Harmony Christian Church

What's your day-to-day life look like?  Do you take the time to truly inspect your heart and invite God into your daily life? Join us as we explore Psalm 139 together!

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OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

You guys should be excited for me, last summer we were able to trade our minivan in and get me a truck without having to make payments - you know what it’s like being the pastor who shows up in a minivan :).  

When we were looking at trucks, I had found one that was a great price, was in good condition and seemed like a great deal.  So, I met the guy who had it at Steve’s shop to get it inspected by a mechanic to make sure I wasn’t getting into something bad.

Steve’s mechanic called me out to look under the vehicle.  The frame was so rusted you could literally poke your finger through it.  It was crazy…  I was like, “um, so, I’m not going to buy your truck…”

The only thing that would have been cool about driving that truck would have been to see it split in half and it dip in the middle and seeing me driving around with it…  lol

Over the last few years, I’ve seen lots of people's lives rust through. 

b

I have a feeling it’s because most people are going through their day to day life without ever inspecting their inner life…

What about you?

How much time do you spend in a day, week, month or year inspecting your heart?

Listen, I don’t mean having emotions.  I mean taking deep thoughtful time away from binging shows, flipping on a phone, playing games on a device.  I don’t mean dealing with problems at work or dealing with issues in your relationship.  

How do you deal deeply with the questions of your heart?

Do I matter

Does God care 

What do I do

b

I think much of our anxiety comes from a deep disconnect with who we are and whose we were created to be.

ILLUSTRATION:

Think about it, you live in a world that is designed to keep you from noticing who you are and whose you are.  You have billion dollar companies who are working night and day to capture your attention and sell it to advertisers.  Do a quick check and look just on your phone - open your settings and look at your screen time.  I can’t prove it, but I bet there is a direct correlation to the anxiety you feel and the amount of screen time you spend.

I want to take you to an ancient way of inspection that has almost been lost to us in our modern world that your ancestors would have just naturally done:

5 reminders to help you become the kind of person who inspects their inner life and answer the questions, Do I matter, Does God care, What do I do.

How would life change if we actually believed God loved us deeply and had our backs? Let's dive in and find out! Join Kent this Sunday at Harmony.

EASY TO GIVE at Harmony, text any amount to (859) 459-0316 to get started (or give online @ my.harmonychurch.cc/give ). Get the fill in the blank bulletins my.harmonychurch.cc/bulletins.

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OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

How many times a day does worry or anxiety pop up in your mind?  

I don’t want to lose you by getting you to jump into anxious thoughts, but think about it for a second…

Here’s a few things I find myself anxious or worried about

-I’m not sure how we’re going to pay that bill

-How are we going to get everyone to where they need to go

-When am I going to have time to finish that project with everything I’ve got to do

-I’m afraid I’m not going to be home on time because of this meeting

-Oh no, my phone is ringing, what do I do? ;)

-I feel like I’m losing my kid

-I wonder if a person is secretly judging me

-I’m worried we won’t have enough for retirement

-I don’t know what to do with my kids

-I can’t figure out what I did wrong with my spouse

I mean, let’s be honest, we could go on and on, couldn’t we?  

Worry and anxiety are at epidemic levels in our country.

Look at this chart: [put chart on screen]

If you are older, you don’t get it and if you’re younger, you don’t know how someone couldn’t get it…

This calls for compassion and some reconsidering of our how we order our world…

b

I think it calls for going back to the one who created you and listening to see if His words could have some meaning in your life…

I want to read some of Jesus’ words and look at them in the context of how we all live our everyday life and then ask the question

What if we took Him seriously - what would life look like for you?

Mt 6:25-34

25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 

Does anybody else feel like at this point you are wanting to say to Jesus “don’t worry about life and eat or drink?  That’s all I do Jesus is worry”

I feel like some of us make worry out like it’s a sport - we’re so good at it that if there was an olympics in worry, we’d have been in Paris this last summer…

I want you to notice something about what Jesus is doing here.  Jesus is trying to elevate your vision - move your eyes upwards.

b

“Is not life more than food, and the body more

How do we fight the spiritual battles we face? Are we really prepared? Join us this Sunday as Kent brings the Word on spiritual warfare and fighting for what matters most. Let’s gear up together and stand firm!

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OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

So, I was working on a sermon about what we will look like after we die, and maybe someday I’ll do that, but to be honest, I decided at the last minute to preach a very different sermon.  I think it will likely be shorter, but I think it’s a vital sermon to preach.  

