Stump:
Welcome to Language of God. I’m Jim Stump.
Hoogerwerf:
And I’m Colin Hoogerwerf. , we’ve launched ourselves like this quite a lot of instances, with out fascinated about it an excessive amount of. Only a easy identify.
Stump:
You assume we must always begin every episode by saying our names and likewise the names of our wind and rain?
Hoogerwerf:
Yeah! Properly possibly. So this wants a bit of rationalization. We had been just lately invited to Oahu, Hawaii to go go to with a church and a neighborhood that’s a part of a fairly cool land restoration challenge. And whereas we had been there we realized about this custom in Hawaiian tradition, that when somebody introduces themselves they are saying their identify and the identify of the valley they arrive from—which in Hawaii a valley is named an ahupua’a—after which they are saying the identify of the wind and rain they expertise there.
Stump:
In Hawaii, the wind and the rain are a fairly fixed pressure. And they also have quite a lot of completely different phrases for wind and rain. And I can think about how there could be one thing actually orienting about connecting your self like this to a spot. And once you meet somebody you inform them one thing about the way you expertise the world, how you’re linked and shaped by the world. That offers quite a lot of context for starting a relationship.
Hoogerwerf:
Proper. I believe this is able to be a fairly cool factor to affiliate with who we’re. However there are just a few issues. One is that wind and rain will not be the defining options of each place. In Michigan the place it’s fairly flat, even a valley is a bit of summary. So, if I had been to undertake this, I would say one thing like, I’m Colin and I come from the Plaster Creek watershed and the identify of my sky is generally grey apart from just a few superb months when the solar shines shiny and heat.
Stump:
Sure, I’d must say one thing like, “I’m Jim and I come from the Crystal Valley…” which for some cause is what they name my little nook of northern Indiana, though we don’t have valleys both, and there isn’t even a Crystal River wherever as far as I can inform. I’m afraid we’ve misplaced no matter connection to that place there as soon as was.
Hoogerwerf:
That brings us to the opposite drawback, which is perhaps larger. Plenty of us nowadays are barely from a spot in any respect. I did a bit of poking round at some numbers and it looks like solely round half of the inhabitants within the US lives in the identical state they had been born in. That varies rather a lot between states, however clearly we transfer round rather a lot. That quantity would go down rather a lot for individuals who reside in the identical state as their grandparents.
Stump:
Or much more for his or her ancestors 1200 years in the past, as is perhaps the case for some Hawaiians.
Hoogerwerf:
Proper. So it’s only a indisputable fact that many people have misplaced the affiliation between a spot and what it means about us and our households and our histories.
Stump:
So this manner of connecting to land via language truly has one thing to do with our story right this moment. After we set out, we knew the fundamentals. We knew that we had been going to the Island of Oahu to find out about a neighborhood that has been on a journey exploring their connection to land.
Hoogerwerf:
This can be a challenge we realized about via our mates at A Rocha USA.
Lowe:
And this gave the impression of such an awesome instance of a neighborhood congregation attempting to do this inside their distinctive context, and with a very thrilling alternative that that they had inherited due to different selections that that they had made that weren’t associated to caring for creation, however now that they had this enormous alternative to determine what it might appear like to be trustworthy of their context.
Stump:
That’s Ben Lowe.
Lowe:
I’m the Govt Director of A Rocha USA.
Hoogerwerf:
A Rocha is a non revenue group with a mission to encourage Christians to look after the setting and to equip others to do the identical they usually have many different inspiring tasks across the nation.
Stump:
A couple of years in the past you and I had an invite to spend a weekend with a bunch of individuals in Titusville Florida at a unique A Rocha challenge. That become an episode we known as The Oceans Declare, and it’s nonetheless one among our favorites we’ve ever achieved.
Hoogerwerf:
And with the assistance of a grant A Rocha acquired from the Lilly Basis, we had been invited to associate up with A Rocha to inform extra of those tales of individuals and church buildings who’re responding to the decision to look after creation. So we went to inform this story of a church concerned in a land restoration challenge, however the story ended up being rather a lot deeper than that.
Stump:
What we thought was a narrative about folks caring for his or her church property, become a narrative about how the land cares for its folks, and about folks caring for folks, and about folks’s relationship to God via this sort of caring.
Hoogerwerf:
Let’s get to the story.
Half One: Hakuhia
Stump:
This story that introduced us to Oahu begins with a neighborhood church.
Lowe:
The First Presbyterian Church of Honolulu.
Stump:
First Prez, because it typically goes by, was outgrowing its constructing within the metropolis of Honolulu and was searching for a much bigger house. And there was a property, simply over the remnant ridge of a 2-million 12 months previous volcano—simply across the nook of the island—with a constructing that will work completely for the brand new church… however there was a catch.
Lowe:
By an entire sequence of most unlikely, however maybe providential circumstances, they really obtained the property, after which it got here with this golf course.
Miyamura:
So I used to be in my 20s, a junior on the time, and I used to be despatched to hike the mountains and to do a survey round simply the boundaries of the property.
Hoogerwerf:
This Kelly Miyamura.
