Reflection on 10 years in Japan - Part 1
With some extra time to reflect this summer break (that I haven't been using to relax with Jess, run errands, hunt for a job, or write for grad school), I've been taking time to thank God for how he has been working on my character and through his church in Japan this last decade.
Tragically, I don't have any online blog posts from my first 4 years and 11 months here (2015-2019). Another loss from my pre-2020 era: the hundreds of pictures on my old Sony and Huawei Android phones. RIP old pics. There are a lot of good friends from that era I wish I could revisit in photos.
Incidentally, the oldest picture I have access to on my current phone is this drawing from a Japanese 2nd-grade student:
When I remember her, I pray she meets Jesus someday, along with the other 80 students from my former 3rd-floor studio classroom.
Those sun-bleached floorboards have surely been painted with more acrylic and oil. Then cleaned with bleach and painted again. The crowd of 1st to 3rd-grade students has certainly changed plenty of times since then. Some of them just starting to use scissors by themselves in April, and baking cakes in class by the end of March.
I'll never forget praying in that classroom for my students and coworkers. The upstairs view of college-level longbow archery through a lightly wooded background is too vibrant to forget.
As is usually the case, wonderful people that Christ created to know him comprise core memories that matter most.
My wife, Jess, arrived in Japan during the sweltering summer month of August in 2019. Hopefully, she was too starstruck by the convenience and cleanliness of Japan to feel the heat much that summer.
At the church recommendation of her atheist coworker, she started attending Paz in September. Unfortunately, in 2019, I had no clue she would someday become my wife.
That would wait. Most of that mystery would wait until 2022.
It would wait:
- until our family groups merged
- until our PBC group merged
- until the fateful 2022 conversation where I learned she lived in our neighborhood
- until I invited her to that year's New Year's party
- until we watched two Marvel films as a young adult group
- until we started serving togeher with the Paz English club
There are a longer series of untils I'll skip for now.
My first-ever Japan update was posted on November 9th, 2019. (You can read it here if you're interested)
Seth Quant
As you might have guessed, in November of 2019, I was praying seriously about transitioning from English teaching into full-time ministry with Paz church. My goal was to start work as a missionary on May 24th, 2020. Perhaps like me, you also had goals for what seemed to be a promising new year.
God's timing is perfect. Jesus makes plans and moves things into his perfect alignment when he deems it best. My character needed more work before I met Jess and started dating her. He's definitely still working with me on my sanctification, I need it.
The year following 2019 was an international incident no one expected. But in his faithfulness, God provided for me to successfully transition into full-time ministry before 2020 had finished.
One of my most regular memories of those single working/ministry years is prayer walking around the neighborhoods of the 4 sharehouses, 1 dormitory, and 1 shared apartment I lived in.
After I had just moved to Noborito in May of 2017, I was dreaming and praying about an in-person youth prayer meeting each weekday morning. A handful of times, I woke up early to pray at Pr. Paul's house in his old neighborhood.
Fast forward to 2024, God brought that dream to life in our youth group by inspiring other leaders to lead a daily morning prayer group. Even now, members meet every morning on a Line call from 6:30 - 7:00 a.m. for prayer. It's become what God wanted and better than I imagined. They even have a second group leading prayer on weekday nights from 10 p.m.
Prayer is so important. Thank you so much for your prayer on behalf of us and our ministry here. It's essential. The growth we've seen at Paz Church is from prayer and the Holy Spirit's power. The faithful prayers of Christian brothers and sisters all around the world partner with us from a distance.
Blog Bloopers:
Anthropic's Claude AI turned this Unsplash "Japan 1o" image with my mediocre prompt:
Into this moving HTML masterpiece?
(Actually the HTML/CSS generated was so powerful, I had to take a static screenshot instead of embedding its HTML/CSS. It broke the formatting of my website with it's rotating, semi sparkling glory...)
