The past six months I have been doing a lot of listening, and a lot of thinking and even some reading about listening.  I hope to continue the topic and would love some feedback/interaction on the topic.  I have shared often that it is perhaps my most important job up here.  I stand with moms waiting for a school bus and I have the privilege of hearing their challenging stories of the past year and a half;  I meet with a friend and we cry over our coffee at the hard, hard things they are still dealing with.  I get to enter their world – sometimes even briefly- and for just a fraction of time experience some of the horrors of the earthquake and tsunami that rocked this world on 3/11/11.

But tonight my coworkers and I learned a hard lesson about listening.

We have been having kids’ english on Thursday afternoons, led by our amazing coworker Beth.  At the same time, the moms all meet and have tea together.  Part of our hope has been to create a safe place for moms to talk and share — whether about their tsunami experiences, challenges with family, whatever.

We have rejoiced as we have seen a real sense of community being built among the women.  It is often hard after the hour and a half to end things.  Several of our friends have talked about this precious time being the highlight of their week.

Today we started the time with me announcing that I had something really serious to talk about… everyone looked a little worried, until I pulled out a priority mail box that had been sent from our office in the US.  It was FULL of brand new ladies’ underwear in all shapes, colors, sizes, and lacy fabric.  A sweet person in Iowa had seen on the news (perhaps about a year ago now?) that the tsunami victims needed underwear, and had gone out and bought a bunch and shipped it with a note of explanation to our office.  Whether it sat in someone’s home or in our office for a long time, I don’t know, but I thought it would be fun to pass it on with the ladies today.

I had a good time guessing at who would enjoy the leopard pair;  the bright red ones, etc… And then we started talking about the first two months after the tsunami when there wasn’t running water and no way to wash underwear.  It was a big problem.  One friend shared that even though they had made a portable john out on the veranda, during the night it was pitch black and impossible to safely go out and so they had used diapers to make a human “litter” box.  I asked how they disposed of poo-poo during those few months (no running water, no trash pick up, etc.).  One friend said they realized if they threw it out to sea it would just come back to them (they were still dealing with floods during high tide); so they would wrap it in newspaper and burn it outside.  Wow.  Never realized a lot of this.

And then several women shared how very, very quiet it was.  After 6 pm (when most of them would go to bed because there was absolutely nothing else to do), there were no lights.  At all.  Pitch black.  So they would lie in bed, wanting to go to sleep, but they would hear everything.  One friend, T., lives about a half mile inland and said she never realized how noisy the waves were.  Without any cars or trains going by, and everyone in bed, they could hear the water.  Other friends have shared how they couldn’t sleep precisely because they COULD hear the water- it represented the most scary thing on earth to them, so the sounds of the waves was anything but soothing.

My friend Y. said she would wake up and hope it was morning only to discover it was still like ten pm.  She would do exercises so she could become tired enough to sleep for another three hours.  I felt exhausted just hearing their stories.

And then I noticed that one of our friends had become very silent and seemed disturbed.  And in a minute, she stood up and left the room.  I went looking for her a few minutes later, and saw her in with the kids.  After the event was over, she came over and found me and totally apologized.  Hesitantly, she explained that it is so difficult for her to hear the ladies talking of their tsunami experiences — at times laughing.  She knows it is good for them, but the pain of loved ones that she lost in the tsunami is still too raw for her.  She felt physically sick and had to leave the room.  Time has passed, but not enough.  we apologized; listened, and prayed with her.

So I am thinking about listening. About telling one’s story.   It is so important;  but the audience is key.  The pain from such devastating loss is not going to go away quickly.  It is still incredibly painful and raw.  I don’t pretend to understand or know.  I pray for grace to be able to walk along side, even when it means stopping along the way with one friend and allowing others to go on ahead.   Pray that we will have more grace, more wisdom, more insight into our roles as listeners.

The 6.2 earthquake that jolted us early this morning did not actually wake me up.  I had had too much soda late last night and was at a the second-worse place to be when an earthquake hits.  (My friend Roberta just said the worse place is the onsen -public bath- especially since the lockers that keep your clothes while you are bathing are now often powered by electricity, meaning they would probably not open in the case of a bad earthquake.  That would be the worst, for sure.)  

Our first week back has seemed to have a lot of bumps in the road.  We are genuinely really really happy to be back!  But  I don’t remember other returns to Japan feeling so jarring;  it is probably a combination of a number of factors.  