I want to enter it by telling you a story…

Years ago, when I was in college, I mean, like YEARS ago… I had a couple of friends I had known for a long time, I thought for sure they were going to get married, they were madly in love and had been as long as I can remember.  Out of the blue, one of my friends took this wide swing from her usual way of life. She started hanging with this other group of guys and was partying with them.  Her whole demeanor changed.  One night, I was with my friend and he said, “I feel like I need to go rescue her”.  We knew she was with these other guys in a hotel and they were partying.  I looked at him and said, “let's go”.  We went to the hotel, we walked in to the room, grabbed her, and literally walked out.  These guys - who we knew got in our face and were yelling at us.  I remember asking one of the guys what happened to him, he used to love Jesus.  I kept telling myself, “if they punch you, don’t punch them back”.  For some reason, the guys left us and went back to the hotel room.  This memory is so vivid, we were sitting on the parking lot talking, my buddy, his girlfriend who was also a close friend and myself.  He kept trying to convince her that she had gone of the deepens.  We both were trying to reason with her.  And I just felt in that moment that what we were coming against was not of this world.  

I told them I was going to pray and I began to pray against satan and against evil spirits.  I prayed against demons and prayed that God would take the curtain off her eyes and help her see straight.  I can remember my neck tingling as I prayed and I’ll never forget what happened next.  When I said amen, she lifted her head and was crying and she said she felt like a curtain had fallen from her eyes and she didn’t know why she had been doing what she was doing, but she was done…

It was the wildest experience of my life…

Look, if I could just be honest with you as your pastor.  

Our church has been under what I would call a serious spiritual attack.

Our staff has had major physical issues and financial issues.  We’ve watched as our church has had marriages being ravaged, we’ve had people struggling in ways they have never struggled before.

And I believe it is all part of a Satanic attack on our church.

Listen, I need to say this plainly to you.

There is an enemy and He comes to steal kill and destroy (John 10:10)

b

And the enemy is not your spouse, coworker, the person at church that made you mad, or any other person.  

Are we living like the reality of eternity matters? It’s time to get real about our future and what happens when we die. Tune in Sunday and hear Kent unpack what the bible says about where we go after we die and what that might look like!

EASY TO GIVE at Harmony, text any amount to (859) 459-0316 to get started (or give online @ my.harmonychurch.cc/give). Get the fill in the blank bulletins my.harmonychurch.cc/bulletins.

OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

Did any of you grow up going to haunted houses?  I went almost every year growing up.  There was something about standing in line to get the tar scared out of you.  To come face to with some of your nightmares is incredibly scary.

Today, we are going to talk about the afterlife

Specifically,

What happens to us when we die?  Where do we go?  What do we know about the afterlife?

The biggest thing I want you to know is that if you are in Christ, nothing we talk about today, should scare you:

1 John 4:4

You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.

At the end of the day, even if what we walk through today, some of it may feel like a horror house, for those of you who are in Christ - you are safe - because he who is in you is greater than the one in the world.

So, I want to give you ..

Some ground rules

1. I will point out where the Bible is clear and specific

2. I will point out when the bible is not clear and leaves room for interpretation

3. I will tell you when something is my opinion

So, let’s jump into it:

What happens to a Christian when they die? 

-do you become a naked baby that’s interested in archery?

-are you singing on a cloud with a harp?

-do you become an angel?

Most Christians believe their eternal/final resting place will be in heaven (a spiritual reality) - but this is not what the scriptures say:

Revelation 21:1 & 3

Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,”[a] for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 

3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.

Our final resting place will be a physical reality - similar to our current reality. 

It will not be this dry boring place - when you read the descriptions of eternity - the things that we consider precious on earth are used as paving stones…

What if God gave you exactly what you wanted for eternity? Would it be heaven or hell? Think about it while Kent digs deep into what the Bible says about hell.

EASY TO GIVE at Harmony, text any amount to (859) 459-0316 to get started (or give online @ my.harmonychurch.cc/give ). Get the fill in the blank bulletins my.harmonychurch.cc/bulletins.

OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

I’m convinced hell is either going to be having to listen to kids fight over shotgun in a car or eternally helping kids with their common core math problems.  Lol.

Ha!  What do you guys think about hell?  

I used to go to lunch with this guy who described himself as the guy who would be driving the bus to hell…

I always thought, “either you don’t know what hell really is or you don’t believe it, because if you knew and believed, you’d have the hell scared out of you…”

What about you?

Do you know what the bible says about hell?

Do you believe what it says about hell?

Today’s sermon is going to be a bit different.  Today I want to ask and answer questions that I think you might have and attempt to give you a foundational way to think about the idea of hell…

First, what is hell?

Most of us have a picture of hell that’s like those old cartoons with a red guy and a pitchfork who is torturing people for all of eternity… 

Our image of hell comes more from Dante’s inferno than from the bible…

Actually the word hell is a word we’ve used to translate several other words in the New Testament…

One of the main ones that Jesus used was Gehenna

Gehenna - was a trash dump outside Jerusalem where ancient kings had sacrificed their children.  The trash was burned with sulphur and bodies of criminals were dumped there.

b

Jesus uses this picture to describe the place where those who are outside of a relationship with God will end up.

