January Newsletter

Seasons

January 1, 2011

Dear Friends and Family,

新年おめでとうございます! (Happy New Year!) I (Celia) am writing this letter from the inside of our Subaru. We have seen the inside of our car a lot lately—this is the 5th full day in the car since we left Seattle on December 14 (side note: snow covered bison look really funny).

The car's new nickname: dirtball.

We first drove to Grand Forks, North Dakota to visit our church there and to spend time with Keith’s siblings and their families, stopping along the way to visit friends in Bozeman and Bismarck. Then we continued on to Fort Dodge, Iowa, where we spent Christmas with the entire Olson family—10 adults, 4 young children, and 3 dogs!

Keith with his brother, Joseph and our nieces and nephews: Alexander, Alison, Michael, and Elizabeth.

On Christmas Eve, I played my own Christmas carol arrangements for voice and viola da gamba at a mini-concert at Keith’s parents’ church. This was the beginning of a major project of arranging and collecting unaccompanied music for viol and cello, and music in which I can accompany myself. Although I was blessed with excellent accompanists in Japan, there will likely be many occasions when I won’t have that option—some smaller churches do not have a piano or organ. Thus my Christmas Eve concert this year laid the groundwork for future Christmas concerts in Japan!

Shortly after we return to Seattle, we will start work with two new ministries. We have already been attending leaders’ training for community groups at our church; we will start our group in January under the guidance of our mentors, Janet and Mel McIntyre. At Westminster Chapel, where we have been serving as hosts for the International Talk Time ministry, we will be assisting in and learning about the Alpha Course, mentored by Sylvia Ramquist, who served many years as a missionary in Japan, and who has been instrumental in bringing Alpha to Hokkaido. We’re very excited about these new opportunities; please expect an update next month!
***

Our Deputation Ministry

The other important ministry we’re involved with at the moment is deputation. This is a word I only learned after I became a missionary, so you may be wondering what I am talking about. Deputation is the work of a missionary before leaving for the field and after returning for home assignment; basically, in our case, it’s anything we do to spread the word about the needs of the Japanese, the needs of the church in Japan, and our own needs as missionaries.

Deputation can take many forms, planned or unplanned, formal or informal. Sometimes we are invited to speak at a church, either for the sermon, a brief “missions moment,” or for a Sunday school class. Sometimes we intentionally get together with friends for a meal or coffee with the purpose of talking about Japan. Sometimes, these meetings are unplanned and spontaneous; since most of our friends know we are missionaries to Japan, the conversation often goes in that direction.

Sometimes we struggle with this kind of ministry: why are we here in the United States telling people about the needs of Japan when what we really want is to be working in Japan with the Japanese? Why do we have to do deputation work at all? Because there are needs—ours, and Japan’s. This is an important ministry, even if it is often discouraging. We, the worldwide Body of Christ, need to work together to reach the world, which means that churches in “sending” countries like the US and Canada work alongside churches in Japan and other “mission field” countries to mutually encourage and build each other up, and to share resources and expertise. Both now and after our return to Japan, Keith and I are working to bridge the gap between the church in North America and the church in Japan.

The truth is, we can’t get to Japan on our own, nor would we want to. By faithfully doing the work God has called us to for this time, we will gain faithful and well-informed partners for our ministry. On the flipside, our partners, both churches and individuals, will have the opportunity to join in God’s work of saving the Japanese and adding new members to the Body of Christ through partnering with us in our ministry.

Sometimes people wrongly assume that “partnering” means “giving us money.” This leads to all kinds of awkwardness. We know that not everyone has the means to support us financially, and many are already supporting other causes. There are many ways to partner. On our blog, we have an entire page devoted to “getting involved” in our ministry. In our last newsletter, we mentioned some of the people we are  thankful for—all of whom have partnered with us in some way.

Our #1 need right now is for people to sign up for our newsletter and to faithfully pray for us. (Update: praise God, we have enough people signed up so that OMF will start sending our letters for us!) Our #2 need is for speaking engagements at churches and introductions to like-minded people. Please help us by spreading the word!