There is much about our current situation that still feels very “temporary,” making it harder than usual to really settle back into routine.  We found out that our long-anticipated prefab house is probably not going to be ready until late December at best;  this has felt surprisingly hard and made the return to this current temporary home harder than i imagined. We will be fine, I am sure, but mentally I somehow hadn’t prepared myself for that and the impact it has on our daily schedule and lifestyle.  We will need to figure out what to do about the majority of our things still  being in Sanda storage much much longer than we ever anticipated –fall and winter goods; dishes, pans, cake-making goods, appliances, etc.  I have really liked (ok – 90% of the time) – not having a television for six months!  But we are using a pretty small washing machine – no dryer – which means try as I might to hang up many loads, I still need to make trips to the laundry mat to get caught up.

We came back and three of the kids got sick in the first couple of days.  Traveling overseas seems to take its toll on our kids!  So Monday I spent the morning at the pediatricians and pharmacy, and several days were spent trying to nurse our kids through very high fevers, asthma, and bronchitis.  

Olivia has a new bus schedule for her school, so we are now trying to have one of us drive all three kids and drop them off at their different places, so we have to have all the kids out the door with all their lunch stuff, school supplies, bottles of tea, gym gear, etc. by 7:35 am.  It is a twenty minute drive to get Owen to his bus stop;  then Annie is next and finally Olivia.  Afternoon pick ups are more challenging- they each must be picked up an hour apart, which leaves just enough in-between time to be frustrating.

This morning was my hardest.  I became a witchy mom for a few minutes as I was trying to get the kids out the door on time with Eric driving, and they hadn’t prepared what they needed the night before.  I let everyone know I wasn’t happy about it.  Aargh.  They piled into the car, Eric raced off, and I collapsed. Failure mom morning!

We had a group of friends coming over for the jewelry business soon,and our house was still not ready, but I needed perspective- really badly!  I pulled out my Bible.  This is the verse that jumped off the page at me:  “Blessed be the Lord, who daily bears us up;  God is our salvation” (Psalm 68:19).   

Isn’t that the most beautiful promise ever?  God daily bears me up.  It was the perfect word for this morning.  It speaks of grace for crabby mom mornings;  of God’s commitment to walk with me through the challenges of unmet expectations and little inconveniences;  of the reality of God breaking into my day with daily salvation.   Truly – Blessed be the Lord!

Fifteen women gathered last Tuesday in Ishinomaki…we learned together a lot about weaving kimono fabric, cutting and smoothing pieces of broken dishes and ceramics gathered from the tsunami, and soldering silver.

None of us knew much what we were doing — we watched YouTube together, experimented, laughed at our mistakes, and tried again….

and we cheered for each piece of broken pottery that,  having been found in a place of pain, was transformed into a lovely piece of jewelry.

Then we met two days later – last chance to make a few more pieces for us to bring as samples to the US.  And what was so amazing – and even more beautiful than the jewelry– was what happened as we worked both of these days.  We laughed at our pieces of jewelry that didn’t work and how silly we felt accidentally melting the sponges and learning how to use machinery that we had never touched before.  And while we worked, we shared from our lives.  It seemed to feel safe to be busy working, looking down, and opening up.  We talked about challenges of being moms.  The majority of the women are single moms, and began sharing some of their insecurities and fears of raising children alone.  One of my friends cried that day for the first time.  Two of us who have lost our moms talked about how we don’t remember our moms getting mad at us…wondered why we can’t be as good as our moms had been…  and we found ourselves needing to stop soldering for a bit as we cried together for each other’s losses.  Someone joked that the name for our group should be the Tissue Team….

As I reflected on those two days together, they felt like… an old fashioned American quitting bee.  Women working together to turn scraps of something into beauty.  And while doing so, they became freer to share their  own lives.  It felt like this same magic occurred in the midst of our jewelry endeavors.

During lunch, we talked about several of the different name options for the jewelry.  The name was decided when one of the women, Y., blurted out, “I really want the name to have the word ‘hope’ in it.  Before I met you, I had no hope.  You told me that there is hope.  Now I believe it.”  And so, we chose the name:  Shards of Hope  (English name)  and   希望のかけら is the Japanese name.   Here’s to hope!  I love it that it was decided by these women – they are the ones this is about.

