Bula vinaka! Greetings and thanks!

Yes, greetings from the Pacific Theological College and thanks be to God for travelling mercies. I've spent a week acclimatising and work begins on 1st September. I'll post some introductory scenic pictures later - just for flavour!

Each morning this week it's been great for me - for body, mind and spirit - to join the PTC community for worship at 8.00. As soft breezes waft through the open windows of the hexagonal Chapel and voices are raised in sensitive, powerful harmony, God is surely in this place. 

I was expecting, naturally, the Body of Christ here to wear a predominantly Pacific face, but was interested and curious to scan a fair variety of others too. One group of participants from the 2014 Face to Face programme run by the Council for World Mission has been based here for experience and exposure. The programme offers an imaginative and potentially life changing cross-cultural experience for younger Christian leaders. Participants in training for ministry experience the realities of Church and society here in Fiji, or in India, based at Bishop’s College, Kolkata &
 Aizawl Theological College, Aizawl. Or at the United Church of Zambia Theological College. Hurrah! So on day one in Fiji,I was absolutely thrilled to meet student minister Rev Karen Mwenda who's been on the Zambia-Fiji option and was in her last week. Karen has been sponsored by Lubuto congregation in Ndola. I know it well from living in Ndola in the 1990s, and my dear Zambian 'Mum', Joyce Kapesa Simengwa is a member there. In due course, Karen will personally deliver a Fiji parcel with love from me to her. And so it goes that God's people connect again, mysteriously and wonderfully, across continents and experiences. Connections for treasuring. Encounters for transformation.

And, as promised,  a few glimpses of life in Suva...