“Gratitude and Generosity”

On Sunday, we read Jesus’ parable in Matthew about the laborers in the vineyard. There were some who worked all day, others who started working around 9 a.m., others around noon, others around 3 p.m. and even some around 5 p.m. At 6 p.m., the owner of the vineyard first paid the workers who started last—and he gave them a full day’s wage. Obviously, those who worked all day expected a lot more than those who worked only an hour, but they got the exact same amount; and that amount was just enough to feed their families for one day. So those workers complained. Of course, we can resonate with them because, if we were in their shoes, we would want more than those who worked only an hour. To pay everyone the same just isn’t fair!

I shared with the congregation about a car accident I was in nineteen years ago. I was on my way one morning to the church office where I worked when a man driving an uninsured truck without a driver’s license slammed into the back of my small sedan at 60 miles per hour while I was stopped at a red light (as were the other five cars in front of me). I was unconscious and suffered injuries all over my body, and spent the next 5 months in physical therapy 2-3 times a week, with the doctors and physical therapists telling me that I would have to learn to live with pain for the rest of my life. Let me just tell you that it was an easy place to feel sorry for myself and complain that life is unfair. Yet, I’ll never forget my attorney at the time telling me, “Alan, you don’t know how lucky you are to be alive. I’ve never represented someone with that kind of damage done to a car when there wasn’t a wrongful death suit. I guess someone up there still has something for you to do.”

Aloha nui!

Kahu Alan Akana

“A Message from Kahu Alan Akana” is provided most weeks by the Kahu (Pastor) of Koloa Union Church, a congregation of the United Church of Christ (UCC), a member of the Kauai Association and Hawaii Conference.

“The Kingdom of Heaven is like….”

(Matthew 18:23)

On Sunday, I shared with the congregation about the strict religious and ethical rules and codes of conduct for the first English settlers on the American Continent. I have been reading Jon Meacham’s book, American Gospel, in which he points out that America eventually became known in Europe as the place to go in order to escaped religious persecution. Yet, according to Meacham’s examples, those who once were persecuted back home in Europe began gaining control in certain colonies, and they began inflicting the same kind of religious intolerance upon others. In other words, they escaped mistreatment and unjust persecution by fleeing to America only to exact the same kind of persecution on others once they had control of a colony. They believed that they somehow deserved justice, tolerance and acceptance for their beliefs, yet were unwilling to offer these things to others once they were running the place.

I was greatly puzzled and deeply disturbed last month as I watched videos of White Supremacists, Nazis and members of the KKK openly march in public places. I am confident that most of them are descendants of immigrants who were given a brand new start in America. Yet they seem to be completely unwilling to extend the same kind of hospitality to people of other races and ethnicities—even to many who are already citizens of our nation.

May God continue to surprise us with many wonderful changes within and all around us!

Videos of Kahu’s Sunday’s sermon are uploaded ontoYouTube most weeks. Please share these videos with friends. Please feel free to “Like” any of the videos you see and share them on social media, such as Facebook, so that others will notice them. You may also subscribe to the page on YouTube; that way you can receive a notification when a new sermon is posted.

“A Message from Kahu Alan Akana” is provided most weeks by the Kahu (Pastor) of Koloa Union Church, a congregation of the United Church of Christ (UCC), a member of the Kauai Association and Hawaii Conference.