Story: Surprise

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 1 Comment

April 5, 2026

Acts 10:34-43
John 20:1-18

Sometimes a bird on the mountainsides just takes a liking for a particular ohi’a tree. I don’t know whether the nectar tastes better, or if you get a particularly crunchy kind of bug, or if there’s something else that gets a bird excited.

This is about an i’iwi who had a favorite ohi’a tree.

He like other trees as well. When the mamane were in blossom, he’d happily sip from those flowers as well, but as far as he was concerned there was nothing better than his favorite ohi’a tree. The flowers were the right color red, he thought, and they’d get that lovely gold tip as they blossomed. Sometimes there weren’t any flowers on it, of course, but that just meant he’d develop an appetite as he waited for them to bloom again.

It was his favorite tree.

I think you know, however, that sometimes trees in the ohi’a forest die. Sometimes the wind blows them down. Sometimes an earthquake from the volcano shakes the soil loose beneath them. Sometimes an eruption knocks them down. And sometimes, I’m very sad to say, they get very sick very quickly. Their leaves fall and, all too often, no leaves grow ever again.

The i’iwi’s favorite tree got sick.

He didn’t notice at first. He noticed it didn’t have any blossoms, of course, but that wasn’t unusual. A tree can’t bloom all the time. But then he noticed that some of the leaves were browning and dropping away. It looked like the tree was trying to grow new leaves, but there didn’t seem to be a lot of them. The i’iwi realized that the tree was in bad shape.

He shouted out his frustration to the world.

He carried on with living. But he decided it would make him too sad to see his favorite tree get sick and maybe – probably – die, so he spent his time in other parts of the forest. There were good trees there. None of them were his favorite tree. None of them could ever be his favorite tree.

One day, however, the forest’s blossoms were scarce in the groves he’d been browsing. The pattern of flowers led him, tree by tree, toward his favorite tree. He didn’t really want to go there, but if that’s where the nectar was, that’s where the nectar was. Eventually he found himself flying right toward his favorite tree.

It was covered with bright red ohi’a lehua.

Imagine his surprise. He was sure the tree was dead, but it had survived, and it had even thrived. He flew around it, singing for joy. He settled onto a branch and lowered his long curved beak into a flower. The nectar tasted like heaven, even better than before, he thought.

This story is about Easter, but it’s not about mistaking who’s alive for someone who is dead. No. this story is about Easter because it’s about surprise. That i’iwi knew, knew to his soul, that his favorite tree was no more. Jesus’ friends and disciples, Simon Peter and Mary Magdalene, they knew that Jesus had died – as he had.

Both a Hawaiian bird and Mediterranean human beings learned that the world has more surprises in it than they’d imagined. An ohi’a that got better. A Savior who rose again to new life.

Happy Easter!

by Eric Anderson

Regrettably, there was a technical problem this morning, and the story was not recorded.

Story: All the Things

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 1 Comment

April 5, 2026

Acts 10:34-43
John 20:1-18

You’ve heard, I know, that there are some birds that winter with us here in Hawai’i, and that they fly to Alaska for the summer. Those birds might prefer to fly on a big jet, like you and I, but they use their own wings, even though some of them are pretty small birds. The kolea are the best known, but we’re also saying farewell to hunakai, ‘ulili, and ‘akekeke in the next month or so.

An ‘akekeke getting ready to fly looks like, well, it looks like an ‘akekeke does most of the time. It hops around the sands and stones and grasses near the ocean looking for crabs, worms, small fish, and basically anything it can eat.

A little flock of ‘akekeke noticed, however, that one of their number never seemed to pause much. Oh, she’d rest when she needed to, but the rest of the time her beak was pointed down, following her eyes constantly searching out the next worm, or small fish, or crab. She’d pause when she’d really filled herself up, but even with that she was hunting far more than her family or friends.

“What are you up to?” they asked her.

“I’m getting ready for the big flight,” she said.

“We all are, but we’re not eating all the time. You’re eating all the time. Why?”

“I want to make sure I can get all the things before it’s time to go,” she said.

“What are you talking about?” they asked her. “You can’t eat all the things. There’s too many things to eat to do that. And where would you put them?”

“I know,” she said, “but I’m going to look for as many as I can find, and who knows? Maybe that will be all the things.”

Why do I tell you this story? Well, it’s because out there along the walkways of the church there are Easter eggs. Some of them are ones you colored yesterday, and they look amazing. Some of them have sweets in them, and the sweets (not the plastic eggs) taste amazing.

