CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT: Mount Ruapehu
Rau stood on the top of the mountain.
His knees were aching, his body drenched with sweat – but he didn’t care. In front of him was Ruapehu’s crater lake – green-blue, and beautiful. Still active! Still steaming! Dangerous, and vibrantly alive.
Rau turned – and stretched out, as far as the eye could see, was Aotearoa. The single distant peak of Taranaki was to the west, the smooth cone of Ngauruhoe and rugged edge of Tongariro to the east, and the brown turf of the Iwi Tainui, the tribe of the Waikato, was expansive before him. This was the land of the Maori king! Rau smiled, remembering Tane – he had stayed in Taupo, to spread the news of Joshua to his own tribe.
This was the heart of the North Island – of Te Ika-a-Maui, the great fish of Maui, as his people had named it in legend.
Tongariro…Rau recalled another legend: the priest of Arawa, Ngatoroirangi, had feared death, on this very summit. Why? Rau pondered. Surely he hadn’t yet known the One – the One greater than death.
Rau cast his eyes again across all the land.
“Areruia,” he said. “Oh, Lord, you are majestic, over all the Earth.”
He breathed in a deep breath, breaking into a karakia: worshiping. And then he turned.
Joshua was there. He was away from the rest. The others were wandering around the crater lake – all but John, who lingered close to Joshua.
Rau wandered across the rocks to Joshua. His back was toward him – his hands straight up, his face lifted to the sky. Rau could hear his voice – prayer, he was certain, though the language was strange to him: melodic, and unknown.
Rau hesitated, now, behind Joshua’s back. He shouldn’t interrupt him. What was happening was sacred, somehow: a joining of Joshua to the divine.
He felt, in that moment, exposed. He felt shabby, and sorely in need of a bath. Did it matter? It was disrespectful, coming so unclean. He turned to leave – to allow Joshua privacy – but then Joshua suddenly turned: suddenly grasped his arm, and looked into his eyes.
Rau gasped. Light flooded over him – light was penetrating through all of Joshua’s being.
“Master,” Rau whispered, sinking to his knees. “Master…”
The light was searching him, within – searching the fullness of his soul, uncovering him. He trembled, and clung to Joshua’s arm – he felt his hidden shame exposed, he writhed, but the light was stronger: the light melted his shame away.
“Atua,” Rau breathed. “Te Wairua, Te Tamaiti: Tapu!” he cried. “Tapu!”
The light was sacred! The light was God.
“Ae,” Joshua whispered, grasping his hand, pressing forehead and nose. “The Spirit is tapu, Rau. But Atua is here – and through me, you can touch the light and live.”
Rau closed his eyes tightly, and now heard Joshua’s voice murmuring words gently over his head: strange words, unfamiliar and melodic. He still felt the light, now fully within – now saturating him fully: now owning him fully. There was more! As Joshua murmured over him, Rau gasped again: and now, suddenly, his spirit was taken by love.
He found himself weeping: crying, as a child. Love! Divine love! Life-giving love. There was no hesitation: nothing was held back.
His soul was swept up by the love – swept wholly up into oneness: swept wholly up into joy. He was caught now, in ecstasy – caught, in full completion: he had found now, what, in all his life, he had trusted he would one day find. He had found Atua: he had found God.
Rau swayed, on his knees, with eyes closed, still clinging to Joshua with tears. He began to speak the same words as Joshua – he began to worship, with all of his being.
Joshua held him. And then, as the light began to fade, he opened his eyes.
Joshua’s face was above him. His brown eyes were also filled with tears – his face lit up with joy. Human! Only human, now – only human. But, for those moments, Joshua had also been divine.
“Master,” Rau whispered – and Joshua tipped Rau’s head between his hands, as a mother to a child, and kissed him on the forehead.
“It’s all right,” he murmured. “You are safe, with me.”
Rau reached again to grasp his hand strongly. “As the pikorua twists together for eternity,” he said, “You are One.”
“Yes,” Joshua murmured. “Like a pounamu twist, we are One. And you also can be one, Rau, with us.”
Rau gazed at him – and Joshua smiled back at him. Then Joshua tipped his head, and rose to his feet. He glanced briefly at John, and then moved away.
Rau remained on his knees. He held, in his mind’s eye, what he had seen: the Light! The Light, around and through Joshua. He held in his heart, in his spirit, what he had felt: the Light and the Love! One heart! One spirit.
He stayed, bathing in the warmth of the sun – bathing in the warmth of the Spirit. And John wandered up to him.
His face looked white. Rau smiled at him.
“You saw it too.”
“Light!” John said. “And…and love…”
“Personal,” Rau said. “Not just a force: God is personal.”
“A ‘person’?”
Rau glanced sideways to Joshua’s back, and then returned to John.
“Open your heart to him,” he said. “Trust him. And then you will know. Then you will fully know, and be fully known.”
John was reading his eyes.
“God himself is light,” John said. “God himself is love.”
“Yes, John,” Rau said. “Come closer to his light. Come closer to his love.”
John glanced toward Joshua, and then looked back to Rau.
“Closer…” he murmured. “I never knew this could be.”
“You did know it,” Rau murmured gently, now rising to his feet. “As a child you knew it.”
Tears filled John’s eyes. “Yes,” he said, “as a child.”
“Know it again.”
John’s green eyes widened, and Rau searched him closely. This brother, from Whangarei – what would it take for him to return to a childlike faith? What would it mean for him?
John’s face broke into a tentative smile.
“I should trust in him,” he whispered, and Rau reached out to lay a hand on his shoulder.
“Yes, John,” he said, “trust. Trust in what you have seen with your own eyes.”
Rau could feel John’s body trembling, under his hand – he showed such vulnerability, in that moment! Such exposure.
“It costs to trust,” John whispered, and now Rau patted his shoulder.
“Ae,” he said, “it costs.”
“He will take everything I am.”
“Yes,” Rau said. “Everything.”
“My life will be changed forever.”
Rau fixed his eyes on him. “Forever, my brother.”
John seemed to hesitate – and Rau waited for him. Each one must decide! Each one must choose for themselves. Then resolution came into John’s eyes – light came into John’s eyes.
“I’ve decided,” he whispered. “It’s done.”
“Haere Mai,” Rau said. “Welcome!” And he embraced him, and now felt John accept his embrace.
“Thank you,” John said, leaning on him a little. “Thank you.”
Rau turned now, to look over the rest of the group. Joshua had joined them! He was talking with them. He was gathering them, for the descent.
“Time to go,” he said, and John’s face looked a little sad.
“Time to go,” he agreed – and Rau led him back, across the rocky mountain, to Joshua.
By the time Rau finally reached the car-park, at the base of Ruapehu, his knees were killing him. Grinning to himself, he imagined Tristan’s words:
“Old man…”
Where was Tristan, anyway?
Rau looked around the rocky terrain – the brown turf in the distance, the shadow of Ngauruhoe and Tongariro. The sun was beginning to set, in the west – ducking behind the jagged rocks of Ruapehu to his left. The light was beginning to dim
into twilight.
Tristan must have left already – headed back to Turangi. Rau shrugged – he sure had a story to tell him, when they met again! Light, and Love! What would the boy do with that one?
Gladly Rau considered him – and then joined Joshua, and John, and the group, to set up camp at the base of the mountain.