Pastor Elwin Ahu
January 2, 2011 - W1101

It’s the beginning of the New Year 2011 and we usually make resolutions when a new year comes. It is good to make resolutions because they help us to remember who we are, and what we should do in our lives. It brings us back to the basics. So today we will be talking about who we are as a church. If you don’t know who you are as a church, you will be just coming every weekend as a meaningless routine. So our new series of “One God…One Church” will help us to remember who we are and why we are here. Today we will learn about the DNA of New Hope through our mission statement, our core values and salvation through Jesus.

We need to first have a good foundation before God can build something upon it. So we had to define our mission first when we founded New Hope. Our mission is “To present the Gospel of Jesus Christ in such a way that turns non-Christians into converts, converts into disciples and disciples into mature, fruitful leaders who will in turn go into the world and reach others for Christ.” This mission was developed by Pastor Wayne and other leaders at the beginning of this church. Our goal is to reach out to the harvested people so their lives can be changed and transformed by the words of God. That is why we have been using multimedia, dance, performance and arts so that people can catch God’s words and be transformed. And we are not only transforming non-believers into believers, but also transforming believers into disciples; and the disciples will be transformed into mature fruitful leaders. As long as you have influence over others, you are a leader already. Thus, we continually invest in equipping everyone here to be mature fruitful leaders, such that each of you can go into the world to reach others for Christ. And that is what New Hope is about. These are our passions. If you call New Hope your home church, have you been presenting the Gospel in a way that turns your friends, neighbors, or anyone you know into believers?

“We believe every member should commit to a lifestyle of consistent spiritual growth with honest accountability” (Mk. 12:29-31; Acts 2:44-47; 1 Pt. 2:2; 1 Tm. 4:7, 8; Prov. 27:17). It is our first priority to love God always genuinely, and by doing so, we yearn for continual spiritual growth in Him. And honest accountability with brothers and sisters is critical in our growth. We will then all grow together as a family this way. If we are not being honest, you will be the one getting hurt eventually. Fifth, “We believe that every member is a minister who has been given gifts to be discovered, developed, and deployed. We are a gift-based, volunteer-driven church” (Mk. 10:45; Eph. 2:10; Ro. 12; 1 Cor. 12:14-20). Each of us is gifted and we will find our greatest joy by serving God with our gifts. Each of us is created for ministry, gifted for ministry, authorized for ministry and needed for ministry. We are able to do the outreach in the community not because of a particular pastor or a staff team, but because of all of us. We need each other in this church. Sixth, “We believe that God is worthy of our very best. Therefore, a growing spirit of excellence should permeate every activity” (Ps. 78:72; Dan. 5:12; Col. 3:17; Ecc. 10:10). I need to clarify that we are not looking for perfection. We are only going to do the best we can with all our hearts. And it should be fun when you are striving to do your best - not seeking perfection. So if you didn’t do something well this time, it is not a problem if you have done your best already. We just need to keep a spirit of excellence growing for God. Seventh, “We believe that genuine love and caring relationships are keys to the life of every endeavor” (Jms. 1:2, 3; 1 Pt. 3:8, 9; 1 Cor. 13:8; Ro. 16:17; Eph. 4:3). We work hard in relationships and keep them strong. We play with one another on stage or even back stage because we love and care about each other, and we want you to see how important loving and caring relationships are through ours, and we do it because we love the Lord and love one another. Eighth, “We believe that the most effective evangelism happens through people inviting people” (Pr. 11:30; Jn. 1:43-45; Jn. 4:28-30). It is not about having our sermons on television. Evangelism happens mostly through you by sharing with others, telling others what you believe in, who your God is, and inviting them to church. And only you are able to reach those who never come to church. And when you are able to invite them to church, we partner with you to transform their lives. Ninth, “We believe in identifying and training emerging leaders who are fully committed to Christ and who will reach their generation with the Gospel” (2 Tm. 2:2; 1 Tm. 3:1; Titus 1:5-9; Ps. 78:6, 7). We continually invest in building up new young leaders, to reach the new generations with the Gospel. That is why Pastor Wayne is working in Oregon to develop the young leaders to reach the new generations. There are many opportunities for you in leadership development and spiritual growth at New Hope too. If you are interested in any of our ministries, you can just join and be involved.