What’s important, however, is that we find all the things. All the dyed eggs. All the plastic eggs. All the eggs you can use to make egg salad. All the eggs that have goodies in them.

Be like the ‘akakeke this morning. Find all the things!

by Eric Anderson

I tell two stories on Easter Sunday. I told this one just before the keiki began the annual Easter Egg hunt, where it is really important to find all the eggs. For the record, they did!

This story was not recorded.

Story: The Colt

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 1 Comment

March 29, 2026

Philippians 2:5-11
Matthew 21:1-11

Today’s story doesn’t take place in the forests of Hawai’i. Nor does it take place in our time. It starts in a small village not far from Jerusalem, and it takes place on a day we’re familiar with because we celebrate it each year.

Surprise! It’s Palm Sunday.

He was a very young donkey. He’d only lived in one place, and he’d only really experienced one other creature, and that was his mother. He drank his milk and experimented with grass and hay and basically thought that life was pretty good, if a little dull.

On that day, however, a couple strangers came by and began to untie his halter and his mother’s halter from the fence. “What’s going on?” he asked his mother, who understood human language better than he did.

“These men say that the Lord needs us,” she said with some surprise.

“What does that mean?” he wondered, and his mother didn’t know, either.

Mystified, they followed the two strangers to a group of strangers. They put cloaks over his mother’s back and over his back, and then one of them sat on his mother while his friends cheered.

“What’s going on?” he asked his mother in some fright.

“They’ve asked us to carry Jesus to the city,” said his mother. “Just walk by me and everything will be fine.”

Off they went. One of the men led his mother along the road, though she seemed to know where she was going anyway. He trotted alongside – his legs were shorter than his mother’s, so he had to go faster to keep up.

As they made their way down a hill, other people began to gather along the road. They began to shout at Jesus and his companions. Some of them took their cloaks off and laid them on the road in front of the two donkeys. Others had taken branches from the trees and were waving them in the air as they shouted. Some of the leaves covered the road and the cloaks, and as the donkeys’ hooves stepped on them, they made a lovely scent rise.

“What are they saying?” he asked his mother, a little frightened by all the shouting.

“Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord,” said his mother with wonder in her voice. “And they’re calling, ‘Help us! Save us!’”

The little donkey didn’t know how they were going to do that. He didn’t even know how he was going to help his mother carry Jesus. Abruptly, he knew that the thing he wanted most in the world, in fact, was to help his mother carry Jesus. He nuzzled up to her side.

“Let me help,” he said plaintively.

She said nothing at all, because Jesus reached over and rested his hand on the little one’s head. Just his hand. It didn’t weigh much at all. Jesus even scratched him behind the ears a little. But he proudly carried that hand along the way, through the city gates, and up the streets as the crowds grew and kept calling out in joy and with need:

“Help us! Save us! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!”

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories in full ahead of time, but I tell them from memory (and a certain amount of improvisation). The story as you read it is not necessarily as I told it.

The image is The Entry of Christ into Jerusalem by Master of Maderuelo (12th cent.) – photographed by Zambonia 2011-09-29, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=17158568.

Story: Late

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 3 Comments

March 22, 2026

Ezekiel 37:1-14
John 11:1-45

The Manu-o-Ku chick was hungry. Of course he was hungry. Mom and Dad had fed him, then flown off to find more food. He sat on the branch where he’d hatched, and waited for them to come back.

He was hungry.

He got hungrier. The sun kept moving across the sky, but as it did no white wings appeared. He saw no black beaks carrying fish. There were plenty of other birds about, but not the ones he looked for.

He was hungry.

He was hungrier.

Where were they? They were clearly late. When you’re hungry, a late meal is the next one you have, because you want to eat when you’re just starting to be hungry, and not when you’ve been hungry for a while.

He’d been hungry for a while. At least so it seemed to him.

The sun really wasn’t moving that fast across the sky, but it was moving. He shuffled along the branch for a bit and that didn’t help. Now he was hungry in a slightly different place. It wasn’t really any different from being hungry in the place he’d been.

Where were his parents?

The ocean wasn’t that far away. He could hear the waves breaking sometimes. How far did you have to fly to find fish in the ocean? He didn’t know. He couldn’t fly yet.

What if they had to fly to a completely different island to find fish? That didn’t make sense, but sometimes when you’re hungry, you think things that don’t make sense.

