Today, we got to be part of a community “carnival” at that apartment. We played sports with the kids. There was face painting, manicures and pedicures for the girls, arts and crafts for the smaller kids. There also was a baskeball hoop and all kinds of sports equipment. There was lots of food and wonderful fun.

My job was to go around taking pictures of everyone especially the families. Many of the families have very few pictures of them and so taking their picture is a very special thing. One little boy was having so much fun, he kept asking me to take his picture over and over again in funny poses. This will further the long term ministry of the apartment church as Andrea will be bringing these pictures for the families to take as a special gift. It made me very proud to see my kids getting into it and “making sacrifices” to do it. Jonathan was playing football with little Joshua (Understand Jonathan hates football… this was a image sacrifice in a big way) C-6 played with the kids though she cried a bit too because they didn’t want to play with her doing the stuff she wanted to do… Of course that is normal and you should have seen her before we went, we wanted so bad to go.

The people from the church were incredible. A couple of teenage girls were doing the manicures and pedicures… It kind of reminded me of Jesus washing the disciple’s feet. Some of the teenage boys were playing all kinds of stuff with the kids. Seeing some of the guys painting bag “pumpkins” and some of the gals face painting and shaving ice. It was really really special. Anyway, it seemed that everyone came away with a big smile.

Back when J-13 (not 12 any more) turned 9, feeling that I wanted to integrate rites of passage in my kids development, we went to a Japanese garden in Fort Worth and I shared with him about his heritage, how he is descended from samurai/teachers though Yabuki blood and from John Muir, Alexander Hamilton, Daniel Boone & Davey Crockett through Lisa’s family and how… wait… I guess it wouldn’t be all the special if I told you everything… suffice it to say, I tried to emphasize our heritage of service and now in our family love and devotion to God and people around the world. I then outlined a process of passing on what I am to him… He began the process as a “page” at 9, being instructed in the ways of men. At 13, he would move on to being a “squire,” given more responsibility but also more freedom as he learns how to apply what he learned in the previous four years. Finally he moves on to full knighthood, the full attaining to manhood, when I feel like he is ready, probably around when he is 18.

This last weekend was special because both T-9 and J-13 went through the ceremony in going to next levels. We were not able to go to the Japanese garden because as we left, a huge storm came by. But that make things more memorable in a way as we sat under a picnic shelter as a huge thunderstorm came by and a river swelled beside us.  J-13 shared the “essential Yabuki things” with T-9 and I passed on the rites of passage to J-13.

The rest of the day, I really saw a noticable change in both boys. It was really fun and I was really proud of them. It was a special time. We then proceeded to celebrate J-13′s birthday with a trip to the aquarium. The kids took tons of pictures. Here is a link to a few of them.

In many ways this has all the indications of being a very emotionally draining week for me and my family. So many difficult things happened (see Prayer needs below). There were some sleepless nights and lots more prayer than usual. Still, God is here and working and for that I am truly grateful. We have lots of huge prayer requests this week. Please pray specially. The next couple of weeks will feel difficult and the effects of the last couple of weeks will start to be felt.

Praises

• God gave our DFW team a wonderful, wonderful retreat. We looked at a new strategy for ministry for the DFW area that incorporates what we already do but looks to expand on it using a new paradigm. We will need some prayer warriors if this will work, but if it does, it could be really special. Let me know if you are interested in praying specifically for this for the next year in a concentrated way.
• I have been really blessed by seeing how my kids have been getting along at this point of the summer. I will miss the special times together working at home with them here when the summer is over.
• We had a wonderful banquet for the Chinese EMBA students at UTA where they got to hear from a wonderful Christian business man who spoke at their level and also they connected well with their friendship partners.

