Revive Devotionals
Week of SEPTEMBER 19-25 | Becoming our true selves-PERSONALLY KNOWING JESUS
Join us for our online Revive community time! What does it look like to know Jesus vs. what does it look like to personally know Jesus? How do we relate to Him? View video. Jesus wants a personal relationship with us. The more we get to know him (his character, his promises, how he sees us) the more we begin to reflect him in our personal lives. We become one. Let's begin to reflect on these verses in Ephesians. View Handout.
Week of AUgust 22-28| Becoming our true selves
Ephesians is a letter to early Christians who were just figuring out what it is meant to be the church and the people of God in the aftermath of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. As we transition to coming back to church community in person, and as we start up Revive again, going through Ephesians can help guide us in reflecting on what it means for us to be God’s people together and what kind of community we want to be as Revive. View and download handout.
Week of JULY 25-31| Change and Trust
This week Pastor Lauren takes us through our devotional! View Video. We wanted to take a closer look at how we respond to change. We are all facing upcoming changes and transitions in our lives, including the changes that are coming up for Revive. Change is hard for many of us, and yet change is a natural part of life and something that is always happening. In the devotional, we look at several interactions between Jesus and his disciples to understand some common patterns of how people can respond to change. Below is a summary of the patterns we identify, as well as an invitation for an alternative way we can respond to change. View and download handout.
Week of JULY 11-17| Embracing Change
This week, Micheal leads us through our devotional. We wanted to take a closer look at how we respond to change. View Video. We are all facing upcoming changes and transitions in our lives, including the changes that are coming up for Revive.Change is hard for many of us, and yet change is a natural part of life and something that is always happening. Experiencing change is part of what it means to be human. And while not all changes are good, change itself is good because it brings meaning and richness to life. View and download handout.
Week of June 20-26| Rebuilding: How We Go Forward
This week Lyndsay will be wrapping up our rebuilding series with Nehemiah 12 and 13. View video. The wall is dedicated and the people celebrate! Their celebration is a reflection of gratitude and an investment for their future. However, when Nehemiah returns, he sees that the people have fallen back into their old ways. Although there was transformation, it doesn’t mean it will be permanent. It will take intentionality to sustain healthy rhythms. Let's take a look and see how we can apply this to our lives as the world begins to reopen. View and download handout.
Week of June 6-12| Rebuilding: Remember, Repentance, Recommitment
This week we will be going over Nehemiah 7-10 in Carina’s devotional. View video. So these chapters can be broken down into three R’s remembering, repentance, recommitment. They recognize how good God is and They realize how they have turned away from God. through the remembering that they are convicted of their sins. Their sorrow over their sin is overpowering the joy of God’s work → “joy of the Lord is your strength” Though we are made aware of our downfalls we walk in joy because God is doing a great work in us. Instead of focusing on the mountain focus on God before us. View and download handout.
WEEK OF May 23-29 | REBUILDING: Response to Opposition
This week Derek takes us through Nehemiah 4 and what we can learn from his response to opposition. View video. Through prayer and community we find Nehemiah and the Jews come together to support and uplift one another through the hostility they face. Maybe in our lives we are in the midst of opposition (job, relationship, health, etc.). How do we invite God into those areas through prayer and community? Take a listen to Nehemiah 4 and also Derek's testimony! View and download handout.
WEEK OF May 2-8 | REBUILDING: Rebuilding and Recognizing Each Other
This week Pastor Lauren takes us through Nehemiah 2 and 3 in our series, Rebuilding. View Video. One of the first things that Nehemiah does is recognize what God has put on his heart, then takes action. Then he examines the damage before gathering people and getting to work. Before we can rebuild, we must take time to survey and understand the areas that are broken and are in need of repair. Once we understand the needs, we then can identify and recognize the people and resources we need to properly address the situation. Are there areas in our life that we need to reassess or rebuild? Let's take a look! View and download handout.
WEEK OF April 18-24 | REBUILDING: a Heart for those who SuFFer
We’re starting a new series this week called ‘Rebuilding’! For this series, we will be studying a book of the Bible, the book of Nehemiah. Our hope with this series is to gleam lessons and insights from the rebuilding efforts of the Israelites that we can learn from and apply to our own lives as we look to the future of rebuilding life post-pandemic. For this week, the reading is Nehemiah 1 and Nehemiah 2:1-10. View Video. Nehemiah hears of the broken down walls of Jerusalem. He himself was not suffering because of the state in Jerusalem. However, when he hears of the devastation there, he identifies with the people in Jerusalem, prays for them, and asks the king to allow him to go and rebuild the walls. Nehemiah goes to rebuild the walls, not for himself, but for the people who are in need there. As we begin this journey of rebuilding, let us keep in mind those who are the most in need, and who have been most impacted by the pandemic. View and download handout.
