I'm home.

You missed a bit in between the end of June and my leaving. I wasn't even done teaching classes yet on that last post. I was going to write a bit the beginning of August, but then I got busy. Then I took a trip to Osaka. Then I went to the hospital.

I made it onto my flight - diarrhea and all. (I didn't think I'd be using that word in my last post.)

Well, I'm home. I've thought about Japan a little bit since being back. But mostly life has come at me day after day. I thought there'd be a break or something. I guess I was picturing it like pulling into a station, and sitting there for a moment on that little piece of diverted track while the Ltd. Express flew by, keeping on its schedule. Then in time we'd slowly pull away again, picking up speed.

I'm living with my dad's parents now, and even in their retired lives they've got things written on their calendars every day. And when you think about it, there's always meals to be eaten, laundry to be washed, bills to be paid...it's funny how much of your time is swallowed by the necessities. You're busy all day and then you get to the end and realize you didn't accomplish anything. It'd all been spent just keeping up with time, as it plodded forward, and now into the night...

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Nearing

I'm going to miss this place immensely when I'm gone. I could make a list of the things I'm going to miss, but I don't know how I'm going to miss it. Two years in any place is long enough to become attached, even if the time wasn't all good.

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bugs

A friend posted this as his facebook message:

friend:

saw a centipede crawl under the tatami. AARGH!

Luther responded:

stomp on the tatami really hard.

There used to be a giant cockroach running across the floor in my closet - he apparently didn't get the memo about 'not being in my apartment an living at the same time' and so I immediately grabbed my laundry basket and smashed him, but I only took off part of his shell because he started flipping around and so I bashed him again, lifted up the basket and half of him was smushed and the other half was normal and then all of a sudden the normal half started running really fast and so I bashed him again, left the basket on him and then hit the bottom of the basket with my guitar stand a bunch of times. If that didn't kill him, then I'm hoping starvation will because I left the basket there and this happened last Friday.

a character study

He was the type of man who, when women met him, made them seriously reconsider their current choice of partner.

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way

This is how I feel life will go: I'll be brushing my teeth one morning, look in the mirror, blink, and be my dad.

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I feel compelled to write something here at least, even if I can't get my head wholly around this experience.

I met a guy in my town a number of weeks ago named Chandana who is from Sri Lanka. I had seen him once before, and kind of did the double take as a biked by, so the second time I saw him I had to stop. I asked him if he spoke English, and he said no, only a tiny bit, so I struggled on in Japanese. At that time he had invited me to come to some kind of international discussion group (so I thought) and so I said of course, and we exchanged phone numbers. Well, last week didn't work out, so this week I had made a plan to meet him after going to JOY Fellowship church in Yokodai. Eri, my Japanese friend, asked if she could come too, and I said sure, and so she drove us. It was raining hard and traffic was really bad so we were a good 30 minutes late (I felt really bad) and upon arrival at the station (where we were meeting) we discovered what the plan was. Chandana was there with a Kiwi named Kevin, and his Japanese wife Misa who was waiting in the car. They were all set to head off to a Buddhist Temple. It turned out there was a problem, because the temple, while being perfectly open to "gaijin" (foreigners) onlookers and observers, did not allow Japanese people who were not members. (Or maybe they did - I didn't exactly understand the exchange, but at the very least they had to pay an expensive entrance fee, like around $25). So, we dropped Eri off at a mall and proceeded on to the Temple.

I'm used to seeing temples from the outside, the kind that are old and where priests live and do who knows what else. However, at this temple, it was very, very different. This temple is for the religion "Shinnyo-en" which is a type of Buddhism that has quite a number of followers in Japan (probably around 500 or more temples nation wide) and temples in California and a few European and Asian nations. It was founded by a lady who was born in 1912. I wasn't allowed to take any of the literature home with me, but I looked up some stuff on Wikipedia to refresh my memory. This particular sect was founded by a man and his wife, Shinjo Ito and Tomoji Ito.

The temple itself was very much like any large, modern American church. It was a new building with a couple of large parking garages as people came from as far as a 3 hour drive to attend Sunday services. The entrance way had a window to sign in guests, and the foyer was filled with shoe and coat lockers where you could leave your stuff. (Hmm...funny thing - I guess I was walking around the whole time in my socks, but I didn't realize that fact until just now because that's so normal here in Japan.) There was an information desk where I picked up a visitor's nametag, and in the basement was an eating area with several vending machines and a kitchen. We proceeded to a classroom of sorts that had chairs arranged in a way that gave some space for kneeling on the floor to chant and bow, which we all did once most people arrived. (I didn't do the bowing and chanting stuff - someone gave me a book with the English translations, so I kind of just read to see what they were doing.) They were saying a lot of mystical sounding things, and calling on the spirits of this and that, and the one-syllable golden wheel to give them insight, and some other things that weren't translated but involved lots of bowing.

