We need ladies, don't we, in our lives?
I do, I'm gonna get one back too next week
when my wife comes home.
She's been with her mom and helping her,
but I'm looking forward to that.
You guys can probably imagine.
But how many of you guys enjoying your summer so far?
You guys enjoying your summer, right?
And I'm glad that you're enjoying your summer
because it's tending to come to an end, right?
And so in a couple of weeks, not this week,
but next the week after that,
that public school starts and so for our teachers,
for our students, those who work,
that things are gonna change.
But often in summer, we've had a break.
You guys had a break?
How many of you guys had a break?
That good, right?
You know what, what I noticed about me when I take a break,
and not so much this year, I didn't get one yet,
but when I take a break and I get away,
that in the beginning, the days seem like so long.
You guys know, like, especially if you're in a different city
or you're a different place, and it's like,
wow, but by the end of the trip, it's like,
where did it go, right?
And as something changes, time is so weird in that way.
Not all time is the same, and I think life is like that.
And so when we're experiencing this change that's coming up,
that for us that who have kids who go to school
or some of us that are going to university
or maybe that you work there,
that some of you might be thinking, you know,
but my life doesn't change because, you know,
my kids are already grown or I don't have kids
or I'm not married or any of those things.
But how many of you know, if you drive on the road,
there's a big difference when school is in session
and UH is in session, then we're not, right?
So you're gonna make a reset as well
about maybe when you leave and different things.
And so naturally, all of us will reset as individuals
or families or companies or organizations
from time to time.
And it's very different.
The time scale or the measure can differ
depending on the organization or the kind of a place.
Like if you work in a restaurant
and you have both lunch service and dinner service,
at the end of lunch, what do they do?
They reset probably like 2.30, 3 o'clock
or whatever that is, 4 o'clock.
Why?
Because dinner service is coming
and they gotta turn all that stuff over
and get everything reset for the next thing.
For most of us, we don't have to reset quite that often.
For most of us, it's at the end of a week
or maybe it's the end of a cycle, it's the end of a season.
And sometimes you have to reset because in the middle
that you make adjustments or changes
that somehow just have to be made and it can't wait.
Or sometimes it's when the vision
or the direction has to change.
And sometimes we just need a breath of freshness
in the midst of that.
So this week, we are starting a series
and as Edna had mentioned, in the name of it,
we're just calling it a simply reset
because we're preparing for a new season which is coming
and that will affect you as an individual
and will affect us as a church community.
And so as we look at that, as a church,
the largest reset that we have ever experienced as a church
happened three and a half years ago
that when everybody else experienced this large reset,
which was called COVID, right?
And so it changed everything the way that we were doing.
We used to be meeting at UH West Oahu,
which was a really nice season
because we hadn't been in the community
probably for about four or five years.
And so we got to get back in the community
and we were there for like four or five years
until March of 2020.
And then all of a sudden there was this like
where we see it coming, it's happening
and we're not going to be able to meet.
And so very quickly we had to find a way
to stream a service, to broadcast something,
just to keep people connected
because life was so unstable, right?
Now, we had talked about this long before
but we just never felt like we had the expertise
or we didn't have the time
or we didn't have the manpower to do it.
But you know when you're backs against the wall,
that's the only way we're going to be able to communicate,
somehow we found a way, right?
Now, when I say somehow we found a way,
that means the guys that sitting in the back,
they found a way, right?
The technical guy, like Dave that was reading and Brianna
and that, you know, like our first streaming,
you know how it happened
because Brianna used to play games, video games.
How many of you guys, any gamers out here, right?
Like OBS, right?
So praise God for OBS and the fact that she played games
because if not, right, we wouldn't have been able to stream,
right?
So some of you guys, you have a skill, you have a talent,
you have something that you do
and you feel like there's no way God's gonna use that.
Oh yes, he can, right?
If God can use OBS, God can use a gaming, right?
God can use anything, right?
So here's this thing.
So we had to reset and but what happened is
in the meantime, all the face to face stuff stopped, right?
Not just a weekend service, midweek kind of a time,
a small group stopped, right?
Classes stopped, all that stuff stopped and all we had,
you guys, are you glad that we're not dependent on Zoom
all the time now, right?
That you don't have to go to school on Zoom,
all that kind of, I'm glad I said teachers,
you guys super happy, right?
You don't have to do school on Zoom.
And so, you know, all that was possible
because we had this space,
because we had a space to plan from,
we had a space to hard set and things began to change.
We began to do different things.
And so, you know, I'm so grateful we have this facility.
I have many friends that, their churches,
they didn't have a hard set facility.
They were totally portable
because we still had Saturday night service here
even before when we were meeting at UH.
And so we had a fallback place.
Some of those guys, they never met in person
for almost three years, right?
Some churches, frankly, some of my friends,
their churches didn't survive, right?
And because of that, so we are super grateful
for this facility.
But yet, at the same time,
how many of you guys were here last week
when we had child dedication?
Anybody here last week when you had child dedication?
Was it like crowded?
Yeah, exactly, like you go like,
oh, how come it's so crowded today?
Like no more seats.
And then you go upstairs and it's like,
wow, upstairs hardly, there's no seats as well, right?
And it's because, to be honest, over the past year,
to be honest, we've probably doubled
in person attendance, right?
And so even that, even at double,
this is still not where we used to be
just on a regular weekend when we were at UH,
but we feel the presence of God and God doing something, right?
You guys sense God doing something in your midst, right?
God doing something in your life.
