A life Full of love ends

Joni Langi funeral July 28, 2005 – Tribute from Uniting Church President, Rev. Dr Dean Drayton.

The President of the Republic of Fiji, distinguished guests, and members of the Methodist Church.

Ringa and the family - we cannot know your grief and loss. It is hard enough saying goodbye to my friend. But this is the time in the tears that we also take a longer perspective, look to the horizon of a persons life and see the way he has sailed. He was a man of the Kingdom of God. Inevitably it means he was caught up with a world vision, a Pacific vision, a Fiji vision and a Rotuman vision.

He was a builder always looking forward in his witness of the kingdom of God that he saw drawing us on. Because his confidence was with God, and not in himself, his life is a living definition of what it means to be part of God’s future.

He was willing to move a long way from his beloved Rotuma. What a task he had in Sydney. Working at the Wesley Mission he was the one encouraging and shepherding all the Pacific congregations that used to meet there prior to the mid eighties when each found their own property to worship in and moved away from the one central sight. He must have had the wisdom of Solomon to help so many cultures work together.

Perhaps it is because he was a Rotuman that he saw so clearly the need for all to work together, Fijian and Indian, Polynesian and Melanesian, Pacific and Australia, Oceania and the world. When you come from the edge you know you cannot do it by yourself. It is necessary to work with others. But he saw beyond necessity, he saw that this was the way of Jesus and Jesus kingdom.

Since hearing the awful news I have been asking myself, what passage of scripture gives us insight into the man of God Joni was. From the first and now after days I come back to 1 Corinthians 3:7 “So neither the one who plants or the one who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. Verse 9 For we are God’s servants, working together; you are God’s field, God’s building.”
Can’t you hear him saying. Verse 11, “For no one can lay any foundation other than the one that is laid; that foundation is Jesus Christ.

What a keen sense of injustice he had. Last year when one of our Presbyteries was most unwise, Joni named the issue as unfair in no uncertain terms. He was direct, no backing away from important issues, but if one was honest and direct too, then the foundation was laid for matters to be worked through. He know how to speak the truth in love.

He passionately worked for the Conference, for Fiji, for all to have their rightful part. Joni had a great capacity to surprise, to pull one out of the hat, or in Rotuman “Bring it out from behind the knees”

But for me one gets to the deepest issues in the way in which he wanted Rotumans to have a place here in Suva, with many more Rotumans living in Fiji, than on Rotuma itself. The Churchwood chapel is a testimony to his faith, to his belief in the future, to his willingness to take risks in the serving of his people, providing a home for them in Fiji.

This was a dream of his. I first met him in 1983 when he was talking about it. After talking with Jone I could see this octagonal concrete building in my mind. That is a great gift, to so describe that which is not yet, that we can see it take shape before us. I heard about the building, and I had always wanted to worship there, and was given the opportunity to do this last August. Joni told me about the major pour of the concrete floor. I am sure that you have heard about it, especially the miracle of that night, when in faith they kept pouring when the engineer was urging caution, holding back. They had committed themselves and went on, trusting God despite what else was happening.

In the traditional blessing “May your shadow never grow less”. As he stands close to the Lord of light, his shadow will now stretch to God’s horizon. In Revelations 7:9,10 it is clear that we will all stand together before the throne.
“After this I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands.
The cried out with a loud voice, saying,
“Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!”
Won’t Joni Langi be at home. He spent his whole ministry pointing to the one who now holds him. Salvation belongs to our God, and to the Lamb.

Rev. Dr Dean Drayton

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