Pastor Elwin Ahu
July 11, 2010 - W1028

Sermon Summary Notes

July 11, 2010 – July 12, 2010

Title: “Restoring Life to the Living Room”

Speaker: Pastor Elwin Ahu

Currently, we live in a very stressful times, and it affects our homes. Most of the events in our homes starts in the living room. Our living rooms are suppose to be our safe haven from the stressful world and the storms of life. But lately it has been the “eye” of the storm. Turbulence and undercurrents like what happens in a storm, threatens our homes. Our homes gets rattled and shaken. We need to bring back the peace in our homes. Pastor Elwyn will  be speaking about how we can bring back peace and security to our homes according to the Bible.

We are living in stressful times. Our families are being pulled in all sorts of directions. There are so many tension in families daily. Sometimes the tension is so thick that you could cut through it with a knife. Problems do happen. We don’t happen to abandon our families desperately. According to a recent survey,  it said that all parents make mistakes. Say “Amen to that!”  Based on the survey, when problems happen in our families, our children still come out alright.  They don’t need therapy or they need to go to 12 step meetings. We have to remember good parents do have rebellious kids. I have one at my home.  Another thing that the survey mentioned was that if a marriage ends, if they had to do it all over again,  the couple would like to be married to the same person. The survey continues to mentioned that 90% of the people asked said that they would do this. Out of the demographics, 95% are male and 85% are women.  Then, Joy heard this and said

“It’s typical. Men are clueless.” Before I knew Christ, I was married before. So, Joy asked me, which of us will you marry again. With all said and done, turbulent storms attack our safe harbor. Our homes should be our safe harbor but lately they become the center of violent storms. So what do we do?

"Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children; and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma." (Eph. 5:1-2)

How do we become sweet aroma…There are three points…

The first point is…

1.  Make LAUGHTER a common occurrence in your home.

Let us read the next three verses in Proverbs in succession…

"A joyful heart makes a cheerful face, but when the heart is sad, the spirit is broken." (Prov. 15:13)

"A miserable heart means a miserable life; a cheerful heart fills the day with song." (Prov. 15:15 MSG)

"A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones." (Prov. 17:22)

Sometimes life’s stresses kills the laughter in our lives. We end up with losing the zeal for life, losing motivation and having a broken spirit. The antidote for that is laughter. Sense of humor and laughter are important. Sometimes we need to laugh at ourselves. According to experts, there is a hormone chemical in the body called endorphins that releases to the top surface of our body and makes us feel better and have a joyful spirit when we laugh. We don’t need drugs or anything. Laughing relaxes our muscles. We become optimistic. Laughter separates our minds from bad thoughts to cheerful thoughts. It gives us a relief. It heals resentment. When we laugh, the prospects of our problems are hidden away. Without minimalizing our problems, yes indeed they exist but just lightening the so called load. The best part of it, it is free. It is all readily available to us. What prevents us from laughing more often?

Do you know the annual sales of stress related medication are 10 billion dollars? When we don’t have to rely on it, we could just depend on God’s word and laughter. It will help in resolving conflict and finding creative solutions to working out problems. When a baby is born what do we do? We don’t try to scare it but we make it laugh and smile. It is our gage of how the baby is doing.  Fast forward to being adult, we take life so seriously. We have no laughter in our lives. It is not healthy. It is not normal. It is abnormal. We need to enjoy life and incorporate laughter in our families. Start by smiling. Look at your neighbor and smile. It lifts the atmosphere of darkness. A smile often brings the process of gratefulness. You see Pastor Wayne often smiles. In my opinion, even in his sleep he smiles. One thing you could do is to make a list of what you need to be grateful for. As you list them, be sure to smile at each item in the list. Next suggestion is go see a comedy movie. Bring life into your family by laughing. Recently, on our date night Joy and I went to see a comedy movie. The movie we was entitled “Date Night” with Steven Carrel and Tina Fey. It was funny.  Next suggestion is hangout with children. They seem to laugh a lot. You know when I come home from work. I play with Jerod. We roll down the floor and just laugh. Imitate and emulate kids. Be childlike not childish. The last suggestion is to laugh at yourself. First thing in the morning, look at yourself in the mirror. Anyway…don’t you have embarrassing moments. I know I have. Let me tell you about what happened to me. Sometime ago, I had an early teaching class at San Island at 5:30. I washing my hair on the sink. I got something stuck in my nose. I kept blowing it.  I didn’t know where it when. Then, I went on to the class. They were videotapping the class.  The students was paying close attention and kept looking at me as I was speaking, After the meeting, a the videoman came up to me and talk to me. As I was talking to him, he removed something around my neck.  Then, I realized what it was. Ha! Ha!Ha! I didn’t tell him. So…laugh at yourself.