And so one of those things is that
we didn't even have any kid's own stuff for a year and a half.
We didn't have anything,
because we didn't know how to do it, how to make it.
And so then we started and kids don't start being online,
all that stuff.
And so now last week, there's 25 kids
or the other week, just like in that little room.
And so some of you guys say, right,
well, how did they do it?
Like I said last week, well, sometimes not so good,
because it's pretty crowded.
So we're coming to this place where we recognize, right?
We recognize that this facility is limiting us.
And even this week, they say this,
most guys who study church girls
say something along these lines.
When a room hits about 80% capacity,
people start to fall off,
because it just gets a little more challenging,
sometimes you'll find parking or find a seat
and all that kind of a thing.
And so we don't want to hinder what God is doing.
Amen.
You guys get to that place?
Right, cause if we don't reset sometimes what happens
is we start hindering the work of God.
So we started to reset, right?
We started to do different things.
We started kid zone again.
We started, we did things in this place
that have allowed us to reset.
But now, if we did the biggest reset
in our experience with COVID
and we have done little things,
but was all based around this facility,
it would behoove us to not reset for the new season, right?
So we're still have to reset for the new season.
So I am announcing today that on September 3,
at, it will be the first service that New Hope Kapolei
will actually have a Sunday service in Kapolei again, right?
So we will be moving this service
to Ho'okele Elementary School
that it's a new school.
Guess what?
It has better AC than ours,
because we just went in, it was nice, right?
It has a bigger room than ours.
It has separate rooms for kid zone
and it's gonna have separate rooms for journey.
There's different capacities to grow.
And it will entail that, to be honest,
that some of you might not be as so directly affected,
but I had to talk to people at eight o'clock.
It will mean also that we will suspend the eight o'clock service
and that we will meet at 10 o'clock together.
Now, it's really different to tell a 10 o'clock crew
because why are you here at 10 o'clock already, right?
So it doesn't matter to you,
but for some of our friends, you know, that was a challenge.
I talked to some folks who've been with us
from the beginning, been with us
like before we even had a Sunday service.
And when I told her, I just wanted to give her her heads up,
you know, if we're gonna be,
we're gonna be, the last service would be
August 27th at eight o'clock here for the time being.
And I could see the kind of like grief, you know?
And so I know that this move is exciting for many of us,
but it brings change, right?
And grief sometimes for others of us.
You know what I'm really glad she said,
hey, you know, I thank you for the message
because I see what God's doing now, right?
And so I hope this morning,
whether whatever way that you process change,
because some of us, you love change.
It's exciting to you, you like it.
But for most of us, I think it depends on the change, right?
It depends on the change.
We don't always like change, right?
But how many of you would like better parking?
Right, how much do you like the fact
that there's not gonna be a motorcycle that goes
in the middle of the service, right?
Passing the doors like, how many of you like the fact
that you know, it's like the area,
I know some people when they first come to this facility
that they would look at the area and they go,
why it's an interesting area.
You know, that kind of a thing, very diplomatic.
They said, but I'm so glad that when I came inside,
it looks like it's totally different, right?
I'm really glad for that.
But how would you like it when the area is just like,
you have kids, there'll be a place for them
to run around after the service.
It's gonna have a lot of benefits,
a lot of improvements for us.
And it will allow us to reset for a new season.
So beginning today, we're starting a series.
We're just calling it reset and processing this aspect,
how we move forward.
Because when some of us, when God calls you to a new season
and as we're heading into a new season,
that some will like it and some won't like it.
And so we're talking about it today
as embracing change, embracing change.
And so to start off this morning,
we're gonna read in Ecclesiastes 3,
would you be kind enough to stand
and then let's read God's word.
And this is what he says in Ecclesiastes 3,1.
Let's read together, shall we?
Ready?
Begin.
For everything, there is a season,
a time for every activity under heaven.
When it says there's time for every activity under heaven,
but it says it in a season, right?
It's like, you don't do everything at one time.
You don't do everything in one season.
You don't go surfing and skiing and all that stuff
in one season, right?
You don't, but many of us, any surfers here.
Okay, let's change the thing.
Well, I'll just say it like that.
Even if you surf, most of us, even if you surf,
you know that you probably don't go surfing
at Waimea Bay in January.
You know why?
Because you don't wanna drown, right?
That if you wanna go diving, you wanna jump the rock,
you wanna do all that stuff.
Yeah, you know what?
The summer's like a lake.
Different season, different activity.
And so sometimes what will happen is saying,
you're not called to do every activity at every season.
You need to right time your activities to the right season.
And so that's what we're talking about in some ways today.
So before you're seated, turn to your neighbor,
says you can right time your activities to the right season.
You can right time your activities for the right season.
I hope you don't go looking.
I don't know, that's a fun group over there.
So you gotta sit over there next week.
But you don't go looking for mangoes in January on trees,
right?
You don't go and look for like, this is a fishing thing.
You don't go looking for halla-loo in November generally,
right?
These things happen in seasons.
And so in the last few years, sometimes that changes though,
I think some of us, we hit a fatigue change,
a change fatigue, I think.
You know, when things were during the pandemic,
things changed so rapidly, you guys remember that?
Like where in the beginning it's like,
you're going to the store, you're just doing whatever it is.
And then all of a sudden, the stores aren't open.
Only like supermarkets and Costco and like Home Depot's
that those are the things that open.
Everybody else is closed.
Then the place where maybe you would go out to eat,
you got to figure out, are they still doing takeout?