The ultimate goal of our deputation work is, of course, to get us to Japan with a full team of partners backing us. We are currently signed up for the July 2011 orientation course in Singapore, after which we will continue on to Japan. In order to do that, we will need to gain financial clearance (100% pledged monthly support) by May. Please pray with us that we will find many like-minded people to stand beside us.
***

Money Jar: We have 1.5+%!

We have been informed of pledges which are in progress now! We need 100% pledged monthly support for our first term (5 years) before returning to Japan. Please keep praying with us that God will provide for our financial needs!
***

Picture Notes
We wanted to briefly explain the pictures in the banner which is usually at the top of our newsletter (on the front of the print copy).

On the left is Tokyo, near the imperial palace, during cherry blossom season. Next is the ruins of Fukuoka castle. The third picture is one of the shrines at Nikko National Park. In the final picture, the little statues with hats are Jizo along the Maruyama trail in Sapporo. Jizo are guardian deities of children who have died due to stillbirth, miscarriage, and abortion. Parents who have lost a child worship the Jizo by bringing small gifts which they might otherwise give to their own child. This act is a means of grieving and assuaging a guilty conscience.

The banner at the bottom of this month’s print newsletter (and also on the back of our prayer cards) was taken at the Hokkaido Shrine on New Year’s Day 2010.

Japanese typically celebrate the New Year by visiting the shrine and praying to the shrine’s deity for good fortune. We are hoping that these pictures will remind our partners to pray for the spiritual needs of the Japanese.
***

Prayer Points

• We are thankful to have safely arrived at home in Seattle--no crashes on the road trip, through some really bad weather.
• Our time with family and friends in North Dakota, Iowa, and places along the way has been very encouraging and a wonderful blessing. We thank God for this time, but we also realize this was potentially the last Christmas in many years where all of Keith’s immediate family will gather.
• Upcoming ministry: we start Alpha and a community group in January. Please pray for us to learn well from these experiences, and for those to whom we will minister.
• Please pray for our deputation work and our upcoming speaking engagements, and for many more opportunities to arise.
• Financial clearance by May 2011: we need 100% pledged monthly support 2 months before we return to Japan.

***

Last year, we celebrated お正月 (oshōgatsu—New Year) in Sapporo with games on New Year’s Eve, church in the morning, tea ceremony, mochi pounding, people-watching at the shrine, and homemade おせち(osechi--special Japanese New Year foods) for dinner. This year, we celebrated with contra dancing on New Year’s Eve in Bozeman, Montana with our friend Kathy… followed by another day in the car. Next year? Who knows! We pray that wherever you are, your celebration may be full of joy.

Love in Christ, Keith and Celia

Christmas projects

The Christmas presents all having arrived at their destinations, it is now safe to blog about the ones we made. So here they are...

Actually, Keith did not knit any Christmas presents. This cozy little scene happened after Keith spent the day cleaning out his old room. He had to prove to me that he still knows how to knit. Moving right along...

Keith did, in fact, hand-make a number of Christmas presents. We'll start with the candles. See the frying pan on the stove? This is not lunch... it's leftover fat from a roast... which Keith rendered to make into a tallow candle. It doesn't really smell when it's lit, but has a mild barbecue smell when you blow it out.

My mother probably ate the peaches out of that can back in the '50s. The can was found in my grandfather's workshop.

This one takes a bit of explanation. One of the kids at our Japanese church draws a cartoon about a character named Mr. Pickle--a pickle with underwear, a cape, and a cyclops eye. Keith provided the underwear for the Mr. Pickle ornament.

The recipients... it's the kid on the left who draws the cartoon. :)

We received this picture of the completed Mr. Pickle. Whichever child finds him on the tree gets an extra present!

On to my knitting projects. This one is not for Christmas. It was Michael's birthday present. His birthday was at the end of November.

This is not a rabbit. It's Totoro. It's for our little friend, Yuugo, in Sapporo!

