Mike Harder

Over the Wall

mike@greenhillschurch.org (Mike Harder or Brad Dunlap) — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 19:01:56 +0000

Another guest post from my sweet wife Tabitha

Walls are built for protection. They are built to keep certain people in and to keep other people out.

Our construction project in Haiti was to rebuild the outer compound wall around the school. This would provide the children with a safe place to learn and play and would protect them from the neighboring slums and dangerous streets of Port Au Prince.

It’s hard however, not to think about the people you will ultimately keep out. I know I am guilty of this in my own life; I build walls around me emotionally and physically to feel safe and secure. But how do you respond when the Lord asks you to go over the wall?

Sarah Jane and I heard of an elderly man living in the slum across the wall. We learned that he was injured during the earthquake and had no family to care for him. He was blind, weak, hungry, and all alone. His home was made of scrap metal and tattered sheets and was approximately 3ft by 6 ft. I watched as his frail body worked to stand up and walk to the edge of his shanty. His knees were buckling and after standing for only a short while, he slumped back down onto a nearby chair. He wore a look of despair and hopelessness.

I definitely consider myself to be a cautious person. I lived in Memphis for 7 years and during that time we were named the # 1 city for hate crimes against women. I learned where not to go alone and how to be very aware of my surroundings. But on this day, I felt the Lord calling me to step out of my comfort zone and go over the wall.

Pierre was our new Haitian friend and translator. He had such a huge heart for his community and for Haiti. He told us that providing a safe place for a school and church to meet would be such a blessing for Haiti and that it would be a beacon of hope for the people of Port Au Prince. When Sarah Jane and I told Pierre that we wanted to go over the wall to see the blind man, he paused to think hard about what we were asking and then he smiled and led the way.

As I stepped outside the compound, I felt a wave of anxiety. This was the first time I actually walked through the streets of Port Au Prince. We traveled through the city in a large open bed truck with a covered tarp and at each destination we immediately got inside the compound walls and locked the gate. There were many stares as Pierre led us into the slum, some friendly some untrusting. Children began to emerge from behind piles of rubble and scrap metal. I saw an emaciated dog crouched on top of debris as roosters walked through a pile of trash. We were cautiously led to the very back corner, where we met Antonio.

Pierre explained to Antonio that we were there to help him and that he was not alone. As we listened to his aches and pains, I looked up and saw holes in his shelter. I imagined how hard it must be for him to fall asleep with the rain invading his home. We gave Antonio a hygiene kit that included soap, a razor, lotion and clean towels. As he rubbed his knee and explained his pain, I assessed his injured leg; something had fallen on him during the earthquake. He had significant atrophy in his quadriceps muscle and his knee felt warm to the touch; a sign of arthritis and inflammation. As Sarah Jane educated him on how to take his vitamins and medicines, I took measurements of his knee so that I could bring him a brace. I watched through tears as Sarah Jane literally fed Antonio her lunch that she had brought that day. I’m not sure where his last meal had come from.

As we took notes of all we could bring him the next day: a tarp, a knee brace, and clean water, Pierre asked Antonio if we could pray with him. We placed our hands on our new friend and thanked Jesus that he led us to him. We asked for the Holy Spirit to comfort his pain and bring peace to his heart. When we finished our prayer, I looked up at a very big smile and heard the sweetest thank you in Creole, “Merci, Merci.”

We made 3 other trips into the slum. I think it is funny that once you allow God to lead you over the wall your fears begin to fade and you start to believe the words in the songs you sing: “If our God is for us, then who could ever stop us”. In three days, we were able to clear the rubble outside his tent and place a new tarp over his roof. We even extended a portion of the tarp so he could have a place to sit in the shade. We filled a jug of clean water for him and made a path for him to walk. We even placed blocks on each side of the path so he could feel his way with a walking stick.

As people saw us return each day, I think trust was established. One lady approached me and asked for help with her back. With Pierre’s help, I was able to teach her stretches to relieve her back pain and give her a lumbar support brace. Children began to run to us and touch our arms. They loved having their pictures taken and I loved hearing their laughter as they saw themselves on the camera. Our last day on the other side of the wall, we handed out shoes to the women and children.

