Cherry Blossoms

Japan is soooo beautiful at this time of years. The cherry blossom trees are in full bloom and the smell of spring is in the air. This is my favorite time of the year! My parents came for a visit a few weeks ago and we had been hoping that the cherry blossoms would be blooming while they were here. Unfortunately, we only got to see the plum trees blooming. These usually bloom in early March. It took me about 8 years of living here before I was able to distinguish between a plum tree and a cherry blossom tree! Anyway, they are both beautiful.

Just as new life is springing up all around us, we are praying that God will cause new life to "spring up" in the hearts of the Japanese people. Would you pray with us that as we are out this month, God would give us opportunities to share about the new life that is found only in Jesus Christ? Thank you!

Home from the Philippines

We have just returned home from 2 weeks in the Philippines. It was quite the trip, to say the least. The first week we spent at our regional home school conference. That is always a wonderful time of meeting up with old friends and making new friends. Ashley, Adam, and Avery took achievement tests to make sure that they are staying on target in school. Buddy and I were able to hear a wonderful series of talks by Steve Demme of Math-U-See. It was a very encouraging week for all.

Our second week we spent on the island of Boracay. This is about one hour south of Manila by plane. This was our second time to go so we were anticipating a wonderful week of glowing sunsets, pizza on the beach, and fun times with the two other families we went with.

While we did enjoy most of those things, we got a few extra things that we hadn't planned on. Adam got an amoeba and vicious stomach problems for about 5 days. He then had an allergic reaction to the medicine for the amoeba and ended up getting a shot at the emergency clinic there on the island. Buddy and Ashley were in bed for a day with high fever and vomiting. Avery and I got the joy of passing out medicines, making clinic runs, and taking temperatures.

The place we stayed at was really wonderful except for the toilet. It was comical after about the 10th time of calling the front desk. All I had to do was call downstairs and say, "It's me again! They knew just what we needed...our friendly little Philipino man and his plunger!" Unfortunately we didn't get to see the sunset this year, as we had rain and clouds almost every day we were there.

Not to make the whole trip sound bad. We did enjoy our pizza on the beach! We had a blast with our friends! The owners of the hotel where we stayed were Christians and said that our coming was an answer to their prayer for God to send Christians to stay at their hotel. We were able to have worship with them on Sunday and several of their staff were there as well. That was exciting!

If nothing else, our vacation made us more thankful than ever to live in a wonderful country like Japan. We often take for granted the fact that we can drink our water straight from the tap, not worry if our vegetables have parasites on them, or fear that someone is going to cheat us. It is good to be home!

Out With the Old...In With the New

Well it is the end of the year here in Tokyo! People everywhere are preparing for the big year end celebration. I just heard on the television that the shinkansen trains were at 150 percent capacity yesterday as families head to their hometowns for the New Year's Holiday.

So what do Japanese do for the year end? Here are few of the traditions...a visit to the shrine to pray for health and properity in the new year, buckwheat soba noodles on New Year's Eve for good luck, and a thorough cleaning of the home (much like our spring cleaning in the U.S.) New Year's day is for eating sechi ryori which is various foods that can be cooked ahead of time and set out for the day. This keeps mom from having to prepare anything special on the actual new years day.

As much as Christmas Day is special to us, New Year's Day is special for the Japanese people. Sadly, much of the holiday centers around the superstitious belief that by doing and eating certain things they can ward off evil and insure blessing and peace . I pray for the day when Japanese will celebrate New Year's Day by worshipping our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. He is the only true source of peace and hope. Ringing a bell at the shrine to wake up the gods pales in comparison to the joy of talking to the God who never slumbers nor sleeps!

Would you pray with us that the Japanese people will open their hearts to the good news of Jesus Christ and of His incredible love for them!