While we are in the US, the women are continuing to meet once a week to work on projects, experiment, and increase prowess in the various stages needed to make soldered silver ceramic jewelry.  We are hoping to get things started in September when I return; able to begin sales as early as October (bring on the Christmas sales!).  I am praying for a building that we can use solely for this purpose starting in September.  We hope to bring one or more artists/jewelry makers  to help train us.  I am meeting with different people while we are back here to cast the vision, gather ideas, hopefully some funding, and put together a team who can help us carry this through successfully.

If you are interested in being part of this team, we are looking for:  graphic designers to help with the logo, branding, advertising;  website designers to help us create a website that can serve both Japanese and North Americans;  those in the retail/wholesale business in the US/Japan who may know of some available markets for the jewelry;  a few willing to come and teach us in September;  help in ordering jewelry supplies in the US, one or more people on Japan side who know about setting up a business in terms of taxes, etc.  Please email me if you are interested in any of these things!  And pray for us.  It is about much more than creating a business for these women.  There is something special happening through the creating that parallels what God is doing in our own lives.  Our friend Peter T. just shared a quote he heard at the recent Asian House church conference that says it well:  “True dreams are not what we see in our sleep, but those which, for the sheer joy of their realization, rob us of sleep each night.”  This is one of those dreams that is keeping me awake at night.  But I don’t want me to get in the way of God wants to do.  Another friend I was sharing with recently at dinner said, “Don’t do anything without letting the Holy Spirit lead you.”  That is my prayer — to listen and follow God’s leading.   Please pray for the Be One staff continuing in Ishinomaki while we are gone to stay strong and not grow weary;  to find great joy in their relationships with others.  Pray for the funding that we need to get things started.   Pray for new creative ideas to spring forth from this artwork.  Pray that God continues to take this project  forward, step by step.  For His glory;  For the Hope that we desire to shine into the lives of each of these amazing, talented, beautiful women we are working with.

This morning’s verse in my daily reading spoke to me:  “Brethren, pray for us.”  (I thess 5:25)   Or perhaps a bit more updated: Friends- please pray for us!  We are feeling the need for prayer up here on many levels.  I would like to write on a personal level because I have realized this past year that those of you who are reading here regularly really are praying for us!

**Most urgently, perhaps, I would like you to pray for one of our friends up here.  In just interacting and investing in the lives of those we meet, we become privileged to know of their struggles.  One of my friends is dealing with a lot of pain, discouragement, and depression right now. Today as she shared with me some of these things, I read Jeremiah 29:11 and prayed with her that she will believe that it is true:  that God does have a special plan for her life.  She needs to believe this is true – a lot depends on this.

**New ministry opportunities:  This morning before 6 am Eric and Chad went to survey and pray a home that is potentially being offered to Be One as another ministry base. It has great potential, but would also need a lot of work and focus.  We also had a meeting with a support ministry about ways they could be involved in what we are doing.  We talked more about the jewelry project – and are realizing it may need a staff person who can really focus specifically on this.  Then another local contact showed Chad another property that is a possibility for a coffee house or the jewelry or — who knows?  We need to be listening carefully and obeying diligently as God brings opportunities.  And I have been thinking how we need to keep praying for God to send more workers to the harvest!

**Prayers for me as a mom – this has been a really really tough week since returning from Sanda.  We have had two kids sick each day since we got back;  mornings and getting those who aren’t sick off to school have been incredibly stressful.  I don’t know why this has been!  Two of our children have had morning meltdowns and insisted that they don’t need to/want to go to school.  And I have not handled these very well!  I haven’t been proud of my own little meltdowns in the midst of these things.  God needs to work in me a lot!  Yesterday I read Genesis 21:7, 8 – the story of Hagar in the desert with her son.  An angel comes to her in her despair and said, “come, lift up the boy and hold him fast with your hand…”  This is a good verse for me!  I need to lift up each of my precious children before the Lord and hold them fast.  I hope that I can find some time to get away in the coming days to just pray over these things, but especially for each of my children who are in need of a mom who holds them up regularly before the Lord.

So my friends – pray for us!  Thanks.

I wanted to share briefly a few follow-up updates on several friends I have written about.