I am thankful that the Lord allowed me be a part of something so beautiful. Our last day at the school, Sarah Jane and I walked onto the roof and looked over the now completed wall. Through tears of joy, we looked at Antonio seated on his chair outside his tent, clean shaven, brace on his knee, and a smile on his face. His expression of hopelessness and despair was exchanged for a look of peace and dignity. I hate to think that my fear could have prevented me from blessing this sweet man. I definitely think that I am still a cautious person and I respect dangerous areas, but I hope I have learned that when the Lord calls me over the wall he is going to grow my faith and show me just how much He loves the “least of these”.

Moses’ Story

mike@greenhillschurch.org (Mike Harder or Brad Dunlap) — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 19:38:55 +0000

I saw this video off a friend’s website. Its a little boy who is severely malnourished in Uguanda. He is not being taken care of by Faith a lady who runs a ministry through Global Support Mission. You can see the whole story here: http://www.knowthinkact.com/stories.php

It is tragic to see the young reap the evil of those that went before them. Maybe you can make a difference.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Happy 4th!

mike@greenhillschurch.org (Mike Harder or Brad Dunlap) — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 23:20:06 +0000

A day late but still funny

Click here to view the embedded video.

God Send Me Out

mike@greenhillschurch.org (Mike Harder or Brad Dunlap) — Sat, 03 Jul 2010 13:54:19 +0000

This is a guest post by my wife Tabitha. She just came back from serving in Haiti and was kind enough to share her thoughts.

1 month ago I kissed my husband goodbye and stepped on a plane for Port Au Prince, Haiti. As the plane took off, I began to pray that God would keep me safe, that he would stretch my faith, and that he would use me to love and serve the people of Haiti. Since I have gotten back, people have asked me: “ How was Haiti?”. I have tried to answer that question the best that I could, but I have struggled with the ability to process my emotions and the things that God has whispered to my heart. I am not a writer and artistic expression is not my gift , so it has been hard for me to put into words what I saw and felt. But, I want so badly to tell the story of Haiti – of God’s amazing and unfailing love for His children. So here goes….

GOD SEND ME OUT!

It was November. I remember it so well because it’s what I have come to call my emotional train wreck! For a period of 2 months, my heart began to break as I became more aware of the global orphan crisis. 147 MILLION ORPHANS became a phrase that plagued my heart and moved me to action. And so I began to pray. I could feel that God was preparing me for something, but I didn’t know in what capacity. Mike and I started to pray about sponsoring a 2nd child through Compassion International. I will never forget scrolling down the list of children in Kenya, Africa. “ How do you pick just one” ? I was thrilled that we were going to sponsor another child and as I began to pray for sweet Susan Mutave and send her stickers and pictures, my heart continued to ache for these children all over the world. It wasn’t uncommon for me to stand in the back of the room at church with tears streaming down my face as God opened my eyes to a hurting and suffering world. How could I sing these songs and cry these tears and not physically do something? My husband is my spiritual leader and I am so thankful that he listens to me as I cry and ask the tough questions. He also began to pray for what God was going to teach me and what it would mean for our family. I remember one specific day where I prayed to the Lord to SEND ME OUT. And that is exactly what He did. Looking back at my journal entries through the winter and spring months, I can see where God began to piece His plan together for me. He began to burden my heart for the abandoned, the broken, and the forgotten. And then in May, I received a phone call from a sweet friend Sarah Jane asking if I wanted to travel with her to Haiti for a disaster relief trip. As I listened to the details unfold, I stood speechless – watching the Lord answer my prayers. Mike and I met with the team leader for the trip and he began to share his heart for the Haitian people and the community that we would serve. And then he told me that the cost of my trip would be paid if I could go. What?!? You see it turns out that as I was praying for God to send me out, a sweet couple that I had never met decided that they wanted to pay for someone to go to Haiti. They didn’t feel healthy enough to make the trip with the conditions there, but in their faithfulness, they wanted to send someone. And that was me.

Many of you have asked me to blog about my trip and I don’t have one so I am going to post notes to tell about the amazing things God taught me while in Haiti. Day 1 soon!