Next point…

2.  Be quick to BOUNCE BACK; life is too short to waste.

We need to bounce back. You can’t hang on to you’re your anger, disappointments, embarassments, failures and frustrations. We are wasting our time in hanging on to them. Life is too short. We need to pass beyond.

 Let us read the next Bible verse…

 "In your anger do not sin. Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do  not give the devil a foothold." (Eph. 4:26-27 NIV)

What is sin? When you let the anger stay pass the time the sun sets. You don’t need allow the devil have a foothold on your life. What does that mean? The devil doesn’t want you to have a successful life. He came to kill and destroy. Kill means here to kill your spirit. He presses on to the points of your life until you give up. And when that happens your whole family is involved. In turn, they are taken away from what God intends them to do. Everybody gets depressed and unhappy. He kills by destroying your spirit and everyone else. The devil is a strategist. He wins by making you see that is all you could be.

"For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal." (2 Cor. 4:17-18)

  Our afflictions are for a moment. We can’t allow the devil tear us down. He wants to pull us down. It’s time to say “Enough.” I remember this time when Pastor Roy took me surfing. He took first to Ala Moan Bows. It  is a prime spot for surfing. I did okay. Next we went to North Shore with the other pastors. The waves hit me backwards. I tried hard not to give up but I went ashore.  When we went to lunch, they were all talking about their experiences. I chose to get upset and not say anything. I went home and told Joy about my experience. She said “Get over it.” I said to myself, “ What kind of woman is she?”  Then, we went to bed and I was still thinking about it. Still turns over and tells me you should get over it. This is the day the Lord has made let us rejoice in it.  We can’t let the devil blind side us.

Next…

2. Family that PRAYS together plays and STAYS together.

Let us read the next Bible verse…

"Hear what the unrighteous judge said: now, will not God bring about justice for His elect who cry to Him day and night, and will He delay long over them? I tell you that He   will bring about justice for them quickly." (Luke 18:6-8)

Illustration in Luke 18 about the unrighteous judge and widow. The widow was not getting any justice. But persistent widow kept going to the judge. She got her answer after she persisted. Next from the Book of Daniel, Daniel prayed three times a day, even in the lion’s den.  He prayed 21 days straight. Three weeks he was on his knees.  Then the Lord says to him…he heard him.

There are three points that I want to make about prayer. First, God hears you the moment you pray. Second,  God connects to  you by hearing you. He opens the curtains of heaven the spiritual realm. We are not dealing with the flesh and blood but spiritual.  Then God  told him everything about the angel rescuing him. When you pray to God, he will show you what is going on in the spiritual part of your life and your family. Third point is that persistence prayed unleashes the authority that God gives you to defeat the devil and the problems you have in your home.

"...for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us . . . and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God." (Rom. 8:26-27)

According to God’s will, things will happen.  Never give up. In conclusion, don’t forget to incorporate laughter into your homes, bounce back and not dwell on the past and persistent prayer. Amen!

Discussion Suggestions:

1. What is the aroma in your home?

2. Do have embarrassing moments you want to share with your group ?

3.  Are you going through specific trials that you could share with the group on how God 

is walking you through about your stresses and storms in your life?

4. Give an example of how the various passages from the Bible affect your outlook on   

    life’s stressors. 

5. What is one of the biggest culprit of your unjoyful family or marriage?

6. What is the difference between being childlike and childish according to the Bible.