The book of revelation says it this way:

Revelation 20:10, 13-15

10 And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.

13 The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what they had done. 14 Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. 15 Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.

Hades is used in the place of the Hebrew idea of Sheol (the underworld)…

Hell is a place of eternal torment.

but why?

are people being poked with sticks for eternity?  I don’t think so, here’s what I think it is…

Coloss

Ever thought about why death feels so unnatural and final? Does God actually take our loved ones from us? How does your view of death shape how you live your life? Let's wrestle with these big questions together.  Join us as Kent helps us dive into the hope Jesus offers.

EASY TO GIVE at Harmony, text any amount to (859) 459-0316 to get started (or give online @ my.harmonychurch.cc/give). Get the fill in the blank bulletins my.harmonychurch.cc/bulletins.

OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

Did you know originally gasoline was just a byproduct of creating Kerosene?  I wonder what the conversation was when the sales team came up with how to turn a profit on it… 

“We’ve cracked gas-o-lean conundrum!  Picture this, Met-tal tanks…”  

“Metal tanks?”

“Metal tanks!” 

“Hmm, that should work as long as you don’t put it near open flame or electrical”

“Oh no, it’ll be surrounded with electrical equipment and flames, but the flames will be VERY small…”

“Hmm…  Ok… we can probably make that work, just make sure any human is at least 50 yards away…”

“We plan on strapping them on top of the tank…”

“ok, ok…  hmm, well, as long as the environment is stable…”

“Yeah, the plan is to put wheels under it and hurl it at speeds of at the most, AT THE MOST 90 mph… but the roads will be super smooth, so…”

“yeah, that sounds a little dangerous…  I guess if I’m on the road by myself with the tank of highly explosive fuel, It will probably be fine as long as there’s some safety equipment around it…”

“for sure, it’ll be safe, we’re putting bags in it.”

“bags? how will they stop the potential for explosion”

“oh they won’t, they’re to protect your face from being ripped off in case you crash into someone else” “someone else, are you going to have other people around you?”

“well, not around you, they’ll be hurtling towards you at no more than 90 mph with their own metal tanks…”

[quiet resignation to the inevitable]

“Just do whatever you want…”

Have you ever thought about how crazy  humans are?  You know they say a teaspoon of water will drown you…  We’re like, “hmm, maybe I’ll fill a pool with that stuff and play in it then…”  

Ha

Humans have an incredible capacity to ignore the potential for death in the world around us…

I think this is because if we had to confront the potential for our own lives to be ended at every moment, it would completely cripple us.  There are people who are plagued with this kind of anxiety and they can’t leave their house…

Today, I want to short-circuit your ability to ignore death and instead put it under a microscope.  

b

I want to give you some theological perspectives on death.

IL

Are we really investing in the next generation or just hoping they’ll turn out OK? Let’s talk about what it means to fan the flame in their lives. Join Kent this Sunday!

EASY TO GIVE at Harmony, text any amount to (859) 459-0316 to get started (or give online @ my.harmonychurch.cc/give). Get the fill in the blank bulletins my.harmonychurch.cc/bulletins.

OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

I have a bad habit of trying to start a camp fire with as little kindling as possible.  I’m the guy that is down there blowing on the tiniest spark possible trying to get it to take - I’ll baby a fire for hours trying to get it to ignite.  A few years back I was at an event where I was trying to get the fire going - the wood had been a little wet and I had tried my normal of lighting a little cardboard, working it to try and build it up and ignite a full log.  I was sitting there getting super frustrated that nothing was igniting and really starting when this older guy came over and said, “what ya doing?”  I was mad and told him I was trying to get a fire going.  He asked me if he could help.  I let him, but internally was fuming.  I didn’t need any help.  He started teaching me about fire, and to be honest, I didn’t want to hear anything he was saying.  He started talking about how I was never going to get the log lit doing what I was doing.  I was like, “Oh yeah, what do you know” in my mind….  :).  He started talking about how you have to build a bed of coals first and take it slow and start small to build up to the bigger fire.  

You ever tried to help a teenager with something they are sure they know how to do already?  Lol, that was me with this guy.  I was rolling my eyes inside my head as he talked.  I’d built so many fires… As he was talking he was breaking off little pieces of wood and trying to get sticks to catch, and slowly adding more little pieces of kindling and getting those to catch and in about 15 minutes he had a full fledged fire going and I was on fire on the inside.  Because I realized something about myself.

I’m wired for instant gratification… aren’t you?

-If I have a thought, I instantly look up the answer

-If I want to eat, I get food

-If I want to buy something, I buy it

If I want a fire now, I just want it to work…

The problem is, some things still take time and diligence.

b

I wanted a return with no investment..

