God’s Provision for CRASH workers – read the story! Update! CRASH Japan is partnering with Samaritan’s Purse, the relief and outreach arm of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, and will be distributing the contents of a 747 full of supplies this week in affected areas.
One missionary returned to his family’s seaside retreat, looking for friends who lived there. His personal story here.
A US friend tells of a Japanese woman, Natsumi, who is interning with Campus Crusade in Texas. Her grandparents home was destroyed in the tsunami and she asked that believers around her pray that they would be found alive. After several days the friend was giving up hope but everyone kept praying. Almost a week later Natsumi reported that they had been found! On the day of the earthquake Natsumi’s neice decided to take them to the store for food. From there they went to pick up her niece’s father. Then the quake struck and the tsunami sirens blared. The niece drove quickly to pick up her mother where she worked. The parking lot is on a hill so when the wave hit the car was pushed against other cars so they could not get out, but only their feet were wet. For 50 hours they were trapped in the car, but had food from the store to eat. What an answer to prayer! Now praying that her family will come to know Christ!
From a friend: We got GREAT news this evening. A missionary friend in Ishinomaki was able to locate Pastor Okamoto and his wife, the pastor of the church Tim’s parents started over 50 years ago. Apparently after the first quake Pastor Okamoto drove out to pick up church members living in low areas and get them to the church which is on higher ground. They are all still living there and were thankful for supplies brought in by a team from the CRASH (Christian Relief, Assistance, and Spiritual Help) Headquarters.
We heard from a friend in Illinois who heard that another family from Ishinomaki (yes, sometimes the news comes in a round about way) is safe. One son, ditched his car and scrambled up a hill to escape the tsunami, while their other son was washed away…but managed to catch a hold of a traffic signal, where he hung for 6 hrs. before being rescued. Praise the Lord!
Tim wrote the following tonight: In one week God has exploded CRASH Japan into a dynamic force, manned by almost 100 volunteers, divided into about 20 depts. CRASH is in now in contact with 3500 potential volunteer workers, and is sending several teams to disaster areas each day. My role is to organize the relief supplies coming in from around Japan and from overseas, and to establish smooth channels for collecting relief supplies. Our kids’ school has allowed us the use of their cafeteria until April 3rd, for storage, and it seems we have just enough supplies coming in as we have capacity to transport them out to disaster zones.
Thank you for praying. Thank you for giving. Thank you for keeping in touch. It all means so much. Please keep praying. We’ve heard of people coming to Christ, we’ve heard of churches being used as rescue centers in their neighborhoods. One of the cool things about the ministry of CRASH is to see missionaries from so many different mission boards coming together to work for the people who need help. Japanese believers are getting the vision to do what they can do join in as well. God is doing good things even in the midst of hard times. – from missionary Katie C in Tokyo.
Pray for Japan music video, God of This City.