Peceli Tawaketini is a Pastor and Langham Preaching Facilitator in Savusavu, Fiji. He shares about the challenges in Fiji amongst churches, “The challenge is we know how to read God’s Word, but to understand it and explain it is a challenge… in God’s Word it says, ‘People who are preachers or teachers will be more strictly judged’ and some preachers in Fiji don’t understand that part. They think it is an opportunity to take the pulpit and do the same thing that another person is doing, but they don’t know God’s Word… it’s not our Word or anybody’s Word. It is God’s Word. And God has to place his Word in your heart for the people.”
Context Matters
Langham training helps pastors to understand God’s Word, and to teach clearly and faithfully to the text. Peceli shares, “Before Langham came, I used to be like that. I read it, I understood, and I thought I had the knowledge and the wisdom, so I delivered it… But when I completed Langham Level One, then I realised the mistakes that I had done in the past with God’s Word; I had taken it all out of context.”
“Langham has helped me and given me a tool to really dig into God’s Word…Before Langham, it was just my own ideas, just my own way of thinking of a passage or a verse and referring to footnotes, commentaries and all the research… And it is the way I thought was right, and I delivered it. And on top of it, I always feared men who were older than me who’ve taken the pulpit.”
Transformed teaching
“After I took Langham Level One, Two, and Three, the first thing when I stood was with no more fear, because it is purely God’s Word. And I’m not only taking a verse out, it is the whole passage and the whole book I need to understand.” Since completing the training, Peceli’s wife also shared with him “I have seen the change in the way you deliver God’s Word and that is Langham. And I thank God for Langham.”
Langham trains preachers to do three things as they preach: be faithful to the text, relevant to their people and clear. People in his church congregation are providing feedback that they are enjoying the teaching now. Peceli shares, “I thank God for His Word. And in my heart, I thank Langham for coming, because I get to understand God’s Word more clearly.”
Prayer Points
- Thank God for Peceli and that he could complete the preaching training and learn how to read and share the Gospel faithfully.
- Pray for more leaders in Fiji to receive Langham training and be better equipped to teach from the Word
- Pray for people in Fiji to come to know Jesus as their Saviour.