BULA! Greetings from Fiji! Pam Christy and I just returned from a two week outreach with a bunch of fun-loving, hard-working New Zealanders. What an awesome experience to see Kiwis, Fijians and North Americans alongside each other doing Kingdom work. The staff at the homebase in Lautoka is led by Oscar and Aralai Vuki, a couple who have a true heart for serving the Lord. Other staff include Auntie Mila, cook and site leader, Losana, site leader and Iliesa, site leader.

Current sites include a pre-school, a special needs school, a retirement home, a construction site, and men’s prison ministry. Site highlights: N.Z. teenagers dramatizing David and Goliath and Zaccheus to wide-eyed Fijian kids, applying lipstick and fingernail polish to an astonished and grateful elderly Fijian lady, installing all the windows in Auntie Mila’s new home and an adult leader from N.Z. giving her heartfelt testimony to a group of eager prisoners hungry to hear what she had to share.

Other highlights: excursion to South Sea Island where many snorkeled for the first time, touring one of the earliest villages in Fiji and singing as a team in their church, a visit to an orphanage with lots of hugs and tears and worshiping on Sunday in a Fijian church. Wow, can those people sing!

Watching the Kiwi teenagers share about how they encountered God in new ways as they left their comfort zones and served others, their appreciation of the Fijian hospitality, and an eagerness to continue their spiritual walk with a heart open to missions: that’s what SI is all about!