After all the trouble it took to get us to Ofunato, was God really calling us to leave?
Whether the cloud stayed over the tabernacle for two days or a month or a year, the Israelites would remain in camp and not set out; but when it lifted, they would set out. (Numbers 9:22 NIV)
Summer, 2014. We were nearly halfway through our two-year assignment in Japan.
The kids were thriving, having attained age-appropriate fluency in Japanese within five months of starting school. Soo and I had settled into our apartment, which itself was a major answer to prayer, and we had learned to navigate day-to-day life in Ofunato. We knew what to do, where to go, and whom to ask when we needed help. Ministry was going well at the volunteer base, and the people of the community were increasingly open to hearing what we had to share about Jesus.
Things were going so well that I thought to myself, do we really only have one year left here? After all the trouble it took to get us to Japan and into a home in Ofunato, would it soon be time to wrap up? What if God was calling us to stay longer? Soo and I began to pray and ask God if He wanted us to extend our stay in Ofunato.
I fully expected Him to say yes. But God had other plans.
I waited for confirmation, and while I didn’t see any ducks this time:
- A pastor friend of mine, whom I had met once in a class years before but had not seen or heard from since, messaged me out of the blue to tell me about a dream he had in which he was telling me to go to Santa Ana. This was odd, as he was living in Northern California and couldn’t remember the last time he had been in Santa Ana.
- Our family went to a store in Morioka, the capital of our prefecture, a two-hour drive away. As we entered the store, we noticed that a woman who was unloading her shopping cart wore a T-shirt on that read, “Orange County, CA.” As Soo and I laughed about it, the woman turned around, and emblazoned on the back of her shirt was “Santa Ana.” This, in a chain store in the middle of Iwate Prefecture.
- Soo and I stopped by a drugstore in Ofunato when a familiar song was playing over the sound system. It was in English, and I recognized the lyrics, as I had included them in my goodbye email to the staff when I resigned from my church role to pursue missions in Japan. The song was “Wherever You Will Go” by The Calling, and the line that resonated was this: “And maybe I’ll find out a way to make it back someday, to watch you, to guide you, through the darkest of your days.” The song was blaring over speakers at this drugstore in sleepy downtown Ofunato.
My home church had recently started a second site in Santa Ana. Was God calling my family to go back to the USA and attend this church in Santa Ana? Soo and I kept praying about this throughout the summer and into the fall. As we did, our sense was that this was indeed what God was calling us to do. I didn’t know what I’d do for a living if we were to leave the mission, as the original plan was to go to Japan for the mandatory two-year initial assignment, return to the USA for at least one year, then go back to Japan as career missionaries.
But if this was what God wanted us to do, we trusted that He would lead us and we would obey, even if we didn’t understand.
Would God have given me all these crazy confirmations to go to Ofunato– the dreams, the signs, the ducks crossing the street– only to have us leave after just two years?
When Jesus was born and his life was in danger, an angel of God appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him” (Matthew 2:13). Later, when Herod was dead and the danger had subsided, the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph again in a dream and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child’s life are dead” (v. 20).
Dream telling them to leave; dream telling them to return.
Following God means going when He says “go,” stopping when He says “stop,” and moving on when He moves on ahead of us.
Since we didn’t want to be the ones trying to move ahead of God, I prayed for greater discernment. “God, it was not an easy decision to come to Japan, and we will not leave here unless we are fully convinced that this is what You want. Just like I needed a sign to confirm that You’ve called us to Japan, I am going to ask You to give us a sign that this is really You calling us to leave Ofunato and go to Santa Ana.”
I got the words, “license plate.”
License plates in Japan aren’t personalized like they are in some states, nor do they contain any letters. Most plates consisted of four digits, with a dash between pairs.
I thought about this for a second. The church in Santa Ana was known as “ten-ten,” based on its street address. Okay, I thought. I know what the confirmation will be: If God is calling us to Santa Ana, I will see a license plate reading 10-10.
I searched for this plate for months but didn’t find a single car with these numbers. In the meantime, we didn’t tell anyone about our sense of calling to Santa Ana, and I focused on making our remaining time in Ofunato count.
If I couldn’t stay and minister here long-term, I would do my best to equip someone who could.
