Harmony Christian Church

Ever feel like your prayers are hitting a wall or like they go unanswered? What’s really going on? Let’s dive into why some prayers seem unanswered. How can we tune into God’s will?

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

OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

I was telling my son the other day that when I was in high school I had gone on this trip and was staying in a hotel room with one of my best friends - we were seniors, and this freshman kid we didn’t know very well.  I came back from breakfast and went into the bathroom to use the bathroom and saw that the toilet was really clogged.  I asked the two guys who did it and both of them denied it.  My friend, who I trusted was like, “There was no way I did that… it’s disgusting”  The freshman was like, “Well, it wasn’t me…” so, I did what any senior in a position like that would do, I believed my buddy and told the freshman he had to go down to the front desk and tell them what he’d done and get someone to come un clog the toilet…  this poor kid was like, “really,” I was like, “if you do the crime, you have to do the time!”  lol.  He left and went downstairs.  I turned to my buddy and I was like, “Man, I can’t believe that kid wouldn’t just admit he did it…”  That’s when I realized I’d made a critical error, my buddy with an evil grin looked at me and said, “That’s because he didn’t!”  

I was so mad at him, he had totally let me blame this kid - and shame this kid for something he didn’t do…

You ever experienced that - taken the fall for something you didn’t do?

WE:

Maybe at work, your boss made it out like her idea that failed was actually your idea and you just had to go along with it?

Anyone who has an older sibling has been blamed for something that kid did

-when I was like 8 I scratched a big “K” into the inside of my closet door - my younger sister later moved into that room - Katie, and guess who got blamed for it… lol

-Or maybe your kids blame you for everything that went wrong in their life as though they had no part in the direction their life took

We all know what it’s like to be blamed for something we didn’t do… but get this, so does God…

See, one of the most common reasons I hear for people walking away from God has to do with them believing God did something He didn’t do…

I don’t know how many people I’ve met who walked away from God because of unanswered prayers…

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Sickness that wasn’t healed, loss that wasn’t avoided, pain & suffering that was not removed…

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The underlying theology is: “A Good God would have done something about __________ for me…  He’d have answered my prayers”

I know that’s not the only reason, but let’s assume it’s a major one

Why is it that some prayers seem to go unanswered?

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Is it that just God isn’t good? or is something else going on?

3 of the top reasons prayers go unanswered

What do we run to when our tanks are empty? Are we staying connected to Jesus, our true source of life? Let’s ask ourselves: how do I get full when I'm running on empty?

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:

Oh man, there nothing quite as exciting to me as taking your gas gauge on a car down below the red line.  Anyone else with me?  I get all excited and nervous when it happens.  Jenni hates it.  She won’t take her car past 1/4 tank left.  For me it’s a game to take it down as low as I can without running out of gas…   

Who are you more like?  Me or Jenni?  How many of you are daredevils and like running it low?

How many of you can’t stand to run it low at all?

I don’t know about you, but coming out of Christmas and the New Year, I feel like my personal tank is running low…

Think about all the things that take your time, all the things that you pour out into…

-Kid's classroom parties

-Getting kids to games and practices

-Year-end projects

-Inbox’s that are FULL to capacity

I saw someone's phone the other day and they had like 1,000 unread messages - that would drive me crazy

It feels like in today’s world our days are chocked so full that our emotional and spiritual tanks are on empty.

ILLUSTRATION:

Jenni and I have had conversations around this.  The words we would use are it feels like we are running ragged.  We are just going and going and going, constantly pouring out and never being filled.

I was praying on this a few weeks ago, I was literally just done.  So tired.  See if this sounds familiar.  I had found myself binging tv, I was getting irritated easily, I was overeating to find joy, I was not sleeping, literally getting like 4 hrs a night.  I was done.  

I was praying and twice I had God speak to me about my emptiness.

