Wednesday, May 4, 2011

JAPAN 2011 - Japan Relief Team Overview


Hello everyone!
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I made it back to Vancouver, Washington late last night from my recent two-week trip to Japan. I am still processing all that I have seen and all that happened on our Iris Relief 2nd Response Team, but I will attempt to give a brief overview of this trip.
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THE SHELTERS:
Our team visited shelters in Watari, Minami-San Riku and Sendai where families were living in areas on gym floors separated only by makeshift cardboard walls. Almost all of these families shared with us how they have lost everything in the tsunami waters; loved ones, homes, cars, businesses. We were able to just love on these families; listen to them, weep with them and pray with them. Many of these people in the shelters prayed with us to receive Christ. Most had never heard about Jesus as Japan is one of the least-reached nations in Asia. Others received physical healings and prophetic words as our team prayed for them. We gave them Japanese Bibles and were able to connect these people with local church pastors from Sendai who will continue to follow-up with them, and Lord-willing, plant churches in these areas. We distributed clothing, food and coffee in these shelters. Our team dressed up in mascot suits and brought joy to the children and adults, something they haven't experienced since being displaced after the tsunami. One thing that we kept hearing from the people in the shelters was that they were so glad that our team had come from so far to bring the love of God to them.
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THE WORKERS:
Our team went on "treasure hunts" where we just asked the Holy Spirit to lead us to the areas of devastation where He had prepared the hearts of the workers to hear and respond to His love and His gospel. In Tagajo, God led us to a group of workers who we stopped and served coffee to. They were on teams that were sifting through and cleaning up the wreckage left by the tsunami, often finding dead bodies of tsunami victims. As we loved on these workers and talked to them about Jesus, quite a few of them responded to the gospel and asked Him into their lives. We also gave them Bibles and connected them with the local church in Sendai. Some workers also received a physical healing as we prayed for them.
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THE STREETS:
There is a huge night life in downtown Sendai where the streets are lined with bars and brothels. Our team made signs offering prayer for healing and prophecy. We ministered for many hours to "the least of these" and led many people to Jesus. God was giving us so many prophetic words and words of knowledge and as we spoke these out over the people coming out of the bars, heaven touched down and miracles happened. One man who received Christ was even baptized by the Holy Spirit and ran off in tears. The Japanese people are culturally closed-off and repressed emotionally. Many have told us that it is not normal for the Japanese to be as open as they were on this trip.
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THE CHURCH:
We also got a chance to minister at the local churches in Sendai and Sano City where we had sweet fellowship with the Japanese believers. We not only ministered to them, but were ministered to by them as they prayed over us. Japan is 0.5% evangelical and most cities and villages do not have a church. We felt such a strong connection with these churches and their pastors. It is our hope to transition from Iris Relief Japan to actually establishing a permanent Iris base in Japan and continue to work in tandem with these local churches to reach Japan for Christ. There has been a shift in the atmosphere over Japan and the harvest is ripe.
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Christian Young

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