Where were his parents? Did they get lost? Were they feeding some other chick? Had they decided that he was too much trouble?

No, he was sure they were coming back. If they could. If they hadn’t been blown off somewhere by a high wind…

He was so hungry.

He closed his eyes to focus on worrying and feeling sorry for himself and feeling hungry.

He opened his eyes a moment later to the sound of fluttering wings and the scrape of claws on bark. It was his mother. She had food for him. She was late – at least as far as he was concerned – but she was there.

But she didn’t have a fish for him.

She had two fish.

Not one, but two. She’d fished a bit longer to fill him up a little more.

He ate the first fish, and he felt less hungry. Then he ate the second fish, and he felt very good indeed.

“Thanks for being late, Mom,” he said. She gave him a funny look.

“Thank you for bringing two fish,” he said.

“Of course, son. You’re welcome,” she said, and she took off again for the next fish she’d bring back to him.

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories in full ahead of time, but I tell them from memory and inspiration. The story as I wrote it and as I told it are not precisely the same.

Photo of a Manu-o-Ku parent delivering two fish to a chick by Eric Anderson.

Stones

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 4 Comments
Gray stones.


“Jesus said, ‘Take away the stone.’ Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, ‘Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead four days.'” – John 11:39

The first stones were the threats,
the stones they reached for when you said,
“The Father and I are one.” They called
it blasphemy, and well, it would be
if it weren’t true.

Given the risk of stones, which thrown,
break bones, returning to Judea
to heal your friend whose illness was
not to the death would make no sense,
at least if true.

But Lazarus was dead and in the grave
when you decided to return. Dear Thomas
pledged to join you in your death
if stones were cast. I’m sure he thought
he told the truth.

They came to you to weep. They came
to tell you just how much they trusted you.
“If you had been here, Lazarus would not
have died.” Your tears proclaimed your love
for Lazarus in truth.

“Remove the stone,” you called, despite the stink.
“Remove the stone,” you called, though they recoiled.
“Remove the stone,” you called, and Lazarus emerged.
“Unbind him now,” you called: he lived
in truth.

The stones they feared remained upon the ground.
No stones would break your bones, though one would seal
your tomb like Lazarus’. You there, as here, proclaimed
“I am the resurrection and the life”
in truth.

A poem/prayer based on John 11:1-45, the Revised Common Lectionary Gospel Reading for Year A, Fifth Sunday in Lent.

Photo by Eric Anderson.

Story: Visible

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 3 Comments

March 15, 2026

1 Samuel 16:1-13
Ephesians 5:8-14

‘Apapane depend on finding flowers for their nectar, and also to find the bugs that they eat, because those bugs tend to like eating the nectar. For an ‘apapane, a grove of ohi’a in blossom is like a long buffet table with all the variety they could ask for. When the trees where they are aren’t blooming, they’ll search about to find some that are.

One ‘apapane turned out to be really good at finding trees in blossom. His friends and family grew to depend on him. He’d fly about early in the morning, find a grove of lehua, and summon the rest of the flock. They’d all descend on it and merrily feast on nectar and bugs until they set off to find another good spot.

One day, as this ‘apapane was making his morning search for nectar, he found two places before he headed back to his family and friends. One of the spots was barely okay. It would do if nothing else was available. The other spot was amazing. Every tree was just dripping with blossoms. A flock could spend a couple days and not visit every flower.

He could just about taste the nectar. He started flying back, and as he did, a thought crossed his mind. What if he led everybody back to the first spot, the one that was just okay? If he did, he could go to the second spot and have it all to himself.

He got back to the flock and said, “I’ve found something! It’s not great, but it will do until something better comes along.” So they followed him – to the first little grove.

As they settled in to sip nectar and hunt bugs, he quietly flew away to the second spot and drank nectar until he overflowed.

The next day he did it again. He found two spots, and led his friends and family to the one that wasn’t as good, while he snuck off to the better one. The next day he did it again. And again.

One of his friends noticed that he wasn’t finding good groves the way he had before, and then also noticed that he went missing shortly after leading them to iffy trees. So when he slipped away she followed him to the heavily flowered grove he’d found and not shared. As he took his first deep sip of an ohi’a blossom, she landed next to him.

“Is this what you’re doing now?” she asked. “Being selfish?”

“How do you know what I’m thinking?” he demanded.

