Congregational Church - First one in Kaua'i

Congregational Church - First one in Kaua'i, originally uploaded by Journal Keeper.

This is the Waioli Church in Hanalei -- we drove up here again on Wednesday to see their museum but it wasn't open. So we went to the Princeville Library to learn more about the early missionary experience on Kaua'i. We had the chance to read an out of print book about the church. The Wilcox's came in 1837 and God truly moved among this community. The native Hawaiians were anxious to have their own pastor and had built a home in preparation for their coming. Out of 3000 living in this area then, over 1000 were attending services. They built a large meeting hall with the traditional Hawaiian palm roof but it was destroyed a couple of years later. So they decided to rebuild using a blend of New England and Hawaiian architecture. This was their church building -- they important the stained glass windows. It's gorgeous. They worked hard reducing the Hawaiian language to print, teaching people to read, developing schools for the children and seminary instruction for the leaders of the church. Within about 15 years, the native Hawaiians were leading the churches. The Hawaiian king changed the laws to allow foreigners to own property, so their families were able to buy property and develop it. There was a true openness to the gospel and to living the Christian life.
I have to wonder what it must have been like for the Wilcox family to leave New England in the early 1800s (we'd only been a nation for 50 years), travel by ship around the tip of South America then out to this tiny island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean with no real connection to home. They had such a deep trust in God to provide for them, and such a desire to see the good news about Jesus shared with this community. It is truly inspirational to consider how they lived out their faith.
The sign on the church and their website still embraces their dream: "To Know Christ and Make Him Known."