Awesome Video

mike@greenhillschurch.org (Mike Harder or Brad Dunlap) — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 15:13:49 +0000

If this wont make you laugh, I dont know what will.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Great Video of Nashville Flood

mike@greenhillschurch.org (Mike Harder or Brad Dunlap) — Fri, 14 May 2010 03:39:27 +0000

Here is a great video of the nashville flooding. One of the local pastors, Pete Wilson, from Crosspoint Church got in a boat and shot footage of the flooding.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The Great Nashville Flood

mike@greenhillschurch.org (Mike Harder or Brad Dunlap) — Sun, 02 May 2010 16:24:19 +0000

Ok so the storms have been insane the last two days. We had to cancel church because the cops shut down our cross streets because of flooding. About 1/2 of a block away, we had cars completely submerged. Brad, my copastor and I got soaked just trying to get inside the building at Cabana. We were hopeful we would have church today. We had already canceled our church picnic and baptisms but thought we could salvage church. Apparently the weather had other ideas. Here are some cool videos of the flooding. The first is on 21st and the other 2 are of the Harpeth River in Franklin.

So many of my friends have had flooding. We are just really grateful that our house has stayed dry so far. We are getting ready for round 3 this afternoon!!!

Click here to view the embedded video.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-SJh2Cpjq4[/youtube]

Click here to view the embedded video.

What the Hell?

mike@greenhillschurch.org (Mike Harder or Brad Dunlap) — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 16:27:42 +0000

As a pastor, I get lots of questions about hell. Most of them go something like this. Does it exist? What is it like? Surely a loving God wouldn’t send people there right? I have found as I have studied what the Bible teaches about hell that most of us know very little about hell. Furthermore, most people believe things about hell that are taught nowhere in the Bible. If we are honest, most of us have our concept of heaven, hell and the devil formed for us by what we watch on television in general and by cartoons in particular. Most of us imagine something out of the far side comics or from Looney Toons to create our impression of what the afterlife looks like. In those portrayals heaven is portrayed as a place where people play a harp among the clouds and hell is portrayed as a place where Satan rules on a throne and has a bunch of weird torture devices where he tortures humans for all eternity.

It is vital that we base what we know about heaven and hell and on what the Bible teaches instead of what pop culture and cartoons teach us. As we study we find out that God teaches us something very different about what mankind’s destiny is after we die.

I was leading a Bible Study the other day and we were looking at the most famous Bible verse in the world. John 3:16. In it there is a phrase that many people just breeze right over. - that none should perish but all have eternal life. What do you think of when you hear that people can perish? Do you believe it? Do you reject it? Honestly it is the reason why Jesus came to the earth. The concept of Hell is vital to the message of the gospel. If there is not hell there is no need for Jesus to come to earth to pay the price of sin for us. If he died anyway, then he was a fool. Jesus was no fool. He came and died for us because there was no other way to have peace with God. Someone had to pay the price for sin so he took the pain of sin and death for us.

When we get started at looking at what the Bible teaches about Hell we need to go to the source. Here are some Biblical passages to look at: Matthew 8:11-12, Mark 9:42-48, Luke 16:19-31, Jude 1:3-13, Revelation 20:11-15, Revelation 19:20, 21:8. These aren’t all of them but they are some of the main verses. Go ahead and look them up if you want.

When looking at these verses something really stands out. Jesus believed that hell was real. In fact, he gives us more information about hell than anyone else. R.C. Sproul says this: It is so unpopular with us that few would give credence to it at all except that it comes to us from the teaching of Christ Himself.

So lets answer some Frequently Asked Questions:

1. What is hell like?

Jesus says it is a place of torment. He called it a place of weeping and gnashing of teeth. It is fundamentally a place where you are separated from God’s favor.

It is a place where people get to experience the reality of choosing to live a life without God.

Many people think it is a symbol and only a image used to scare people I love what R.C. Sproul says.

I suspect they are symbols, but I find no relief in that. We must not think of them as being merely symbols. It is probable that the sinner in hell would prefer a literal lake of fire as his eternal abode to the reality of hell represented in the lake of fire image. If these images are indeed symbols, then we must conclude that the reality is worse than the symbol suggests. The function of symbols is to point beyond themselves to a higher or more intense state of actuality than the symbol itself can contain. That Jesus used the most awful symbols imaginable to describe hell is no comfort to those who see them simply as symbols.

2. Does Satan live in Hell?

The answer is no. Although the Bible teaches that someday Satan will be thrown into the lake of Fire, there is no evidence that Satan has ever been to hell. In fact the Bible teaches that Satan is the prince, the ruler of this world. Jesus references him as the ruler of this world in John 14:30. You also find that Satan a lot about Satan in the book of Job. Check out this passage from Job 1:6-7 6

6 Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came among them. 7 TheLord said to Satan, “From where have you come?” Satan answered theLord and said, “From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.”

