The Discipleship Training School was an answer to an unspoken prayer. Dani and I had talked before about wanting to take time out from our ‘regular’ lives to concentrate on learning more about God, biblically and practically. So when the Marine Reach Fiji staff announced that they intended to run a school in 2015 (and subtly suggested we could be students) it wasn’t for some time that I realised God was giving us what we had been hoping for in our hearts – an opportunity to focus on Him without distraction in order to know Him better and understand His plan for our lives.
And so we embarked on four and a half months of teaching and practice that is geared to educate, probe, release and challenge us. As we’ve written about previously it was a bit of manic start, straight off the back of an outreach and the disaster relief trip to Vanuatu. We were plunged into an environment where we were constantly surrounded by 10 adults and 7 children, with another 15 regulars dropping in on a daily basis. As a newly married couple from the UK we’re just not used to that level of activity! So there was a period of adjustment, but gradually we came to value the people around us rather than see them as an infringement on our personal space. Before long there was a strong feeling of unity amongst the students, staff and their families as we sought to engage with the teaching.
