The year 2022 is underway. What will the next twelve months hold? Only God knows! I am thankful that we journey together with Him. He goes before us, lighting our path day by day. One plan our family has for this year is to take a six-month furlough to the States, to report to our supporting churches, visit family and friends, and recruit more workers for God’s harvest field.

You may wonder what it is like to be on furlough from the mission field. I will attempt to give a glimpse of it for you. As a side note, each missionary’s furlough may look vastly different from how we do things.

• We have around 34 supporting churches. We hope to visit each one. This means that every available Sunday, we will be visiting a different church to give an update or report. Obviously, in a half a year, there are only 26 Sundays, so that means a number of Wednesday night services will need to be used as well. We enjoy meeting up with “old” friends we’ve seen and known for the past 20+ years, in addition to meeting newcomers to the churches since we’ve been away. It does involve a LOT of traveling!
• Our supporting churches are located mostly in Alabama, Iowa, and Wisconsin, but there are some in Kansas and Minnesota as well. During our furlough, we typically live with both sets of parents for some of the time, and we hope to find a place to live during the times we’ll be in Iowa.
• It is difficult to leave behind those we’ve been meeting with here. Norman always makes a plan to have someone preach each Sunday that we’re gone. So far, we’ve had someone in place to help out. There are two men who are planning to arrive in June to cover for us, but they’re coming from the US, and the coronavirus has kept Japan’s borders shut for much of the last couple years. Pray with us that these two men will be able to arrive this summer!
• We look forward to joining God’s church gathered in larger groups than we see here in Japan. A typical church service here has under twenty people at any one time. To sing together with a group of one hundred is thrilling!
• Our kids love to spend time at American libraries! We borrow loads of books each week we can!
• One of our children said the thing she likes about furlough is traveling by plane to get there. And then she’s able to read ALL the signs! (Japanese is very difficult to read!)
• Some of us look forward to all the food we can’t get here. This includes the wide variety of breakfast cereals, instant oatmeal, certain snacks, flour tortillas, sausage, “real” ham/bacon, macaroni and cheese. (However, when we leave Japan, we will miss Japanese rice, unsweetened green tea, and chopsticks!)
• We will have to get accustomed to driving on the right side of the road again! And American vehicles are SO much bigger than Japanese ones! Driving speeds in the US are also much faster.
• I will need to relearn how to cook in America. I use a gas stove here, so electric is very different. I’ve also grown used to adjusting recipes for using what’s available in Japan.
• People act so differently in America, too! Japanese tend to be reserved and to hide their emotions. It can be both refreshing and shocking to experience the change between the countries!
• It is very strange to live for half a year without a home. In recent years, we’ve been gone from our home in Japan for only a couple months. After even that long, I am more than ready to be back at “our own place.”
• This time, we’ll be leaving behind our two dogs. We hope we can find someone to watch them!

Maybe that gives you an idea of what we’re looking forward to. Furlough can be both exciting and exhausting. We are so grateful for each one who prays for us year after year. And our churches have been so faithful in supporting us for over twenty years now! Thank you from our hearts!