Or, you know, like, can you sit down?
And then you had to figure out, like,
do you need a vaccine or a mask or all this kind of crazy
stuff and things were changing so much.
And for us as a church, whether, you know,
that you need shields and then we bought like air purifiers
and we did like defogging kind of a antiviral stuff,
commercial grade, we did all these things.
And when people used to come,
they had to do a temperature check.
I'm so glad there's no temperature checks, right?
All that stuff is done.
But when all this change was happening,
people got tired of the change, right?
Yeah, you just, man, I got tired of change.
I did a funeral yesterday and I know a bunch of those guys,
just kind of like by name and they know me just because,
you know, over the years,
so many things I have to do there.
And he go, oh, wow, Glenn, we haven't seen you in a long time.
I said, no, no, I've been still, you know,
doing stuff around here too.
And but sometimes at the other chapel,
but I did a lot like Graveside and all that.
And they go, yeah, yeah, yeah, I said, but you remember?
You remember when in the pandemic,
that even when like kind of like the most critical thing,
like a funeral, that people,
like I would, I've done a funeral with it in a giant room
with 10 people because that was the restriction.
And they had to sit six feet apart in individual chairs.
You know what the funny thing was?
They had, they came all in the same car,
got, they was all hanging out at mom's house,
who mom passed away,
but they came in the same car.
They all sat at separate places for the service
and they couldn't even comfort one another,
sitting next to one another.
At the end of the service,
they all get back in the same car and go,
and sometimes it's craziness, right?
It just doesn't even make any sense.
And so when all that was done,
I think, you know, we got a breather.
They got, whew, man, I'm so glad that that craziness is done.
And you kind of just built into a rhythm, right?
After all, so now, however you're living is a rhythm.
But there's some of us are rhythms that, to be honest,
we gotta stretch ourselves in our rhythm,
but you just got comfortable.
Like I have a friend that I saw yesterday,
I hadn't seen in a long time.
And he used to be kind of like the head set up
and breakdown guy for me when I was on staff
at New Hope O'ahu.
And I used to do a midweek service at St. Francis School.
And so he was a great guy, you know,
I mean, this guy didn't go to church every week.
He's like several times a week.
He would be every Wednesday, every Sunday, in between,
all of that and working full time.
And like kind of running a company
and all of these things.
So he was just around and I said,
hey, he's asking me how's the church?
So we just kind of talking back and forth and ask,
hey, so how is it?
And he goes like, oh, shoot,
we haven't gone since pandemic, to be honest.
We've just been watching online.
And he said, you know how it is, you know,
just kind of just develop a different rhythm.
So Sunday became yard work day, right?
And I said, yeah, I know how it is.
Maybe your yard looks good already.
How about soul work?
You know, like, and he said, yeah, it's time.
Yeah, I know it, it's time.
And sometimes you just have that sense where there's time,
time for a reset, right?
And so this is what we're talking about.
So what's the first thing you need to do?
We're gonna talk about three things
that you need to embrace change.
The first thing about it is you gotta embrace
a growth mindset.
You gotta embrace a growth mindset.
So when we're in the midst of these kinds of times
that there will be change.
And so because we, but it's comfortable, right?
So when we say, okay, if we were comfortable
and predictable and easy,
like for us being in this place is predictable,
it's comfortable and it's easy.
You know how much setup we need?
The hospitality, that's pretty much the setup.
And then kids in the separate rooms, that's about it.
That's all we have to do.
No trucks, no nothing about,
we don't have to do all that stuff.
It's very predictable, very comfortable, very easy.
And a lot of us like it.
We don't have to tear down any equipment.
We don't have to do all that kind of stuff.
So if we're embracing a growth mindset, does that mean then
I have to start liking unpredictable
and liking discomfort and liking hard?
No, that's not what it means.
What it means is believing God
that he is preparing us for something more.
That if you wanna have whatever the change
that you'll go through,
for some of us it's the new school year.
For some of us it's the new grade
that you're going through, right?
For some of us it's some kind of change
that's happening in your life.
Believe that God is preparing you for more,
for different, for change to bless you
and not to hurt you, right?
To prosper you and not for calamity it says in Jeremiah 29,
11, you're something he's gonna do is to grow you, right?
And so we need to have this mindset
that God is trying to do something more than where you've been.
And so this is what it says about that
in Philippians chapter three.
Philippians chapter three, Paul said it like this.
He says, I don't mean to say I have achieved these things
or that I have already reached perfection.
That resemble anybody out there, right?
I think all of us, right today,
like none of us would say we got it.
I have arrived, I'm all good.
You guys need for change?
Go ahead, go change.
I'm all good already, right?
No, nobody's here yet, right?
But this is what it says.
But I, what?
Press on to possess that perfection
for which Christ Jesus first possessed me.
And he's saying, I know as much,
and Paul has been on missionary journeys
and he's planted churches and he's written books
and he's circulated letters
and he's planted all of these churches.
But what does he say?
I know I haven't.
This is not the end for me.
I'm not where I need to be.
Paul had a growth mindset.
So he goes on, he says,
no dear brothers and sisters,
I haven't achieved it,
but I focus on this one thing, what?
For getting the past and looking forward
to what lies ahead.
Are we grateful for the past?
Yes.
Be grateful for your past.
Be grateful for what God has done in the past,
but don't live in the past.
Live today, right?
Some of us, we cannot embrace relationships today
because to be honest,
you long so much for the relationships you had in the past
and maybe some of them are no longer in existence,
but God says this,
that you need to value the past,
but you need to press on to the future.