I apologize if I don't give all of today's events in order because a lot happened, and I never got a succinct description of the religion, but rather pieced together a few parts based on all of my observations. On the way over in the car, Kevin was telling me about the "Mediums" (Priests who do "sesshin" which literally translated means "touch the heart") and how they stand infront of you and observe the spirits that are behind you and tell you about your life and your struggles and what you need to do to get back onto the right path. Kevin said told me that in the past he has seen spirits and totally understands that there is a spiritual realm, actually a spiritual reality and that everything physical is basically an illusion of the spiritual truth, and in Shinnyo-en he found the religion that agrees with what he has experienced. I told him I agreed - there definitely is a very active spiritual realm, and literally, the forces of good and evil are battling in a dimension that most of us don't see but are surrounded by constantly. Kevin also said he was a Christian, which was a common iteration from several of the other people I met in the Temple.

Shinnyo-en is a religion that is accepting of all religions - its purpose is harmony and to free all people through helping them to realize that Buddha lives inside of each of us and that we simply must work to push out the bad things that are dragging us down and causing us to go off the straight path, and uncloud the purity that we each have. (Or something like that.) There was one lady there who spoke (a whole story in itself) about how happy she is to have found Shinnyo-en and how she wished she had found it earlier, and how she wants everyone to know the freedom of Shinnyo-en (at which point I found it very curious that a religion that is trying to convert people would turn away non-members or at least charge them exorbitant prices). It was a little hard to understand everything because a translator was explaining to me what she was saying by throwing in her own (the translator's) opinions and explanation. It was furtherly weird because the lady kept talking about "gaijin" and how it was amazing that the "heathens" were starting to catch on to this amazing religion. There was not a small amount of ethnocentrism in her talk, which was a bit offputting at first until I started thinking, "How often do we Christians in the US talk in our churches about reaching "Africa" and having a heart for "Africa" (can you get any more ambiguous verging on the condescending than that???) and thinking about how great it is that people outside the US believe in Jesus, and how "God works in mysterious ways" in the point that people worship God in languages other than English, completely missing fact that as 21st-century Americans we are in the far-reaches of the definition of the word "Gentiles."

So anyway, it came to me acutely in this discussion, the perplexing question of just how Shinnyo-en Buddhists are able to accept all religions when they have mutually exclusive tenets. I asked this question, cutting right to the point, by saying, "How do you accept Christianity which says that there is one God and that Jesus is his son and the only way to be saved is by Jesus alone, and other religions that say there are many Gods and that Jesus was just a man. How do you reconcile those mutually exclusive beliefs?" The answer I got was that, there is one-truth and anywhere in any religion, a mutually exclusive statement or belief or tenet is simply a human invention. When I mentioned that the Bible and the Quran present mutually exclusive worldviews, I was told that the Bible is not Christianity and the Quran is not Islam.

That really confused me, because we have no other way of defining them. Once your tenets begin to deviate from the Bible, you are no longer talking about Christianity; you are now creating a new religion. It's like the Mitch Hedberg joke about the number of bedrooms in a house. "...And this is 4th bedroom. It just happens to have a refridgerator, a microwave, a sink, a guy eating cereal...oh, and there's no bed." When Christ is no longer the sole Savior and Lord, it's no longer Christianity.

I found myself sitting there really wondering how to reach these people. I realized that 99% of my experiences with sharing the gospel are with people who are either atheists, agnostics or have had some dabblings in Christianity. I really don't know where to begin talking with people who have very strong professed beliefs in a well established religion, especially a religion I know literally nothing about. (I mean, c'mon - I was wikipedia-ing it 30 minutes ago...) At least the people there are seeking truth, and I do know that some of them are hitting on part of the truth of the universe, but it's just that - they're only seeing a part. They're experiencing spirits, but what spirits is the question...it freaked me out a bit to be quite honest. I was praying, a bit scared, and was reminded by God that yes, He is everywhere, that he's promised to be with me to the end of the age, that I, Luther Flagstad have been crucified and it's no longer I that lives but Christ in me, so Christ was there, and my body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, so he was there with me too.

There's quite assuredly more to tell about this whole experience and hopefully I can reconnect with people again. Chandana is not a Buddhist either, and I don't think he's anything, he's just interested in making connections of the heart with people all over the world. He was orphaned at a very early age by the (now ending) Tamil/Sri Lankan government war, and his life has been greatly shaped by the atrocities that war produce. He was explaining to everyone (I heard it through a tanslator) how he met me, and how he was attracted to my shining smile, and he knew that he had to introduce me to the people at the temple. He very much is interested in coming to my church and learning about Christianity and meeting the people there and sharing hearts together. I'm curious to see how that goes and am excited to welcome him.



Whew.

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There is one theme in literature though that I do not buy into. It's the idea of having one-shot at things, that your chance at life arrives one time, that once serendipity has passed you by it's too late, and all these especially pertaining to love. That true love only comes to you once in life. I find none of this true and none of it difficult. Here's what I wrote a few days ago on a notepad while riding the train:

"Falling in love is not difficult. It is not hard to find someone to love. There is no difficulty is finding a pretty face, an infectious smile, a consuming laugh - I fall in love daily. What is difficult, what is so hard, what bears the high calling and demands one to be a man, is choosing one, and loving her above all others for the rest of your life."