“I don’t know what you’re thinking,” she said. “I do know what you’re doing. What you’re doing is showing your friends middling spots while you save the good spots for yourself.”

“What are you going to say to the others?” he wanted to know.

“That depends on what you do tomorrow,” she said.

Early the next day, he flew off to seek for ohi’a groves. His friend watched him go, and she watched him come back. The flock followed him to a stand of ohi’a trees, and they were covered in bright red blossoms.

He perched next to his friend.

“Better?” he asked.

“Better,” she said. “I’m glad to know you’re not selfish at heart.”

“How do you know that?” he asked. “Can you read my heart?”

“Of course not,” she said, “but what you do reveals your heart. When you act selfishly, you show a selfish heart. When you share, you show a sharing heart.

“Of the two,” she added, “I prefer the sharing.”

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories in advance, but I tell them live from a combination of memory and improvisation. The story as written does not exactly match the story as told.

Photo of an ‘apapane in ohi’a blossoms by Eric Anderson.

Seven Rejections

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 2 Comments
A line of eight men with the figure at furthest left holding a horn of oil over the head of the fourth figure from the left.


“Jesse made seven of his sons pass before Samuel, and Samuel said to Jesse, ‘The LORD has not chosen any of these.'” – 1 Samuel 16:10

Eliab, no.
Abinadab: rejected, too.
Perhaps Shammah? Well, no. Not he.
Four more paraded past their father
and the prophet and of
those seven sons you chose, O God,

Not one.

I wonder if they knew.
I wonder if they guessed,
since all seemed to have heard
that king and prophet were at odds.
Were they at all concerned that You, O God,
sought to incite rebellion?

Maybe one?

You told the prophet you
peer in the heart,
where humans cannot comprehend
(my own heart is a mystery).
Full seven times you looked,
and saw, and told the prophet, “No.

“Not this one.”

What did you see in David, God,
for he committed sins that Saul
had never dreamed. A hasty spear
that missed is terrible. Conspiracy
to cover up a rape is so much worse,
as David did.

This one.

They fade away from this account:
Eliab and Abinadab, Shammah as well.
Four brothers’ names have fallen from the tale.
I wonder, though, how many breathed
a soul-relieving sigh that they were not
anointed by the sage, that they were not

The one.

A poem/prayer based on 1 Samuel 16:1-13, the Revised Common Lectionary Gospel Reading for Year A, Fourth Sunday in Lent.

The image is David Anointed King by Samuel, Dura Europos synagogue painting (3rd cent.), reworked by Marsyas. Yale Gilman collection, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5107843.

Story: Comforter

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 2 Comments
A black and white bird standing on widely space long pink legs has its long straight black wide open.

March 8, 2026

Exodus 17:1-7
John 4:5-42

I don’t know precisely why the ae’o was upset. I don’t know whether someone had squawked something at her, or if one of the fish she caught tasted bad, or whether the sun was too hot for her that morning. I suppose she might have been frustrated by a fish that got away, or by the sun’s glare in the sky, or by a friend who forgot to say, “Hi.”

It could have been any of these things or more. For whatever reason, she was upset and she let everybody else know it.

She squealed and she squawked. Ae’o can be very loud about that. She hollered at the fish she was hunting. She hollered at the ala’e ke’oke’o in the water. She screeched at ‘auku’u and the cattle egrets and the kolea and the akekeke. To be honest she yelled at so many different birds that I can’t name them all.

She was upset and everybody knew it.

Her family couldn’t get anywhere with her. Brothers, sisters, parents, even tutus all flew over to her and asked her what was wrong. She didn’t tell them anything – she just shrieked at them without words and they unhappily retreated. They didn’t like being yelled at. They also knew that as long as she was yelling at them she wasn’t getting less upset, so they went away.

“I don’t know what to do for her,” said a brother.

“I didn’t get anywhere,” said a sister.

“She even yelled at me,” said her grandmother.

“Let me try,” said one of her friends.

“Are you sure?” asked the ae’o’s mother. “She’s just getting more upset with everybody.”

“I think there’s one thing I can try,” said the friend, and she flew to be a little closer to her upset friend.

She didn’t get very close. She just settled onto the shore and started poking at the grasses for bugs and worms. Her friend huffed, but didn’t scream.

Gradually, the friend took one or two steps at a time toward her upset friend. Each time she poked her beak down to peck at a bug. Each time she paused before taking any more steps.