Miyamura:
And I bear in mind searching and saying, like, “okay, this seems like God is on this. That is an incredible place. I can see the church right here. I can see a lot greater than what we might even think about on the time of simply needing a sanctuary.”
Stump:
Kelly is the board chair of Hakuhia, which is the non-profit that has since been set as much as handle the challenge we’re about to explain.
Hoogerwerf:
She’s additionally one of many those that instructed us about the best way of introducing your wind and rain.
Miyamura:
Ko’u inoa—my identify is Kelly. My ahupua’a is Kapalama, so on that aspect. My wind is uluniu. So it’s the wind that the palm timber are swayed by that wind. and Kukala-hale, I imagine, is the rain. Hale is a home. It’s the rain that comes down and pierce it like you possibly can hear it on the rooftops.
Hoogerwerf:
So First Prez strikes their church to this property and turns the clubhouse right into a sanctuary, with home windows searching onto the Ko’olau mountain vary. And for some time they hold working golf on all 18 holes. However fairly rapidly it turns into clear that golf isn’t going to be sustainable.
Stump:
There are just a few causes for that. One is as a result of it is a actually moist piece of land, being on the windward aspect of the island. The opposite is that this explicit golf course was constructed to be one of many hardest programs on the earth and so that you wanted a very particular clientele which weren’t all that simple to come back by.
Hoogerwerf:
So it didn’t seem to be golf was going to work. The church had to determine what to do.
Stump:
Now, there are just a few methods you possibly can inform this story, and doubtless relying on who you ask you’d get just a few completely different variations. One is that the church purchased this property with no ideas of restoration or creation care in any respect, however that these solely got here up as soon as it turned clear that golf wasn’t going to work. There’s in all probability some reality in that no less than for some folks.
Hoogerwerf:
Yeah, however as we heard a minute in the past, Kelly had a imaginative and prescient about this place from fairly early on.
Miyamura:
It wasn’t a tough promote for me to see it as one thing greater than a golf course. [laughs]
Stump:
And there have been others who had concepts in regards to the place and the spark of a imaginative and prescient to revive this land and make it out there once more for the neighborhood. And as time went on that imaginative and prescient began to take maintain. Even then, there have been challenges.
Miyamura:
When you consider the church, the primary form of problem was shifting a church to a golf course and understanding why we might do this.
Hoogerwerf:
It wasn’t essentially energetic resistance to caring for land as a lot as simply not sharing a imaginative and prescient for what the place could possibly be if it wasn’t a golf course.
Stump:
To not point out, restoring a golf course takes quite a lot of work.
Miyamura:
Individuals had been like, how are we going to maneuver this and remodel this? And it seems like a really daunting process
Grzebik:
So the 246 acres managed by a golf course at the moment are primarily launched invasive species due to the way it was managed.
Hoogerwerf:
That is Jayme Grzebik
Grzebik:
I’m the Malama Aina Supervisor with the Hakuhia, 501 c3 with the First Presbyterian Church of Honolulu at Ko’olau.
Stump:
There’s just a few Hawaiian phrases there which might be value translating as a result of we’re going to maintain listening to them. Malama means to guard or to handle. And aina is… land.
Hoogerwerf:
And one of many issues I realized is that within the Hawaiian language nearly each phrase has many layers of which means. And aina is a phrase that’s actually central to Hawaiian tradition.
Miyamura:
Whenever you say issues like aloha aina, malama aina, like rising up right here, we everybody grows up with that worth set, so it’s very acquainted, and once you join it together with your religion, it’s much more highly effective, realizing that God is on the heart motivates us. That is how we reside, how we steward our aina is about how we look after our neighborhood.
Stump:
So what does it appear like to malama aina, look after land, on a property that has been managed as a golf course for a few years?
Grzebik:
I’ve by no means described our mission as taking all invasive species out and having a local returning to native crops, the state that it’s proper now. We are able to by no means get there. It’s not an inexpensive objective. However what we’re doing is specializing in the massive native crops, the massive species which might be inflicting essentially the most hurt, and that’s the albizia.
Hoogerwerf:
Albizia are timber. Huge timber. And so they aren’t native to Hawaii.
Stump:
Hawaii is fairly fascinating on this regard. As a result of it’s so remoted and comparatively younger geologically talking, it took a very long time earlier than flora colonized there.
Grzebik:
Thousands and thousands of years in the past, there have been these large lava rocks in the course of the ocean, and by wind, wing or water, just a few 1000 crops truly landed right here and survived.
Hoogerwerf:
Then, when the Polynesians got here they introduced with them a few of the crops that had been necessary to them, crops like banana and coconut, breadfruit and taro. They launched these crops to the islands and cultivated them for a thousand or extra years.
Stump:
Then…solely 250 years in the past, Europeans stumbled upon the islands. And in these final 250 years, crops from all around the world have discovered their option to Hawaii, both deliberately or unintentionally. A few of these crops very a lot preferred what they discovered within the soil. These are what we name unique invasive crops.
Hoogerwerf:
The albizia are a type of. They develop very quick and really giant. And so they can do quite a lot of injury.