Today I went to the bus stop to wait for Olivia, and N.’s mom who I wait with came over. I wrote previously about how their home was washed away, and their pet poodle had died in the tsunami….    I could tell she wanted to talk.  she grabbed my hands and said nearly bursting, “Can I tell you a big secret?”  (Oh my gosh – this is ME!  I love to be in on secrets!)  Then she said, “We just bought a new poodle!”  At first I thought she said a new “pool” and I tried to be excited with her.  But as she said it again and it dawned on me how HUGE this was, I spontaneously hugged her and shouted with glee!  We had two friends waiting in the car – Mary H. and Anda F. – who were quite curious what all the jubilation was about.  But it was just SO important and So healing to hear this. She said she was finally ready to have a pet again.  When her daughter got off the school bus, N.’s mom led her back towards the apartment where N. was going to discover this amazing surprise and see their new puppy with her own eyes.  I drove away filled with joy over this sweet family addition.  

Second – our friend Y. has been spending a lot of time at our home while her two older daughters are at daycare.  It has been a great blessing.  Several days ago she brought over photos of her mom and sister.  Her mom looked like someone who I would have loved so much;  who would have welcomed me into their home and loved on our kids.  The loss struck me in new ways.

Anyway, Y. has helped us immensely by staying here some afternoons so Ian can nap while I have to go at three different times to pick up the three older kids.  We are able to pay her some for her help and have just enjoyed whatever time together we can.  She has come to every worship and english kids’ time that she is able to come with her three little ones.

Today she had to go to the family court to continue with divorce proceedings (initiated entirely by her husband).  Before she left, I gave her a Japanese version of our favorite children’s bible, and an adult NT. We are leaving for the next four days to go back to Sanda, so I was glad she was excited to get these.

She called tonight and was really struggling.  Her husband is claiming that he has spent all of the savings that should have gone as alimony for the three girls.  But he stills want custody (which right now is just one weekend day and night a month).  To make matters worse, it will be a 50/50 settlement so Y. will need to give him half of the savings that she has been putting away in a credit union over the years. She will get nothing from him.  And it seems like the laws all favor the husband and there is nothing that can be done.

We talked for awhile, and I encouraged her to continue to live righteously, and shared with her the principle that “you reap what you sow.”  I told her that I believe that God will take care of her through other means – she can trust Him to care for her and her daughters.  She said that she somehow believes that and felt hopeful for the future.  (Yeah!).  And she said, “Tonight I was so happy because I realized that after I put the kids to bed I can read my new Bible!”  

Going to bed thankful for little steps in the lives of those we love.  

As our days in Ishinomaki progress and our relationships deeper, we are given more opportunities to share in the joys of healing as well as the continued challenging conditions for many here.

This morning, we went to the San Juan Baptista park for our worship service and a picnic lunch and games afterwards. I have written previously about the San Juan ship replica that is in Ishinomaki and its historical significance.   The park built next to it is wonderful!   It was fun to watch everyone enter into the events of the day.

Especially Ian!

About fifteen friends/children from our community came.  One of the men, Mr. S., is teaching Eric and Owen aikido now every Friday night.  As we were walking up the hill together, he said that he used to come here all the time.  On his way out a few hours later, he told Eric that he hadn’t been able to come here since the tsunami (I am not sure why- perhaps because it overlooks the ocean?)  I think today was a time of healing and moving forward for him.

We were so happy that one of our grandmother friends, R. came too!  She has come to our home for dinner and to a previous picnic we had had at the park.  Her family lives across the street from the ocean;  on the day of the tsunami, her daughter-in-law drove home from work with a co-worker.  Even though her co-worker lived out of the way, she dropped her off first, and then tried to make it back to their home.  She was swept away just two blocks away from their home.  Her husband and four-year old son stayed up on the roof through the freezing night until the water subsided enough.  Her body was found a week later.

Now, R. is basically raising her five-year old grandson, providing for her widowed son who is just working part-time as an oyster farmer,  taking care of her 92 year old mother, and also caring for the families of her other two children who live nearby.  Both of her daughters are single moms.  She is an amazing lady.  At the picnic today, she pulled out a sketch pad and showed us some water-color postcards she had done the night before  (her grandson last night stayed over at his other grandparents’ temporary housing and so she had a little free time!).  We were amazed at her talent.

And then she shared with us that most of her artwork had been washed away in the tsunami;  she has not been able to touch any kind of art after that – until last night.  We all oohed, and aahed, and cheered for her.  It is wonderful to see small and big steps of our friends finding places of healing.  (And I asked her to make postcards that we could buy and give as gifts!)