Focus on what God lies ahead.
So I press on to reach the end of the race
and receive the heavenly prize
for which God through Christ Jesus is calling us.
And the reality is nothing stays the same.
This side of heaven, nothing stays the same.
You don't stay the same, right?
Right?
How many of you guys, you looked in the mirror,
you're like, oh my gosh, what is, right?
Like, oh my gosh, you put the belt on
and you're like, oh my gosh, right?
Nothing stays the same.
You don't stay the same.
I don't stay the same.
The world doesn't stay the same, right?
And to be honest,
trying to prevent change from happening
is really a frustrating thing.
Sometimes we need to learn how to embrace the change.
Some of the people that you really care about, they'll change.
Your relationships will change.
Your marriage will change.
Your kids will change.
Your job will change.
Everything changes.
The issue is not that it changes,
just make the change positive.
Make it be growth rather than just loss.
Make it be, make it to propel you forward
not to drag you down, right?
So I hope you don't wanna stay the same.
You ought to want to grow.
Because living things, what?
Grow.
Living things grow.
And the growth is not always physical, right?
The growth is not always outward.
Some of the growth is inward.
You know, I've kind of long past
where that my physical strength used to be the thing
that I would work on.
I can work hard.
I can work long.
I can give all.
But you know, sometimes it's like, I can still do that.
But my strength lies elsewhere.
If that's the only thing I give my,
that's what I rely on, I haven't grown, right?
Because I need to be using my heart.
I need to be using my mind.
I need to be developing other people.
And so in this aspect,
that sometimes that's where change happens.
Maybe you need to grow mentally or emotionally
or spiritually, right?
That professionally.
Don't ignore, don't just be one dimensional in that sense.
I like what Albert Einstein said.
He said, and arguably one of the brightest men
that existed, he says, the more I learned,
the more I realized how much I don't know.
You guys in that place before?
When I first became a believer,
I knew I didn't know anything.
Cause I never went to church and never read the Bible.
You know, I was an adult already.
I was in like 21.
And when I didn't know, I didn't know anything.
And when I started to read the Bible,
I didn't understand a lot of it.
But I understood that I could sense God trying to talk to me.
So I kept reading and went to Bible study,
went to church and did all those things that I grew
and I learned.
And you know, after about three years,
I felt like, oh, I know a lot, right?
But I didn't know as much as I needed to.
I went to seminary after a while.
I was serving the Lord in full-time ministry
for like six years before I went to seminary
and I wanted to grow.
I wanted to be more equipped.
And when I came back, I thought like, to be honest,
when I came back, I thought I was all that.
You know what I mean?
But then today, you know what?
That attitude God had to correct
because today I realized, man, what I know right now,
I know surely, but there's so much more.
Because how can a finite individual who lives,
you know, like I feel like up to a hundred, right?
That's a long life.
But how can that one person expect to understand
all of the universe and the God who is eternal, right?
And the God who is, that's impossible.
How can I know all things?
And so I need to say, I need to keep growing.
I need to keep learning.
But not all change is growth.
And so growth has to be chosen, even in hard times.
Some of us say, I want to grow, but the season is hard, right?
And so I cannot grow.
The reality is you cannot grow in certain areas
without hard times.
There are some trees that cannot reproduce
until a fire burns through.
And that stress that happens on the tree,
on the physical cones allows the resin to melt
so that life can spring forward.
It's the same with people.
And he says it like this in Romans five,
three, five, he says, we can rejoice too.
Let's read this next line.
What?
When we run into problems and trials.
Well, let me stop here.
Anybody run into problems and trials this week?
Anybody?
Okay, fair amount of hands.
Now, how many of you, when you run into that trial this week,
you were like, whoo, yeah, problems and trials, man.
I'm stoked today, right?
Probably that's not what you're saying.
Because this is not saying be thankful
for problems and trials.
It's not saying be thankful for.
It's saying even in the midst of them, you can rejoice.
Why?
Now he continues.
He's gonna say, for we know, let's say we know.
We know.
Right?
That they help us develop endurance.
You see, if you never had to go through a difficult time,
then you don't have endurance.
Because if every time you hit a hard time,
you quit, you stop, you turn around,
you don't have endurance.
You see, it's something to grow through, right?
It's gonna change you.
It's gonna, but what kind of change?
Gonna grow you, right?
Because when you quit, all of those kinds of things,
what happens is you get stunted at that place.
But when you get through it, you've grown through it.
And endurance develops strength of character.
And I can say this pretty confidently,
that when I look around the room
and I look in the mirror for myself,
is that none of us possess the character we need today.
Today, none of us possess the character
that we need to accomplish all God has for us.
That makes sense, right?
Because the character that you have today
is probably sufficient for today.
But if God is gonna grow you,
he's gonna have you be involved,
and have more influence,
gonna allow you to do different things,
you need to grow character along the way.
Because without it, to be honest,
you can have the most skillful person, right?
But if that person doesn't have character,
sometimes the most skillful person
becomes the greatest thief, becomes the greatest rebel,
becomes the greatest disruptor, right?
What prevents that?
It's character growth, not talent growth, not skill growth.
Skills and talents, they're necessary,
but character is indispensable.
So this is what God says.
I want you to develop not just endurance,
but strength of character.
And character strengthens what?
Our confident hope of salvation.
What does that mean?
That whatever you face, he's saying this,
that I know God's gonna take me through.
That whenever you hit rough waters, God, you know,
God's gonna take you through.