So now you have all the 9 core values with you. What are you going to do with them? I always keep them with my Bible to remind myself if I am following each core value. When conflicts happen in church, I will pull out the core values and see what core value we are not following.  I am not being a judge when conflicts happen, I will only settle them back to the words of God through these core values.

Without these core values, we will be only playing at church. But we are not playing at church here, we ARE the church. It is like renting versus owning. When we rent, we will spot problems and ask the owner to fix the problems. But an owner will solve all the problems and give every effort to strengthen the home. A renter only expects and thinks they are entitled to something because he has paid rent; he wouldn’t participate in making the house better. However, an owner would invest in the home for the sake of a better future. A renter is only temporarily staying in the house as a transit. But an owner stays in the home and treats it as part of the family and encourages one another within the house. If we are calling New Hope as our home church, we need to take ownership of New Hope. And I pray that we all take ownership of New Hope starting from this New Year.

In order to take ownership of this church, we also need to start with the basic foundational stone - the Salvation. To understand salvation through Jesus, we need to understand that:

 1. We are spiritually BANKRUPT.

“We are constant sinners; how can people like us be saved? We are all infected and impure with sin. When we display our righteous deeds, they are nothing but filthy rages. Like autumn leaves, we wither and fall, and our sins sweep us away like the wind.” (Is. 64:5-6 NLT) Paul also described clearly who we are in Romans 1:29. He said we are greedy, gossipers; we do idolatry and disobey parents. We all fall short in many different ways, and we are all sinners. But be thankful to God because …

2. God is HOLY.

God is love, gracious and merciful. It is written that “But just as He who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: ‘Be holy, because I am holy.’” (1 Pet. 1:15-16 NIV) God is all the good things, and we are totally separated from His goodness because of our sins. The wage of sin is death. In the old days, people who did terribly wrong would be crucified, thrown into a hole with wild animals, or sentenced to carry a decomposing body so that the wrong doer would be slowly eaten away by the disease from the decomposing body. It might seem fun at the beginning when you sin, but the wage is death at the end and there is no escape from it. However, God loved us so much, even though He saw how sinful we have been, He decided to send Jesus to be the bridge between us and God.

3. Jesus is THE BRIDGE to life.

“For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard. Yet God, with undeserved kindness, declares that we are righteous. He did this through Christ Jesus when He freed us from the penalty of our sins. For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin. People are made right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed His life, shedding His blood.” (Rom. 3:23-25 NLT) Through believing in what Jesus had done for us, we are saved and are no longer carrying the death penalty because “He personally carried our sins in His body on the cross so that we can be dead to sin and live for what is right. By His wounds you are healed.” (1 Pet. 2:24 NLT) Let’s imagine how life would be if God didn’t send Jesus to be the bridge between Him and us. So what are you doing with your life since receiving this great gift of salvation?

One of our sisters in New Hope, Tiana Komeiji, accepted Christ when she came to New Hope as a child with her mother. She saw the hula dancers on stage and decided it was something she wanted to do for God. She learned the hula and met a lot of different people at church. At that time, her parents separated and she cried one day after church service. Pastor Wayne asked her what happened and found out it was because of the divorce between her parents. She felt she didn’t have a father anymore. Pastor Wayne told her that he would be her dad until her birth dad came back, and would pray for her birth dad to be back one day. Since then, Tiana got to meet her new family members at New Hope. New Hope is her home and everyone she met was very loving, encouraging and supportive. The love she received from this New Hope family replaced the hurt she had from the loss. She was once given a chance to dance at Hilo with a hula dance team. However the team was to dance for the false gods and she refused to do so though it would have been considered a golden opportunity. She refused to compromise her belief and values no matter how valuable that opportunity would be on earth. She responded to God with her unshakable belief and faith in Him. You need to respond to God too like Tiana did.

4. Your RSVP is required.

As it is written, “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16 NIV) God has given this gift of salvation through Jesus to us, but we have to respond to Him. If you believe in Jesus, you will have life everlasting.

·     Has salvation made a difference in your life?

·     What will you do different today because of your salvation?

What are you going to do different this year because of the salvation you have received? Let us all do it together as a family and respond to Him.

Discussion Questions:

1. What are the church mission and core values?

2. What is the difference between a “renter” and an “owner” of a church?

3. How are we spiritually without Jesus?

4. Who did Jesus bridge us to?

5. What are you doing to RSVP with God?