Update from Nashville!

Hello Everyone!

    It's been a while since my last entry, so I thought I would update followers and give  those who are new to my blog a little summary of my life thus far. I graduated high school a year early & left for YWAM, where I studied in Hawaii for three months then served with Samaritan's Purse in Japan for another three months. Immediately following that, I spent a couple of weeks in Maui trying to figure out what to do next and ended up moving to Nashville, Tennessee for work. I have been here for the last six months just making money to save for college. While here I found my passion for art and my great desire to counsel women who come out of human trafficking in other countries. I have since decided to pursue a career in art therapy, as a tool to help rehabilitate those women. So, starting in January I will (God-willing) attend school in Washington state to start working towards my masters degree. I am currently applying to Moody Bible Institute in Spokane, where I will hopefully attending if I am accepted.

         While I have been in Nashville I've been spending my time working, reading a lot, studying French and speaking to as many professionals in the psychology field as possible. 

I do miss missions very much right now, but I believe that God puts us through certain seasons for a reason, and I believe that right now I just need to be preparing in whatever way I can for whatever is next. I do hope to find an internship or job at some counseling center while I am in Spokane, so as to get exposed to the psychology field more. But we shall see what God has in store. 

 Please feel free to email me with any questions or comments you have! 

Much love,

Demetria

demasdemi@gmail.com 

Hello from Nashville!

Hey ya'll! (ok I dont actually ever say ya'll, it just seemed appropriate..)
   I am so sorry that it has been so long since my last post. Life is crazy as usual and remembering to update my blog is not one of my strong points...The rest of our outreach in Japan was amazing. We went back down to Narashino Church in Chiba for our last week there in February, it was there that we debriefed and kind of let ourselves breathe before we went back to Hawaii. We arrived in Hawaii on March 3rd, which was our second March 3rd (time change-we went back in time a day!) I left the next day for Maui, where my family was waiting for me. It was so great to be reunited with them, but it was very hard to leave my Japan Outreach family. Because that is exactly what they had become, my second family. That is one of the factors of traveling and short term missions that I struggle with the most. I get so attached to the people I meet and so leaving is like ripping a piece of me away. But God is good, and shines through that. Amen? Amen!
Anyways, the reason my family was there in Maui waiting for me is because I was planning on moving to maui directly after YWAM, and I didn't know the next time I would see my family, so they used it as an excuse for a vacation and came out. I bet you're wondering why I am writing this from Nashville then..hahah me too! Well, while I was with my family in Maui I was desperately looking around for a job and an apartment, but things were just not working out, so I was praying and I really felt like God was saying "Not yet." It was hard to submit to that. But I have learned my lesson in obedience to God, He knows what's up, so I told my dad and he brought up the idea of going to Nashville. I told my sister Jessica who was already living there and she loved the idea, but my family was going back the 14th of March, and she didn't have a place for me to stay until the beginning of April. I had to decide if I was going to go back home with my parents until April and basically do nothing except for catch up with friends and wait for april to come or couch-surf in maui. But I only knew of a few people I could stay with in Maui and only for a couple of nights, and I had fifty bucks in my pocket, so it was definately going to be a faith journey. When I was trying to make the decision my friend back in Chicago called me up and said she was spending a couple of weeks in Cali with her family and wanted to know if I wanted to join her. She would be there until the first week of April. It worked out so perfectly, but I still had a couple of weeks in maui after my family left that I would be on my own with no where to stay. But God was so good and totally came through. It was one of the best weeks of my life. I made great friends and it was really nice to be travelling on my own because I got to spend a lot of alone time with Jesus. He was my travel buddy. It was hard to leave the islands because it felt like my second home, but I clung to the "not YET" God had given me. I still had that 'yet'...so i have hope hahaha. California was great, I hadn't seen my friend Hannah (the one who invited me out there) since I had left for YWAM in September so it was great to be with her. She is my 4th sister basically. Then I headed over to Nash, where I am now, I am living in a small college town just outside of downtown, I have an amazing roommate, I just got a job as a waitress and making great friends. I don't know what is next, as soon as I am settled I am going to start looking for some kind of internship I could do in another country helping out at a halfway house or something for women who got out of prostitution. Or maybe i'll just go straight to college. God only knows. Much love!
Demetria

me in starbucks in Nashville-

Ishinomaki-shi

Hello again!
Ohio Gozaimasu from Japan Ishinomaki-shi!
We have have been here for a little over 2 weeks now. We are
staying at a home where a missionary family is temporarily
staying, they call it the Be One house (the name of the
ministry they are with) Below is a picture of the room we
(aka my team) sleeps in. We have to pack up all those
blankets and foutons every morning after we wake up so
that we have a little more room to meet in.

We have been doing a lot of hands-on work here.
We have breakfast at 8 then leave for the worksite to
either move rubble to the dump (one of the many huge ones here)
(little fact: the tsunami created the amount of trash that
this town alone would create in over 100 years!) or we gut-out,
or mud-out a destroyed house. We have also been helping a man
named Cameyama-san rebuild his shed for his car shop, which
also involves digging for water lines in rock-soil. So we
have all been very tired physically from all the labor but
it is such satisfying work that you don't even care that
you can't feel your hands or have a forest of knots in your
back. The ministry here is amazing because the people are
so ripe for the gospel. Just yesterday a young woman who hangs
out at the Be One House a lot was asking us openly what we
thought of God and why we loved Him so much. It encouraged
us as much as it encouraged her because we were reminded why
we were here in the first place. We love because HE first loved
us. Amen? Amen!
 Oh I forgot to tell you guys! The last day we were in
Narashino-shi we had a goodbye night with the kids who came
to the church for english class. None of the kids were christians
so before we said our last goodbye we presented the gospel to
them and told them why we were here. Then at the end we asked
them to bow their head and close their eyes and told them
we were going to say a blessing prayer for them and at the end
of the prayer we asked them (while their eyes were closed) if
they wanted to accept this Jesus into their heart, and AT LEAST
2/3 of the class raised their hands! They are young but definately
old enough to understand what was happening. Praise God!
Thank you Jesus we got to see some of the fruits from our
ministry! He is so good and faithful. Please, if you remember,
pray for these children who accepted Christ, that they would grow
up to be strong men and women of Christ, expanding His Kingdom.


We as a team are getting very close too, unity is definately
a gift God has given us. Praise God!
Its snowing here and the heat isnt working so  my fingers are too cold to type
any more, so sionara!
Naturally,
Demetria