A God Moment

I wanted to share with you a really neat thing that happened yesterday. We have a dear friend whom we have known for about 10 years (she lived in Sendai while we were there and moved to Tokyo just before we did a couple of years ago). We reconnected with her about 6 months ago and invited her to come to our Bible study that we are having in our home. At first, she was hesitant and said she would come but could only stay for 30 minutes. The next time she said she could stay for the whole time but had to leave immediately when it was over. She takes ballroom dancing classes so this was always her reason for why she might not be able to commit to the entire Bible study.

A couple of days ago she came by and said, "I am very sad today." I asked her why and she said, "Today my dance teacher told me and my husband that we can no longer attend dance class. I was very sad at first but I realize that now I can come to your Bible study every week!" I told her that maybe God had a reason for this and she said, "I believe He does. I think He wants me to come to the Bible study!"

God is sooooooo good! We realize again that it is all about Him. He is so able to orchestrate people's lives in such a way that they seek Him! Please pray for Mrs. K to come to know Christ!

Merry Christmas!

Well I can't believe it is already Christmas! I had hoped to be better at staying up to date on this but alas, the year is over and I have written so little! We have had a great Christmas season. We stayed busy with volunteers and were excited to see 5 new folks pray to receive Christ! God is really using volunteers to share Christ with the Japanese people.
We had a big Christmas party at our community center and were very excited when 60 or so people came! It was a great opportunity to share the true meaning of Christmas. Several of Avery's friends came so she was really happy to get to tell them about Jesus!
We did something a little different this year at the Brents' home. We decided to open half of our Christmas gifts today (Christmas Eve) and the other half tomorrow on Christmas Day. It has been fun to spread out the fun for two days. I think the whole family was in need of a few days of just "playtime" after a crazy holiday season. It was fun to just drink cocoa, play games, watch Christmas movies, and enjoy being together.
We pray that your holiday season is a blessed one and that the coming year is full of joy in the Lord! Merry Christmas!

2 Days Till We Head to the States!!!

Well can't believe it is almost time to go to America!!! It will be so great to be back home for a month! There is nothing as good as being with family and shopping at Walmart!! We have been busy this past few days with orienting our new missionaries and helping them to get set up in their new place. We've also been working to prepare for our speaking opportunities while we are in the States. We will be sharing with churches in Ohio as well as at home in Texas. Our good friends, the Morrison's, have invited us to share with their church on our second Sunday back and then on Nov. 11th we will be sharing with my home church, Central Baptist, in Hillsboro, Texas. They are praying about bringing a team over next year so we are excited to be able to go and encourage them in that!

The kids are really excited. Avery has been counting the days for the last "who knows how long"! She told me tonight it is only 3 more night nights until we leave!!


Well sorry for my rambling! I am new at this blogging thing so I kind of tend to go on and on. Okay...stopping now! More later!

The Saga Begins...

October 12, 2007
I have heard so much about these blogs that I finally decided to start our own! Just to let you know a little bit about who we are...My name is Melanie and my husband's name is Buddy. I have been married to this great guy since March 10, 1990! God has given us 3 wonderful children...Ashley who is 12 years old, Adam who's 11, and Avery, our little girl, who is now 6 years old!

We are missionaries with the Southern Baptist International Mission Board and we serve in Tokyo, Japan. We have been here since April, 1995. It is so much fun to serve the Lord here. It is amazing that we are actually paid to live here and to tell folks about Jesus. Japan is a wonderful country. However, with less than 1 percent of the people claiming to have a relationship with Jesus, we certainly have a big job in front of us. God is at work here, though, and we are seeing Him opening new doors for sharing the gospel and more and more people are coming to know Him.

Our assignment is to help facilitate volunteers from the States and other places who want to come to Japan for a short term mission trip. This has been a neat opportunity to see God use all kinds of different people to be a witness and to prayerwalk here in Tokyo. God used these volunteers to lead 14 people to Christ just this last summer (2007). It is awesome!


Well I guess this is enough for one blog...I'll save more for later! :)

Melanie