The Girl Worth Fighting For. ♥

While it may seem a little backwards, today I saw the coastline of northern Japan for the first time with my own two eyes. For whatever reason, the idea seeing areas affected particularly by the tsunami had been met with many hesitations, I'm not sure why. But one of the Crash staff who hasn't seen the disaster area himself decided to take our team along the long drive (about five hours) up past Sendai to a place called Ishinomaki, a cove like town with a huge harbor and many homes along the coast. After yesterday, I was hesitant to see more of the devastation in Japan, however, I knew this would be my only chance to see for myself the reason I am even here.

The drive up from Nasu to Ishinomaki was beautiful. I have never seen so much of Japan before. There are countless hills upon hills covered in green life of various stages and textures, from the heavy oak trees and the smooth ivy, to the soft whispering glades of the rice fields. There are houses in every warm color your head could think up, stacked along the hillsides, and high rises and overpasses, small cities within cities and streets that seem to lead to a world of magic. Japan has always been beautiful, I think. And so coming upon Ishinomaki slowly, turning the corner around a lush green hill, I was met with a sight that I'll never forget.

 There was a whole lot of nothing, just about as far as my eyes could see there was nothing. There are mountains of rubble and debris just sitting in piles so high I'd be afraid to climb it. Some places are still flooded, becoming resevoirs of water from the March 11th tsunami. Fences are knocked down, buildings' first stories are completely wiped away. Tables are overturned inside houses, childrens bikes and toys are strewn across the sidewalks.

I've seen pictures in the news, I've read stories, I've even watched videos of the aftermath of March 11th, 2011. But to come and see it with my own eyes felt surreal, and I felt an emotion I'd never expected to feel.

Tohoku University's Marine Science Building
stands hollow as everything has been washed
away on the inside.

I felt angry. Why did God let this happen?

As I walked around slowly taking in the sights, my heart just sunk deep into my stomach and my eyes welled up with tears that just wouldn't fall. My guess is I have somehow been desensitized to all of this, but when I think about it closely and carefully, my heart can find itself again, and I can pray for Japan in a way completely different than before.

I could pray before almost blindly saying, "God is good." and it's not that I don't believe that anymore, I will always believe that God is good. But I had to struggle and say these same words in faith, knowing the truth, but having to teach my heart again that my God is a God of Love.

A broken soup bowl.

After seeing all of this, I wish I could stay here longer, or start these past two weeks all over again and just work even harder than I did these past two weeks. I wish I could go and visit more refugees or speak to more people in Nasu and love on everyone the way that Christ would. 

I don't want to leave Japan. Something is just telling me it's time to though, and when I return home, I do have a mission in mind. As compelled as I already am for Christ in Japan, to see the devastation of the tsunami first hand has just ripped my heart to pieces. More people, more Christians need to come and see this, and have their hearts broken for the most unreached country in the world today. In the United States it's very easy to be desensitized to disaster, because it always happens to everyone else and hardly ever to us (not to gloss over the tornadoes in the midwest or Katrina at all!) and so we don't grasp disaster beyond a weeks worth of news reports, pictures, dramatic music and some kind of closure that comes by just not hearing about the disaster any more. If anyone has even the slightest amount of love for Japan, they need to come and see places like Ishinomaki. Then the phrase "Pray for Japan" will have a completely new meaning for all of us. I know the saying is becoming newer and newer to me even as I type this. We will pray for Japan a prayer unlike any other.