The Rev. Noah Van Niel

St. John the Evangelist

April 22, 2018

Easter 4 (B): Acts 4:5-12; Psalm 23; 1 John 3:16-24; John 10:11-18

On March 16^th, 1978 the Hokule’a, a traditional Polynesian voyaging canoe departed from Honolulu on a 30 day trip from Hawaii to Tahiti. (For those of you who have seen the Disney movie, Moana, you’ll have an idea what it looked like.) The Hokule’a was the crown jewel of the Polynesian Voyaging Society which sought to recreate traditional Polynesian seafaring techniques and celebrate that cultural history. The ship had made the voyage from Hawaii to Tahiti two years earlier, but on this day in ’78 they were trying a slightly different route and things did not go as well. Bowing to pressure from the press and political officials, they set sail in questionable conditions. Five hours later they got struck by a large wave and capsized, about 12 miles south of the island of Molokai. The crew hung on to the vessel overnight drifting farther and farther from land. Their flares weren’t seen, their rescue signals went undetected.

On board as a member of the crew that day was Hawaiian surfing legend and lifeguard Eddie Aikau. Eddie had made a name for himself by surfing, with glee, the biggest waves on Oahu’s famous North Shore and by being a fearless lifeguard who would rescue any swimmer or surfer from any situation no matter how dangerous. While he served as lifeguard of Waimea bay—the epicenter of the North Shore high surf—he made over a thousand rescues and not one life was lost. In 1971 he was named lifeguard of the year. And the phrase “Eddie would go,” became an island refrain, referring to the fearlessness and selflessness of this humble Hawaiian surfer.

As morning dawned with no rescue in sight and the capsized vessel floating further and further from shore, Eddie convinced his crew mates to let him take his surfboard and paddle for land. He figured he could make the 12 mile swim (though by now it was probably much more) to the coast of Lanai, on his board. But he eschewed a life vest as it inhibited his ability to paddle. And so, with a prayer on his lips and aloha in his heart, off went Eddie, into the Pacific, swimming for land, looking for help. He was never seen again. Continue reading →

The Rev. Noah Van Niel

St. John the Evangelist

April 15, 2018

Easter 3 (B): Acts 3:12-19; Psalm 4; 1 John 3:1-7; Luke 24:36b-48

I love a good mystery. Though, to be fair, I’m not half as obsessed with whodunits as my wife, Melinda, is. So that means in our house, when we can manage the time, we watch a lot of Sherlock Holmes, Hercule Poirot, or other master sleuths going about their trade; using their brains and idiosyncratic charm to outwit the bad guys (or girls).

The thrill of these stories, be they Conan Doyle or Christie, always comes at the end. When, through using those “little gray cells,” the brilliant detective pronounces, “I know who did it.” And everyone gathers around for the great reveal. The detectives then run through the story we have all just seen or read, but highlight certain details anyone else would have overlooked. Lost amidst the cacophony of information, they have an ability to take it all in, determine what is relevant, what is important, and how it connects. That is their great genius. And from these seemingly unrelated fragments they piece together a mosaic of evidence that points to the guilty party. The rush of watching these climactic scenes is the rush we get from someone smarter than us telling us how it all fits together, and what it all means. Continue reading →

The Rev. Noah Van Niel

St. John the Evangelist

April 1^st, 2018

Easter Sunday (B)

John Newton was born in London in 1725. His childhood was, by many measures, disastrous. His mother died by the time he was seven. By eleven he had left school to go to sea with his shipmaster father and by 18 he was pressed into duty in the Navy. His service was disgraceful. He was caught trying to desert and received a brutal punishment and stripping of rank, at which point he went to work on a slave ship bound for West Africa. But even on this ignominious vessel he ran afoul of the crew and they were so fed up with him that in 1745, they left him on the coast of West Africa where he was made a servant to a notoriously abusive slave trader and his wife. After three years he was rescued, but on the way back home the ship encountered a severe storm off the coast of Ireland and sprang a leak, and Newton wondered whether this would finally be the end of his nasty, brutish and short life. He was unmoored. He was lost in every sense of the word. Continue reading →