It's not gonna last forever,
because this hope will not lead to disappointment.
For we know how dearly God loves us,
because he has given us what?
The Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.
Aren't you grateful that you can experience God?
You guys grateful for that?
And for some of us, you know, maybe in the worship time,
you experience God, maybe in the message,
sometimes you experience God, maybe in fellowship.
But wouldn't it be sad
if the only place you could experience God was here?
That would be sad, right?
It's not to experience God,
Jesus's gotta come to a particular building.
What is it saying?
That where does the, what does the Holy Spirit fill?
Our hearts.
So this is what God's solution is.
When you believe in Jesus,
he places the Holy Spirit where?
In you.
The Holy Spirit is in you, so what?
When you go to work, can you experience God?
Yes.
When you go to school, can you experience God?
Yes.
When you talk to that person that rubs you the wrong way,
can you experience God?
Well, sometimes that doesn't feel like you're experiencing God,
but yes, you can experience God in that place.
Why?
Because the Spirit of God is with you, right?
And so this is the thing.
And so when we gather corporately, what happens?
There's a greater kind of like an anointing on that
because the people of God, when they're coming to seek God,
the Spirit of God is moving our hearts corporately.
So there is a greater sense sometimes when we gather,
but the good news is that wherever you are,
wherever you are, that God, you can experience it.
I'm grateful for that, amen?
Right?
And so when you believe it like that,
when you reframe your mind, you reset your mind to say,
I'm gonna have a gross kind of a thing.
It's almost like Babe Ruth, he said it like this.
You know, one of the things, every strikeout
just brings me closer to my next home run, right?
Because he's learning whatever the situation,
whatever change happens, he's saying,
I'm adopting a gross mindset.
Here's the second thing, three principles.
The second thing is this, don't say,
I'm never and fill in the blank, right?
How many of you guys said, I'm never doing that again?
And what?
Did again, right?
And now I'm not saying when I say that,
like don't get wisdom or, you know,
I'm not gonna, I'm never gonna blow up my marriage again,
or I'm not gonna ignore my responsibility.
I'm not talking about that kind of a never,
but sometimes we're gonna make vows,
we're gonna make promises to ourselves.
And this is one of those things that sometimes
they're not based on faith, they're based on hurt.
And so, or disappointment.
And so the first job I ever had was at Jack in a Box,
you know, first job in Wahiawa on Kilania Avenue.
Some of you know Wahiawa, but you go for different things,
but that's where my first job, and I got that job,
it was five minutes walk from my house.
But one of my best friends, his older brother
was assistant manager there.
So we're talking, hey, we have nice spending money, right?
So let's go work, where can we work?
Who's gonna hire us?
He says, hey, Sheldon, he'll hire us, right?
So we went, but how many of you guys know,
like when you're in high school
and you got your older brother's, the boss,
that sometimes that's a hard relationship, right?
You're not the boss with me, yes I am, right?
I got work, and so we lasted there two weeks, right?
But at the end of the two weeks, what did I say?
I'm never working in a fast food restaurant again.
And I didn't for a little while, right?
And the jobs that I had was like doubled my income,
doing, you know, from what a minimum wage was,
and like even in high school, right?
That was nice, right?
It's like doing the office maintenance
and doing yard service and all that kind of stuff,
and it made a little money.
And I became a believer in college right before I graduated,
and I went on a summer mission trip
because I wanted, I felt God leading me to go to this place.
So the mission trip was stateside,
and so we went to this little town
that has like a winter time population of 25,000 people.
It's called Wildwood, New Jersey.
It's in the tri-state area.
And it's a little island actually,
but on 4th of July, so just a few weeks ago,
the average is it swells to about a million people.
So it is like tourist town, like crazy,
way more than Waikiki, that kind of a feel, right?
So it's just crazy.
So what we do in that town is people came from all over
the US and we kind of do a mission team,
and we were there for 12 weeks.
First four weeks, three to four weeks was all training.
And then they say this, that they'll continue to,
will continue to do training and all that,
but now you gotta go get jobs in the community.
Why is that?
Because the majority of your life,
if you're gonna do ministry, it's you still gotta work, right?
You still gotta go to school,
and so you gotta learn how to get along with the people,
you gotta learn how to share with your friends at work,
and do all that kind of stuff.
And so I said, oh, okay, but guess what job I'm avoiding?
Fast food, right?
I said, I'm never doing that again.
So I go to the landscape place, oh shoot,
some guys already got all those jobs.
And so I went to kind of like a bank,
they had a bank thing and I'm, nope, not, you know,
hey, I'm Asian, I can do math.
No, it's kidding.
But you know, they didn't work, right?
So the whole thing, and so there was one job that was left,
and it looked like the golden arches
were part of the logo, right?
And so I worked at McDonald's and I hated it,
and I complained about it, and I was like sour about it,
and when I went home, I smelled like French-Rye oil,
and I had to wear this like really kind of cheesy,
maroon, double knit, nylon uniform,
and no matter how much you watch it,
it still smells like French-Rye's,
and it kind of hated it.
But you know, one of the things that was good,
they paid for it, they gave us free lunch,
so man, we'd make pancakes this size on a break,
or whatever, like eat 20 McNuggets,
but you know, young, you can just eat whatever,
and so, but then one of the things that,
even though I hated it, if I never went there,
you know what, I never would have met this kid named Tony.
Tony was a senior, going into the senior year
in high school, a black kid, and never been a church,
and you know, I started to share the gospel,
shared my testimony, like what are you doing from Hawaii?
