Mauri Faith

Whakapono (faka-pono) is faith.

Piripono is faithfulness. 

Two words: one for faith in a higher-being; one for loyally engaging the higher power

In the words of a friend, "I love what Elder Matthew Cowley said of the Polynesian saints. Elder Cowley said that they expect miracles as a matter of course -- they just know that God will answer prayers and will grant them miracles. I think that's very cool. And I believe that you are like that in many ways. I know you and I have both had some very hard experiences with prayers that seem unheard (let alone unanswered). And I know that we have been broken in a few places. But I see in you the same thing that I feel in me: a dogged hope and a persistent belief in faith, miracles, and Heavenly promises." 

I've been thinking about FAITH. FAITH in God mostly. 

I've been thinking about how faith is contrasted with secular and spiritual knowledge, and the Mauri culture.

Mauris are people of AMAZING faith. How they communicate that faith can be confusing to a foreigner, such as myself. But I was so grateful to receive the above email because it helped me perceive how I see faith and how they see faith. It helped me make sense of a comment that was made to me in church two Sundays ago. 

I felt impressed to  bear my testimony, but it turned out to be a thanks-imony, and I hate those, but it was an intense impression and a quick moment at the pulpit. In my testimony/thanks-imony, I talked about how being in New Zealand has been much, much harder than we had planned, and sometimes I ask if God has forsaken me and my family. I was grateful for the help of the ward members. The end. Ryan is a ward missionary (or assistant ward mission leader given the tasks he is consistently assigned to do). The ward mission leader is Mauri. He saw me in the hall after my testimony and said, "You need to harden up your faith." I was furious! I need to harden up? I've been to hell and back multiple times in my short 36 years and primarily in the last 10, and he had the audacity to tell me I need to "harden up my faith." Once I calmed down, I prayed for forgiveness; I prayed I'd forgive him, and let it go. And I did. I moved on.

When I read my friend's email, it clicked. We were having the worse kind of intercultural MIScommunication.  When he said to me, "I need to harden up my faith." He was saying, "Stop wavering. EXPECT MIRACLES. God will provide and there is no need for you to worry about it any more. The End. Stop doubting and blubbering." It all made sense to me. My stubbornness and pride and my inability to decipher that message held back a sorely needed lesson. I need to stop wavering, stop worrying because God will provide--maybe not like I think it should happen, but that doesn't really matter because there is a God in Heaven that knows me intimately; He is aware of my walls (Isaiah 49:16); and I am engraven upon His body. He knows Ryan and my children AND YOU; he KNOWS what we need and desires to give it to us but he cannot if we do not stand firm enough or consistently enough in our faith and in our relationship with Him. So, grateful you reminded me of the Mauri history in the church and their concept of faith.

A few days ago, I taught Relief Society. I was having a hard time connecting to the lesson and discerning what messages I needed to share. One of the Relief Society presidency sat by me during sacrament meeting and I felt impressed to ask her, "What is the  biggest struggle you see among the Relief Society sisters?" When I asked she said, "They struggle financially and thy struggle with loneliness." Then she stopped and she said, "They struggle because they think they are supposed to be fitting into the box of expectations. Like stay-at-home if you have kids even though you absolutely hate it, or like not being married and it's all you want, or being so lonely because your husband has been dead for years." Then I knew what I needed to do, I needed to teach about the ATONEMENT and how it REALLY HEALS, not just the physical things, but that it REALLY HEALS our HEARTS an MINDS. So we talked about Molly Mormon. It was eye-opening. Some had never heard the phrase before, but we happened to have a HUGE family visiting from Cache Valley in the ward, and they helped explain the stereotype. LOL! 

These sisters, primarily Polynesian, said: Molly Mormon is blonde, blue-eyed, thin, American, apron-wearing, cookie-baking, never-yelling, perfect children, perfect wife. Then I stopped them and said, "This is sad." Most of us are physically NOT this and we literally CANNOT change our appearance. So, by the very nature of what we cannot change, we already feel disconnected. What about the woman who's not married? Who can't have children? Whose husband is not a member? Who is a single mom? What about the woman who's given everything and her husband leaves her? What about them? 

Then I asked, "What is the point of being a part of this church if this is who think a Mormon woman is and how we think she should behave?" It's because of the atonement and the covenants. It's because Jesus knows our walls, another way to say that He knows how we hurt; He knows the ways in which we struggle and if we do not believe He can heal and help us, then what is the point? Because He can! I talked about Isaiah 49:16, read some quotes by Lorenzo Snow. May favorite was this quote: "Jesus, the Son of God, was sent into the world to make it possible for you and me to receive these extraordinary blessings. He had to make a great sacrifice. It required all the power that He had and all the faith that He could summon for Him to accomplish that which the Father required of Him." It required ALL THE FAITH JESUS COULD SUMMON! This phrase blew my mind. I thought He knew it all. I thought Jesus was in a state where his faith was dormant and he was working from the basis of knowledge (Alma 32:34). I didn't think Jesus would have to exercise faith, the assurance of things hoped for the evidence of things not seen which were true (Hebrews 11:1; Alma 32:21). My eyes have been opened differently in how to conceptualize faith. 

That night, our Bishop came over. He's also Mauri and we talked about our situation in New Zealand. How things have turned out differently than we planned. He validated our concerns when he said, "This is not how I envisioned your time here at all." He offered what help he could offer, in our behalf. He was equally bewildered by our situation and wasn't sure how to advise us. Do we work to trudge through this hard time here or do we need to head back to the US? It was a helpful conversation; what moved me was his prayer in our behalf before he left. He prayed with the faith of expectation. I keep thinking of the phrase "prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of Hosts" (Malachi 3:10). Even in his prayer, he acknowledged we were all equally confused about how we should proceed from this point forward, but the tone and the faith was that God would answer our prayers and we didn't need to worry that our best interest was in the forefront of HIS, God's, concern for us.

This faith knowledge has happened parallel to conversations with Ryan about how knowledge, secular and spiritual, affect faith. I asked Ryan, "Do you think it is harder for someone with a hyperanalytical mind and increasing secular education, such as myself, to have faith?" Our conclusion was no. But that hyperanalytical minds have the extra temptation to doubt, overanalyze and struggle staying firm enough in their faith to receive the blessings they need and the blessings God desires to give them. In other words, hyperanalytical minds struggle trusting in hope absent of knowledge. 

Our conclusion, although not definitive, was supported when we talked to Bro Wong. Bro. Wong is a member of 6+ months of the LDS faith, well-educated with a crazy, beautiful analytical mind. He's a BLAST to talk to and struggles with the hypocrisy he sees in the church culture (not the gospel, so much). AND YET, he has faith, that when he's worthy, he can take his family to the temple and they will be sealed for eternity--even though his one experience doing baptisms in the temple was horrible. He still exercises his faith; He trusts in the promises God has made to him (Elder Uchdorft talks about this). He told us this week, "We (he and his wife, Natalie--a true Christian saint) knew what we were getting into before we were baptized; We have faith in God and the promises of the gospel no matter the stupid things people do."

I think one of the most profound lessons I've learned in New Zealand has nothing to do with reason we are here, my secular knowledge. It has everything to do with how have faith in God, how to have both whakapono and piripono. 

In the eloquent words of someone outside of our perspective, having not had our envisioned experience fall together beautifully, we've learned a new way to see the world; we've learned a new way to see something as fundamental as faith. I feel sorry for people who stay "home," who stay in their comfort zones. 

Even though the process is hard on me, I'm so grateful for the choices Ryan and I have made in our life to learn and grow over the choice to be comfortable.