Moving Forward
We are coming up on 3 weeks since I arrived in Fiji, and it has not been the easiest 3 weeks.
The purpose of myself and Dane (fellow YWAM sailer) coming to Fiji was to take over the ships here in Fiji so that they could continue their work in taking teams out to the islands only accessible by boat. The teams would do work in discipleship of the people there in ways to live life how God calls us to, helping teach the bible, and bring living materials. (Many of these islands often only see a boat come to their island once a year, so living/building materials are appreciated).
The first 2 weeks were not easy weeks for me. Our leader, Hinrich was out on a trip on the larger of the 2 vessels, so we set about settling in. We moved into the smaller vessel that was left. But 2 weeks is to much for me to just settle in. We still had not met the team of people that were going out on these trips, and we did not know what the plan was for moving forward, how often we would be taking trips out, if there was a plan or not etc. After 2 weeks of this, a common thought was, “what am I really doing here?”
Community would have been a harder aspect to deal with as well were it not for the local missions families here. Moving from a vessel with a large community around constantly to a very small vessel in comparison with just 2 of us is a big change.
Yet, as I said, the families here are fantastic, helping us with anything we needed, spending time with us, and opening their doors to us for anything, even when we have not been living in the same house for the whole time we have been here. They have been a true blessing.
5 days ago our leader and his team arrived back from their trip. Introductions were made as we met the local people who would be leading and planning the trips, and we got more of a picture of the plan for the coming months. It for sure lifted my spirits hearing how grateful they truly were to have us here. With Hinirch leaving for the next 6 months besides 1 weeks in November, the boats would have been put away and not used till he returned in April. So with us here, they are able to continue planning trips out the the islands.
No trips are planned as of yet, but everything is now moving forward. We have moved into the bigger boat now and getting settled there.
I am hoping to start doing to videos as well as these writen updates, to help keep information up to date, and so you can see a little bit more about what we are doing. Figured it would be to much work to write whole updates about sails, so filming it to show you is the next best thing.
I Will try and write an update focused more on Fiji itself in the next couple days, so keep a look out for it.
Until next time,
Joshua