Sharing at Davis Korean Church

Pictured with me is Pastor Tim Park, one of my former roommates while I, Peter, attended UC Davis. He is currently the college ministry pastor at Davis Korean Church, and I had the great pleasure of sharing our Journey to Japan with over 100 members of his ministry on Oct 18th.

What I shared at Davis Korean Church is one of the many lessons God is trying to deeply ingrain in us, which is to trust in Him. And it's not to just trust Him in providing us the financial support we need to minister in Japan, which we know He'll do in His time, but so much more than that. He wants us to trust in Him completely to do His kingdom work through us. The thought of this is extremely humbling.

This is such a valuable lesson for us, not only as we raise prayer and financial partners, but especially when we are in Japan planting churches.

Initially, we had intended to go to Japan as self-sufficient missionaries, so called tent-makers. We went on our vision trip to look into various options to sustain a living in Japan such as buy an English teaching franchise or other profitable business, and tried to figure out how best to return as quickly as possible. However, if we had gone to Japan as tent-makers, 1,000 fewer people would know about the spiritual needs of Japan. You see, God had changed our means of ministry, and had us raise prayer and financial supporters instead of us going as tent-makers, which by no means is any lesser means of ministry. In so doing, we've spoken at over dozen churches where we communicated the spiritual needs of the Japanese people to over 1,000 individuals. That's 1,000 more people who can pray for the people of Japan, and possibly even be called to serve in Japan themselves. We believe He still has us here in the States raising support in order to inspire more people to serve God here and overseas, and, of course, because He still has more refining left to do in us too.

Why is this lesson so important? When it's all said and done, and all our support is raised, who will receive the credit and the glory? Will we honor ourselves for a job well done, or will we praise God and give glory to Him for doing what He promised? When we're in Japan, and a church begins to grow and flourish, who will receive the glory and honor? Will we honor ourselves for being skillful, resourceful and talented in planting a church? Or will we praise and glorify God for transforming the lives of sinners and giving them new life? Who will receive the credit? Who is doing the real work? God is preparing us to trust Him deeply so that we can give Him all the credit, all the glory, all the praise and all the honor that is rightfully due to Him.

God will plant His churches, and He will meet our financial needs... on His terms and in His time. But in the mean time, He desires for us to share about the needs in Japan to any who would listen so that it wouldn't be just us, but that many would know and care about the spiritual needs of Japan.