Grzebik:
So they’re taking on water from the watershed. They’ve very shallow root methods, to the purpose that if we had any form of wind occasion, if it’s a hurricane or a wind shear, they will take that whole tree as a result of, as a result of the cover truly acts as an umbrella, it truly pulls it up out of the bottom and may put it on high of this constructing. It’s that simple.
Stump:
Albizia are removed from the one invasive species however they’ve taken some priority at Hakuhia no less than at this stage. However identical to the crops that got here in from world wide and determined to name Hawaii house, folks additionally got here to Hawaii and preferred what they discovered.
Miyamura:
And the historical past of Hawaii is one all the best way from the best way that it was annexed from america, one which felt very high down, that felt like exterior forces had been coming in and took one thing away. And so the strategy to that therapeutic could be very a lot one about embracing neighborhood and empowering neighborhood and the intergenerational households that know this place and making them part of this course of.
Hoogerwerf:
Due to this historical past of colonization, Hakuhia wished to verify they acknowledged what this land had been and what it meant to the neighborhood.
Miyamura:
This explicit space of the island could be very important, very particular. Kamehameha the First—Mokapu, which is true out right here, it’s the piece of the island that jets out, was the place he would carry all of his ali’i, or chiefs. Prefer it was a really particular place for him to assemble all of his leaders and the individuals who led Hawaii, and produce them to the place for retreat, his particular lo’i patches, or the place he would develop his meals are on this Kailua aspect.
Stump:
When the property received become a golf course again within the early 90s, there was a reasonably large neighborhood outcry. What was a spot with cultural significance abruptly turned a spot that the neighborhood was not even allowed to go to.
Miyamura:
I used to be studying all of this testimony from the neighborhood. It was very painful, very painful testimony of how these households—they knew that this was a spot the place they may develop meals. They knew that they had been sacred locations and tales they usually knew the tales.
Hoogerwerf:
And so First Prez and Hakuhia set out not with bulldozers—and even with baggage of seeds—however merely with open ears.
Miyamura:
It was first about listening to them, and likewise listening to the land, in figuring out that this land, it’s conservation land, it may solely do sure issues, sure issues traditionally grew right here, you could’t develop elsewhere, or that will do nicely right here.
Grzebik:
I imply, that is actually necessary that we’re we’re stewarding 246 acres, and it’s going to be actually necessary that we hearken to the land, that we hearken to the neighborhood, that we carry younger folks alongside us, that that’s at all times been one thing that Kelly has mentioned, that it’s going to be so necessary how we carry folks alongside our journey and and I’m excited for that.
Stump:
We had an opportunity to stroll across the property for a bit. And I assume my first thought was…it nonetheless seems to be like a golf course.
Hoogerwerf:
Yeah. The challenge continues to be to start with phases, though the church has been on the property for some time. And there’s nonetheless even a bit of golf occurring on entrance 9, in the interim. However a lot of the property has been opened to the general public and now connects to mountain climbing trails within the mountains behind the property.
Stump:
One of the crucial hanging issues about this for me was how the idea of time performed into this challenge. This stage of listening has not been rushed, there was a cautious intention to not rush into making these modifications.
Hoogerwerf:
Which signifies that, no less than once we had been there, there’s nonetheless upkeep of quite a lot of the fairways, to maintain invasive crops from taking up, and to be sure that motion, even with good intentions, doesn’t proceed a sample of constructing hasty selections about the right way to use land with out the buy-in of the people who find themselves from that land. And in that point the imaginative and prescient continues to develop.
Grzebik:
So what I think about is that every one among these fairways is a unique partnership. So there’s an entire nonprofit group that simply does seed banking. And they might are available and they might do their seed banking on fairway 17, and we might form of parcel it out like that, and possibly a few of their kuleana, or their information could be used to combat the invasive species that we now have whereas they’re on the aina.
Hoogerwerf:
Perhaps one other fairway would have a bunch rising breadfruit and one other one engaged on composting.
Stump:
That’s the sensible imaginative and prescient, even only one concept of what this place might appear like after they’ve gone via the method of listening to the land and the folks. However the imaginative and prescient extends past simply the number of natural world or the panorama design.
Miyamura:
I see it as a chance for the church to develop into actually related. I believe that, particularly with a younger era like our younger era right here, and quite a lot of our native populations right here, get it, and if they may perceive that the church additionally embraces this, I believe it will make them extra open to religion.
Grzebik:
These kinds of areas are a chance for these in the neighborhood to come back and be part of us as a church, and it’s not as daunting as coming via that church door.
Stump:
However even in island time, the form of affected person listening and ready they’ve dedicated to is just not at all times simple. And there are those that need it to maneuver sooner.
Hoogerwerf:
And on the opposite aspect there’s additionally a sense like that is too large, too arduous.
Grzebik:
The albizia are a very good analogy, like they’re daunting, they usually’re so large, and there’s so lots of them, however except we simply get our boots on the market and begin. After which little by little—there’s a bit of saying, kipuka by kipuka. So little like gap by gap, we will begin to do that restoration, or flip it into some form of neighborhood. , use after which this kipuka will begin to contact this kipuka.