I've been working on snowflakes. Keith says this is my most useful skill. Need a pretty gift for someone? Give me a couple days of sitting in the car and I can produce a variety of them. Really, it's the finishing process that takes most of the time. They have to be stretched, pinned, glued, glittered, and dried.

Here are an assortment of Christmas ornaments I made this year.

This was for my mommy's birthday...

...and this one was for Keith's mommy's birthday.

My biggest Christmas project was making toy chickens for all 4 of the nieces and nephews! I started working on them in October, and finished the last one on Christmas Eve. I worked on them for most of the drive from Seattle to Iowa.

Here is a nearly completed chicken... and a bag of "chicken parts" which I had to sew onto the chicken to give it a face and cute decorations.

Yay, all done, just in time!

A couple of hours later...

Elizabeth was too smart... she suspected I was up to something!

 

Just for fun, I decided to use the same pattern, slightly altered, so make a tea cozy for my brother.

It also works as a hat.

Christmas with the fam, part 1: North Dakota

Merry Christmas! Here's a quick report on our road trip and time with Keith's family.

We made it to North Dakota... and we got stuck behind a sand truck at one point. Gross...

We played with the kids. My how they've grown!

Compare this photo with the smiling child in the previous picture. I think they might be related?

I was sick, so we didn't do much. We did manage to get to church, where Keith preached (recording coming soon), and also to Elizabeth and Michael's first Christmas pageant! There were a bunch of little kids with stars on sticks who were supposed to sit still and look cute while the older kids did their stuff... perhaps needless to say, they started hitting the microphones and each other with the star sticks. One kid fell off the back of the risers and nearly knocked over the backdrop. The production became known in the family as "the trainwreck." We celebrated with pizza afterwards.

The kids were all dressed up, so we did a little photo shoot.

 

Keith had some time with his friend, Jason. They did Keith and Jason sorts of things.

We're in Iowa now... all 14 Olsons in one house. What a party! More on that later.

Christmas Luncheon

This year, my family was invited to provide music for the program of the annual women's Christmas luncheon at our church. We sang carols and antiphons and O Holy Night--complete with a verse in Japanese (sung by me, of course). We finished the concert with Jesus Christ the Apple Tree which you can download and listen to if you want.

Photo credit: Pat McGiffert. Thanks a lot!

This was also a special event for me, since not only was it my first time to attend, but it was also my first time to host a table! I love hospitality and pretty things on the table, so I went all out. I dug through all the boxes in my storage closet and pulled out all the beautiful things I received from my grandmothers.

At the luncheon, I sat with Andrea, my childhood friend, my mom, and the ladies from our Japanese church. My dad was one of the waiters.

The food was amazing... everything was made from scratch by a team of cooks from our church. What a talented bunch! Of course, the head chef did win our chili cookoff this year...

On a side note, I'm happy to report that my teacups and other such things finally have a home which is not a box in the closet under the stairs! This beautiful piece of furniture was built by my grandfather. :)

Keith reflecting on Japan grief

There have been many times in my life when I suffered grief. Most of those times were in high school and were compounded by the problem that I seemed to lack a reason for my grief. I later found out that it was my detachment from God that was the root of my problem. So I know what grief feels like. When it hits me more intensely, it affects me physically. I kneel down and stare at a spot on the ground. Somewhere in my chest cavity there are muscle contractions that force me to double over slightly. I studied some human anatomy, but I can't seem to place what exactly is contracting, maybe my intercostals because I also draw in a slow breath that I never fully exhale until the intensity passes. To an extent, this physical pain reflects the mental pain of my grief. 