This, my friends, is much, much harder than finding "true love." True love finds you, as if it were an accident, or an inevitability. Now I'm not here to say that there should be no feelings of love in the choosing. What I'm saying is, they will be there. The hard part comes in staying true through all the low-tides, through the ebbing of love, through the elusiveness of the feelings. The man who makes a choice is truly to be held in awe. Love should not sit atop our pedestal; rather, a husband should place his bride there, and cherish her in every way, even unto death, as Christ died for the church.

It is "choosing in love" that I find so compelling. I discovered this this past week while studying the first chapter of Ephesians. Paul writes, "[God] chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves." (1:4-6) How amazing is it that we have a God who has chosen us? Jesus says, "You did not choose me, but I chose you..." (John 15:16) I don't have to pick the winning team, a lofty idea, or an admirable goal. God loved me and chose me, he made that decision - a decision that even took him to the grave. I can live in full assurance that I am cherished regardless of what I do, and wherever my feelings might take me. How awesome is that? It is this that allows me to love another, and especially my bride, as our relationship will be a reflection of the gospel - of the choosing in love.

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Full-circle

I've come back full circle to where I was 1-year and 7-months ago. I just finished a book The Shadow of the Wind and upon the last words it put me instantly in that old mindset. I've been missing reading for quite some time now. And, finally now, my view that reading fuels writing, has solidified. I don't know precisely what it is, but maybe it's that another story accelerates our understanding of the world, of how the cogs spin and reel. Maybe it pulls all of our own experiences into place, assigning them to someone else, giving them a name, codifying them with a beauty called prose. A character in Carlos Zafon's novel writes that "...[Reading] is an intimate ritual, that a book is a mirror that offers us only what we already carry inside us, that when we read, we do it with all our heart and mind..." There were many places in that book where I had to set it down and squeeze my eyes shut, tight enough to fuel the intensity of my memories and push them out at the same time. A good story shows me the starkness of life, and climbing back out of one gives me a perspective into the world that I couldn't have approached in any other way.

I have that feeling again. That feeling I had in those first sweltering, Shizuoka months sitting on the rough concrete of the sea wall, staring at an ocean I knew nothing about. I would smoke a cigarette or two, not daring to throw the butts onto the beach out of a fear of her vastness, that if I did, in time she would come back to haunt me. A feeling that would grip me sitting on moonlit tatami, reading the final pages of a novel purchased in yen from the loft of a Japanese bookstore. It's a feeling that leaves me wandering in my own head, connecting new thoughts to realities, making me wonder how I can be different, how I should be different, how I've been irrevocably changed by the turnings in 6 inches of space.

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Home?

I'm missing a place I haven't left yet.

I feel like I've already checked out of this place. Thinking back over the 21+ mo. that I've spent here, my experiences and thoughts have varied greatly. Now I'm just ready to come back. But I've still got almost 3 months to be here. I've stopped studying Japanese. Heck, I barely even speak it anymore. I spend my time talking with English speakers, reading English books, listening to English stuff online, and keeping silent. I think a lot of it is because I know I'm coming home. I know I'll be home in 3 months, so what's the use in investing a whole lot in new friendships? Or even in acquaintances? I'm about to be 6,000 miles away from here, in a different job, in a different language, and not only will I be away physically and time zone wise, but there will be every aspect of life wanting to use and fill my time - new hobbies new people, a new church. How much do I try and hang on to what I have had here?

Maybe part of my problem is that I see everything as temporary. High school was temporary, college was just a few years in Eau Claire, Japan was never going to be more than a couple years, now I'll be out in Rapid City for a year or so, then hopefully eventually I'll get into the Foreign Service, and then they'll send me to a couple different places for 2-year stints, then after that I'll still be headed to places only on assignment temporarily...it won't be until I retire that I'd be living in one place for any extended amount of time.

So people will come and people will go. I guess I've got to start learning how to make life-long friends that I don't get to see but once every few years. Or just settle for peripheral-status friends for the rest of my life. A wife and family would always be there, but how could I call them into that same lifestyle of get up and go (for decades)?

"I'm a stranger, in this land
I'm calling out to you.
I'm a stranger, in this land
Oh what am I to do."

And part of it too is I've never felt like I've settled anywhere. Maybe this is true of most people. I think for me it's that my real residence is heaven, and everything else will just feel like sleeping in a hostel on rented sheets until I get there. Maybe I've got to start seeing everyone as they are - as eternal, and that some of them I will be seeing again and others I hope to be used by God to affect their lives in the eternal way so I can see them again too. That's actually quite a bit encouraging, remembering that we're all eternal. It will ease the sting of "sayonara." I actually don't usually say goodbye, and I certainly never drag it out. If I did, it would hurt, so I just don't. Maybe I need to embrace the goodbye in the way that people say it when they know they're going to see each other again.

Siiiiiiiggggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

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sa sa sa BEATBOX

Luther is too alive to function.

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Import store

I bought a jar of pickles at the import store. I put it in the fridge to cool it down. A couple days later, I tried to open the jar, but the lid was on too tight. So I put it back. I waited another day or so and tried again. But I wasn't strong enough. So I put it back. The next week I decided to try again. I took the jar out, placed it firmly in my grip and twisted as hard as I could. The lid didn't budge. So now I decided to try something crafty. I took the end of a spoon, placed it under the lid and pushed. I heard a popping noise and the lid came off. I thought to myself, "Tools. They're what separate man, from the monkeys." I reached my hand into the jar and grabbed a hold of a pickle. But when I tried taking my hand out, it was stuck. That pickle jar was on my hand for 3 days until I bashed it against a wall and it broke off. And I thought to myself, "Walls. They're what separate man, from pickle jars."

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Hmm... I just read what I posted last night - wow, I was pretty tired.

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A Real World chat

Hey - this is something I haven't really done yet with this blog. I've always come on here with something in mind that I want to say, and fleshing it out with a lot of editing. But tonight, I'm just going to journal...

My mind is a million miles from here. I say a million, but really I mean 6,000. I'm not in Kambara, Japan anymore. I am sooo set on leaving, on moving on to what's next.

I love it here in Japan, don't get me wrong. I do. I want to be both places though. I like being here, but I really want to be back in America - the good ol' USA. I will be - in 4 months.

I've just got myself too over-involved. At one point I had had a lot of free time, so instead of picking up an activity or two I picked up like 7. And now I just don't want to being doing much of anything. I just want to chill out in Japan, ride my bicycle, sit on the sea wall and stare out at the ocean, write, play my guitar...and reflect - reflect because I am leaving, and I realize that. I didn't even get back to my apartment until more than 2 hours after sunset today. It's hard to miss the sun.

I stayed up until almost 5am watching episodes of "The Real World -Brooklyn" 2 nights ago. Then last night I fell asleep at 5:30pm and didn't wake up until 6 this morning. Now I'm up again still and it's almost 3... I guess watching The Real World pulled me away from Japan for a few hours. I was watching TV! And the people were speaking some language I understand! And not only that, but I was getting the social nuances - I was picking up on the consequences of their actions - I was assembling it and fitting it into a moral, social and cultural puzzle - one with which I'm familiar and care to even try to understand.

This all sounds a bit weird, even to me. I don't know what I'm writing right now, nor do I even want to try and figure it out. I've been in a TOtally different culture and silenced myself inside a language I don't understand for almost 2 years now. Seriously. Where did those 2 years go? What are they? How have I changed? What was the purpose for being here? The big purpose? What is the list of lessons I've learned? What relationships am I going to take away from this?

I fall in love every day.

I AM sick of my job. I am looking forward to not doing something where I don't have any semblance of an impact on the learning of any individual around me. Nobody really learns English in Japan, and very few even care. There's just no need for English, and the systems and methods for teaching it are broken. I'm mostly here to give Japanese people access to a "foreigner." And I get petted regularly. Apparently "foreigners" have soft hair.

Sorry, that's a bit of venting. I mostly don't have anything bad to say. But Japanese people in general are quite naive about the world around them. Very few people are interested in knowing me at all. And those who are want to know me so they can practice their English, not because they think "Luther Flagstad" is an interesting person. Heck, most people don't even know I have a last name. Or they think I'm "Mr. Rusa." (The Japanse pronunciation of Luther). I have found Japan to be, in general, quite cold.

Not to say I haven't had my prejudices and flat-out, crazy cultural experiences of my own. I need to see the world, and I'm doing it. Let's hope I haven't been too ethnocentric.

Yeah - I'm just tired (and it is 2:53 am) - I don't want to go sit at my desk tomorrow. This weekend isn't going to be much better. I teach English for my volunteer club on Friday night (7pm-10:30pm), I go hang out at a camp in Fujieda all day Saturday, I get back so I can go to church early on Sunday morning (get up at 8am), then come back for a pot luck dinner late afternoon - then I'll probably have some NAJET work or school work to get ready for the week. These things seem like they'd be fun, but when I'm only doing things I said I'd do, everything starts feeling like an obligation and nothing is fun anymore. I have to use the wee hours of the night if I want some time to just chill out, and then I'm super tired the next day. I don't even have a chance to work out anymore, and I'm supposed to be walking 100km the end of May.

I've discovered that it takes exactly 4 days (no more) for my apartment to go from spotless clean to pig-sty messy. Not that there's dirt, but just everything is everywhere. I need to learn to put things back when I take them out and use them. Hmm...that's a big life lesson I wish I had learned when I was about 9 years old. But there was always someone there to pick everything up for me, even if I was told to do it. So I never learned. It will probably take until I get married (or at least engaged) to start picking up things on a daily basis. (And if you're reading this, my future wife - yep, that's how it's going to be - and if you're reading this from the future my current wife - am I better?).