WEEK OF April 4-10 | Rhythms of Grace WRAP UP
We’ll be wrapping up our series this week, led by Carina! View Video. For our last devotional in series we’re going to spend some time looking at the bigger picture and reflecting on the idea that these rhythms are not necessarily about the action itself but our heart’s position behind the action. The big question is “Who is God creating you to be?” God has intentionally and purposefully made you and is continuing to mold you into who he is calling you to be. View and download handout.
WEEK OF March 14-20 | Rhythms of Grace: Abiding
This week Lyndsay continues our Rhythms of Graces series talking about abiding with God. View Video. Finding our rhythms of grace is less about having doing something than it is about being present before him, abiding in him. It is a personal experience between you and God that allows ourselves to look beyond what is happening circumstantially and surrender to him. Just like in John 15 where we see Jesus's relationship to the Father, we can use that as an example for our own lives. View and download handout.
WEEK OF March 1-6 | Rhythms of Grace: Solitude
This week Michael talks about solitude as a rhythm that has impacted his life, especially in his current season. View Video. We also see that after Jesus’s baptism, the Spirit drove him into the wilderness, where he was also in solitude and being tempted by Satan. Sometimes we may find ourselves confronted with things during our time of solitude – yet God continues to minister to us even in those times. This week, let’s reflect on what has been helpful in our lives for connecting with God. Let’s encourage each other in how we can be drawing closer to God during this time. View and download handout.
WEEK OF February 14-20 | Rhythms of Grace: Lent
This week Derek will be continuing our series by talking about the purpose of Lent as we move closer towards Easter. View Video. More than just a religious practice that we see in the Bible, lent is a spiritual reset that allows us to turn our attention towards God in a deeper way. It becomes more about our heart posture than it is about the act alone. Feel free to take some time to be with God and think if there are any ways you can refine your life during this season of Lent. View and download handout.
WEEK OF February 1-6 | Rhythms of Grace
This week Pastor Lauren will be launching our new series: Rhythms of Grace. We want to experience more of God’s grace through diving into spiritual rhythms and disciplines. View Video. As we experience God’s grace for us, we also want to allow ourselves to soak in grace mentally, emotionally, relationally, physically, etc. through practices we can implement in our own life. We need to recognize that there is a constant battle against the evil one with our flesh, therefore we need to learn how to put things in place offensively and defensively as we go into battle. View and download handout.
WEEK OF January 17-23 | Revive’s One Year Anniversary!
Believe it or not, we launched almost a year ago on January 26th, 2020! Through a year unlike no other, we had to discern and pivot to move in creativity and God’s newness. As a congregation, we continued to share, grow, and foster a safe space of authenticity, intentionality, belonging, and freedom! For this week’s devotional, our core team will recap and reflect on how our core values were experienced. View Video. In this handout please read and reflect on Isaiah 61 and highlights from the year. Then reflect with the Lord to set goals for yourself in 2021! View and download handout.
WEEK OF January 3-9 | FamilY: Living with Tension
Happy New Year!! We hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season and we’re excited for what God has for us in 2021! This week, Michael Ohno will be wrapping up our series on FAMILY. View Video. First, when we look at Jesus and how he viewed family, we have to acknowledge that we live in this tension between two competing realities: One, Family is important and two, we must be willing to go against our family. There isn’t an easy formula or set of rules that can quickly resolve all of our family drama – and that’s okay. For this week, let’s reflect on our own family dynamics and how issues of control may be impacting our relations with each other by looking at Jesus as our example. View and download handout.
Week of December 13-19 | Family: Redemption in Mourning
As the holidays are here, we may be feeling a mixture of emotions. We all have experienced some kind of loss this year and in our own ways had to mourn that loss. The loss may have been something physical or it could be something not seen like loss of a tradition, hope or dream. Carina talks about how these emotions can manifest and how they compare to God’s truth and how God can enter into those spaces, bring us into deeper connection with people, and redeem our situation. View Video. View & download handout.
WEEK OF november 29-December 5 | FamilY: Generational Brokenness to Blessing
This week Lyndsay will be continuing our Family series talking about how patterns, behaviors, tendencies, experiences etc. manifest generationally . Thinking about generational brokenness specifically, we will be talking about we can recognize ways in which its passed down to us and how we can partner with God to break those ties in order to receive his blessing. View Video. The hope for unpacking this is to come into a place of greater freedom not only for ourselves, but also for our children and children’s children. View and download handout.
WEEK OF NOvember 22-28 | FamilY: Going Beneath our Expectations
This week Michael will be continuing our Family series. View Video. We want to reflect on the expectations we bring into encounters with our family and loved ones. It is natural for us to have expectations when it comes to our family, and there are a few different things that can feed into these expectations, including the assumptions we make, based on our past experiences and prior knowledge about one another, how we interpret the actions of our family members, and what our underlying beliefs are about our family – both how we feel about them and what we imagine they feel about us. View and download handout.