Prayer Needs

• Many of you have been praying for the Chinese student, N, who police are looking for as she has been missing since Saturday. There is no new news to report. Please keep on praying for wisdom on the part of the police and that she will be found one way or another.
• My grandfather in Japan passed away today. I did not know him too well as he was always so far but I do know he was a very special man who was a huge influence for my mother. I’ll never forget his wonderful laugh, his constant smile and his deep but simple wisdom. I just wish I could have gotten to know him better. I don’t believe he ever knew the Lord. That saddens my heart.
• My oldest son turns 13 this week. I can’t believe that that little boy who was little more than one year old when we came to Texas is going to be a teenager. In many ways I am so proud of him and yet I feel compelled to pray for him and all the kids every day. There is so little we control and so much we depend on God’s grace.
• We began our “Politics, international relations and religion” discussion group at Starbucks on Wednesdays two weeks ago. The first one had one Italian student. This week we doubled our attendance with the Italian student, an Iranian couple and myself. Please pray for good conversations about worldviews and stuff eventually opening up discussion about Jesus.
• We are winding down our summer groups and getting ready for the craziest month of every year when we welcome new students. At UTA alone there are over 600 new international students coming and we meet most of them in this busy month.
• Pray for wisdom on some financial and priorities things we need to decide on for the city ministry soon.

Jeff Anthony, our ISI City Mobilizer and “blessing man”, helped kick off the first thanksgiving dinner for Collin College (formerly Collin County Community College), a new ministry focus for us. Here is his report…

It was fantastic! God definitely answered our prayers and pulled everything together for His glory. We had over 100 people and I think more than 60 students. Countries represented were: Pakistan, Vietnam, China, India, Kenya, Bangladesh, Tanzania, Iran, Brazil, Japan, Malaysia, Bolivia, Taiwan, Fiji, and Belgium.

A lady from Iran who works in the int’l student office and brought her three daughters (soph at CC and two HS seniors) went on and on about how wonderful everything was and how  much she and the students appreciated it. She called me the blessing man (I’ve been called lots of things over the years, but this was a first!) and said I would be blessed because of all that we did to make the students feel loved. We had lots of students from Pakistan and they really had a good time. I re-connected with several students I had met at the BSM retreat in Oct. and two of them lead different int’l student organizations on campus.

McKinney Memorial Bible Church offered to host thankgiving dinner parties for international students at several different american volunteer homes as they provided the food. As key TCU ministry team and McKinney member Babs shares,

All went well with the American Thanksgiving Dinner Saturday night.  We had about 40 students and all went to an American home. They seemed to be in groups in which they knew people and felt comfortable.  The feedback which I have received from students and JP and Cassie has been very positive; everyone had a good time!  The families really enjoyed having the students, so all in all, I think it was a very positive experience for all!  Praise the Lord!  Thanks to all who were involved from planning, to recruiting students and sending them to the right place, to driving and eating with them, and getting them back home!  Thank you so much!

In addition soon-to-be TCU intern Cassie adds,

There were… students there from China mostly and Japan, Korea, Sri Lanka, and some others.  We split up into groups.  JP (Cassie’s fiance) and I took 4 Chinese students to a house and we got to stay with them.  Everyone involved seem to have a great time.  Plus, the time waiting at the [TCU Frog] fountain was just good talking to a lot of students I had not met before.

Finally, Bennie & Patti, key TCU team members, had more than 30 people, mostly international students, over their house on Thanksgiving day as they do every year. It sounded like, as usual, students had a rich and warm time. Bennie was telling me that he went down to TCU to pick up some students and twice as many as were expected were there… They are incredible people…

Continue to pray as we juggle ever-increasing family responsibilities with daily ministry realities. Now that Roy is helping a lot with the TCU ministry, we sometimes feel our time is divided between 2 campuses. On October 31, we were able to combine the two groups and help with a fall festival at a church in Fort Worth. Regarding TCU, praise God for bringing Cassie on staff as an ISI intern there now that the Willis’ are leaving. She is also getting married in January, so has a lot of transitions to look forward to.

Please pray for Lisa as she ministers to Grace and also to Carol, a new believer and young mother from Taiwan, married to a UTA professor. Also keep Charlotte in your prayers. She and husband Canon have returned to Taiwan for an extended visit and for Charlotte to get some medical testing. Though she isn’t yet a believer, she is trusting God for answers to some perplexing problems. Pray that He reveals Himself mightily in her situation. We are also excited about a young student couple from Iran who have been coming to Bible study. Pray that God would soften their hearts to the gospel.