Stump:
Right here’s one other Hawaiian phrase, kipuka, which is filled with which means. As Jayme talked about, puka means gap. Kipuka is definitely a phrase that has develop into utilized in geology and describes a spot the place lava has flowed and surrounded a bit of land, however has left a bit of island within the center unhurt.
Hoogerwerf:
I visited a kipuka on the massive island of Hawaii, the place the volcanoes are nonetheless energetic. The truth is I noticed a volcano spitting lava whereas we had been there which was fairly cool. A lot of the land on this a part of the island is simply naked black lava rock. As you drive, you move stretches with indicators of latest lava flows. Rr So when driving to the kipuka you move a bunch of those, and you then come to a spot that’s nonetheless lush and inexperienced and the timber are enormous and previous. There are a whole lot of those on the massive island. A lot of them have species which might be solely discovered inside that little kipuka.
Stump:
Kipuka additionally has another much less geological meanings and can be utilized to explain a spot the place life endures. And there’s truly one other phrase biologists use for this identical idea, and it’s one which very long time listeners right here would possibly acknowledge.
Rienstra:
The idea of Refugia.
Hoogerwerf:
That is Debra Rienstra, earlier podcast visitor and creator of the ebook Refugia Religion.
Rienstra:
So refugia are locations the place biodiversity persists and may increase from within the midst of disaster or disturbance. There’s an entire subject known as refugial biology the place you principally research locations that survive like a wildfire or possibly an insect invasion or possibly some excessive occasion like a volcano eruption.
Stump:
Debra was with us in Hawaii, alongside along with her husband Ron Rienstra who’s a professor at Western Seminary in Holland Michigan. They lead a cohort of seminary college students who’re all engaged on numerous methods of seeing the church as refugia.
Hoogerwerf:
Refugia as a metaphor is absolutely useful for fascinated about what the church might be and the way we will help the world in flourishing amidst environmental disturbance.
Stump:
The Hakuhia challenge is a kipuka. A refugia. However refugias typically don’t exist on their very own. They arrive in communities too. And this was probably the most thrilling issues that we discovered on Oahu.
[Herb Lee speaking in Hawaiian]
Miyamura:
What we do right here on the high of the mountain impacts what Herb does on the backside, when it comes to water high quality, the kind of fish, proper? Prefer it’s all linked.
Half Two: Waikalua Loko Fishpond
Stump:
To satisfy Herb Lee we have to journey—as they are saying in Hawaiian—mauka makai, from the mountains to the ocean.
Lee:
What actually began the dialog with First Prez Church, once they purchased the property up mauka is that every one of that space that they maintain, that water, finally flows to me.
Hoogerwerf:
That is Herb Lee.
Miyamura:
And I mentioned, I’ll be very fascinated with what you guys do up there, as a result of no matter you do up there impacts me.
Hoogerwerf:
Herb is a board member for Hakhuhia however has spent the final 30 years down close to the ocean working to revive the Waikalua Loko fishpond.
Stump:
Fish ponds are an historical approach that Hawaiians used to farm fish in a protected space subsequent to the ocean.
Lee:
That is previous information, okay, previous knowledge.
Hoogerwerf:
Hawaiians arrived on these islands in all probability round 600 AD. And in some unspecified time in the future they realized that as an alternative of going out into the ocean to catch their fish they may have fish a lot nearer by.
Lee:
The transition from being a hunter gatherer to really farming fish was enormous, and I name it in all probability the initially financial disruption in Hawaii.
Stump:
So the gist is, you discover a bay or inlet and also you construct a rock wall to chop it off from the remainder of the ocean. And you then make a bit of gate.
Lee:
In order that they designed this factor known as the Makaha gate.
Hoogerwerf:
So the gate has a bit of gap, and when the tide goes out, the little fish swim in opposition to the tide, via the gate, which they simply match via and into this protected little pond, filled with tasty seaweed and with out predators.
Stump:
Properly, apart from one bipedal predator.
Hoogerwerf:
Proper. However in contrast to the barracudas the human predators let the little fish develop till they get too large to depart via the little gate and finally might choose them out of the water and produce them to their tables.
Lee:
And so the ponds had been developed in order that, we all know now from a scientific standpoint, they’re 100 instances extra environment friendly than mom nature when it comes to with the ability to develop fish, virtually in a pure situation. Nevertheless it’s nonetheless exceptional. And you already know, that is once more, I believe I discussed, it’s 400 years previous. This nonetheless works.
Stump:
At one level there have been fish ponds all around the Hawaiian Islands. However within the final 800 years rather a lot has modified.
Lee:
90% of the ponds are gone. There are 500 of those ponds constructed on the six main 90% of them are gone. And we’re 80 and 90% depending on ships and planes to carry us meals.
Hoogerwerf:
When the Hawaiian practices had been disrupted by colonization within the 1700 and 1800’s, the fish ponds fell into disrepair and began to fill in with invasive species.
Lee:
It took us 26 years to take away the mangrove from contained in the pond.
