Outside Our New Home

(Click on the images to see larger versions.)

Our perfect little home (little house on left side of pic, across from apartments) is like a little oasis in an up and coming busy urban area of Hiroshima city. We're close to the highway, to downtown, to lots of shops & restaurants and yet we have a little peaceful stream, a lo~ng path for nice walks and a few big houses with farmed land close to us so we sometimes feel like we live in the countryside.

As perfect as it is, there are a couple of things about it that remind us to be praying constantly. Every time we walk past our home, every time I look out the kitchen window, every time I go out to hang the laundry, every time I step into our entryway, I'm reminded of the need to pray...

One thing is that when our house was being built, it was probably dedicated to a god of some sort during a traditional Japanese Buddhist/Shinto ceremony, and a message of blessing was placed somewhere in the house (some say they're placed in the ceiling/attic, some say entryway). Please pray against any spirits that this house was dedicated to, that they would not take residence here in our new home.

Immediately outside our home, we are surrounded by family burial sites on three sides. The first time I was walking towards our house, I saw one of them and said, "We live next to a cemetery?" Little did I know that it was only one of THREE ancestor burial sites. Our three neighbors who have large homes and small farms/large gardens next to us also have their family burial sites are on their property. We just so happen to live right in the middle of the three burial sites.

So, as perfect as this house is in being a central location for life and ministry in Hiroshima, it also reminds us that we are smack dab in the middle of a spiritual war, and that we've just landed on the front lines. Please pray for our family to be protected from spiritual attack for our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

Pic 1 of 3: the burial site on the way to our house (also in big pic above). Pic 2/3: the burial site on the other side of the house which is next to the area I use to hang laundry and the walking path we take to some of the local shops. Pic 3/3: the view from my kitchen window (and the kids' bedroom) also has a smaller burial site.