Fiji Day 24: Looking Ahead!

We've farewelled our friends at the conference, and we and our bus full of Papua New Guinea staff headed off to Nadi, Fiji where we all spend the night before boarding our planes home.

We're all a bit tired and brain-fatigued...it's been a very full and eventful 3 1/2 weeks.

BUT, right now Dan has 3 young staff around him at the restaurant table, trying to cram in last minute discussions and training Jasmine in the accounts before we part ways.

(One more sleep to go!)

Fiji Day 23: Final Banquet!

The final banquet was tonight:  Commissioning new staff (including our two PNG girls,) prayer for Ludwigs going to Guam, anniversary presents for length of time on staff of CCC Pacific,  stories on the history of CCC given by Judy Douglas (and she tells great stories!), prayer, singing, tasty food, lots of picture-taking, dressed-up beautiful people...it was an eventful night.  I think my favorite thing was hearing Judy tell of the heart behind our ministry and realizing how privileged we are to be a part of it. 

Judy D. with her new bilim from PNG

 Eva had a hard time receiving her award for 15 years on staff because George wasn't there to receive it with her...We are so proud to be her friends!

Two more sleeps until we arrive back home!

Fiji Day 22: Whale Tooth!

Tonight Judy Douglas was given a whale tooth at a kava ceremony.  (Highest honour in Fiji)



Earlier in the day Judy had lunch with all the ladies and told us how God has been teaching her to say, "Thank you."  Just after lunch I got a chance to practice because the hotel wanted us to change rooms...so we packed up and now are one floor up.

After the whale-tooth ceremony we returned to our room and had another chance to say "thank you" when we discovered that the water pressure is so low all over the city and our room has no water tonight.  

This river was in Anaconda movie

But on the plus side, we had fun in the afternoon with outdoor contests, and we're sitting on the bed right now watching Eureka on the TV in our room!

Fiji Day 21: Dancing!

For our opening night at the resort, the staff kids did a Polynesian dance, and then the PNG staff did a Melanesian dance...including DAN MILLS!  Yes, you heard it hear first!  Dan told Elton that he couldn't dance and Elton said, "This will be a first for you!"

Each province has their own design they decorate their faces with.  My design is from Greg's province, and Dan's is from Elton's.

Fiji Day 20: Table Talk!

This is the last night in this house.  Tomorrow we take a bus ride to a resort for the last three days of our conference.  Right now that sounds pretty good to me!  I'm tired.  The "big guns" from our HQ in Orlando (who are our speakers) flew in to Fiji today and will meet us there.

I AM going to miss mealtimes together in this house, though.  You can learn a lot about a person from "table talk" over the course of time.  Tonight I learned that Don's (our regional director) talk on the armour of God, zeroing in on the belt of truth, really meant a lot to Eva.  (Don gave many verses from Ephesians to demonstrate truth to cling to.)  And Jeanette, Koli's wife, used farming illustrations during her devotional (which everyone thought was wonderful,) and I learned that Greg is from a cattle farm.  His people live on a small island that belongs to PNG, and it has a river and grasslands...enough for 100 cows.  When he was little he tried to ride all the animals:  cows, pig, etc.  He said he fell off, got hurt, then his parents found out and he got hurt some more!

Did you guess the lyrics of yesterday's song?  "Yu strong blo mi taim mi wik" means, "You are my strength when I am weak."

(Tomorrow's blog should contain a surprise!  Hold onto your hats!)

Fiji Day 19: PNG report!

Amazing grace...that awesome gift of God doing something special and profound when you feel broken and totally inadequate.

As we showed powerpoint photos & music and the staff spoke of change lives they’d witnessed as a result of students hearing the Good News, the steps of faith taken by disciples...and themselves;  As they told of George Puipui and how much they’d learned from him and miss him; everyone could see that God had not abandoned his children in Papua New Guinea, even if He did take George home.

Amazing night, amazing grace.

Dan and I even joined the team in singing in Tok Pisin, which is similar to Solomon Island pijin.  Can you work out what this line of the song means?
 “Yu strong blo mi taim mi wik.”     (Sound it out phonetically and listen to what it sounds like!)  Answer will appear tomorrow!





Of course when we got home, the whole 8 person gang of us walked to McDonald’s for celebratory ice cream sundaes!

Fiji Day 18: Planning!

Greg (in green) and Jasmine lead worship

 
After a morning and afternoon of meetings, the evenings are reserved for country reports...what we’ve seen God do in the last year.  Fiji was Monday, and PNG is Tues.


After seeing a wonderful presentation of all God has done in Fiji, we...who are the biggest and most complex country, have a big challenge.  We got home after our day of meetings and tried to put together a flow of a program.  I think we’ll cover the last two years, since it’s been that long since we’ve had a staff conference, and last year was filled with so much sorrow because of losing our friend and director, George Puipui.  And yet, God is still big, and powerful, and faithful, and full of compassion...He has been so good to us this year as well.

Part of our plans call for singing a song in Tok Pisin.  Dan and I are learning it on the fly, so we’ll see how it goes!