TOMOKO PICTS

I am an MK (missionary kid) and mother of two grown children. Altho' my husband is Japanese (from Koriyama), and we speak Japanese at home, my education (elementary-university) has been in English, so most of my reading and writing is in English too. Last year, we moved to Okinawa and now live in the house my Dad built. I was born in Okinawa--it's been a long time, but I've come home...at last. 2025 August posts are publications put out by wildlife of a Saitama park in 2019.

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July 2, 2011

Handing Out Fliers

"Taking one doesn't mean you have to come; just read it;" I heard myself saying to children who seemed hesitant to accept the fliers we were handing out for this year's Vacation Bible School; adding, "but if you think you want to come, ask your parents first!"  At the end of the month, we are having a "Western Carnival" at the community center nearby, and we had 4000 fliers made to invite the neighborhood children (this year, kindergarteners and mothers are invited too).  The church people have been handing them out faithfully every week--and it amazed me that there were only a few hundred left yesterday.

pic: the fliers, showing the Nippon Initiative Team from the U.S. coming for VBS

I have confided in my daughter Emily about how timid I am, even in just plain tract distribution; but since the  March quake, God has given me five witnessing opportunities (well, over five, if you were to count the few-sentences-of-distinctively-Christian-witness instances).

Some people call natural disasters acts of judgment by God; I have seen they can be God's acts of MERCY.  Gospel tracts left in a rack outside the church always have to be replenished--there has been an increase in spiritual interest the past few months as a result.  Another effect of the recent quake: it has opened my eyes to how little real burden I have for eternally lost souls--I can so easily tell myself I am a good person for feeling compassion for tsunami victims, when in actuality there are people right before my eyes who are having, not merely their homes washed away but their very souls as well...and I am not willing to open my mouth to those in front of me and communicate the Gospel to them because they might think me strange or judgmental with such a strange message?

I am getting carried away again....
The forecast for the afternoon had been rain, but God kept it away while we were handing out fliers, and there was a furious downpour as we were finishing up.  In the car, on the way home, we talked about how God can use anything to accomplish His purposes.  Sometimes, it can be one Gospel tract; sometimes it can be one flier to attend VBS and find Christ.  God can keep water away when it impedes His purposes; He can even use water to make a wall!  (The Red Sea Crossing; didn't God make walls of water then?)

If He can use something as "wishy-washy" as water, doesn't that mean He can use even timid me?
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