always have a Shinto priest leading in ground-breaking ceremonies.  They usually wear a tall white symbolic hat.  We didn’t have special hats or priests, but we had God, and I was greatly encouraged by the Scripture, prayers,  and words of hope that were offered during this time.

Chad shared a promise he felt from God about our home, that it will be as it is written in Malachi 4:6:  “And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their parents…” His sense is that our home will be a place for family reconciliation to happen. Oh, let this be, God!

At the end of the formal time, I requested that we all take a picture in the living room!  Mr. Tsuchiya (above in the white behind Eric), corrected me and said that we were taking the photo in what will be HIS room.  We laughed.  (I hope he comes over a lot;  in fact, we are standing about where the guest room will be).

We had cookies, coffee, and pumpkin pie – and we were so happy to see our next door neighbors pull up as we were eating.  I went over and remembered right away why I love them so much- they are so kind and warm, and thrilled that we will be moving in.  Look at his eyes smiling after he scooped up Ian.  They came and joined us for cookies and pie.

And before the morning ended, I did not want to waste a perfect opportunity.  Mr. Tsuchiya was enjoying pie, and I asked him if his whipped cream smelled bad.  He thought his tasted ok, but I had him smell mine.

I guess he may not want to stay in our guest room too much after that!  He was a great sport.

I left encouraged.  We may not have a home yet, but God has built a wonderful community to help carry us.

Eric and several other staff/volunteers were out on Saturday helping an older lady, who lives about a half hour away, move from her run-down home into a temporary housing unit so that her current home can be re-done. This is his third visit to help there, and on Saturday one of our local older friends, Mr. Aogi, was off work and offered to go help as well. We always love when he comes along!

In the truck on the way up, Mr. Aogi shared with our friend Jonathan that he has never been happier in his life.  He said, “I wish I had met Be One people before the tsunami – – I could have started being happy earlier in my life!”  It is amazing to hear this coming from someone who had endured so much trauma during and after the tsunami.

Some of you remember us sharing about him — during the days after the tsunami he and his son went out and gathered up all of the dead bodies, laid them in a row, and gently cleaned off each face.  Chad first met him when he was going around the nearby roads with a magnet stick, trying to pick up all the unwanted nails so that the volunteer trucks would be able to get through without too many delays.  Each day he would gather a bucket or more of nails and dangerous pieces littering the area.

Mr. Aoki also had the remarkable chance to meet Jesus!  He had a vision one night that Jesus was standing before him.  He motioned Mr. Aoki to come to him, and held out his open arms for him and the volunteers.  He knew from this vision that Jesus really is who He says he is.  We have been so encouraged by the stories of people having visions of Jesus since the tsunami.

Back to Saturday.  During the lunch break, the team was sitting around and Eric and Mr. Aoki were sharing some of these stories.  Eric was sharing of Mr. Aoki and his son’s incredible service of collecting the bodies and cleaning off their faces.  He looked over and saw Mrs. Kato, one of the resident’s relatives and a friend of ours, with tears running down her cheeks.  She was astonished.  “Mr. Aoki- you cleaned my niece’s face!”  The team confirmed that her deceased niece had indeed died at the very apartment complex where Mr. Aoki lives.  Exactly.  She continued, “We found her a few days later.  We were dreading discovering her, and wondered if we would even know her.  But as soon as we came across her body, we knew right away it was her.  We said someone must have lovingly cleaned her face.  She looked so beautiful lying there – like she was just asleep.  Thank you so much for caring for her.”

It was one of those strange, God-made encounters where He brought people from across Ishinomaki to share and put together their painful experiences and find some places of healing and peace. We continue to realize that deep healing is still much needed, but can come through honest interactions, prayer, and loving relationships — God doing His best work.

Mrs. Kato called me the next day and wants to get together this next weekend.  So thankful for the beautiful web of relationships that God is weaving in our midst.

Yesterday our Nozomi staff received their first wages   In addition to giving out their envelopes and having them sign, our manager Yuko and I also met with each woman individually to see if they have any concerns and to talk about the next steps in their learning process.  I was thankful for the work that Jennifer had done in making up professional envelopes and salary sheets for them to sign.  

It was much more emotional than I expected.  Half of the women cried.  T. kept looking at the envelope and with a shaking hand said, “I don’t remember the last time I got paid.”  One staff tried to give me back the envelope, saying that she has received much more than she has given.  She collapsed in my arms in wrenching sobs.  

Our friend Chi.was reflecting with me on how we first met- two moms bringing their daughters to a bus pick up in the middle of a washed-out tsunami zone.  She said she didn’t quite know what to do with this friendly foreigner mom who suddenly appeared one day (we had moved into a different temporary home in June and our bus pick up had changed).  But over the coming days and weeks we became friends.  She thanked me for helping her process the loss of their poodle in the tsunami, resulting in their family now having an adorable puppy named Ron.  I told her how valuable her friendship has become to me.  It has been such a joy to work together now four days a week–her presence in the Nozomi Project makes me so happy. As she received her paycheck, said she was going to lay out all the money on the dinner table so her whole family could enjoy looking at it!  

Even though this past month they were all paid a lower “training” salary, it was a REALLY big deal.  We had better sales just from volunteers and others coming locally so we were able to pay a bit more than we had initially promised for the first month.  We are now making a switch to paying them “per piece,” with the hopes that this will raise their wages and help them make more money. 

As the last one took the envelope with tears and profusely thanked me, I couldn’t take it.  My words did not come out as clearly as I wished, but what I tried to say was:  I wish it wasn’t me standing here.  I wish it was Jesus!  Then you would know who to really thank.

That probably sounds really trite.  But I meant it so much.  I wish they hadn’t been thanking me. It is still so so cool how God has brought all of us together — Be One, Nozomi ladies, different experts, volunteers, supporters who have contributed in various significant ways to make this happen.  It all points back to God, who loves to restore what is broken.  He is doing that very thing amongst us.