Freshman orientation ended last week, and the busyness of ministry continues. For me, this has been the most exhausting period: building friendships with new freshman contacts, discipling current student leaders, planning weekly meetings... on top of everything, i am in charge of the singapore mission team coming in may/june this year... so much is happening and so much more could be done. the plate of every staff is full and i wonder when God will raise more laborers for this land... today as i was walking to the weekly meeting, i asked God why life is but a mere breathe when it is also a very long race. with a word God could call me home anytime, but while i'm on this earth i have to keep on running...

Last thursday at about 3am, there was a big fight in the apartment above mine. For at least thirty minutes i could hear loud noises of furnitures being thrown all over. What was really horrifying was the voice of a woman screaming non-stop. It was so loud and clear,filled with anger and pain. Other neighbors started gathering at the corridor wondering if calling the police was necessary... i knelt beside my bed crying and praying to God for help. i know that more than the compassion i was feeling for the lady that was screaming, i was really crying because i felt very scared. that night, i cldnt sleep without my lights. i thought about the many other horrifying news of murders and suicides that i see on the tv everyday. i thought about the many japanese i personally know that are in some kind of bondage or mental depression. i guess there are just some nights where the isolation and spiritual darkness of japan overwhelms me...

this week there were more alarming news of murder at virginia tech, the iraq bomb incident... all these and so many more things are happening all around the world. i know that this earth that is filled with sins is really not my home, because God has promised a better place that all who believe can place their hope in.

"1Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.5He who was seated on the throne said, "I am making everything new!" Then he said, "Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true. 6He said to me: "It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life. 7He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son. 8But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars—their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death....... 22I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. 23The 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. 24The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. 25On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there. 26The glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it. 27Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb's book of life. " -Revelations 21