Urbana09

My new favorite Bible verse is Revelations 21:23.

v. The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp.

Going to Urbana was honestly just more inspirational and motivational to do the things that I already had in mind. Didn't learn a lot of "new" information honestly. But this is just a personal thought of course. I'm sure it was much more informational for many other people.

But honestly, I strongly encourage anyone reading this post to attend Urbana 2012. (Flying there from might be a wiser choice, however.) Although you might hear a lot of the same things you've heard in the past, hearing it from different cultural and personal perspectives, it can be really motivational and even life-changing.

During the 4th night of Urbana, there were decision cards for all of the attendees to fill out and I marked down that I would commit to short-term missions. As of now, I have my mind set on missions in Japan. But even though we were encouraged to act now upon our decisions, my heart has to be fully set on God first, and must agree with what my mind is set on.

So why Japan? Well I'm glad you asked! Here are a bit of statistics first. (Just because Asians love it.) Japan is the 2nd most unreached people ground in the world. 0.2% of Japan's population claims to be Christian, and 0.15% are evangelists. 9% of teenage girls make themselves prostitutes. (Japan is one of the most wealthy countries in the world. Most teenage prostitutes don't need the money. They simply want extra money to indulge in materialism.)

I've always been fascinated by the culture in Japan. The way people behave, the foods they eat, their creativity, and their success in business. That's even the reason why I'm taking Japanese in college right now. I really hope to be fluent in a few years. (I know I know, watching anime will help me learn some new vocab, but I'm honestly not that interested in anime.)

But when I heard the negative side about Japan's culture, it made me even more eager to go there.

** I originally planned to write more, but my mind has just shut down for the day and I need some sleep. If Greg ever reads this, he'll probably nag me about giving this as a testimony sometime in the near future so expect to hear the rest soon.