September 17, 2023
Romans 14:1-12
Matthew 18:21-35
They were building their first nest together as an ‘apapane couple. An ‘apapane nest is a pretty impressive piece of engineering, taking a week or even a day or two more. That’s a lot of grass and twigs and moss to move.
They weren’t the only ones, of course. In a tree not far away his sister and her husband were also building a nest, their first one, too. They’d got started a little earlier, so their nest was taking shape while the brother’s nest looked pretty ragged. Everyone was having trouble finding the grass and moss and twigs for their nests, and flying farther to find them.
That’s when he got his clever idea.
When his sister and her husband (and his own wife) were away looking for more material, he flew quickly over to his sister’s nest. He pulled out a particularly nice twig that would be perfect for his own nest and flew back. When his wife returned she found him proudly settling that twig into position.
“Well done!” she said.
“There’s more,” he said.
They both flew off, she to search the forest and he to his sister’s nest. Before his wife came back he’d made three trips to it, taking grass and moss as well as another good structural twig.
“Where are you finding this so quickly?” his wife wondered.
“I found an old nest that nobody’s using,” he said.
“Oh, good! Show me and I’ll come, too.”
“I wish I could. This was the last of it,” he told her.
But he went back to his sister’s nest again for more.
He was careful to make sure his sister and her husband were absent. It was clear that they had had a difficult time replacing the things he’d taken. They were still ahead in their nest’s construction, but not so much as before.
He pulled a piece of moss from his sister’s nest and turned around. There, sitting silently on a nearby branch, was his wife.
“Abandoned nest?” she said.
“I’ll stop with this one,” he said.
“That’s not enough,” she told him. “You have to put that piece back, first of all. Then you have to wait for your sister and her husband and tell them what you’ve been doing. Then you have to help them build this nest that you’ve been stealing from.”
“Isn’t it enough that I just stop and let it be?” he asked.
“No, it isn’t. It’s nowhere near enough. You’ve been pulling their nest apart and you need to help them put it back.”
“Couldn’t I just do that? Leave out that I’ve been taking things?”
She gave him a very sharp look indeed. “She’s your sister. Do you think she’d be content with a lie?”
He admitted that she wouldn’t.
“Ask anyone among the ‘apapane,” she said. “We can live together when we make mistakes and make amends for them. We can’t live together with lies. It begins with truth. So tell the truth.”
He told the truth. His sister had some true and truly angry things to say to him about it, but she did accept his help in repairing the damage and, during family gatherings, was sometimes heard to say, “It begins with truth. Thank you, brother, for the truth.”
by Eric Anderson
Watch the Recorded Story
I write these stories ahead of time, but I tell them from memory rather than reading them. As a result, they change.
Photo of an ‘apapane by Eric Anderson.
ordainedgeek 
Hardest thing ever !