Once I felt like He showed me a bright light and I immediately looked away.  He was like, “This is what you are like with me”

The second one I had decided because of the first that I was going to stop putting an earbud in my ear at night to listen to a show to go to sleep and instead I would pray until I fell asleep.  I was praying and getting pretty sleepy and I felt like Jesus was like:

“Kent, you’ve run out of wine…”

All of a sudden I was awake…

Some of you are like, “Kent, what does your grocery list have to do with a sermon?”

It’s funny because Jenni and I don’t even drink.  

but here is immediately what came into my mind.

John 2:1-3

On the third day, a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there, 2 and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. 3 When the wine

Have we tuned our ears to hear God’s voice, or are we letting the noise drown Him out? What if He’s already speaking to us? Join us as we learn to listen to the good Shepherd.

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:

So, I have a major problem.  I’ve always played this joke on my kids that they will say something like, “Dad, we need to go soon” and I will pretend to mishear them and I’ll say, “did you say we need a goat platoon?”  They are always like, “Dad, that’s not funny…”  the problem is, now I’m starting to really not be able to hear them…  Lol, I’m getting old!  

This isn’t just an old person problem.  The other day we were in our car on the way to school and one of my kids popped up from reading their book and said, “You need to do something about that hair.”  I laughed and said, were you listening?  I asked the question because we had just spent about 5 minutes talking about the hair and how I can look like a rooster at times!  Lol, they hadn’t heard a thing because they weren’t listening…

We all have times we don’t listen so well, right?

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But what happens when you don’t listen to God?

In this series, we are going to talk about “hearing from God”

But I don’t mean this in a generalized sense.  I mean actually hearing the voice of God…

ILLUSTRATION:

Have you ever heard some one talk about “Hearing God” speak and thought, “that’s a bunch of hocus pocus”?

I think that a lot.  I think LOTS of people misuse and abuse the notion of hearing from God.  They use it to justify all kinds of junk…

So, before we go too far into this short series, I want to do a few things today:

First, I want to normalize hearing the voice of God.  Hearing from God should be a normal part of the Christian experience and show you how even if you don’t think this is your experience, it might be.

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Second, I want to give us some VITAL guardrails.  I want to protect us from weaponizing a part of what should be a normal piece of the Christian experience.

1. Is hearing from God normal or signs of a mental condition? :)

Lol, come on, you know that’s what some of you are thinking “hearing voices in your head Kent?”  That’s crazy…

But you do know this appears to be the normal experience of people in the scripture, don’t you?

[Put up as one slide so I can move through fairly fast]

Hey, good morning Harmony. I'm so glad that you guys are joining me. In light of having actual in-person church. I'm going to do a quick devotional online for us. I was thinking recently Jenny and I were getting ready for bed and she came to me and she said I just, I just have something to tell you.

And you know in your marriage when your wife says something like that you're like, what did I do? Did I leave the underwear on the floor again? And instead of it being that it was something really sweet. She said, you used to come to at night before we go to bed and you would give me a good night kiss and you don't do that anymore. And I thought about it and I was like, yeah, I haven't done that for a long time.

That was like a long time ago. And I said, baby, I'm so sorry, I haven't been doing that. And then it hit me. Do you know the reason I stopped giving my wife a good night's kiss? It was this stupid thing.

Does anybody have one of these? It was a CPAP like I turned into Darth Vader every night. And so every night we would go to sleep and I would just put on the mask, turn into Darth Vader and I'd Roll over and go to sleep. And I stopped giving my wife a good night kiss. It reminds me of our relationship with Jesus and something that Jesus told the church in the city of Ephesus a long time ago, thousands of years ago, in the Book of Revelation.

He's speaking to the Apostle John, and he says these words to the church in Ephesus. I want you to listen to this. He says this, but here's something I hold against you. You have turned away from the love you had at first. Jesus looked at this church in Ephesus, and he said, when you guys first fell in love with me, there was something about that love that was changing who you were.

It was making who you were. And he says you have turned away from the love you had at first. And then he says this. Think about how far you've fallen. Think about how far you've fallen.