Stump:
26 years to take away the mangroves and some extra for another clear up tasks…
Lee:
So first 30 years was repair this place up, clear it up, did quite a lot of education schemes, quite a lot of neighborhood packages. And after 30 years, final 12 months, we spent a 12 months reflecting on, what did we be taught within the first 30 years?
Stump:
Okay, can we spare a minute right here to speak about the truth that they took 30 years to organize the place. Then they determined to spend a 12 months reflecting on what they did in these first 30 years. In my world, reflection is a crucial factor… so necessary that we would determine to take a weekend away to consider issues. Within the Hawaiian world, you are taking a 12 months to consider issues! That’s a unique tempo.
Miyamura:
So herb has, he’s been just like the grasp mentor on this, and it has made me a lot extra relaxed and fewer anxious. In order that’s one other a part of the therapeutic facet of this. 25 years. You assume in a era. You assume in a era as a result of issues take time. Jamie is absolutely good at this too. Individuals who work with land perceive that you simply want endurance, you want this lengthy arc timeline and perspective to grasp that change and transformation takes time. And that helps in a few methods. One, it lets you be much less anxious, like she would at all times calm me down and be practical and provide you with perspective of how lengthy change and transformation takes. And two, it makes you consider depth versus breadth. And Herb—like 30 years to do this proper? And he’s nonetheless engaged on it.
Hoogerwerf:
Again at Hakuhia, one among issues they’ve began to develop is koa, a local hardwood that was utilized by historical Hawaiians to construct canoes and surf boards.
Miyamura:
And so the work that we’re doing at Hakuhia, the selections that we’re making are ones which might be about rising koa. We wish to make investments sooner or later. We wish to spend money on the following era, and we wish to know that we would not be capable to see a few of that for the following 10 years, realistically, possibly for the following 20 years, proper?
Stump:
Over on the fish pond, having spent 30 years clearing out the mangroves, the following step is to determine the right way to have the fish pond truly produce meals. To date the fish rising there haven’t met the requirements wanted to carry them to market. Herb has partnered with a lot of completely different analysis teams to start out experiments and assessments to learn to make the pond viable for producing fish. They’re not simply attempting to do precisely what their ancestors did. They’re additionally open to innovation—they aren’t merely attempting to reclaim the previous methods. It’s studying from the previous methods, after which enhancing the place you possibly can in our context right this moment.
Hoogerwerf:
We’ve talked principally in regards to the work Herb has achieved to bodily restore the fish pond, however that work, whereas fascinating and necessary, is absolutely not what motivates Herb. From the very starting, this challenge has been far more about schooling.
Lee:
To see that transformative course of within the faces of children once they come down right here they usually’re studying science or math they usually don’t even understand it. It’s fantastic. And it nonetheless occurs 30 years later when these new youngsters come down.
Stump:
It’s not simply science and math they’re studying both.
Lee:
What we’re attempting to show right here is the idea of aloha aina. How do you like the land like your loved ones, proper? As a result of it takes care of you, proper? I believe that’s what God additionally, you already know, meant. So my idea is that aloha aina, malama aina—malama aina means to look after the land, however in case you don’t have aloha for the aina, why would you take care of it? As a result of that’s the arduous work. So what we’re attempting to show right here is how these youngsters can have aloha for the land, for the locations by which they reside, in order that they might wish to malama aina, not pollute it, you already know, all that stuff, not simply, you already know, feeding it, feeding folks, but in addition having that form of familial relationship, a kin relationship with land.
[Herb singing with guitar]
Half Three: Ho’Okua’Aina
Hoogerwerf:
Let’s hold going outward. Kipuka to kipuka. So we’re going to journey from the place we’ve been, just some miles to the following ahupua’a—keep in mind that’s the Hawaiian model of a valley—actually just some miles away from Hakuhia, to an 8 acre taro farm or kalo because it’s known as in Hawaiian.
Stump:
Similar to the fish pond when Herb began restoring it, this place hadn’t been cared for in a very long time.
Wilhelm:
So you possibly can think about this over this complete space, and these timber had been right here, there. This highway was identical to a path. We didn’t even have this space to show round.
Stump:
That is Dean Wilhelm. He’s one other board member of Hakuhia, which is additional testomony to how these kipukas are starting to achieve out to one another and unfold their bounty round. However most of Dean and his spouse Michelle’s work right this moment occurs on these 8 acres.
Hoogerwerf:
There was an extended journey for Dean and Michelle to even discover themselves and their household on this land. That story concerned many moments of cautious listening and prayer and a number of other moments of questioning whether or not they had made the fitting alternative. However there they had been and step one was to start out clearing out the crops that had taken over.
Wilhelm:
And so I bear in mind vividly. It was a Saturday. So I’m mucking round. I’m attempting to dig a ditch, and I received a shovel, and I’ve received a choose, timber on the aspect and roots are coming in. I’m simply attempting to empty a few of this water to see if I can truly begin planting. And I’m having, I’m on this place the place I’m actually questioning God and like, “Lord, is that this what you actually have for me and my household?”
Stump:
At this level that they had gone fairly far down the trail towards their imaginative and prescient of making a neighborhood gathering place. There wasn’t quite a lot of option to go backward.
