Ke Alahou, Volume I, Number 2, 1 December 1979 — The Word of God [ARTICLE]

The Word of God

GREETINGS, to you, the Church of Hawaii, in the name of Jesus Christ, the Son of Man who calls upon. his children to sacrifice their very" selves in the name of God, in the name of love. I write to you so you may consider the augmentation of our commktment in Christ; of the of our forefathers. And indoing so, we seek not to re-live their past, but to make those values consistent with the realities of today. Our acceptance of the meaning of aloha has become the foundation of our moral judgement f our conscience. Our understanding and adherence of aloha continually serves to guide our actions and love for one another and we strive to fulfill this committment over the temptation of expedient ways of the time, over the growing reliance upon unnecessary technology, and over complete self interest whereby individuals of a community become a community of individuals. Recalling: "No man ean serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other or be attentive to one and despise the other. You cannot give yourself to God and money." (Mathew 6:24) Our committment of faith must go beyond our very selves, beyond our seeking of a guarantee of security, and beyond the confines of our personal world. Our committment is not limited just to our daily routine and existence, for the realities of today forces us, what science has been revealing to us for so long, to realise we are part of a larger community: a community of the creation of God. And we as human beings, endowed with gifts beyond the abilities of others, are responsible as guardians and stewards of God's creation. M Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds and the cattle, and over all the wild animals and all the creation that crawls on the ground. M (Genesis 1:26) II is the realisation of this responsibility that we must face in the years to eome. We ean no longer hold the idea that we ean utilize the reBources of God's creation for our own benefit, without understanding the interdependence of all living thlngs. No longer ean we disregard the lives of other creatures for they too are our brothers and sisters. We must see the potential all

living things have in the work and developinent of creation. Our forefathers called this potential mana. And although they could not articulate or know of the interdependency of life as we are able to, they spoke of the potential a stone, a tree or living things possessed and how it became special when ever God dwelled within it. This was mana. Today, it is the realization that everything has a potential to be made special not according to how we would want to utilize it, but how we, as the guardians of God's creation, perceive it in light of its utilization by all of creation and it becomes special, because we rise above our self interest. In seeking an example of humility, Christ turned not to man, saying: "Look at the birds in the sky. They do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns; yet yourheavenly Father feeds them. Are not you more important than they? Whieh of you by worrying ean add a moment to his life span? Leam a lesson from the way the wild flowers grow. They do not work; they do not spin. Yet, I assure you, not even Solomon in all his splendorwas arrayed like one of these. M (Mathew 6:26) | My message is that we pse above all our self interest, because we not oniy see the potential of

all of God's creation as parf of our own, but our committment of aJo{la demands that we understand and help our neighbors too. It is the unity of all these that allows us to proclaim such things as a stone, a tree or a living thing as havingaspecial relationship wth our Lord. This is the power of mana and aloha at work seeking mankind to realise the dominion of God over us and his creation, whieh fulfills Christ's words: "Seek first his kingship over you, his way of holiness, and all these things will be given you besides. M (Mathew 6:33) And the more we begin to understand who we are and the world around us, the closer we will be able to be with our Father. This is the challenge put to us: whether we shall take a higher step in the ascent of man or whether we will forsake our faith and our brothers and sisters of creation for expedient ways ānd things. Rejoice, then, that we all may continually perceive and grow in the understanding of God's love and that our eyes may be kept clearto see the wonderous works of his creation. Tbe grace of our Lord be with you &nd the blessingof his Soa, our Sa viour be with all ofus as we make hisword known in flesh.