Turn, Listen. Turn away from your sins. I don't know what your life looks like, but my guess is there was a time in your life when you were radically in love with Jesus. My hope is there was a time in your life, and maybe for you right now, that is that time. But my hope is that if.

If that time is not right now, if it was in the past, that you would do what Jesus encourages the Ephesians to do. Listen to what he says. Think about how far you've fallen. What was. What was your life like when you first came to know Jesus?

What was it like that got you so passionate and excited? What was it that had not burnt you out and kept you from just being turned on for who Jesus was? You were in love with him. And listen to what he says. Think about how far you've fallen.

Turn away from your sins. Then listen to this. Do the things you did at first. When my wife told me about the kisses, you know what I've been doing? I've been ripping my mask off when she gets into bed and I've been rolling over and going and giving her a kiss.

I've been like, let's smoochy, Ruchi baby. Do you know why? Because I'm going back to what I did at first. He doesn't say, I want you to notice this. He doesn't say, to go back to the love that you had at first.

That. That was a childish, immature love. What he says is to go back and do what you did at first. Go back and act the way you did at first. I'll tell you when my relationship with Jesus gets a little bit cold, when I feel a little Distant.

And again, it's never because Jesus has moved. It's always because I moved. You know what I do? I g

Why did God give us Christmas?  Does it even matter in today's world? Let’s get real—what if we might be avoiding what God came to fix? Let’s wrestle with this together. ❤️

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:

When I was working on this sermon I asked my wife Jenni if she could think of any funny stories where she said to me “Why?” (needs to be said with contempt/confusion).  Her answer: “I’m sure there were plenty of times where that happened…”  lol.  I think she’s right.  I can remember driving down a grassy hill when there was a road right next to it and her saying, “why?”.  I can remember undergarments that ended up on the floor right next to a hamper and hearing a “why”?  Lol.  Let’s be honest, living with me, that’s probably the most often posed question…

I want to flip the question on yall though and on God little bit..

I want to ask the question of “why” Christmas?

Don’t be too quick to answer…  

I know you probably have an answer, but I think people who are far from God don’t get it…

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They get the lights, and the fun, and the gifts, what they don’t get is why the Christ of Christmas…

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On first blush for the non-Follower of Jesus, Christianity feels like the answer to a question they are not asking or more likely, are avoiding…

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CS Lewis said this about avoiding God

“…in our own time and place, [avoiding God] is extremely easy. Avoid silence, avoid solitude, avoid any train of thought that leads off the beaten track. Concentrate on money, sex, status, health and (above all) on your own grievances. Keep the radio on. Live in a crowd. Use plenty of sedation. If you must read books, select them very carefully. But you’d be safer to stick to the papers. You’ll find the advertisements helpful; especially those with a sexy or a snobbish appeal.”

-CS Lewis

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What are we avoiding?

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We are avoiding our deep disfunction, what the bible calls sin, and our profound need for something more, God.

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And when we do look for God, we end up looking in the wrong places…

ILLUSTRATION:

In the 1960’s during the space race - the Russians who were atheists send Yuri Gagarin to space.  When he came back he said, “I went to space, I looked and looked for God but never saw Him…”

ILLUSTRATION:

I get this way of thinking of God.  When I was in college, I can remember really struggling.  Our bible college had chapel services - in the evenings and I was so mad at God

Why would anyone give up everything for Jesus? What are we holding onto that keeps us from fully trusting Him? Tune in this week to be challenged to go deeper in Jesus!

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 recently watched a thing on Dietrich Bonhoeffer, do you know about him?  He was a pastor and theologian during WWII from Germany.  As Hitler was rising to power preachers were literally saying he was sent by Jesus to the church and to Germany.  Bonhoeffer was actually able to escape to America but after getting here he said he had to go back to Germany because how could he help the church rebuild what she was supposed to be if he had abandoned her during that time frame?  He went back and was a part of a failed assassination attempt on Hitler-Valkeryie.  Bonhoeffer and thousands of others were arrested and put to death for their resistance to Hitler and for helping smuggle Jewish people out of Germany.  

