DTS Graduation

2010 DTS

Sadly, but surely, it sooner or later  had to come… the DTS would have to come to an end.   Here are our students holding their graduation certificates which enable them to become  YWAM staff members and/or continue on with their studies in the University of the Nations.  Yes!  All of them made it and have now left us to return to their homes, seeking God for their next step.

IT is always a sweet sadness to see them complete the course and then leave us when they have been so much a part of our lives for the last five months.

DTS with Staff

Here they are again with the staff who prayed with them, lived with them, cried with them and did outreach with them during their time with us.  Some of the staff were graduates of our first two schools and others were blessings that God sent along the way.

It has been awesome to be involved in the students’ lives and see them grow and grow as they opened up their hearts to the love of Jesus.  And then add to that seeing the joy they had in sharing that love in Japan with high school kids and University students and then in the Philippines with bar girls and others in the red light district.  They should not be content with the ordinary now.

English Camp

Playing Rainbow

As you may know, the week of Aug. 8-14 we held an English camp for the kids in our neighbourhood. Twenty grade one friends of team member Maria’s daughter Claire  attended and almost all of our staff were able to get involved.   We decided that at this stage we could not use the English camp to share the gospel the way we hope to in the future but we were able to prepare the way for that by building relationship and trust with these kids and their parents.

On the first day, we taught the kids ‘hello’, ‘what is your name’, and ‘my name is’.   We also taught them the phonetic sounds of the first 8 letters of the alphabet.   Each day, we gradually taught them more and more  until they knew all the phonetic sounds and could ask questions beginning with “how” ( ‘how are you” ,  ”how old are you?) and “where” ( ‘where is it’ , ‘ where is your home’)’

Maria, Derick and Rhonda teaching the kids vocabulary words.

Every day began with a game to reinforce the previous day’s teaching, to build relationship and to have fun. It was like “fruit basket” but we called it “rainbow”.  The kids seemed to really enjoy this game and it was a great ice breaker.

Then we got into our teams with the children to listen as Maria, Derick and Rhonda used little skits to teach the new phrases.  First they would teach them the phrases (e.g. how old are you?). The leaders then helped the children practise in their teams and then play games like ‘Duck, Duck’ using their new phrases!   As we taught the children vocabulary words we were able to review them together before learning new words later!

If you look closely at the card in the picture to the right, you can see that it says, ‘God’. This is the only time we mentioned God to the kids, merely saying that God is not a ‘what’ but a ‘who’ and that you cannot see God. There are many festivals on now in which idols are carried around in what looks something like the ark of the covenant! (mikoshi).  Children are encouraged to carry these.  Many of these idols are in the form of animals.  Although the facts that God is a person and we cannot see Him are very basic, we hope that this will affect their view on God, and eventually lead them to him.

Blue Team with team leader, Mary

Red Team with team leader, Katie

After this, we had break time. This time was set aside for the kids as a bath room  and water break, but many kids saw it merely as

an opportunity to rough house with their new friends (below).   We all enjoyed this time as well and had a great time playing with the kids.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           After break, we all gathered together to watch a dvd which taught the kids phonetics.  The fun part came next!  Maria and the team had made props to act out the DVD characters who made the sounds of the letters!  It was great fun and the kids learned phonics, too!

The last part of the morning was spent doing crafts and hearing a very special story , “You are Special” by Max Lucado, translated into Japanese.  ’You are Special’ was our theme for the week and we prayed daily for the children to feel and believe that.  Throughout the week, we asked the kids what they thought about this story, and their answers were quite interesting. When we asked the kids if they were special, many said that they were just ‘normal’.

Derick playing with one of the kids

When we asked them if they had anyone like Eli (who represents God although we did not tell this to the kids), they said, “you mean someone who’s nice to me?” And many mentioned their grandparents. When everyone finished talking, one girl looked around and then said, “I don’t have anyone like that.” So heart wrenching.

Crafts

The craft was making their own finger puppets! The children drew 2 fathers, 2 mothers, 2 brothers, 2 sisters, and 2 babies’ faces. We then took these faces and glued them onto gloves to make finger puppets.  However we ran into a problem.