I write this because I along with my wife have been feeling grief over Japan. I first misinterpreted it as reverse culture shock, which we did have, but the lingering sadness over the months did not abate like the culture shock did. It was only recently at a conference about communication, when we were discussing the various symptoms of grief, that we noticed we had those symptoms of shock (which we attributed to culture shock), sadness, wrestling with pain, and attempting to come to terms with reality. Celia and I have attempted to short-cut the process by claiming God's promises that He will bring us back to Japan and that right now He has called us to Seattle for a reason. I am, however, still at the stage of wrestling with the pain of having a calling to Japan and acknowledging the reality that I do not live in Japan. I am grieving the loss of relationships that we were fostering in Japan, of seeing all the children growing up at Satsunae Lighthouse Church, of explaining the gospel to college students in simple English, and of working with our mentors and co-workers. 

My favorite picture of Satsunae Lighthouse Church in Sapporo, Japan

For each of these areas and others I have given myself excuses like, “I can be with people here now,” and “There's no reason why I should miss my Japanese friends more than I missed my family when I lived there.” I have downplayed this grief, and compounded it like I did in high school. The difference is that I do not feel distanced from God, and to some extent, that is part of the reality that I grapple with. The reality that God gives me a passion for Japan, does not (nor do I want Him to) take my passion away, yet settles me here in Seattle which is not Japan. I am aware that there are a number of reasons why God gives me the desire to go to Japan but keeps me in Seattle for this time (plenty of reasons like: I can be a living testimony to American people that Japanese people need Jesus, or the obvious reason is that I need prayer and financial support that I otherwise would not get if I were in Japan or that I would not want to get if I were not passionate to go, or another reason is that I can partner with others who are passionate about helping the Japanese but unable to go themselves), but one thing about grief: it does not listen to reason. When I think about what I did when I missed my family while living in Japan, I realize I did very few of those things upon coming back here. When I went to Japan, I knew I would miss big events, like the births and baptisms of nieces and nephews. I addressed the problems specifically and prayed about it. I dealt with it instead of trying to cheer myself up. I did not say, “God has led me to Japan for this time, so I should make the most of my time while I'm here and stop 'living' back at home.” Maybe there is a time to say that, but it was not when my brother was in a burn care clinic in Minnesota and I was in Japan.

My brother (born with spina bifida, hence the wheelchair) was flown by helicopter to Minneapolis to treat his leg burns, which happened shortly after Celia and I had arrived in Japan in 2009.

 

So even in the last week or two, I have noticed that I perceive this grief differently. It is no longer negative feelings to be discouraged but acceptable feelings that show the burden of love (pardon the Christianese) that God has placed on me. I love the Japanese there, and I love my family here. Both types of love are God given, and I must deal with the consequences of this love. “To arrive means to have left,” which is something I will have to deal with over and over again especially as a missionary.

Knitting projects (procrastination)

I'm procrastinating right now. There's a lot to do that I don't feel like doing... so here I am blogging about my knitting projects. Also, I'm working on about 10 projects right now (need to use up the yarn stash before moving to Japan), so there will be a lot more pictures of completed projects after Christmas!

First, hats. These are great for using up yarn. I posted pictures of Alison's baby sweater in my last post. I used up leftover yarn from that sweater for Alison and Alexander's hats, inventing the pattern as I went:

I also made a birthday hat for Elizabeth, which she received about 5 months late. Oh dear. She picked out the pattern herself from my friend, Cosy's pattern book. (She was 2 at the time... ;)

Elizabeth's hat, and Michael's birthday hat, which is still in progress (oh dear... his birthday was last week...) came from leftover yarn from this blanket (pattern available here), which was Carla and Arnaldo's wedding present:

I'm working on a lot of stuff at the moment. One recent fun discovery was this blog, which has many fun snowflake patterns. So I'm making Christmas ornaments.

Incidentally, the green sweater in the picture is the one that's been in progress for several years. It still doesn't have buttons, but I'm wearing it anyway. Hopefully I'll actually finish it soon...

My sermon is online!

In case you missed our November newsletter (previous post), I preached at Newport Covenant Church (my home church) last Sunday on Psalm 145 for our Thanksgiving service. I never would have thought I'd do that when I left for college 11 years ago... but now I have. Then again, I never thought I would become a missionary.

