The Fellowship of the Ring

Greetings again from Japan, fellow partners in the Gospel! We’ve had a great week and have now overcome jet lag (although Christina seems to have somehow avoided it entirely). That means that we’re a bit cheerier, a bit more alert, and happier overall. Last week at the end of our letter, we asked you to pray that somehow we would get our iPod touch back and praise the Lord, we did! We had a friend call Japan Airlines for us and they had indeed found it and set it aside. It was in our hands in less than 48 hours (Japanese shipping is the best!).

We had a wonderful time at the school festival and got to see lots of graduate students whom we would likely miss otherwise. On Saturday we went to eat Sushi with 3 of the students and tried fried ice cream at the school – and then we tried it again We helped out a little, and posted some pictures on Facebook (no account necessary) and some videos on Youtube.

On Sunday, it was great to see many of the Christians we knew from last year and we ate lunch together after church. Despite the rain, we headed back to the University to chat more with the students, but they were very busy finishing up.

Tuesday was a blast because we spent nearly the whole day with someone. We had a very long lunch with a close Christian friend and another fellow missionary, Sarah. But our evening was spent again with the same English student we ate with last week. After dinner, he took us to his favorite café which happened to have a zen garden. He said that he loved the garden and so we began to ask him what his thoughts were on Zen Buddhism. He shared that he did not believe in Buddhism, and we agreed as well. I used my background in Religion to explain to him the differences between many of the major religions and I explained that Christianity offered the most hope. Earlier in the day, I had visited a Shrine and felt as if all hope had been sucked out of the air.

Interestingly, he explained that his mother had been going to a Bible study for the past few years but did not know of a church in the area! Ironically, he and I met at a church very close to his home! I pointed out several of the churches in Takamatsu that would be good for both he and her to visit, so please pray that these conversational seeds can grow into fruit!

On Wednesday we got to see a side of Japan that we had never experienced before. We rode for 4 hours deep into the mountains of Shikoku to climb the 2nd highest mountain on the island. It was over 1 mile high! Thankfully, we only had to climb about 200 meters, or so we thought. We took the lift up to around the 1730 meter mark. From there we, and 25 others from church and ESS huffed and puffed our way up Tsurugi Mountain. Christina and Mark, the leader climbed like Mountain goats, but the rest of us had a struggle. When we finally reached the top, the view was amazing. We sat down and ate lunch in the freezing wind, but really enjoyed the view. When it came time to go down, it was decided that we would take the “scenic” route. Unfortunately that meant 2 more hours of climbing! We all followed the leader, walking through some thin trails that made us look like the Fellowship of the Ring, and saw some beautiful views. I was most impressed by the Seniors who came along, complaining far less than the rest of us. They were all so healthy, despite their age.

The Fellowship of the Ring

Mountain Spring Water

Thursday we took 2 close friends to our favorite ramen shop for lunch and afterwards drove up a MUCH smaller mountain to see the view over Takamatsu. Despite climbing so much the previous day, Christina and I were both hardly sore at all! It must’ve been the “healing water” we drank near the top. They were a lot of fun to hang out with, but we didn’t get much opportunity to share with them. One of them came to ESS later that night where Mark lead a wonderful discussion of how humans are different from animals. We read the beginning of Genesis in both Japanese and English and many of the students stayed after to ask good questions about what makes us “in God’s image.” Nearly all of these students are non-Christian, so please pray with us that God’s Word takes root in their hearts.

The view over Takamatsu

Sorry for the long update this week, but there’s so much we wanted to share. We have less than 2 weeks left in Takamatsu, and we covet your prayers. Money is tighter than we expected due to the exchange rate, so we would appreciate your prayers there as well. We are both enjoying our time, but struggling to keep up with work in the US. Thanks for reading and caring and praying. Your partners in the Gospel,

Matt & Christina Reed