Tonight, her neighbor and our good friend Yu. stopped by with her family on their way home from a day outing in Yamagata. We were excited to give her son two plastic boxes of Legos that the D. family in Tokyo had donated — and he was thrilled!   It was also her birthday today, and we had prepared a little cake for her.

She was surprised and so happy.  We all did kampei! – toasted over coffee and cake… and I thanked her for being my first friend in Ishinomaki, and such a special one at that!  She shared that she never imagined this year would hold such special things.  They had been visiting some good friends this afternoon, and she said her parents were able to invite these friends to come and stay in their Ishinomaki home now since our volunteer teams had mudded out their home and redone the floors over the past few weeks.  Another reason to cheer.  Thankful today for steps of healing, grace, and friendship.

One of the things that I have loved about working with Be One is the sense of trusting God with who He brings to work with us.  We never know from week to week what skills, faith, gifts God will bring to us.  When our housing capacity reaches its upper limit, we need to say no to volunteers, but besides that anyone who feels led to come and serve is welcome to.  In the past two weeks some of the volunteers we’ve had:  7 Singapore missionaries (including a 2 year old), 2 Koreans, 1 Swiss, and 2 British volunteers (in addition to many North American/Japanese);  a high school youth group  of 18 from one of the military bases in the Tokyo area (during a 6.3 earthquake yesterday at 5:30 am they were ordered out into the field by their leaders to wait awhile and they all obeyed!) ; a middle-aged Japanese couple who heard about our work from some mutual friends and came up to serve for a few days;  a nonChristian who had just finished hiking all the Buddhist temples in southern Japan;  a Japanese friend trying to make sense of life and God;  a team of “alumni” who came for part of the summer last year and have returned for more;  and an 82 year old woman who needed a wheelchair to get through the airport (but was amazingly active on the ground!).  Somehow God uses all of these fun and funny mixes of people to keep pushing us out into the community… finding more jobs for volunteers;  more people who need help in putting their life back together.  They challenge us to work together, to be creative, to be genuine in our faith.

I realized recently why Be One has had so many volunteers… because Chad H. has been praying every day for nine years the same prayer:  Luke 10:2b – “ask the Lord of the harvest, then, to send out workers into his harvest field.”  God has been answering his prayer and sending them!  Over a thousand  – maybe even 1500 – have come to Ishinomaki to work with Be One.  Lots and lots of workers.  If you really pray that prayer – look what God will do!

The second photo above is our friend Y, with two volunteers from Tokyo.  She and her three children have already become dear to our Be One group, and to many of the volunteers who have been here!  She has been coming to various gatherings, and most of the days of the week she comes to our home in the afternoon to help out and hang out. I was incredibly touched last week by one of the volunteers who shared with Y. some of her own previous struggles, and then gave her a bracelet that she had not taken off her wrist in more than fifteen years.  She told Y. that every time she will go to play with the bracelet and not find it that she will stop to pray for her;  and that whenever Y. feels the bracelet on her arm she will remember that she is not alone;  that many are praying.  Overall she is doing well, but the stress of raising three little ones alone has been challenging.  She has been going to the doctor to get prescription sleeping pills to help her at night.

For those of you reading this around the time of me writing it (June 19/20), a typhoon is barreling straight up the main island of honshu and it looks on course to hit the Tohoku region tomorrow morning.  This is bad news for Ishinomaki, as the ground is still swelled from last year’s tsunami, and any extra rain means flooding.  Parts of the city have received calls for evacuation already.  We called our friend Yu. and asked if her family wants to spend the night with us.  They are going to wait it out at home- she said they have moved their car, are not in danger for their lives and hoping for the best.  Our volunteers have just finished cleaning under her family home, putting in insulation in the floors, and sanding them down to make them smooth.  Eric and several others also planted a new maple tree where a former one had died from the salt water.  Hoping their home, and tree, weather the storm well; and the many others on lower ground.  (As I’ve written in previous posts, we are up on a bluff that overlooks the sea, so flooding is not a concern for our own family, but it is for many others).  We may unfortunately have a lot of new jobs for volunteers….

We will keep praying for God to send workers to His fields, and embracing them as they come.  I am convinced of His powerful and personal love for the people of Ishinomaki.  Can’t wait for more to tell them so.