Wilhelm:
So it’s like, “Lord, is that this actually what? As a result of I don’t see progress, and I simply don’t really feel any traction.” So I’m in this sort of place. And so it’s a few month or so later that I received one morning, and I’ve this Bible Revell dictionary that I can be taught cool stuff. So I’m like, Okay, Lord, what do you must say about farming?
Hoogerwerf:
So he turns to farming. However there’s…nothing.
Wilhelm:
Nevertheless it says, “see gardening.” Okay, so flip to gardening and there’s about 10 verses.
Stump:
Unsurprisingly the primary is from Genesis. Chapter 2, verse 8.
Wilhelm:
And within the east, the Lord planted a backyard. As a English individual, the verb “planted” jumped out at me, as a result of he didn’t create it. He didn’t breathe life into it. He didn’t. He planted it. And for me, that was like clearing out this land and gathering what we name a huli and hand planting it. As a result of that’s how taro farming is, nonetheless not mechanized. You plant that kalo and you take care of it, and a 12 months later you pull it with your personal palms. So to me, that’s what planting is. And it’s like I had this imaginative and prescient of the Lord God Almighty in the course of this Taro patch, clearing out all of the weeds, grabbing a kalo—kano, as we are saying—planting.
Hoogerwerf:
Planting of kalo is what has been occurring on this land because it has been cleared. And this kalo patch has develop into one of many largest producers on the island. However for Dean and Michelle this was by no means only a want to develop meals.
Wilhelm:
We do farm, and we do—however we’re not, I wouldn’t essentially name ourselves farmers within the sense of we’re simply rising meals. , we’re actually within the folks enterprise.
Stump:
Similar to we heard with Herb, right here is one other challenge the place the restoration and caretaking of land turns into a conduit for taking good care of folks. Dean and Michelle have been inviting folks to this place, and particularly youngsters and in danger youth, to stroll into the mud the place the kalo grows, to work with their palms and their our bodies, and to take up a stone and pound the kalo into poi within the conventional technique.
Wilhelm:
So we all know that God’s hand is upon this place, and that it’s via His creation that he’s doing a piece in folks. Like we will we facilitate it? We, present a chance, this gathering place for folks to come back, whether or not it’s at-risk youngsters or older, you already know, kupuna, elders who come via. Each week we now have neighborhood teams on Saturdays.
Hoogerwerf:
At the moment, this work is thru the Wilhelm’s group which they named Ho’okua’aina.
Stump:
There’s that phrase aina once more.
Wilhelm:
So kua means again and aina means land, however it was the individuals who lived within the again land, kalo farmers within the valleys, caught in these valleys, who’re the kua aina. They had been the spine of society. And anytime you add ho’o to a Hawaiian phrase, it means to make or to develop into. So to make or to develop into kua aina is the identify of our group.
Hoogerwerf:
And truly in some unspecified time in the future after Hawaii turned a state and the rising of kalo within the valleys misplaced a few of the relevance it as soon as had, that time period okua’aina, back-lander, turned extra of a demeaning time period, somebody who was out of contact, out of recent instances. The Wilhelms wish to change that. And so, as they create life again to this land, they’re additionally bringing folks again to the land via the rising of kalo.
Wilhelm:
So we now have this expression right here that we use, and we share this with everyone. The expression goes nani ke kalo. And nani means fairly or stunning. So stunning the kalo or kalo is gorgeous. For Hawaiians, kalo was the staple meals. It was the meals eaten day-after-day.
Stump:
Suppose bread, corn, potatoes, rice.
Wilhelm:
It comes out like a corm. It’s not a tuber, it’s a corm. And I nonetheless have to determine why. It’s denser than a potato. And so they say that it’s one among, if not the perfect, advanced carbohydrate, in case you monitor these sorts of factor. So very wholesome. It sustains your vitality, versus spikes in vitality.
Hoogerwerf:
Kalo truly comes from India, however was unfold eastward and finally introduced on boats as folks started exploring and spreading into the pacific ocean and reaching so far as Hawaii. In Hawaii, the plant has develop into intertwined with the earliest tales of the folks and with the very id of Hawaii and Hawaiians.
Wilhelm:
There’s a Hawaiian story of creation. We all know that every one peoples world wide have tales of creation, so I simply share it with you, as a result of there’s a deep to share, that there’s a religious connection to this plant in contrast to others. So the story goes, there was a God and a goddess. They got here collectively. She turned hapai, or pregnant. Sadly, the child was nonetheless born. So the place they buried that that child sprung forth the primary kalo plant. And so they named that kalo plant Haloanakalaukapalili.
Stump:
That interprets to “the lengthy stemmed leaf that quivers within the wind”
Wilhelm:
So The Goddess turns into hapai once more, pregnant once more. This time she offers start. And she or he offers start to the primary kanaka, the primary human being. And so they named that baby Hāloa, in honor of the elder sibling, Haloanakalaukapalil. And what occurs is one thing actually stunning, is the youthful sibling stewards and cares for the elder sibling, and in return, the elder sibling reciprocates that care within the type of sustenance.