Well, it's over... I think it went pretty well. (This was my third time preaching, but I got a lot of public speaking experience in Japan, since I gave my testimony a whole bunch of times.) What was really great was the open mic time afterwards. Many people had the opportunity to publicly thank God for his goodness in their lives for the encouragement of the congregation. I was encouraged. :) Oh, I also got to lead communion for the first time in the second service. I remembered the words of institution, but forgot the prayer. Oops.

On Monday I wandered around wondering what to do with all my free time... and quickly filled it with other things I had neglected to do last week while writing the sermon. Oh well. On to the next big thing: on Saturday my parents and Keith and I will be providing music for the Newport Covenant Church Christmas luncheon. I'm also hosting a table. What fun!

The sermon, as the title says, is online--you can download it here or listen from the church's website.

Happy Thanksgiving!

November Newsletter

Seasons
Newsletter #8, November 25, 2010

Dear Friends and Family,

I find it somewhat ironic that I'm writing about our Christmas travel plans in the middle of a winter storm in Seattle. Nevertheless, weather permitting, we hope to drive from Seattle to Grand Forks, ND and stay for a few days around Sunday, Dec. 19 and then down to Fort Dodge, IA for Christmas with Keith's family. Please contact us if you want to meet us or to introduce us to someone while we are in the area.

Autumn leaves in our yard meet first snowfall

Having divulged our Christmas plans, I'm now backtracking to Halloween weekend, when Celia and I spoke at an OMF conference. It was well attended: about 100 people showed up to Youth Night. We were encouraged, and we hope we encouraged others to consider involvement in missions, even if they aren't traveling across the ocean. Just recently, we also attended a “Sharpen Your Interpersonal Skills” (SYIS) workshop, which, among other things, taught us that we are still grieving the fact that we left Japan. When we started speaking about this loss in terms of grief instead of reverse culture shock, we were better able to identify where our “heaviness” for Japan comes from. Fast-forwarding back to the present, here we are at Thanksgiving weekend…
***

Boldly Proclaiming God’s Faithfulness

As I (Celia) am writing this, I’m taking a break from sermon preparations. On Sunday, I will preach about thankfulness at the church where I grew up (Newport Covenant Church), using Psalm 145 as my text. In my sermon, I’m going to encourage the congregation to proclaim God’s faithfulness, because to do so will make God’s glory known in our own lives, among our family and friends, and to the ends of the earth.

I find when I write a sermon, I am often preaching as much to myself as to the congregation. This sermon is exactly what I need to hear right now, because sometimes it isn’t easy to give thanks. There are times when I can hardly stop myself from gushing God’s praise to anyone who will listen, but much of the time, distractions of life get in the way, and I don’t really feel very thankful. Sometimes life sucks. Thanking God starts as a discipline which I must do, which then swells into heartfelt praise. Thus my daily discipline is to spend time in prayer thinking about what I am thankful for, starting with concrete things around me if I can’t think of anything else. The more I look for God’s goodness, the more I see it.

At the risk of embarrassing some people, I would like to proclaim how God has been faithful to us through the people he has put in our lives. We have been very blessed!

Recently, as we mentioned, we went to Abbotsford, BC for the SYIS conference. Our housing was provided by Pete and Sara Heinrichs, who had been complete strangers until we arrived. When we came into their home, we immediately noticed that their refrigerator was covered by pictures of missionaries and exchange students. We learned that over the years, Sara and Pete had traveled extensively to visit and encourage missionaries, and that they had welcomed numerous international students into their home. Sara carefully set the table each morning with a spread worthy of a Bed and Breakfast. As we ate, we prayed together and encouraged each other. I was overwhelmed by their hospitality—“This is our missionary work,” Sara explained. We are thankful for the many people who have hosted us in the last 7 months, especially when we were trying to discern where God was calling us to live.