WEEK OF NOvember 8-14 | Family & Faith
This week Pastor Lauren will be kicking off a new series called “Family: Past, Present, and Future”. As the holiday season is quickly approaching, this may or may not mean you will be gathering with your immediate or extended family. In recognizing that not all family structures are perfect, we wanted to provide a space to search our hearts as we dive deeper in processing our family dynamics. View Video. Each generation must be taught who God is,what He has done for humanity, and how it looks like to have a relationship with him. Through studying the life of Timothy, we can see how God has given us a model of how to pass on our faith to others. View and download handout.
WEEK OF OCtober 25-31 | Kingdom leadership: Leading in Vulnerability
This week Carina Ogawa will talking about “Leading in Vulnerability”. View Video. Many times when God called on people to step into leadership, they were fearful and doubtful. Instead of seeing what God could do they saw their own flaws. What God shows us is that by embracing our weaknesses we allow Him to grow us, transform us, and equip us to do more than we think we are capable of. The bigger the mountain the greater work we get to see God do! View and download handout.
WEEK OF OCtober 11-17 | Kingdom leadership: Leading by example
This week Derek Wong will be continuing our sermon series “Kingdom Leadership” with leading by example. View Video. Leadership is not a prized position to attain, but is instead about the actions we do every day to live out the values of the Kingdom. The perfect image of this is Jesus washing the feet of his disciples – that Jesus chooses not to be served but to serve, to set the model for others who look to him. View and download handout.
WEEK OF September 20-26 | Kingdom leadership: Leading in vision
This week Pastor Lauren will be continuing our sermon series “Kingdom Leadership”. View Video. Follow along as P. Lauren explains the 4 “C”s of leadership and examples in her own life. Kingdom vision is about recognizing God’s presence and leading in our external circumstances – this kind of vision gives us courage to move forward in the path God has laid out for us! View and download handout.
WEEK OF September 6-12 | Kingdom leadership: We Are All Called To Lead
This week we are starting a new series on the topic of Leadership. Our first message will be led by Michael Ohno as he talks about how we are all called to lead and how we can see this evidently through Jesus’s ministry. View Video. In times of crisis, it is natural for us to look for strong leadership – but the problems in our world cannot be solved by a few select individuals bearing all of the responsibility. What we see in the Bible is that God invites each and every one of us to partner with him in shaping the world. View and download handout.
WEEK OF August 23-29 | Hopes & Dreams in Exile
This week we will be taking a look at Jeremiah 29:4-14 with Carina Ogawa! View Video. She draws parallels with the exile talked about in Jeremiah to what we may be currently going through as we face the Coronavirus pandemic. Rather than just surviving this time, we want to thrive in Jesus! If you are in dry place, God has not put you there to drain you, but to stir something new. Let’s bring life to those dry areas! View and download handout.
WEEK OF August 9-15 | THE Vine, The Branches, & the tomatoes
This week Lyndsay Ogawa will be taking us through John 15:5-11 on the Vine and the Branches while also sharing about caring for her garden during quarantine! View Video. There are many connections we can make between a garden and our spiritual journeys that make these verses come to life! We hope that whatever you’re going through this week, that we can take time to reflect together and bring our “spiritual gardens” to life! View and download handout.
WEEK OF July 26-31 | THE LOST SHEEP (AKA DOG)
This week let’s take time to reflect on ways quarantine has shaped us. View and download handout. Have there been moments of distraction or straying from God? In what ways may we feel lost? Derek Wong will be leading us in our devotional on the parable of the lost sheep and diving into how we can invite God’s voice in a time where we may feel areas of our life need to be rescued. View Video.
WEEK OF July 5-11 | difficult conversations
This week Michael Ohno will be leading us in our devotional on difficult conversations. View video. For Jesus’s first public act of ministry teaching in the synagogue, he faces rejection. Luke makes it clear that Jesus is not afraid to be confrontational and say things that people need to hear, even if it means being rejected and even persecuted.How many of us put off having difficult conversations because of the fear of rejection? Let’s take a look and reflect on this together! View and download handout.
WEEK OF June 21-27 | Reflection, Refinement, and Recalibration
This week we have our whole Revive core team reflection on the past 100 days of quarantine. View video. Since we are living through unprecedented times, we may not always be aware of how changes from the past 3 months could have changed our lives, positively or negatively. Let’s take some time to reflect and recalibrate, as we recognize how our lives have been forever changed through divine refinement. View and download handout.
WEEK OF June 14-20 | Rest
This week Pastor Lauren will be taking us through this week's devotional on what real rest looks like. View and download handout. Pastor Lauren will be guiding us through a heart check exercise and also ways we can meditate on God’s word as a way of rest. Be sure to also watch our YouTube video to see ways she has personally inviting God into her self-care routine! View video.