You know, you guys ever get the hit start,
like what are you guys, what are you doing here?
Are you from Hawaii?
And so it came, you know, I shared my story,
it wasn't raised in the church,
so you know, I experienced God, and this and this and this,
would you like to get to know Him?
And I got to lead Him to Jesus, right,
after work one day, got to lead Him to Jesus,
and then I told Him, hey, Tony,
why don't you come to church with me?
And He says, I can't, sorry, I can't,
I go, oh, why not?
He says, I don't have the clothes for it.
And being raised in Hawaii,
and being raised in the church in Hawaii,
when you know, my experience in faith being in Hawaii,
I didn't, I never experienced that, right?
Cause you can come in shorts and T-shirt, right?
Rubber slippers, or you can come,
you can dress up if you like, right?
No problem, you can just,
hey, come how you feel comfortable, right?
As long as you have clothes, you can, you know, welcome.
So we're, and so that's why I said, no, you crazy,
just, let's just go, right?
And then I brought Him, and then I understood,
because I went to a church that was close to His house,
and I hadn't gone there before,
but everybody was like in a suit and a tie.
And then I knew that I felt,
and I had worn a long sleeve shirt,
because he told us, you know, go and do that
when you go into the new church, and it was like, oh,
a long sleeve and shirt, you know, kind of dressed up,
I felt underdressed.
Now, if I had never let Him to Christ,
and didn't go with Him,
how much likelihood would He have ever gone to that church?
Zero.
But you know what, God used something
that made me uncomfortable, that when I said never,
I'm so glad that Tony got to experience Jesus,
and got to get connected and plugged into that church, right?
But you know, when you say, I'm never gonna do that again.
I've said that many times in different things, right?
When we left couple A Middle School,
it was a great experience.
We were there for eight years.
It was a great experience for seven years.
The last year, not so much.
They had a leadership change,
and that principle, the acting principle didn't like us,
and we couldn't figure it out, right?
She just kind of resented a little bit,
like the favor that we had with the previous principle.
And so just all of a sudden became hard.
So when we left, guess what I said?
Never go into a public school again, right?
And guess when we looked for our locations
in different places, and we've been looking for years,
and when couple A, I mean, Okele Elementary showed up,
what if I just said, I'm never doing that again?
I would have bypassed the blessings of God.
So here's the thing, some of us, you have made those vows.
I'm never letting somebody get that close again.
I'm never putting myself in this kind of a position again.
And it's not a vow of wisdom and faith.
It's a vow of out of your wound, right?
It's a vow out of your hate or out of your hurt.
And so, you know what?
Mine was like that.
You know what I had to do?
I had to repent.
Because this is what I said, God, it is impossible
for you to work in that.
And if I had said that, it would have not just crippled me,
it would cripple the church.
And some of us, your vows, they don't just hurt you,
they're hurting those around you.
This is why we have courses like Finding Freedom.
Because all of us get hurts and wounds along the way.
And sometimes you don't know what to do with them,
but you just shouldn't carry them all through life.
Don't make your hurt your identity.
It's not your identity.
That's not who you are.
Yes, you've been hurt.
But God says this, I'm with you.
You're a son or a daughter of God that he's in you.
He's gonna help you to overcome.
But you gotta, sometimes you need help,
how to get rid of that stuff.
That's why we have classes like that.
We're gonna have one in the fall.
If that's you, you found that you've made some vows.
And that vow prevents you from engaging life.
It prevents you from embracing a growth mindset.
Because you're never again,
it's keeping you from the blessings.
Maybe it's time to learn how to get rid of that stuff.
Learn how to deal with that stuff.
And so the scripture say it like this in James 4-10.
Let's read what it says.
Ready?
Let's read.
Humble yourselves before the Lord.
And what?
He will lift you up in honor.
You don't have to just grovel to people.
That's not what it's saying.
It says humble yourself before God.
God, I need help.
God, I cannot fix this.
I don't know how to do this thing, right?
Humble yourself before God.
I need you God.
I love that we sang that song.
Oh God, my God, I need you, right?
Oh God, my God, I need you.
When?
Now.
How I need you now.
Man, that's a humbling thing to say, right?
I'm not saying God might be a nice idea
if you could help me.
I'm singing that song, I need him.
And I humble myself before him.
But this is the good news.
When you do that, God lift you up.
It's not weakness.
It's wisdom, right?
It's honesty.
It's being, so humble yourself before the Lord.
Don't let the past poison you, right?
Now, in the midst of that,
is the other thing is it's a protection.
It's a protection for you.
Because he says this in Proverbs 16, 18.
Because why?
Because pride goes before destruction.
And haughtiness before a fall.
We all probably understand pride, right?
And, but haughtiness, what is haughtiness?
Haughtiness means when you raise yourself up
above other people.
And so all of a sudden,
this is when you kind of get a haughty spirit.
It's like, nah, I did my time already.
I'm not gonna do that.
That job is beneath me, right?
I'm not gonna, like, you know what?
I did that, like, as a young guy growing up
in the ministry, I like, I drive the truck.
I would set up, like, I would, at one point,
I was on staff at another church.
You know, there's times I would drive the truck,
help set up the church, get everything together,
help the worship team to practice,
and not to play an instrument,
because then it would sound horrible
if I helped it and done that.
But get up, preach, help break down, drive the truck home.
And drive the truck back to the church office.
Because it was like a satellite kind of a service.
