After a month of living with Miho’s parents and living out of a bag, we were able to move into our new apartment on Saturday. With the help of fellow missionaries, friends, and church people, it was actually quite quick (it also helps that we are only 1.5 blocks away from the church). Allie now has her own room and has done quite well sleeping alone. So far, we are loving our new place. There is a sense of renewed joy and excitement for our ministry, as our place feels like it will allow new things to happen.
Already we have visited a half dozen neighbors bearing gifts. Grant was planning on baking some cookies and other goodies to deliver to them, but we were cautioned against this as Japanese people can be suspicious of strangers. They might be a bit uncomfortable receiving homemade food from somebody they don’t know. A lot of neighbors have kids, which we obviously love. One family has a junior high daughter who wants to learn English. Based on a new visitor to our language cafe and a few other connections, this actually might work out perfectly with the recent idea of starting another cafe primarily for teens.
Though we loved our time with Miho’s parents, it feels great to be able to sleep on a bed and pick out clothes from our closet 🙂 Thank you for the many of you who have helped give to get us into our new place. More than half of our need has already been received. It is amazing to have such generous friends give so quickly to this need. We are very excited about the many things coming up in the next month. Being settled in a safe place has helped us pick ourselves up from the disaster and look forward again.
Hope for Japan 
Leave a Reply