WEEK OF June 7-13 | Understanding Where We Come From
This week Michael Ohno will be taking us through this week's devotional reflecting on what it looks like to understand different point of views from our own. View and download handout. Many of us have different emotions and reactions to what is currently happening in our nation, especially regarding racial injustice. Our hope for this week is that we can learn to reflect our own stories and how they may shape our perspectives differently from others. Our hope is that we can understand and honor diverse stories like Jesus did with grace, humility, and compassion. View video.
WEEK OF May 31-June 6 | The power of prayer
This week Derek Wong will be taking us through this week's devotional about the Lord’s Prayer. View and download handout. We recognize that with the recent protests regarding racial injustices and the continuing news of the coronavirus, this may be a heavy and confusing time for some of us. Even as Christians, we all may come from different viewpoints and opinions, but one thing we hope we can all agree on, is in times like these we can rely on God’s presence through prayer. Follow along this week’s video as Derek guides us through a reflective time of the Lord’s Prayer. View video.
WEEK OF MAY 24-20 | finding joy in every season
This week Carina and Lyndsay Ogawa will be taking us through this week's devotional about how we can discover small joys in every season. We will be going through and reflecting on Ecclesiastes 3 where God reminds us that there is a time and place for every season. Even if that season is difficult God reminds us there are greater things ahead. View and download the handout. Also follow along as Lyndsay and Carina show you what some of there small joys have currently been! View video.
WEEK OF MAY 17-23 | Being a Catalyst for Jesus
This week we Timo Suminda will be taking us through this week's devotional about being a catalyst for Jesus. He will be discussing what it looks like to surrender to Jesus and allow the new things He may be inviting us into to enter our hearts. View and download the handout. Also worship along as Timo sings “Let the Redeemed” in his Youtube video. View video.
WEEK OF May 10-16 | Meditating on the word
This week Ciara Nagao will be taking us through this week's devotional about meditating on God's Word. She will be diving the importance of being rooted in God’s word especially in seasons of questioning and doubt. The scripture today comes from Psalms 77. View and download the handout. Follow along by also watching her YouTube video to go with the handout. View video. Stay tuned until the very end for a special surprise that involves working on your physical health as well as your spiritual health! We will also be hosting Revive community time through Zoom this Saturday, May 16th at 2pm. Hope to see you there!
WEEK OF May 3-9 | The Importance of remembering
This week Michael Ohno will be doing our weekly devotional on the importance of remembering, especially in a time such as this. Michael will be taking us through scripture and contemplative exercises that will guide us through processing our personal experiences through this specific time of our lives . View and download the handout. Also check out the devotional video to go along with it! View video.
week of april 26-May 2 | Worship
This week Derek Wong will be doing our weekly devotional on worship! Worship is not only singing or playing music, but also a heart posture of praise toward our Father. Derek will be taking us through the Acts 16 where we can tangibly see evidence of this while Paul and Silas were imprisoned. View and download the handout. Be sure to check out his awesome drum cover of “King of my Heart” and also the video portion to the devotional. View video. We also will be hosting community time through Zoom this Saturday, May 2 at 2pm. Hope to see you there!
week of april 19-25 | Earth Day
This week Lyndsay Ogawa will be leading us in a fun drawing exercise in celebration of Earth Day! Following that will be a short devotional on listening prayer and using this as a great tool to help us navigate hearing God’s voice in a time of confusion, doubt, and uncertainty. View and download the handout. Watch our short video for the drawing activity and devotional, which also includes some updates and announcements. View video.
week of april 12-18 | Peace be still
This week we are going to be looking at the passage Mark 4:35-41. Carina Ogawa will be taking us through this passage by analyzing and applying it to our lives and how we can discover peace in our personal “storms”. View and download the handout. Watch our short video for the devotional, which also includes some updates and announcements. View video. We will also be having a Zoom community time this weekend, Saturday April 18th at 2pm. Please email our core team if you would like to join!
Week of April 5-11 | Holy Week
This week we are currently in a week known as “holy week.” In holy week, we are led through the journey of the cross with mourning Jesus’ death on Good Friday, and celebrating how he conquered the grave on Resurrection Sunday! Pastor Lauren will be leading us through a devotional using the exercise “SOAP” through Matthew 26, 27, and 28. These chapters are groundbreaking, revolutionary, and quintessential to understanding our faith! View and download the handout . Also view the video going along with this message and worship with James Mizuki: View video.
Week of March 29-April 4 | Community in social isolation
This week, Micheal Ohno will be leading us through the topic of finding community in a time of social isolation. We have made a short video: View video. Follow along with the handout as we dive into scripture and some reflective questions. View and download the handout. We will be joining as a community via Zoom April 4th at 2pm to discuss our responses and support each other. If you would like to join, be sure to you are subscribed to our email to get our updates!