Lastly we covet your prayers for our family. We are adjusting to teaching J-12 (7th grade) at home this year through a virtual academy. Though we have had some struggles, it seems that things are starting to smooth out. Pray that we’ll have patience with him and that he’ll have a good attitude. He has also transitioned into the youth ministry at our church. T-8 (3rd grade) finished a season of kid-pitch baseball this fall that was challenging for him, but we’re proud of him for sticking with it and seeing his skills improve. He also got baptized in October. It was a special day because Roy got to baptize him. Pray for him as he learns to live out his faith, especially with difficult kids at school. C-5 is doing well in kindergarten and has made some new friends. It’s exciting to see her learning how to read and write. Sometimes she struggles with thinking we love her less than her brothers. Pray that she will know that we love all of our children equally, and especially that she will know she is loved by God.

It has been incredibly fun to meet new students at the various different campuses. This year I had the privilege of helping out on three different campuses with welcome events. The fun of it is meeting all these different types of students. On one campus I met a Chinese student who was so excited to see that there was a Christian group on campus for international students. He became a Christian in China and is really wanting to grow and seemed very excited about his walk with God.

On another campus, I met another Chinese student who said that while he wasn’t a Christian, he enjoyed getting to know Christians at his previous campus in Florida and so he was very interested in learning more about what we do. That reminded me how often God takes students through a process of bringing them to himself through a journey of studying around the country. At each stop, the student gets a different but consistent (hopefully) perspective of just who Christ is and His affect on people’s lives.

Here is one other observation. In the past ISI worked very closely with the international student offices in directly being a part of the orientation, sharing about friendship partner programs etc. But it seems today, things are different. Several years ago, it seemed the international offices were more reluctant to allow that having concern that they be identified with a Christian group.  Instead they have allowed us to have a table at activities fairs, etc. At first this was a difficult change for many of us. But recently as ISM (International Students Ministries) have adapted, we have found that the table could be even more effective in reaching students. There is more time to “personally” interact which is more important in this generation of students rather than  interacting  in an official capacity. The result is not relationships not built on external motivation but internal motivation. It has been awesome! At TCU, it was cool to see almost every international student at a reception last week having our bright pink flyer and likely they all had direct connection with a student or ministry partner at the table we had set up. I saw the same sort of thing at UTA and UTD as our team really touched almost every new student in a personal way. No matter what… most students were able to see a loving personal response from some believer.

Kudos to our whole team who are doing a great job of adapting and touching many more students because of it!

]]> http://yabukibreeze.isisites.net/2008/08/19/welcoming-new-students/feed/ 0 http://yabukibreeze.isisites.net/2008/08/07/j-11-becomse-j-12/ http://yabukibreeze.isisites.net/2008/08/07/j-11-becomse-j-12/#comments Thu, 07 Aug 2008 11:44:59 +0000 yboogie http://yabukibreeze.isisites.net/?p=88 Our oldest son, J-11 turned 12 in August. We all celebrated with a trip to the fun center and a party with his best friend Jacob. He also completed his first class rank for scouts at his Court of Honor and we featured in his summer camp video. Good job son!

We had general admission tickets and at first, I thought that was a bummer. I was wrong. We had a blast and because we had general admission, we had freedom to move to several different places in the stadium. At first we watched the game from the first row in front of the opposing team’s (Wichita Wingnuts) bullpen but we moved to some chaise lounges behind the right field foul pole(See video below). I never enjoyed watching a game in such comfort. We also got a couple of BP (Batting Practice) balls and ate some great food. T-8 got one of the balls autographed by 8 people including the team mascot (Dodger the cat… the Cats were a Dodger affiliate when it started and have retired numbers of some of the be best players from my favorite team, the Dodgers, including Maury Wills, Duke Snider, etc. ). He had no idea who the people were (I don’t either) but he ran up to the Cat’s bullpen, ran to the locker room door, etc, just like a long time fan.