Breakfast with Pete and Sara

During the last several months, we have had the opportunity to gather in prayer with a number of different people and groups. We have been searching for God’s will for our lives, as we are seeking to serve him in North America while we are waiting to return to Japan, so being supported in prayer has been very important and encouraging to us. In particular, we are thankful for my mom’s MIT prayer group, who have been praying for me since childhood, for Hosanna Christian Church (the Japanese church we have been attending), and for the OMF prayer group in Seattle, which mostly consists of retired missionaries who have encouraged us through faithful prayer and by sharing wisdom from their many years of service. There have been many others; we are greatly encouraged every time we hear that someone is praying for us!

During the month of October, God provided us with several great opportunities to meet people and make connections. We are thankful for the ministry of Phoebe Wong, the OMF regional ministry coordinator in Vancouver, who arranged the conference at which we spoke at the end of October. Earlier in October, we met up with Obo, a fellow student from Regent, who is now a pastor at a Japanese church in Seattle. He introduced us to a number of other Japanese pastors, so hopefully we will be able to speak at other churches.

Finally, we are thankful for the people who have supported us financially, through treating us to meals, giving one-time donations, and making pledges. Many of these people have been long-time supporters—in every sense of that word.

We thank God for allowing us to partner in ministry with so many loving and faithful supporters. We have acknowledged only a few of the people we are thankful for here; we thank God for each and every one of you reading this letter.
***

Prayer Points

• Praise God for the turnout at the OMF conference in Vancouver! We are thankful to have been able to speak at that conference and at other churches as well, and we are praying about other speaking engagements as well.
• We have decided to participate in community groups at Newport Church. Please pray for Mel and Janet, with whom we plan to start a group in January.
• We're driving some 3,683 miles (about 60 hours) in December, so please pray that the weather and our Subaru will cooperate with us for a hassle free drive across the country.
• We thank God for everyone who has given us a one time donation; these will help us with plane tickets and initial set-up costs in Japan. However, while OMF does not require that we raise all the money necessary for the first term before we leave for Japan, we need people to pledge to support us when we get there (usually given in monthly amounts). Please pray with us for pledges.
• We still experience waves of sadness when we remember and miss Japan and our friends there. Please pray that we can find balance between our passion for the Japanese and living well now, in this current season.
• Both of Celia’s grandparents have moved into their third assisted living home. Please pray for their continued adjustment, especially that they will make friends. They are still unhappy, but they are getting good care.

***

Preparing for Japan
Warning: the following is very nerdy… and silly.

Even though we’re in the US, we’re still studying Japanese. We’re specifically focusing on reading and writing, since that is relatively easy to do without a teacher. Japanese has 3 sets of characters which make up its writing system: 2 syllabic sets of 46 characters each (hiragana and katakana) and kanji (the Chinese characters used in the Japanese writing system which provide meaning; there are about 2200 in standard use). Kanji is complicated, since most of the characters can be pronounced in several different ways depending on the context. Some people—both Japanese and foreigners—try to avoid studying kanji, since any kanji character can be written in hiragana as well. However, it is fascinating to learn… and very necessary, given the huge number of homonyms in the Japanese language. Let me explain with a test sentence, written in hiragana:

うらにわにはにわにわにはにわにわとりがいる。
(uraniwaniwaniwaniwaniwaniwaniwatorigairu.)
Translation: ??

Without kanji, this is a meaningless run-on sentence. Adding kanji, the pronunciation stays the same, but we know the meaning of the sentence and where words begin and end:

裏庭には二羽、庭には二羽鶏がいる。
(uraniwa ni wa niwa; niwa ni wa niwa niwatori ga iru.)
Translation: 2 birds are in the backyard; 2 chickens are in the garden.

We are thankful for kanji!
***

Money Jar: We have 1.5%!

We need 100% pledged monthly support for our first term (5 years) before returning to Japan. Please keep praying with us that God will provide for our financial needs!
***

“The LORD is good to all; he has compassion on all he has made. All you have made will praise you, O LORD; your saints will extol you.”
—Psalm 145:9-10

May your voice join with all of creation in thankfulness to our God, who is worthy of our praise.

Love in Christ, Keith and Celia