Eventually the two birds were standing much closer to one another. The upset one hadn’t screeched. Her friend hadn’t said anything. She just drew a little closer to her friend, so she could see she wasn’t alone.

Two black and white birds with long straight black beaks and long pink legs stand near one another alongside a large pool of water.

Neither of them spoke for a long time. It was the upset bird who broke the silence.

“Thank you,” she said.

“You’re welcome,” said her friend.

“I’ve been so upset,” said the first bird.

“I know,” said her friend. “And you’re not alone.”

“That’s good,” said the first bird. “It’s good to know it, too.”

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories in advance and tell them from a combination of memory and improvisation. The story as I wrote it is not precisely as I told it.

Photos of ae’o (Hawaiian black-necked stilts) by Eric Anderson.

Over Coffee

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 2 Comments
A coffee cup

“Then the woman left her water jar and went back to the city. She said to the people…” – John 4:28

I can’t remember when
theology so stimulated me
I left my water jar behind
to tell my neighbors what I’d learned.

But then I cast my mind
upon these Monday mornings with a friend
when our thoughts range so far
and our hands clasp the coffee cups before us.

She left the water jar, while I
would finish the coffee first,
and savor wisdom new and sweet
and sharp and challenging.

A poem/prayer based on John 4:5-42, the Revised Common Lectionary Gospel Reading for Year A, Third Sunday in Lent.

Story: The Fast and the Futile

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 3 Comments
A bird in flight, wings spread wide. The bird coloring is mostly brown.

March 1, 2026

Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
John 3:1-17

Saltiness, sweetness, bitterness, and sourness. Those are the four senses of the human tastebuds. I’ve told stories about the first three over the last three weeks. Shall we go for sour?

Let’s go for sour.

He was the fasted akekeke in his generation (the English name is ruddy turnstone, and there is some reddishness in their brown feathers, and they do turn stones when looking for food). Yes, the fastest akekeke in his generation, and everybody knew it.

After hatching and fledging he’d quickly begun winning races among his siblings and cousins and friends in Alaska. They’d made a short journey to the shoreline where they’d munched on crabs and fish and snails before making the long flight to Hawai’i. That had been his first time, so even though he could fly very fast, he stayed with the other birds and they arrived on the island together.

But as spring approached and the return to Alaska, he started to think about winning.

“I’m going to win the race,” he announced to his friends and cousins.

“What race?” they asked.

“The race back to Alaska,” he said. “I’m going to win.”

“There’s a race?” they said, and they looked at one another in confusion.

“And I’m going to win,” he said firmly, and leaped into the air to practice.

“What are you talking about, son?” asked his father later on. “What race are you flying in?”

“The race to Alaska,” said the young bird. “I’m going to win.”

“But there’s no race,” said his father. “We just fly to the same place.”

“What good is that?” said the fastest akekeke in his generation. “There has to be a race. And I’m going to win.”

And that was that. His father, his mother, his sisters and brothers, his tutus, his cousins, his friends: Nobody could convince him that there wasn’t a race, that there wasn’t anything to win.

“I’m going to win the race,” he insisted.

When the day came for the akekeke to begin their flight to Alaska, he was among the first to take to the sky. He pressed on hard, and rapidly drew to the front of the flock, then beyond it. He was the fastest flyer in his generation, after all.

It wasn’t long before he couldn’t make out the other birds behind him. He was alone in the sky. He was confident, though, that he knew where he was going, and he was also right. He did. It was a long tiresome journey, but he made a successful landing on the Alaskan shores and began hunting for food.

He’d won.

But as he satisfied his hunger, he realized that another hunger remained unsatisfied. He’d won, but there was no celebration. There was nobody there. He was the only akekeke on a long empty beach. He was lonely. It was a sour victory.

It took quite some time before the other akekeke began arriving. It took longer for his father to find him. “How was your race?” he asked his son.

“The flight was all right,” he said, “but you’re right. It wasn’t a race.”

“The victory wasn’t what you thought?” said the father.

“It was sour,” said the son.

“How about now?” asked the father, “with everybody else here?”

The son looked around at the busily feeding akekeke, and the sourness subsided. He felt good again.

“Everybody is in the same place,” he told his father. “We’ve all won.”

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories ahead of time, but I tell them from a combination of memory and improvisation. On this day, for example, one of the youngsters raced up to the front, which was a little unfortunate given the theme of the story.

Photo of an akekeke in flight by Eric Anderson.