Here’s my question:

Why in the world would someone give something so costly as their life to the cause of Christ?

I think it’s a fantastic question at Christmas…

And it feels ridiculous, doesn't it?  

Bonhoeffer's family didn’t even know he had been sentenced and hung until weeks later. 

This guy died as what would seem a failure, as someone who died in anonymity.  

Why give your life for what seems like nothing?

Isn’t this the question we are all really asking?  

-I mean we ask it in little ways all the time.  

I want to look at an answer hidden in the Christmas story.

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We are going to have to go back hundreds of years before that first Christmas to find the story..

SCRIPTURE:

We have to go back SO far.  It’s not cold, but instead, it’s hot - you need to picture Iraq because that’s where we are landing.  It was almost 500 years before Jesus would come into the world.  But the land at this time isn’t called Iraq, it’s called Babylon.  The King, Nebuchadnezzar had been having terrible dreams at night.  You might know this story.  He tells all of his magicians and enchanters that they need to interpret the dream, but that he will not tell them the dream.  An impossible task.  He orders all the wise men to be put to death - this includes a guy named Daniel who pleads for a chance to interpret the dream.  The story is serious and would be terrifying.  Daniel is answered by God and interprets the dream.  After he does this, Nebuchadnezzar does this…

Daniel 2:48

48 Then the king placed Daniel in a high position and lavished many gifts on him. He made him ruler over the entire province of Babylon and placed him in charge of all its wise men.

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Daniel becomes the ruler

OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

What do you do to prepare for Christmas to come?  Years ago we had a two-story house, our kids were young and they REALLY wanted Christmas lights on the house.  Jenni gave me the whole, “It would just mean so much if you’d put them up”.  So, I put the ladder on our back deck off the second story and started to climb up onto the roof.  I got up there and looked about 25 ft from the roof to the ground and I did what any reasonable person would do.  I sat there for about 20 minutes deliberating on if my life was worth putting lights up for the kids…  Lol.  I’m such a weenie, but I knew if I fell off that roof, it would be lights out for Kent.  I finally came off the roof and said, “I’ve got a great idea!”  Let’s put the lights in the yard.  We strung the lights all over the ground and when it would snow, it was the coolest thing to see the light coming up through the snow…

WE:

Most people have traditions for getting ready for Christmas, don’t they?  

-In our family, we do all of our Christmas decorating after Thanksgiving

-Some of you monsters out there do it after Halloween lol

What’s your tradition for getting ready for Christmas?

All along the way in the first Christma,s there was someone who was getting things ready…

Before Jesus was even born his mother Mary went to visit her cousin Elizabeth who was also pregnant and this happened:

Luke 1:41-44

41 When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. 42 In a loud voice she exclaimed: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! 43 But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? 44 As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy.

Elizabeth’s baby, John (the Baptist), was moved in the womb when Jesus came into his presence.  

This was what John the Baptist did, he got things ready for Jesus…

Mark 1:1-4

The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah,[a]the Son of God,[b]2 as it is written in Isaiah the prophet:

“I will send my messenger ahead of you,

    who will prepare your way”[c]—

3 “a voice of one calling in the wilderness,

‘Prepare the way for the Lord,

    make straight paths for him.’”

4 And so John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 5 The whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River. 6 John wore clothing ma

When anxiety grips us, what do we do? This Sunday, let’s talk about how God helps us face what feels overwhelming.

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:

In Kansas when there is a tornado, they take over the tv stations?  And there are only two responses to a tornado…  1.  You freak out, grab all your kids, dogs, pictures, and toilet paper and run to your tornado shelter.  2.  Or you grab your binoculars, open your garage door and stand out in the storm looking for a funnel cloud.  That’s it.  Those are your two options.  Well, there’s a third option, you move to Canada, but none of us in here are that chicken hearted…

Which one would you be?  tornado shelter or binoculars?  There aren’t any canadians in here are there?  Phew… Ok…

This week we are talking about anxiety.  The scripture actually deals with anxiety a lot.