That's one of the goals for next year when I move back to the states. (no, not clean silly...) Find a wife. I will be actively seeking to get married. So I've been starting to do a lot of things about and for myself since about November to get ready to impose myself upon another human being. Let's hope she takes the whole package and says it's good enough. I'm totally ready to start moving in that direction - I'm just going to start looking, and when I find that special someone I'm going to start pursuing.

Ok, getting super tired now... (3:03).

That's about all the updates I can think of at this hour. It sums it up pretty good I guess. My mind is far from here, I've totally given up speaking Japanese (never had a friend that wanted to teach me or hang out with me in Japanese anyway), I'm sick of crawling into an empty bed night after night - I've got more to give than only I can receive, and it would be nice to stop letting that fade away into the ethereal nonsense of my apartment.

Time to do something about everything. Only 4 more months...


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I had a GREAT night tonight - I almost called and canceled my Japanese lesson at Ihara-nihongo-no-kai, but decided to go instead. It turned out that this week was actually a yasumi (break) but my conversation partner Furuyasan had told me that there was. So he was there, and 2 of his friends from his old job (Furuya-san is a retired police officer) and those 2 women's high-school aged daughters. One of the girls will be attending Ihara next year. I had seen Gotenyama all lit up for hanami (cherry blossom viewing) and so suggested that we all walk over there. We ended up sitting in the jiyuseki section, having konbini snacks and chatting. Then me and the girls hiked up to the tsuribashi (suspension bridge). It was really fun just talking and joking and learning some Japanese. After, we came back to the sukoyaka center, Furuya's friends left, and he invited me over for some coffee with him and his wife. We sat under their kotatsu (warm-table - we don't have these in the states) and watched a crazy Japanese show called "taimu shoku" (time shock) where celebrities are strapped into a contraption and asked questions, and if they don't get enough right they get spun around in a 3-d "torunado." Some 56-year-old Japanese dude dressed as a woman won the game. (His name was Peter.)

I'm really starting to feel the weight of the fact that I'm leaving Japan in 4 months. There are a lot of things I wish I could stay and do, and I'm going to miss a lot when I move away.

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This is all worth it - everything I do is worth it.

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Passion

It just hit me. It just clicked. It just all came together, moments ago. I have thought, for years, that I am passionless. I have told myself that I'm 80% good at everything, but not 100% good at anything. I've never found an activity that I could see myself doing every day. I have agonized over this thought for a long time, wishing there was a career, a cause, a sport, or something that I could give myself to in order to find meaning in my daily life. And now it's hit me: My passion is for Jesus Christ. I'm not talking about a career, I'm not joining the ministry, I haven't decided to enroll in seminary. I'm talking about passion - a daily living, a daily purpose, a unifying cause which rules over everything, and under which my daily life plays out.

Recently I've been learning how anything I do can be and should be done to the glory of God, and how offering my body as a living sacrifice is how I am to spiritually worship my Creator. I've been learning and hearing new things through sermons and messages from Mars Hill Church in Seattle. I've been reading good books and memorizing scripture. I've been wondering about my career, what kind of a job I should get after the JET Program, and how my calling to be a diplomat is supposed to play out practically and be satisfying. I was worried that I couldn't do it, and I was worried that I wouldn't find joy in it, if and when I got there. But tonight I was reading Don't Waste Your Life by John Piper, and it taken me many days and about 50 pages into the book before that book's specific message suddenly finished the picture, finally tied the last knot on the shoelace that pulled together my vehicle for purposeful motion for the rest of my life.

I've been running with shoes untied for so long, slipping and stumbling, turning my ankle and losing my purpose as it falls off behind me and I go tumbling down some God-forsaken path. The sentence in Piper's book read: "Don't coast through life without a passion." and I had been been doing this, looking for something to focus on, never being satisfied with anything, and feeling all the worse and inadequate for it.

But I see it now! The real and true something. The thing that's not a what, but a look to the whom. It's all for the praise and glory of Jesus, and in this I get the joy and the fullness of life! There are no compartments to my life, and I will not define each aspect of my life on its own merits and its own purpose. I now have the purpose, and therefore anything I do will have purpose because it's done unto Jesus. I am no longer passionless because again, the definition of passion is not found in what I do, but to whom I do it.

This is all very new to me, and I have a lot of thinking to do, and a lot of thoughts that must be mastered by this truth that I have discovered. I simply had to come on and share this tonight because it is going to absolutely revolutionise the way I see my purpose in my career, my job, my family, my hobbies and my daily life.