And you know, when I went to school,
I went to seminary and did all that stuff.
When I came back and came on staff,
I was a pastor, and I went on staff at New Hope O'ahu.
You know, one of the first things that I had to do
was help set up and break down with guys like Art,
you see me and Maddie over there, like, right?
Remember?
What time, you know, we used to go?
Two o'clock in the morning.
I was a pastor, I was a missionary,
went to seminary and all this stuff.
But you know what I said?
Yeah, humble myself.
Whatever, you know what I mean?
Like, there's nothing I'm not willing to do.
I mean, as long as I'm capable.
Don't ask me to play keyboard,
like, no, O'ahu is gonna run out of the room.
So, you know, but the things that I can do,
and there's nothing that I'm not too proud to do it, right?
And so, let's make sure that we do that.
Because once we start saying,
yeah, I'm not doing that again, I cannot do this thing.
That's like, just let other guys do it.
Then be careful because pride goes before destruction
and haughtiness before a fall.
So, it's a safety thing, right?
So that we embrace who we are in Jesus.
Make sense?
Amen.
So, and this is the last point, right?
And we're kind of rounding the bases here.
And so, do you guys ever feel like in this change process,
you know, you're not quite there yet,
but you're not quite where you started from.
You're in this weird in-between middle, right?
And so, the people of God,
we have experienced this kind of a process a lot,
that when you're not here and you're not there,
and what do you do in the midst, right?
And so, when you look at the people of God,
that in Israel, when they were called out of slavery,
they were aware in Egypt, 430 years, right?
430 years of like no wins.
That's a long losing streak, right?
And so, God delivered them, right?
Through Moses and then all these plagues and stuff,
and then they got through, they went through,
we sang the song, that he led them through the Red Sea,
right, led them through the ocean,
they get to the kind of the desert in the promise,
toward going toward the promised land.
But all of a sudden, food runs out,
that they could carry, right?
Drinking water is hard to come by
in a lot of different places.
And so, what were they thinking?
Some of them said, what?
Let's go back to Egypt.
And God said, no, no, you're never going back there.
Why?
Because the way to grow is to move forward.
The way to grow is to move forward.
I am grateful for the past,
but I don't wanna be the guy that all I talk about
is like all the wrestling accolades in high school.
You know what I mean?
I don't wanna be the guy that, like,
I'm telling all the stories, it's like,
hey, remember, and it was like 30, 40, 50,
you know, however long ago, I don't wanna be that guy.
I wanna move forward.
I'm grateful for those things.
And there's times to talk about those things,
but I don't wanna live there, right?
Don't live in your past.
Like, launch from the past.
Move forward.
So this is what God said.
How does he provide?
Because they didn't have food, right?
So what does it say?
It says it like this in Exodus 16.
Let's read what it says.
Then the Lord said to Moses, I will rain down bread.
Let's say those words, rain down bread, right?
Pretty clear.
What are you saying?
I'm gonna provide.
From heaven for you, the people are to go out each day
and gather enough for that day.
In this way, I will test them
and see whether they will follow my instructions.
On the sixth day they did to prepare what they bring in.
That's to be twice as much as they gather on the other days
because there was a Sabbath day
and you were supposed to rest and not just be working.
Now, so what did God promise?
I'm gonna rain down what?
Bread from heaven.
And so that God did that the next day.
It's called, anybody know?
Mana, that's right, mana.
And so, but you know what mana looks like?
It looks like little flakes.
Like was little white delicate flakes on the ground.
You guys know what mana means?
What is it?
In other words, God promised bread.
They saw white flakes on the ground.
They go, well, what is that?
Right?
What is that?
Where's the bread?
They're looking for bagels, right?
They're looking for like pita bread or whatever.
Like they're looking for French bread.
But I got flakes on the ground.
And this is the thing.
The way to go forward, some of us envision change one way,
but it's gonna look a little bit different
than what you think.
But it's not gonna be less than,
it's not gonna be worse than,
it's gonna be better, but it's not the way you imagined it.
And so why?
Because this bread fed them for the next 40 years.
Right?
Bagel, I'm sorry, your bagel, your favorite bagel
cannot feed you for the next 40 years.
But this mana came every day.
But what did it involve?
They had to go out and gather it.
Right?
And you know what can happen is
not everybody gathered the same amount.
Why?
Because when I look around the room,
there's some of you, you guys need to eat.
I talked to some people, I know some people,
I'm trying to gain weight, but I just can't.
But it says eat more.
No, but, and some of us, you know what?
We wish that, let me just give you some of mine.
And so we eat different, right?
But what is it?
Like if it depends on you, depends on your family,
depends on your needs, right?
And so, you know what?
Some people, when we go through change,
it's gonna look like some people have more
than you, but don't judge them for it
because they need more, right?
And some of us can less and don't judge them for that,
you know why?
Because they need less, right?
Don't worry about that, right?
But everybody has to gather.
But what does it say?
How often?
Every day, except the Sabbath day.
And what is the principle behind that?
The principle is this, because you cannot live
off old manna today, you need fresh bread
from heaven every day.
You need a fresh anointing every day.
You need a fresh experience with Jesus.
You need to bring, seeking Him.
Please don't live your faith from Sunday to Sunday.
Live it every day, right?
Please don't live from Christmas and Easter, right?
And obviously you guys aren't, you guys are here, right?
But this is what it's saying,
that we need a fresh, fresh anointing, right?
Fresh experience, a fresh Jesus every day.
And, but when do you find it?