Orange Team

Some of the children were not drawing their fathers. When we asked why they weren’t drawing them they said, “I don’t have a father, so I can’t draw him. ” This was really sad. Eventually, we were able to convince the children in question to draw their grandfather instead as quite a few Japanese children often spend more time with their grandparents then their actual parents.

The Play

On the final day of the camp, the DTS performed a skit version of “You are Special”. Many of the kids were very excited to see the play and seemed to really enjoy it. However when, after the play, we asked the kids if they thought that they were special, they replied ‘no, we’re just normal.’

Over all we were blessed to help in this camp and feel that we were able to create meaningful relationships with the kids. As the new school term begins we look foward to fostering relationships with these kids and, hopefully, leading them to a meaningful relationship with Jesus.

Camp Picture

Tsuby! You are one in a million!!!

After the singles outreach Rhonda & I headed out for the Asakusa Temple where we were going to meet part of our team as they were planning to visit the stores and also see the biggest firework display in Tokyo.  This event attracts an estimated one million people and as you can see from this picture it is already VERY crowded and there are still two hours before the fireworks begin.

Well you can imagine my surprise when in the midst of all those people suddenly out of nowhere appears a familiar face –  Tsuby, one of the  high school boys in the small group I lead for Tokyo Baptist Church.  So, Tsuby, today you really were a one in a million blessing in the midst of the push and shove of the crowds.

Our friends finally arrived.  Two of them are volunteers for the English outreach this week and next week.  Katy – in the white top – is from our church in the UK,  Holland Road Baptist Church, and Bonnie is from Virginia in the USA.  The guys are Olivier – DTS staff from Quebec and Jesse – DTS student from Colorado.

DTS Outreach Continues

Here they come and go again.  After returning from the Hi-BA camp the DTS was able to fit in a couple of hours for testimony from the outreach to the Philippines and also share highlights from the Hi-BA camp.  It seems that this year’s camp was the best so far in seeing high-school kids hungry for God.

In the Philippines they witnessed to several girls from the red light district and saw four of them come to church before they left to return to Japan.

In the picture you see a quick shot of how we finished up the time in praying for the students and their coming trip to Hokkaido then having them pray blessing for their leaders as well as speak out their commitment to follow them during the outreach.

DTS – OUTREACH

The outreach phase of the DTS is about halfway through and we get to see the teams in between trips.  Their first trip was right here in Japan when they served with Hi-BA on their gospel team outreach, working with Japanese high school kids to invite Japanese kids to rallies.  Like last year it was exciting to see many giving their lives to Jesus through this outeach.

The Gospel Teams are probably the most time intensive portion of our  DTS outreach as they started early morning till late at night with no day off for two weeks.  Then they came back to us for a week of lectures ending with preparation for their overseas trip to the Philippines.  This trip is one of the areas where we are taking things to a higher level than before.  This time the location and type of outreach came from the intercession time of the lecture phase.  Our outreaches are all led by young staff and have proved to be an incredible time of growth for them as they have more than stepped up to what was expected of them.  For the Philippines it was Kyle from our first DTS who took the leadership for the team.   AWESOME !!!!!

In the Philippines they reached out to bar girls,  teaming up with the local YWAM base in the area.  I have  not heard all the reports yet but four of the bar girls gave their lives to Jesus and will be followed up by the local YWAM staff.

Coming back to Tokyo our DTS missionaries had two days to rest then here they are in the pictures at our local train station heading off to be camp counselors for the Hi-BA summer international camp.  Our relationship with Hi-BA has  grown over the years and it is a special part of our DTS outreach every year.

Staff Training

Wow,  we just completed our week of staff training for our new staff workers and I don’t have any pictures from that time except this one.  It was Kyle’s birthday this week and already there is a tradition for the school.  Yes the birthday boy or girl will have to wear this hat all day on their special day.

We had Barry Austin teach the training week. it has been a blessing to have Barry join us and impart some of the wisdom he has accrued over his 40+ years of leadership in DTS’S in Europe and in leadership training across the globe.  We are VERY fortunate that Barry has family here in Japan that keeps bringing him back at about the right time for our staff training week.