Did you know that in Japan, for every 13 people there is one vending machine!

That’s a lot of machines.

In fact there are 5 machines only 15m from our front door!

My first obsevation would have to be that Japanese Pastors WORK HARD! I admire there dedication to God and their call to serve him.

At least 6 or 7 days of the week they are on the go.

Every week they go to or do:  prayer meetings, pastors meetings, gospel music workshops, ladies meetings, bible studies, childrens groups, counseling, visitation, Sunday school, service preparations, etc, etc, etc….

There are a lot of meetings in Japan – a group based society means that the Pastor is not on his ‘own’ but meets weekly with a group of pastors to discuss matters and make decisions. They have support from other in the same position.

One other difference that I have noticed from Australia is that in Japan the pastor must be at everything and be involved in everything. Even ladies meeting for example, of the the pastor will lead or be at these. This is very demanding upon the pastor and often doesn’t allow for people in the church to grow into leadership roles.

Sermons usually go for at least 40 minutes (unlike our 20 or 30 minute ones from Australia) so this also keeps the pastors busy in preparation.

Many church activities don’t start until after 8pm due to people retuning home from work at a later time. This means many nights of the week the Pastor is out away from his family.

It must be diffcult for the pastor to be able to model good family relatinships to the other church members when there are so many demands upon his schedule.

I see many good aspects about the way a Japanese pastor conducts his daily life – he is dedicated, motivated and strong in faith – but there are also some areas that concern me – and I see a problems with ‘burnout’ and exhaustion, and an isolation from family life.

This is Ben at Lake Biwa with two of our church members.

They were seeing who could ’skip’ their stones the furthest.

These are two photos from a 3 day Retreat that we went on with the SFDD Japanese Pastors that WEC Japan works with. There is one of the view from our bedroom window (stunning countryside!), and also a picture from one of the services we had in the hotel chapel.

(the hotel had a chapel because it is owned by the VIP club – who are christian business men in Japan who want to make a difference in their workplaces).

The blossoms were really beautiful after the grey and cold winter.

But they just lasted a few weeks.

Now they are gone and the tulips are out – and they are just as stunning.

The cherry blossom is only in full bloom for about 2 days.

The Japanese love this time of year so much. People are out everywhere having picnics, walking around together as families and riding bikes in the parks and on the river bank paths.

Interestingly, My husband and I thought the cherry blossom symbolized ‘new life’ to the Japanese, like many of the ’spring things’ do to us in Australia (baby animals, daffodils etc).

We were recently told that in fact the cherry blossom symolizes ‘the fleetingness of life’ to the japanese, due to the full bloom only lasting a few days.

Here’s a few pictures from this spring.