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Thoughts on G.K. Chesterton's "Orthodoxy"

I finished reading Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton today. It's chock-full of careful ruminations that are carefully written. There are at least 30 places in the 150 page book where I stopped and had to write things down in the margin because his comments were so thought provoking. It's hard to believe this book was published 100 years ago because it is as if he is rebutting the agnostic, atheist, and "spiritualist" thinkers of today. But, as C.S. Lewis stated in Surprised by Joy and Chesterton stated himself in this publication, the truth is truthful no matter what age it was discovered in. We cannot simply assert that our ideas today are better simply because they're newer. (This fallacy is called Appeal to Novelty.) **edit** C.S. Lewis calls it "chronological snobbery" - the thought that, because it's the most current year or age, we therefore are smarter, more advanced, more logical and have it more figured out than people did in ages past.

Anyway, there's nothing that will prove that the Bible holds the truth to life, the universe and everything, but there are a lot of things that you can try and test, and if there is such a thing as Truth (with a capital "T") then it will stand up to all trials.

There are a couple of things that I would like to share here that I found relevant to me. (Hey - it's my blog!)

1. Chesterton writes in the chapter "Authority and the Adventurer": "All the real argument about religion turns on the question of whether a man who was born upside down can tell when he comes right way up. The primary paradox of Christianity is that the ordinary condition of man is not his sane or sensible condition..." Which is to say here, Christians believe we were created perfect by God. Then we rebelled (Original Sin), which brought upon us death and all kinds of bad things. Man is living today in a state we were not meant to be in; we have a perfect creator and we also have evil in our world.

As a Christian it is so difficult to argue with people about religion, and in particular Christianity, because we're starting with different assumptions. It doesn't even make any sense to argue: you can't convince somebody of the logical steps of your argument when that person isn't standing on the same staircase. So I will not argue. I have made up my mind to never argue.

I will love. I will explain. I will answer sincere questions about Jesus and the Bible and Christianity sincerely from those who are wanting to wait a moment to listen to an answer. But I will not argue. I'm 25 years old and I can't believe it took me this long to realize this necessity.

2. Earlier in the same chapter Chesterton writes: "But my own positive conviction that personal creation is more conceivable than material fate, is, I admit, in a sense, undiscussable. I will not call it a faith or an intuition, for those words are mixed up with mere emotion, it is strictly an intellectual conviction; but it is a primary intellectual conviction like the certainty of self or the good of living."

It is true that the Bible states faith is necessary for salvation. "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith..." (Ephesians 2:8). Jesus says to a woman in Luke "Your faith has saved you; go in peace." (Luke 7:50). I don't think Chesterton here is denouncing the necessity of Faith. I think he's resisting the current day's definition of the word "faith." Maybe Chesterton's statement above helps us better understand Hebrews 11:1 - "Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see."

I, too, have been blessed with a rock-solid faith insomuch as I am convinced that the Bible is true, that man is sinful and damnable, and that grace through Jesus is our only hope. I've known this as long as I've been able to know. However, I have not always reacted to this knowledge with obedience, to my salvation with good works, and that is my great sin. To be blessed with such conviction, yet to flail about in a cesspool of profligateness.... I shudder to think what will happen if I'm still living that way in equal measure on the day I fall into the hands of the Living God. This is a completely different discussion, but one I am quite happy to talk about because I have seen Jesus changing me in revolutionary ways since this past November 1st.

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I am not alone

This morning, chocolate tasted like chocolate again. I stood in that moment and sighed, before opening my door to the world.

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I've forgotten what warm weather feels like.

It doesn't get as cold here as Minnesota, but my school and my apartment don't have insulated walls, and my school isn't heated. The offices have air-conditioner like heaters, but none of the classrooms has any sort of heat. It hangs around in the 40s while we teach in the wintertime, and sometimes drops down low enough to see your breath inside the classroom. It's quite terrible. You may say, "Well, 100 years ago most school houses in Minnesota didn't have electricity. They toughed it out." No, they had stoves. Kids lit a fire in the classroom each morning so that they could concentrate on their studies. We have the irony of a "modern" building that isn't heated, and being "modern" won't allow for fires being lit in the center of the room. I really don't know how students are expected to perform to their full potential when the only word I hear from them during an entire lesson is "Samui!" - "Cold!" Kids huddle together before class starts and fight over the seat in the sun.

My apartment also has an air-conditioner heater thingy, but it's only in 1 of my 5 rooms, and about 3 minutes after I turn it off it's cold again because my walls are so thin and I have 3 huge sliding glass doors. The only 2 places I'm ever warm is in the shower and in my bed. And people wonder why they lose motivation during the wintertime.

I'm not super-upset about this, and you might think it's complaining, but for the most part I've grown used to it. (There are so many things you have to just shrug your shoulders at when living in a different country and culture, hoo, believe me...or in the case of cold "hunch" your shoulders...) The winter can't last forever, but it's lasted long enough now to the point where I can picture myself wearing a T-shirt, but I can't picture myself being comfortable while wearing one. I really miss being comfortable and relaxed and warm...

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2/22

Jesus is really changing me, it's amazing!

Update

I'm sorry I've been bad about writing here over the past month+. The truth is, I've been going through a lot of changes, and doing a lot more writing in my journal. (And I've picked up reading again.)

Things are going really great. And I tend to not write as much when things are great.

