For 2 weeks during the recent holidays, 17 or so of our young and not so young people spent time in Fiji on a missions trip. They were working at a camp doing painting and other maintenance projects.

Some of the highlights:
– The members of the group all took turns speaking to the church there. Eg, one person read from Ps 1 and made some comments theron.
– Renee, a 17 year old, gave her testimony (eg, a bit about her history and how she came to Christ). She spoke about how she interacts with her non-Christian friends. She went to Fiji to be part of another culture and church family.
– Phil spoke about how the money came through for his trip. Each person had to raise about $1500 to go.
– The team introduced a few songs they learnt in Fiji. One involved everyone getting up and walking around.
– Toward the end of the report back, the team showed a collections of photos showing scenes from their work. After wearing shorts and t-shirts during the trip, it must have been a shock to return to a Canterbury winter.
– The team got to do some tourist things too, eg, swimming, sailing, water fights, sailing, etc.
– The Fiji people were very generous and hospitable.

There’s talk about planning for the next missions trip to Africa in 2010.