You find that he wanders the world looking for evil to do. He also has access to go to heaven and present himself to God. But you see that he also needs to ask for permission to take action against those who are followers of God.

I believe one of the reasons we like to think that Satan is in hell ruling the underworld is because it is much more frightening to live in the reality that he exists on this terrestrial ball with us. If he is actively at work on this planet then we must be on guard that we will not fall under his influence.

3. How could a loving God send sinners to hell?

He doesn’t. They volunteer. Those who go to hell choose to go there.

How do they choose? People choose hell instead of God whenever they choose to deny him as their Lord and Savior. The most powerful sin in the universe is rejecting Jesus as God and God as the ultimate reality. C.S. Lewis says it this way, “I willingly believe that the damned are in one sense, successful rebels to the end; that the doors of hell are locked on the inside.”

The Bible teaches that if you spend your life telling God to be quiet and leave you alone, hell is that place where he honors your request.

I believe we must be careful that our hearts don’t get hardened toward God. Matt 13:14-15 gives a sobering warning:

‘You will indeed hear but never understand,and you will indeed see but never perceive.15 For this people’s heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them.’

4. Why does the topic of hell create such resistance?

The primary reason is because people resist the concept of punishment for sin. People don’t want to think that God could possibly punish people for rejecting him. In doing so they throw out huge portions of scripture in order to make the Bible conform to their image.

I think people really want to just let God off the hook. They want him to be humane and humanitarian God. That God be a being that only exists to ease human pain and not cause any of it. They want him to be a God that looks the other way when people actively hate him by denying who he has revealed himself to be.

In conclusion:

Hell is an unpleasant reality of life. Although we may not like the concept, Jesus taught very clearly that hell is a reality and it is the future of those who deny God’s offer of salvation in this life. This is essential to the gospel. Without the doctrine of hell there is no need for a savior. If Hell is not real then Jesus came to this earth and gave himself up as a ransom for us in vain. I hope that this post causes you to think, to explore and to discover what the Bible really says about what happens after death and to consider what the future holds for you.

Trusting Jesus is the most important decision you can ever make. If you need help making it let me know in your comments or can email me at mike@mikeharderministries.com

Stay tuned for a future post on what heaven is like.

Fertile Soil

mike@greenhillschurch.org (Mike Harder or Brad Dunlap) — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 20:47:32 +0000

This Sunday I preached a message out of John 15:5-8. The thesis is that we prove to be Jesus’ disciples by producing much fruit. From John 15 we jumped to Matthew 13 and the parable of the sower. We learned that we are able to produce good fruit by being fruitful soil.You can listen to it here: http://greenhillschurch.org/Podcast/2_28_10.mp3

After the service someone asked me to elaborate on how the Holy Spirit allows us to be good soil. I felt that the best way for me to address this question was here, online.

I believe that the Holy Spirit is God’s main tool to transform us into the likeness of his son Jesus. The Holy Spirit speaks to us by convicting us of sin and moving in us to do God’s work. The best way to have the Holy Spirit work in your life is to begin to have a relationship with him. The Bible tells that he is the third part of the Godhead. That means that he is as much God as God the Father and Jesus. Although he isn’t human, he is a person with the desire to be in relationship with us. As we grow in our relationship with the Holy Spirit, through prayer to him and trying to do his will we will change into being good soil.

One of the most powerful roles that the Holy Spirit does in our lives is being a helper. Jesus tells us about the role of the Holy Spirit in John 14.

But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. John 14:26

I find great confidence in becoming good soil knowing that the Holy Spirit is working in me. That he is going to teach me all things and that he will help me follow Jesus’ teachings.

To hear more about the role of the Holy Spirit you can listen to this message on the Holy Spirit that we taught on Recently. Just click on the link!

http://greenhillschurch.org/Podcast/1_10_10.mp3

Show Love Benefit Concert

mike@greenhillschurch.org (Mike Harder or Brad Dunlap) — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 21:33:29 +0000

Hi! I want to invite you all to the Show Love Benefit Concert. It is a concert to raise funds for Brad and Katie Dunlap who are adopting a child from Ethiopia. It is Saturday night February 20th at the Edgehill Cafe at 7PM. Josh Bronleewe, Jason Eskridge and Sarah Jane Madole are performing.

Adopting a child is a huge undertaking. It takes a lot of time and money ($25K at last count). So please be praying for them and if God puts it on your heart you might consider donating to bringing this child home.

You can follow their journey at http://www.dunlapadoption.com/