Stump:
There’s a very stunning metaphor on this creation story about reciprocity between land and other people. That is fairly frequent in quite a lot of indigenous creation tales. However Christianity has its personal creation story and it seems that people had been made out of the land itself. That connection is apparent within the historical Hebrew when it says God shaped a person—Adam—from the bottom—adama. There’s an echo of that very same relationship in our English phrases people and humus… We’re people who got here from the humus; or as Scot McKnight mentioned at a BioLogos convention, we would perceive the connection higher if as an alternative of Adam from the adama, we translated it as Dusty coming from the mud.
Hoogerwerf:
Right here’s Ben Lowe once more.
Lowe:
People had been created distinctive amongst all the remainder of creation in that we had been created not in our personal picture, however in God’s picture, in order that we might signify God and God’s will and God’s coronary heart to at least one one other and the remainder of creation. And that’s what we perceive Shalom to be, this flourishing of proper relationships between all of the completely different entities in God’s world and with us and God.
Hoogerwerf:
When Dean went to go search for these verses about farming and gardening he was led to the second chapter of Genesis the place God crops a backyard in Eden. However he stored studying a bit additional.
Wilhelm:
After which just a few verses later, chapter 2, verse 15. “And he positioned man there to steward it look after it.” And as soon as I learn that, I by no means questioned what God had for me. I mentioned, “God. That is all you’ve got for me? That’s what I’ll do.” And you already know my mindset is that God didn’t place man in his backyard to steward look after it, as a result of he doesn’t want us. He positioned us there for our personal nicely being and for our personal vivi by our personal as a result of that’s the place wealth comes from. That’s the place abundance comes from. So he designed us to reside like this, with our palms within the soil, near the Earth, residing off of it, respiratory off of it.
[Dean singing in Hawaiian with guitar]
Conclusion
Stump:
In only some days on Oahu we had been capable of see a number of communities performing as refugias or kipukas, harboring life even when they’re surrounded by disturbance.
Hoogerwerf:
Yeah it was actually inspiring. However I stored arising in opposition to the identical two issues from the start of the episode. One is the right way to replicate this in a unique bodily context and the opposite is about the right way to rebuild a cultural and religious context the place this stuff occur.
Stump:
In order that first one could also be a bit simpler. It’s true that the majority church buildings or religion communities received’t ever discover themselves with the identical determination, what to do a few failing golf course on their property simply contained in the eroded fringe of a 2 million 12 months previous volcano.
Lowe:
This challenge is fairly distinctive. You’re proper. I don’t know some other church buildings which have the chance to handle or determine what to do with a golf course. However that mentioned, I hope it may nonetheless be an inspiration, as a result of if this congregation can work out the right way to restore 260 acres of golf turf full of invasive species, then what isn’t attainable for a church to do? So I’d not say that is prescriptive for different congregations, however quite a lot of church buildings do have their very own amenities and are on land. And a few church buildings have various land, and a few Christian ministries, or Christian schools and universities have quite a lot of land that they steward and handle. And so how can they if this one church can tackle restoring 260 acres of golf turf, what can different congregations do with the ten or 50 acres that that they handle?
Miyamura:
I actually assume we’re all in want of therapeutic, whether or not we reside in city locations, whether or not we reside in Hawaii, we’re all in want of therapeutic. I believe we’re all looking for some form of wholeness. I believe that’s why our nation’s within the disaster that it’s in. I actually assume that Hawaii can educate the world. I believe that, and it’s not simply because we reside in a phenomenal place. It’s a mindset. It’s a price set. It’s the best way that you simply see the world, it’s the best way that you simply see others, it’s the best way that you simply handle what you’ve got. It’s not nearly—I do know that it appears simple as a result of we reside in such a phenomenal place, however it’s actually a lot extra. It’s about actually loving God in a method that you take care of others, and also you spend money on the place that you’re in. And I believe you are able to do that wherever you’re.
Hoogerwerf:
These three locations we noticed are organic refugias, harboring literal life—Koa timber and breadfruit, striped mullet and barracuda, kalo. However they’re additionally refugias of hope in a world so typically full of violence and degradation, harboring a unique concept about what it means to be a caretaker, which is far more about relationship than it’s about some particular motion.
Lee:
And I hold telling everyone, they ask me, what’s the key? I mentioned, relationships, relationships, relationships.
Stump:
Within the Hawaiian worldview they discuss three relationships which might be wanted to be in a state of concord, or possibly even what we might discover within the Hebrew notion of shalom—a way not simply of peace, however of being at peace with all issues.
Wilhelm:
And the primary is our religious relationship.
Hoogerwerf:
The second relationship is with folks
Wilhelm:
Our relationship with our fellow kanaka, our fellow human beings, proper?
Hoogerwerf:
That one might be one we consider most frequently, caring for our human neighbors, the sick and the poor and the needy.
Wilhelm:
After which the final relationship is our relationship with the aina and kai, the land and the ocean.
Hoogerwerf:
Aina and kai, the land and the ocean.
Stump:
That one might sound a bit odd, or incongruous, and even not relevant, no less than for a lot of the non secular communities I’ve been a part of.