When it comes to anxiety, there are really two kinds of people. 

There are people that are gripped by anxiety and people that are affected by anxiety. 

And of course, there’s Canadians…

the reality is, all of us face anxiety at some point. 

-When you see your child climbing 40 feet up in a tree and your heart skips a beat, that’s a reasonable anxiety

-When there are flashing lights behind you after you’ve been driving 90 mph, that’s reasonable anxiety

-when your boss says, “Later today, I need to speak to you in my office alone”  that’s reasonable anxiety.

Anxiety is a natural, God given response to create a heightened state of alertness in dangerous or fearful situations.

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The problem is for some of us our brains have a disproportionate response to the inputs we experience. 

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This can lead to excessive nervousness, fear, apprehension, and worry.

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If you are the kind of person who is gripped with anxiety, you get this. 

ILLUSTRATION:

You know what it’s like to walk into a room full of strangers and feel like the walls are closing in on you, dreading every interaction.  You’re thinking, “you’re lucky I’m even here Kent!”

You know what it’s like to be immobilized by a deadline, feeling the weight of it hanging over you like 100lbs barbell.

You know what it’s like to run the events of the day over and over again, rethinking every situation to the nth degree.

When you are gripped by anxiety.  It can feel desperate and hopeless.

Here’s the problem.  Others of you are like the binoculars people with the tornado - you go through life pretty care free and don’t get it.

OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

Can I tel you a quick story, and I’m gonna be a little vulnerable here and expose myself some, is that ok, yall will treat me with kindness?  So, a little over year ago Jenni and I started this journey to build a rental cabin at the gorge - we are taking out a loan and hoping to use it to try and build up a retirement.  As we were doing this we started working with this builder.  When he found out I was a pastor he asked me if I wanted to try and help him sell cabins and he would give me a percentage of whatever I sold.  I thought, “we’re doing this for our retirement, so why not” some of you may have seen some of my posts about it… Well, thank Jesus I had someone reach out to me, a fellow believer who had done business with this guy and had been taken advantage of him.  I started doing research and found out this builder had been involved in a HUGE fraud case.  I’ll never forget it because it was Jenni and I’s anniversary weekend and we had this trip planned.  On that trip I started calling people I had in the pipeline to buy a cabin - 100’s of thousands of dollars worth of cabins.  I told the guy I was not comfortable doing business with him and we backed out of the deal.  

He began leveling threats at us…  He was going to sue us if we did anything to ruin his business.  I remember for weeks having this sick feeling in my stomach.  How did I get here?

But now I felt like I had put everything in my world on the line.  My integrity was wrapped up with this guys - that’s why it’s embarrassing to share with you.  

My  mind started spinning with all kinds of things, what happens if this guy sues me, I knew his  business partner’s dad is one of the wealthiest people in KY.  What happens if these people that I sold on these cabins build and this guy takes advantage of them…  My mind was spinning for weeks - I felt like an idiot and literally any time I got a text from that guy my gut would wrench and I’d get sick…

I was experiencing a level of anxiety I’d never had before…

What do you do to get yourself out of that level of anxiety?

Where does that kind of anxiety even come from?

Have you felt that before?  

-Maybe for you it was you following one bad business decision after another and having to finally tell your spouse that you lost your job

-or Your car broke down and then your furnace went out and you started putting stuff on a credit card and then you foolishly bought christmas on a credit card and now you stuck every time the bill comes in you stomach drops…

I did some thinking on where Anxiety comes from and I think these are at least a few of the reasons we experience anxiety:

Where does our anxiety come from: [put up one at a time]

The reality is for most of us who are used to controlling our worlds, when we lose control - our hands get off the steering wheel, we become anxious.