The novel experiences have begun to wear off. That's not to say crazy stuff doesn't keep happening to me, I can assure you, I've many a time waited for clocks to start floating around me, having just fallen down the rabbit hole. But I'm seeing these events as inherent to my time here -- no -- my life here. (Just today I was reminded by a friend that this too is real life!)

Most of my changes are God-centered. I've discovered repentance. I've discovered the joy of getting to go back and do it right this time, of receiving the freedom from Christ to pursue what's "true...noble...right...pure...lovely...admirable...excellent...and praiseworthy." I'm truly very happy here with my little plot of life I'm living in Japan because I have a living God who loves me, who has kept no good thing from me, and because I have a lot of hope for the future - encouraged by the promise of my good and fruitful efforts now leading to affirmation on the day of judgment. "I've been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me...", the father having taken Christ's life for mine, and the power of grace having spurred me on will say, "Well done good and faithful servant." This is certainly the steady assurance I have in everything.

And, there are a lot of things to be worked on. My character must change. My obedience must align with Jesus'. I must hide the Word deep in my heart. I must take note of my Bible, pick it up, and investigate. I must consistently maintain my prayer life. All of these things with the hope that they pour over into the practical, into the visible realm where others "will take notice and praise my father in heaven." This is by far the most difficult part because I'm selfish and self-serving. I heard something from Mark Driscoll (Mars Hill Church) today that made me write the following:

Why would I ever exchange perfection for failure, wholeness for the broken, the Object of joy for objects of frustration? Why would I EVER exchange Jesus for myself - honoring my slovenly ways as more urgent than His rich promises? Yet I do this every day. I'm trying to do it less.

That's where I'm at.

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A Flight Log

Written in flight on my way to the US from Japan. Dec. 15, 2008....


Now I remember why I don't like Northwest. I had this sneaking suspicion in the back of my mind when I saw that Northwest logo next to the online cheapest price - that NWA with the red arrow staring back - sort of like coaxing you onward but at the same time screaming STOP!

I'm about a third of the way into my flight and it's been all fairly comfortable and all - luckily my year and a half in Japan has made me quite accustomed to hanging out in cramped places for long periods of time. I think this realization came on with that nostalgic 1970s in-flight atmosphere only a northwest 747-400 can provide. When I flew into Japan well over a year ago with AA, each seat had its own personal screen and you could choose to watch 1 of several movies starting every 20 min. or so. (Last winter when I flew the movies would even start as soon as you selected them). Not on this flight though. I'm almost in a corner so I have a sharp angled view of 3 screens, each with their own unique malfunctions. The projection screen is one with the 3 separate colors shining from 3 angles. Except the colors aren't exactly lined up. Now I know this is Christmas time, but do I have to see Merrel Streep dancing and singing in Red and Green AND Blue? Op - and she just jumped off the dock in all her clothes. I looked up in the booklet to see what movies would be playing on this flight: "For those lucky souls traveling from Tokyo to Minneapolis we will be showing Mamma Mia! and The Women." I'm not sure who did the customer analysis for NW, but it surprises me that they get mostly middle-aged ladies on this leg of the journey. The second tv nearest me is overplaying the red on the right of the screen, so anyone appearing on that side looks like they have a terrible sunburn. And judging by the size of the third one, I'm pretty sure it's somebody's ipod stuck up on the wall so that they can watch it without holding it.

I just got back from the broom-closet bathroom and found it fully "manual." I even had to drain the sink by pushing on a lever that lifted the plug in the bottom.

Probably one of the more sadder moments already came (I hope) when a young girl 2 rows in front of me called the flight attendant over with the problem that her seat wouldn't go back any further, only to be told that was all the further her seat went. The seats truly recline to an almost negligable angle. I don't know why they ever bother telling people to return their seats "to the upright position." EVERY position is an upright position. It kind of makes the preflight comfort literature laughable. I read it all trying to kill our taxiing time. Dr. so-and-so was going on and on about back stress and how you should keep your seat at the optimal 135-degree angle for your spine during the flight. I'd be lucky if my seat could break 93. (Uh oh, turbulence...I'll just pretend I'm in a non-reclining massage chair. A 160-dollar-an-hour massage chair...*sob*).

Speaking of adjusting - there was also a nice 1970s-esque video that had advice for adapting/getting used to the new time zone. I had no idea it was so simple, but aparantly there's just 3 things you need to do: 1) "Spend time outdoors everyday." Ok. This is the flight to Minneapolis in the dead of winter. The estimated landing temperature is -15. My entire outdoor time this vacation is labeled "neccessary transit only" and that whole time I'm reassessing ways to get to the next indoor place quicker. 2) "Drink plenty of fluids." ... and fluids do what for adjusting to the fact that the sun will be coming up at my dinner time? 3) This one was the gem. The words appeared one by one on the screen: "Take...Time...For...YOURSELF." Take time and make it your slave! The clock says 3 in the morning. NOPE! This is LUNCHTIME! "I know that clock says I'm supposed to be at the Christmas Party right now, but I'm taking time for myself! I'm going fishing!