Wilhelm:
I’d argue that for many of us, and it’s to not fault any of us, that in relation to having a relationship with the land or sea, in our case, in Hawaii, we’re very challenged. Once more, it’s to not fault us. It’s simply due to the best way society and civilization is has progressed, proper? We’ve come additional and additional away from our connection and relationship to God’s creation.
Lowe:
This facet of being in proper relationship with God, with one another, our neighbors and the land isn’t just one thing that we see in conventional Hawaiian cultures and worldviews, however it’s one thing we see from the start of the Bible in Genesis one and Genesis two and three, the place, when this world was created it was created to flourish in proper relationships.
Stump:
So the massive query, and essentially the most difficult facet of this journey for me, was whether or not we will get only one or two of those relationships proper. Can we reside in proper relationship with God and our neighbors, if we don’t reside in proper relationship with the land? And what does it even imply for me in my midwest subdivision to reside in proper relationship with the land?
Lowe:
How can we as people and households who day-after-day get up and breathe, breathe the air and drink the water and eat meals and produce waste. How then can we reside in proper relationship ourselves with our personal life and the way we relate to our neighbors and the remainder of creation round us? So sadly, if we’re alive and we’re human, there appears to be no getting across the actuality of our impacts to the world round us, and of God’s calling to be much less of a curse and extra of a blessing.
Hoogerwerf:
If we settle for that even some stage of discovering a greater relationship with the land is part of residing in shalom, then we nonetheless must ask how to do this in our personal contexts.
After spending a number of days with these folks and seeing these tasks, I used to be actually impressed by how so many individuals had been reaching into their cultural identities and discovering language and ritual that linked them again to the land, after which, again to God. And one of many issues it made me understand is what I’ve missed from not having this lengthy connection to a really particular place via generations of ancestors and the tales they inform in regards to the place.
I’ve spent quite a lot of effort and time making an attempt to develop issues on my little quarter acre right here in Grand Rapids, Michigan. And though I’ve realized rather a lot, I typically really feel like I’m simply having to make all of it up from scratch. In fact I’ve youtube and a thousand gardening blogs to reply any particular query I’ve, however it simply doesn’t really feel the identical. And so this brings me again to my remark from the very starting of the episode about our misplaced connection to put.
Stump:
Indigenous Individuals and Hawaiians and lots of different folks world wide have some actually stunning and significant methods of reconnecting with the land, even after acts of colonization and elimination of individuals from the locations they got here from. You and I each depend as our ancestors lots of the individuals who did that colonizing. And as with every act of violence, there’s a loss on either side. And many people nonetheless don’t know what we now have misplaced by being so disconnected from place.
Hoogerwerf:
However we had been reminded…
Lee:
Everyone seems to be from some place, proper?
Hoogerwerf:
And so possibly whereas I don’t have songs and tales handed down via my household about when to plant tomatoes or the right way to get via the awful winter, I do have some historical past right here. I do know by the sound of strolling within the snow when it’s good packing snow and my dad and mom nonetheless inform tales in regards to the blizzard of 78. I’m by no means going to have the Hawaiian context right here, however I might be attentive to what I do have and move that down.
Stump:
And there’ll at all times be people who find themselves extra linked to a spot, whether or not it’s via native indigenous individuals who do have generations of information via ancestors or others who’ve spent a lifetime paying attention to their place. We are able to faucet into them and their knowledge.
Lee:
It’s important to be delicate and observant sufficient inside your space to form of perceive what the lay of the land is, and who’re the folks that actually have the fervour and understanding and the depth of information to grasp land like how we’re speaking about proper now. And go type relationships with these folks to determine how you already know you guys can collectively aloha aina—love land—in ways in which it may be productive on your neighborhood.
Hoogerwerf:
Refugias and kipukas have at all times been a characteristic of the organic world. It’s how life has at all times endured via disturbance. And the church too has a historical past of discovering locations of shelter, an higher room or possibly even a grave, after which sending new life out into the world.
Stump:
These tales we heard are of people that have taken the time to pay attention, to be attentive, and to do what they will to construct refugias in their very own context. And essentially the most paradoxical factor about all of it, is that it finally ends up not solely being in regards to the locations we shield and restore.
Wilhelm:
And once more, we’re simply so human centric, yeah, that we expect, Oh, we’re restoring these lands! No, No. Whenever you begin to do this sort of work, you understand it’s the land that restores us. I imply, it’s symbiotic, I’d say too, as a result of we do have an element, and it’s completely different than I believe what environmentalism and conservative, you already know, is right this moment that, you already know, it’s like man is separate and void from creation. I imagine man, we now have the capability to influence creation. We’re not simply customers. We might be contributors too. And I imagine God designed us that method.
[Herb Lee singing in Hawaiian]
Credit
Hoogerwerf:
Mahalo to the entire communities that had been part of this story: to Mark and Vicki for his or her hospitality, to First Prez neighborhood and the Wilhelms and Herb Lee for sharing their tales with us and naturally for the work they’re doing to construct kipukas in Oahu. We hope the life and spirit we discovered there’ll discover different secure locations to take maintain.
[Song ends, credit music starts]
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