When you go look for Him, when you go gather Him.
And so this is how, what did it do?
It grew them forward.
And when we started this journey of looking for new places,
we looked at a lot of different places.
We looked at movie theaters,
we looked at kind of storefronts
that are long, very prominent places.
We looked in Kamakana Ali'i.
We looked at an old supermarket that was the right size.
Some of them were just too small.
You had to look big on the outside,
you go inside, it's not that big.
And, you know, there's some like the supermarket was great.
There's, be bigger than this place, nice size room.
We could make it whatever we want,
but the terms kept changing.
And all the things that they promised,
like you wouldn't need a permit now,
all of a sudden you got to get a permit,
but we can't even get our permit.
And, you know, they have a master permit.
And so this got complicated
and you want us to sign a lease,
but you kind of tell you when you can take occupancy.
You kind of tell you when every, you know,
so like we couldn't do that, right?
So we're looking, we looked at the old New Hope,
Leeward space, the old Ace hardware in Kapolei
by Home Depot.
We looked at that space.
We cannot afford that space, but you know what?
I'm going to pitch a number, I said,
but we can afford this.
This is better than zero, right?
We'll do it for short term.
They entertained it.
Didn't quite work for them at the end, right?
And so some of you, you're like me.
You've been trying to move forward.
You've been trying to make a change,
but you've been getting a lot of no's, right?
You're getting a lot of no's.
It's discouraging, I understand.
But you know what?
When you get a lot of no's in life,
don't focus on the no's because right now,
all I needed was one yes, right?
And I don't want you to care about the rest anymore, right?
There's a yes for you in the future.
When you embrace change, yes.
Sometimes you're going to get a lot of no's.
Don't worry about it.
All you need is one yes, amen?
Let's bow our heads when we close in a word of prayer.
Father, today we are grateful.
We are grateful because you were faithful to us
in some of the craziest seasons as a church,
Father, as a people.
Lord, that you were so faithful.
And Father, we're thankful that you'll be faithful
in the future.
And Father, we don't want to live out of,
we don't want to live in our past,
but we want to live based on things we learned in our past.
And so Father, for some of us today,
we're learning to not just see all the challenges
and all the unknowns, but Father,
we're going to embrace a growth mindset.
Because even when things look good
or when things look hard, we're thankful we can grow
and we can change and we can become better.
That you can grow our character
and you're going to, in that process, grow our influence.
And for some of us, maybe you need to examine the,
I'm never's, the vows you've made.
Be careful about those things.
Don't let them rob you of the potential that God has for you.
That you only know healing
when you deal with some of those hurts, right?
You only know through those things.
Would you maybe just invite God into that?
And to be honest, for most of us,
you'll probably need some help to process that.
It doesn't mean you go to therapy per se,
but maybe understand that God has a process
by which we get free from the hurts from our past.
We have a course for that.
It's called Finding Freedom.
Would you prayerfully consider,
God, is this the season for me to do that?
But Father, we're thankful that we can grow forward today.
Even when we're not where we want to be
and we're not in the comfort place where we used to be,
God, we're thankful we can grow forward.
So Father, would you speak to your people
about Lord the places that they're at
and maybe what they, you're really challenging them to do?
What you're really encouraging them in?
What you're really comforting them in?
Father, we receive, you have that message for us today.
Father, I know there's some out there
that have never said yes to Jesus,
maybe like my friend Tony,
that you haven't experienced it before.
But today, maybe today's your day.
Today you're recognizing,
God, if you really want me, I want you.
God, if you really can receive me
and all the things that I've been through,
you know what he really can?
That God wants you.
You just have to receive him.
You just have to respond to him.
So we're gonna pray a very simple prayer
to respond and receive the grace of God for you.
You know, the scripture says this,
that when we come before God,
we come not before a God of judgment.
Although he is a judge and one day we'll all be judged.
But this is what he says.
When you come now,
when you come before the judgment,
this is what he says.
You receive grace.
You receive mercy.
That's what we're receiving today.
His grace and His mercy.
We're gonna pray that prayer.
If it's you're saying it for the first time,
would you join me?
If you're maybe saying it as well,
just to kind of renew something in your faith
that we invite you to join along.
We're gonna pray.
Dear God, thank you for seeing me
and all the changes that's going on in my life
and receiving me.
Thank you for Jesus who died in my place.
I don't understand everything about that.
But today, I open up my heart
and would you come live inside me today?
I trust Jesus to be my savior and my Lord.
Thank you, he paid the price for me.
Help me to understand your will and your ways.
Help me to understand your words
so I can trust you more and build my faith.
And Lord, would you bring people around me?
Because I need some help in how to grow.
And Lord, I thank you that relationships
are something you made.
And so help me to encourage others as well.
I say this now because it's useful, you can hear me.
And I can hear myself that Jesus is my savior,
he's my Lord and I belong to him.
In Jesus' name, amen, amen.
Hey, can we say congratulations to those folks?
God bless you guys, thanks for joining us this weekend.
Thank you for tuning in to the New Hope Kapolei Messages Podcast.
We hope you enjoyed this weekend's message
and that it brought you inspiration and encouragement
in your journey of faith.
If you'd like to listen to more messages
or stay connected with us,
visit our website at newhopekapolei.org
or follow us on social media.
Remember, no matter where you are in life,
there is always hope and a new beginning in Christ.
So let's continue to grow and learn together
as we pursue a life of purpose and impact.
Thanks again for listening.
We'll see you next time.
Aloha and God bless.