He also lit up the radar gun as some pitching display at 35 mph… He thinks he can be a Major league pitcher some day. Finally, we watched the movie “Angels in the Outfield” on the “Jumbotron” while sitting in center field after the game (part of scout night) until around 12 AM. T-8 was actually throwing his “non-autograph” ball around the field most of that time with another kid. To me this felt like one of those movie father-son evenings. I know he will never forget this and I really enjoyed watching him develop an interest in baseball.

This summer has been really good for re-connecting with all my kids… The neat thing too is that this re-connecting is affecting their spiritual life too. Incidentally, the Cats lost the game in 11 innings 0-1.

Yesterday I sat in on a gathering of 70 somethings where Jonathan and the rest of the Amaraillo kids shared about their experiences on the mission trip. The videos and the sharing were incredible and really brought out how amazingly God used these 11 and 12 years old. I was so proud of Lisa and Jonathan. J-11 was so touched by the neediness of the kids they served. He also had the opportunity to share about leading his best friend to Christ the day after the mission trip at church and how it was the training for the mission trip that made it possible. I remember tha day so well… he was running late in rendezvousing with us and I was getting irritated and sent T-8 to the library to see what was going on… When T-8 told us, asking for further instruction, I couldn’t believe it… I was really humbled… and yet J-11… our quiet J-11 was doing this amazing thing… My prayer throughout the trip was that God will show J-11 his power through an experience like this and he did it right in front of our eyes. Back at the banquet for sexagenarians, one of the ladies said she was specifically praying for Jonathan(they passed out wristband before the trip as reminders) and how touched she was by what he shared… Wow!! God was using my Son… I was so proud of J-11 but more reminded of God’s faithfulness. Our son is growing up.

Earlier in the week, I was reminded of the same things in a different way. J-11 has been a Boy Scout for the last year and a half. He learned a lot about himself and what it takes to be a proactive leader through this experience. It was fun watching him grow after almost every camping trip. He also seemed to have a good time with the guys in the troop… He also had the privilege of leading some of his peers in his first few months of scouting.  The only thing he consistently voiced was that he really disliked camping and the monthly camping was difficult for him and he wanted to leave the scouts.

The Boy Scouts rank system is built into two major sections. The first three ranks teach the boys the basics of scouting. The latter three ranks teach the boys more advanced skills and how to lead. I told Jonathan that it was important to at least finish the first half to get the basics. So, if once he finished this first class rank, he still felt the same way he had the freedom to leave, provided he found some other similar activities to replace it.

J-11 completed his First Class Rank this week. According to J-11, Monday marked the last meeting he planned on being a part of. (may we can convince him to go to the awards ceremony to get his badge) I was saddened some… I was really enjoying the experience and loved seeing his growth through the experience and the friends he was making. Still, I respect and feel like I need to honor his decision and his right to choose. This really marks an important time in our relationship as he seems to be making the first steps toward the independence of manhood and adulthood. Wow!

Our kids helped Citychurch prepare 1400 sack lunches each day, which included a hot item, fresh popcorn, cookies, and fresh fruit. I can proudly say that I learned how to run a popcorn machine! Our kids ran a 4-day VBS which included music, games, a puppet show and Bible story. We also participated in going on bus routes to hand out lunches to the needy kids of Amarillo. For me, it was heartbreaking when we visited one really run-down apartment complex and ran out of lunches for all the kids that wanted one. A lot of our kids were shocked at how special it was when we included a toothbrush one day in the lunch sacks. You would have thought they won the lottery!

During the week we saw 15 kids led to Christ by the 6th graders. Even though J-11 didn’t lead someone to Christ on the trip, he was motivated to share with his best friend from school the next Sunday, and his friend prayed to receive Christ! It was exciting to see him have that kind of boldness. All in all, it was an eye-opening and very exhausting week, but well worth it.

Check out the Mission Trip website for more pictures.