Well, I'm picking this journal up again while we're landing here to help me take my mind off my popping ears. It's been a loooong flight, but at least I could lean a bit on the empty seat next to me and sleep some. At any rate, despite the ups and downs (literally) I know I got a better deal on this Northwest flight than all those passengers around me because I farted the entire 6,000 miles home and I can't smell.

So long to Northwest for now; however, with my long distance locked into their frequent flyer program, it might not be too long until I'm coaxed back by that arrow, albeit red, for another adventure.

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Musing

The days are getting longer every day, and I love it. I can slip out of this office at 4:15 with enough time to see the sun before he falls behind the hills of Yui.


I have another musing - what is the balance between the vanity and ego that has allowed so many great men and women to do so much good in the world, and sinful arrogance? At what point does loving oneself turn into self-love? Should this even be a concern of mine? I've always been really hard on myself - held an anti-vanity - even in the face of real success. But maybe that too is selfishness, disguised in my self-effacing. Yes, I'm commanded to love myself. I've just always been afraid that in allowing myself to reach the limits of my high expectations I would somehow be reveling in self glory, puffed full of pride. Maybe it's time to start expecting to reach my expectations.

I think the fall comes in where you give the credit. Who allows me the privilege to think? To do? To navigate complex social constructs? Or to even breathe? And I've been asked to do a lot. I've been given a lot and assembled with a lot of potential and maybe it would be a sin to not reach it. Objectively, I have everything it takes to do anything. I just lack the drive and discipline. Maybe that's what this all comes down to. Maybe I'm disguising the hard work of great men with their ego, using that created cause so I can better attack it with my arguments in order to feel better about my own mediocrity, not daring to rise above timidity and slightness.


I need discipline.

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Things I will miss

I ate lunch on a whale today.

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Land Ho

I’ve been at my desk an hour now and I’ve managed to wade through the pile of papers left on my desk, submit my attendance sheet for the month of December and pass out my omiyage to everyone’s desk. I have 4 days here before classes start for me. I still have to figure out exactly what I’m doing for my classes this term, so I’m going to need the days to figure that out.

I got home 2 nights ago, but it certainly hasn’t felt that long. I spent most of the trip from the plane to my apartment in a blurry delusion with one eye asleep and the other cutting in and out to check the station names for my transfers. I’m not exactly sure how I got home. I do remember clearly arriving at the airport and seeing the sign that in English said “Welcome to Japan” but underneath it in Japanese it said, “Welcome Home.” This is such a perfect representation of the dyadic feelings I have as both an American and a man who lives in Japan.

The hours after that were spent passed out on my bed. I woke up on Sunday with enough time to throw away molding food, wash laundry (I tried running the water first to get rid of any rust and in doing so disconnected the hose without turning off the water so it sprayed my entire bathroom and I had to run fans for several hours to dry it out), hike the half a block to my view of the ocean (and smacked my knee super hard on a bolt sticking out of the barrier and almost threw up because it hurt so bad) before heading to the Sano-san’s poruche ramen for dinner. I biked there to keep my knee from locking up – it was becoming quite swollen. I felt kind of bad about not coming for so long. I think Mr. Sano was a little distant because of the elapsed time. I said “hisashiburi” and he responded with a phrase that he explained meant longer than “it’s been a long time.” His grandchildren were there so it was nice to see them. His newest grandkid, a boy named Yuuki now a year and a half old, was wearing a shirt that said in English, “Friendship transcends national borders.” I thought this was so appropriate and a real sign that I should be spending more time at the Sano-sans. I think I might go every Sunday evening.

I biked across the road to the drug store after dinner to buy some ibuprofen for my knee. I was walking very slowly in the store. I was able to say and spell “ibuprofen” for the pharmacist and he recognized it with the Japanese pronunciation so I got a small package for about five-dollars. I was quite surprised to meet the girl working the register – she’s probably the prettiest Japanese girl I’ve ever met, and she even has really nice teeth. (A funny thing to say maybe, but you can’t take that for granted here. It’s unfortunately such a limiting factor with Japanese women…) I talked with her in my terrible broken Japanese and she was still smiling after 10 min. so I think she liked me. Her name is Yumi (You-me) and she lives right next to Ihara High School. We were interrupted a couple of times by other customers so I eventually said, “Ah, that’s right, you have a job.” She told me to come back and see her. I said sure, and she said anytime would be fine. I told her I’d make sure to injure myself again so I could come back.

This year (and anytime) is going to be a year that needs structure. I also have already made myself a calendar with dinners to be cooked each night of the week, a room in the house to be cleaned, and an evening activity. I really do not want these 7 months to go to waste. I don’t want a day to go to waste. I have so much to do and so many reasons to be happy here in Japan. I’m going to focus on very concrete ways of keeping myself occupied.

Well, now really should be work time. I’m keeping my work life and play life as far apart as east and west. That way I can hit it hard when I arrive “home.”

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