How Lego and This Old House led me to Toyota City, Japan
At 6:30 am, November 5, 2005, my flight touched down at the Mid-Continent airport in Wichita, Kansas, bringing to a close an extraordinary journey for which God had been preparing me since the early days of my childhood. I was reminded of this story a few weeks ago when my pastor spoke on the topic of “purpose” on a Sunday morning. While digesting his message, I began the process of composing this bit of writing. My hope is that you may find some encouragement as I reminisce upon the paving stones of my life that formed the path to Toyota City, Japan.
From an early age, I loved building. I grew up in the 1970s and 1980s when Lego building kits consisted of rectangular blocks and plates with very few specialty pieces as you find in Lego kits today. While I enjoyed building spaceships and race cars, the bulk of my time was spent building houses for the recently introduced minifigs that were a part of the Lego Space sets and City sets. I would build ranch houses, like the one in which I lived. I would build split levels and two story houses, even tree houses. The whole idea of being a builder fascinated me.
At the time, This Old House and The New Yankee Workshop were some of the few TV shows geared towards helping a budding builder learn about professionals in the construction industry. This was long before HGTV and its myriad of building, renovating, remodeling, flipping and selling programs. My imagination was captured as I watched Norm Abram and Tommy Silva and Bob Vila as they renovated interesting homes with historical significance.
I would talk with my grandma during holiday visits to Kansas City about the most recent episodes of these TV programs and what had been done to refinish the floors or how windows were replaced. My grandma was just as interested as I in what was being done to these old houses and this was a special connection that I had with her.
My folks also helped to foster a love of building within me. They even let me set up a small workshop space in our unfinished basement. As I grew older I started drawing blueprints for houses and designing various projects like furniture and built-in cabinets for my parents’ house.
After I graduated high school, I attended a semester and a half of college. I decided that further education wasn’t the right thing for me at that time in my life. My dad sat me down and explained that there was nothing wrong with learning a trade; however, if I was not going to school I needed to do more with my life than just work fast food with my friends.
I was lucky enough to have a relative who was a finish carpenter (also called a trim carpenter) and he agreed to take me on and train me with this skill. A finish carpenter comes into a house after the walls have been framed and drywalled and hangs doors, trims out windows, installs kitchen cabinets and closet shelves, builds stair railings and fireplaces… all of the things that help to make a house a home.
I worked as a carpenter for about six years and then decided to go back to school where I received degrees in Information Technology. In the summer of 2004, I developed an interest in what God was doing around the world through missionaries. I even thought at one point in time that God might be calling my family to help with an English learning center in Northern Thailand. That change in our life didn’t happen but the knowledge and experience I gained through two short-term mission trips to Thailand gave me the connections and the experience that I would need for a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Japan.
In 2005, a Mennonite Brethren Church was being built in Toyota City, Japan and a group of Canadian finish carpenters were scheduled to travel to Toyota City in order to install kitchen cabinets, build closet shelves and do all of the finish carpentry for this church. At almost the last minute these Canadian Carpenters had to cancel their trip. Upon hearing about this opportunity I was instantly interested in how I might be able to step out of my normal everyday life and meet the needs of this church across the globe.
In a two week period of time I was able to secure ten days of the next year’s vacation from my job (at which I had been employed for three months) and find a private donor who paid for a round-trip ticket from Wichita to Toyota City. Before I could have second thoughts on the logistics of this crazy plan, I was loading up two Rubbermaid tubs with my personal woodworking tools and boarding a plane on my way to a construction site on the opposite side of the world.
I arrived in Japan on Saturday, October 22nd, and had the opportunity to experience a Japanese church service the next day, Sunday. On Monday, I started installing kitchen cabinets and countertops. I built shelving units in classrooms, closets, the pastor’s office and the church library. I essentially did whatever was needed in order to check woodworking off of the list of projects needed to be completed.
I finished these carpentry tasks two days before my flight home and had the opportunity to visit some of the attractions around Toyota City including the Toyota World Headquarters and a Japanese tea garden. Flying home I was exhausted but exhilarated knowing that God had used me, and this love of building that had been developed in my life so many years ago, in order to accomplish something for which I seem to be perfectly made.
So now I am left with the question: what’s next? The episode in my life described above occurred nearly two decades ago. If you have read any of my other articles, you know that I have spent some time in “the Gray Zone”, under the fog of medication, and have only recently returned to a place where I am looking forward to the future.
What’s next? I would like to hope that God may call me to another specific purpose, perhaps using the written word, to help others. Until then, I will try to remain faithful to the four words that have become my life’s purpose: Love God, Love others.
Respectfully submitted for His honor and glory.