I wanted growth with no sacrifice…

We’ve been talking now for a month about “For the Next Generation”…

We’ve been looking at what it takes for us to set up the next generation for success…

But can I tell you a secret, 

Investing in a generation takes, well, investment…

I want to show you an example of this in a passage that most of us would probably not spend much time on…  Listen to it…

This comes at the end of Paul’s life.  He is in prison and facing death.  As far as we know, this was Paul’s last letter and he died sometime after this.  It is an int

What’s one thing that’s holding us back from inviting people to know Jesus? Let’s tackle that together this Sunday with Kent’s message. Don’t miss it!

EASY TO GIVE at Harmony, text any amount to (859) 459-0316 to get started (or give online @ my.harmonychurch.cc/give). Get the fill-in-the-blank bulletins at my.harmonychurch.cc/bulletins.

OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

Have I ever told you guys the story of asking Jenni out?  I was the youth pastor at our church and I was preaching some and leading worship at our young adults service.  Jenni was a teacher and went to church at that service.  I had tried everything.  I started a singles bible study she came to, I invited her and a bunch of friends over to hang out, but the thing I could never figure out was how to ask her out.  Think about how weird it would be for your pastor to ask you out… lol.  I didn’t know what to do, so finally I just decided, I’m just gonna do it.  So, I put together the best sermon I ever preached, people were laughing, and crying, and I had them all in the palm of my hand.  Afterward, I walked quickly around the back of the room and to the side where Jenni was sitting.  As everyone started to leave I walked down her row, and she said “That was a really good sermon”  I said, “Thanks…  wanna go out sometime?”  Lol, she literally started walking backward away from me.  I was like, “Or maybe I could get your phone number or something…”  Finally, her friend forced her to give her number to me…

Lol, normally I say, “and the rest is history”

can I tell you a secret?

If I had never asked, Jenni never would have said “yes"…

I know this isn’t a revolutionary idea, but it’s an important one…

If you don’t ask, people can’t say “Yes” because you’ve already said “No” for them.

I want to read something Paul said about the question he was asking people all the time…

1 Corinthians 9:19-23

19 Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. 20 To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. 21 To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law. 22 To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. 23 I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.

b

Paul became all things, to all people so that every person he met had the opportunity to say “Yes” to Jesus…

I don’t know about you, but that challenges me…

I feel the same fear about talking with people about Jesus that I felt about asking Jenni out…

I’m worried about how I’ll be perceived

I’m worried they might ask me something I won’t know the answer to

I’m worried I might lose a relationship with the person…

What about you? Do you find it easy to talk to people about

How do we help our kids fall in love with Jesus and live as fully activated disciples? ? Let's dive into it together this Sunday!

? What's one step we can take to make Jesus the defining factor in our families? Tune in to find out!

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OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

Parenting is the craziest, toughest thing I’ve ever done, amen!  

I’m honestly not sure how Peter, our oldest survived.  I think 3 separate times when I was feeding him as a baby, I would throw him up on my shoulder to burp him, not realizing I was up against a wall, and would smack his head - one time it was on the corner of a post and he literally had a sunken in line on his head with swelling all around it.  One time, he would not stay in his bed and I was done with it.  I was like, “Buddy, you’re gonna stay in your bed tonight” I laid by his bed all night long with my hand on his back and forced him to stay in bed.  The next day, Jenni took him to the doctor and we found out he had a raging ear infection.  Oh my gosh, I felt like such a terrible dad.  I just didn’t know…

I’d say most parenting could be summed up by looking back and saying, “I just didn’t know…”

b

I didn’t know making jokes about someone your kid is interested in would shut them down from talking to you about that stuff

I didn’t know I’d have to spend every waking moment being judge and jury - I one time created a spreadsheet that I could put my kid's problems into, fill in a bunch of data and it would tell me what they got to do…

The challenge in parenting is every day is a challenge…

… and most of them are challenges you’ve never faced before.

ILLUSTRATION:

I remember one of my biggest worries when we had kids was how I would help them fall in love with Jesus.  I had known so many people who grew up in the church and grew up as Christians who just had no fire in their bones about Jesus.  My worry was that I would fall in love with Jesus from the life I came out of and have kids who were just lukewarm at best in their faith.  What do you do with that?  

How do you help your kids fall in love with Jesus in a way that moves them to follow Him and be fully activated Disciples of Jesus?

b

There is a two-ingredient recipe to parenting in a way that produces kids who love and live for Jesus:

b

-Two parts, your child being sensitive to what God is doing and allowing/inviting Him into their life (you can influence this, but you have no control)

-One part, is parents leading their child to know Jesus in a way that works. (You have control over this and it will influence the other)

b

What is the way that works?

Deuteronomy 6