3/11 Earthquake

Do you remember where you were one year ago today, when the Great Tohuku Japan Earthquake struck?  Today, March 11th, marks the one year anniversary of this life-changing event.  The Great Tokuku (Northeast) Japan Earthquake, measured at magnitude 9.0 on the Richter Scale, was the largest ever recorded earthquake to hit the country of Japan (and the 4th largest ever recorded in the world). 

I clearly remember the morning I heard about the quake.  Haidee had already been living and teaching in Fukushima, Japan, since June of the previous year.  I was working at Mount Carmel Ministries, in Alexandria, MN.  I woke up around 7:00 am, just as the rising sun was poking through my window.  I noticed a new text message on my cell phone.  It was from Haidee's mom, Sue:  "Have you seen the news yet?  Did Haidee email you?  Do you know if she's okay?"

Having no TV or radio in my house, I immediately turned on my computer and opened up my email.  There I found a new message from Haidee, sent just 30 minutes earlier:

"Hey.  So I spent the afternoon with my English students under the table for 45min...and then I cleaned up part of the church wall that had fallen down...we just had what they are calling the biggest earthquake in over 100 years. Anyway, so I'm letting you know that if you see things on the news, etc., don't worry, we really are fine...we're just riding some aftershock waves and waiting for power to come back on."

"IF you see things on the news" . . . .News stories were everywhere!  I spent the next hour browsing the internet as more and more updated news articles with headlines like:  "Hundreds dead as earthquake, tsunami rake Japan," and "Nuclear fears emerge after quake," became available.

I sent emails and text messages to Haidee, but didn't really expect that she would receive any of them, with the power being down in parts of Northeast Japan.  That afternoon I drove down to a hotel in St. Cloud, MN to speak at a regional youth gathering.  The news at the hotel started using words like "leaking radiation," "meltdown imminent," and "just like Chernobyl" to describe the situation at Fukushima nuclear power plant.  All 250 high school students and youth leaders present at the gathering said a prayer for the people in Japan that night.  I returned home late that night (incidentally driving through a blizzard that would close Interstate 94 - just after I made it back to Alexandria) to find no new messages from Haidee. 


Thankfully, 36 hours later we were able to have a Skype conversation.  There was a lot of cleanup work to be done, and you had to wait in long lines to obtain drinkable water, but Haidee and Cindy, and the members of the church were doing okay.  And, only two weeks later, Haidee was still able to come home to Minnesota for her brother's wedding, so we got to be together for a short while.

Here are a few pictures that Haidee took after the earthquake.  Click here to read some of the blogs Haidee wrote in the aftermath of the earthquake:.

 People in Fukushima City waiting in line for food and water.

Koriyama Church and the apartment in Fukushima after the earthquake.

So much has changed in Japan since the 3/11 earthquake.  Many people have lost their homes from the earthquake or tsunami damage, or have been forced to evacuate the radiation zone near the power plant.  Families have been separated, as many have chosen to send their children to live further away where radiation levels are lower.  Anxiety and hopelessness have further increased suicides in a country which has already has one of the highest suicide rates in the world.  (25 out of every 10,000 Japanese people took their own lives last year).  


In the midst of these disasters, God has opened more doors for His love to be made known among His children in Japan:  Concerned about radiation levels, many foreign English teachers left, creating job openings in Fukushima that have been filled by Christian teachers!  The local Fukushima churches began to work together shortly after the 3/11 earthquake, forming a Christian Network of churches that has never before existed in this city.  A country whose people put so much pride in their own strength and endurance has lost an illusion of stability, creating a need to find a True Source of a firm foundation.

I find it no coincidence that I opened my Mount Carmel Daily Texts devotional book to find today's verse (chosen by lot by the Moravian church) to be Proverbs 18:10:  "The name of the LORD is a strong tower; the righteous run to it and are safe."  Yahweh is very much the Lord of heaven and earth.  The same God who created the sea and ordered it to obey His command is still in control of His creation today.  In Him we find our strength and safety.  And He loves us so very much.  He loves the people in Japan so very much.


PLEASE PRAY for God's will to continue to unfold here in Fukushima, Japan.  Pray that He will make His love and peace known to people whose lives have been riddled by anxiety and despair.  Pray that people here will be filled with a longing for real Truth and that they will seek Yahweh, to find their strength and safety in Him alone.  Pray that Christians living here in Japan would always be prepared to answer everyone who asks them to give a reason for this hope that we have.  (1 Peter 3:15)


And may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. (Romans 15:13)