Sermon Tone Analysis

Regaining Vision

When we read these words we usually do so with pre-conceived ideas.... unfortunately, not from the Bible but from ideas we have continually heard or been brought up with, either conciously or unconciously.

What is Jesus actually saying here?

Much of western Christianity over the last several centuries have focused on the divinity and death of Jesus.

Much focus, even among Adventist circles is about:

The divinity and humanity of Jesus;

Was He tempted like us or not;

What is justification;

Righteousness by faith;

Sanctification;

How am I saved;

Am I saved

There is one common theme though that runs with most Christians who obsess over these topics, they tend to be anthropocentric.

Anthropocentric

Anthropos = Human beings

Centric = Center

Human beings are the central and most important entity in the universe.

So for a lot of Christians it’s about how

I am saved

How am I justified or sanctified

They’re sincere but it’s a “zeal not according to knowledge”.

They’re motivation is misguided

They’re vision is impaired.

And what has happened is that people will read the letters written by the Apostle Paul but and try unpack his theology without ever looking and contextualising it with the middle part of Jesus’ life.

The life of Jesus is completely looked over.

But without understanding His message and life, we can’t fully understand the rest of the New Testament.

Was Paul obsessed with a kind of anthropocentric theology?

Not at all!

Was he obsessed with salvation, righteousness by faith, sanctification.

Maybe, but possibly not in the way we think he was.

Paul as the rest of the disciples were not preaching about ‘righteousness by faith’ or ‘how do I get saved’ but they were proclaimed, explained, preached, and argued persuasively about the kingdom of God.

They were only continuing what Jesus and John teh Baptist had begun:

Repent = to change direction not necessarily to be sorry for sin.

Jesus calls Peter, Andrew, James, and John and says to them to ‘Follow Me.’

When they “abandoned their nets and followed Him” they repented.

They didn’t only abandon their career, but more than this, they began a journey where they were going to learn to abandon everything they thought they knew and follow a “new and living way”; they were going to embrace a new way of ‘being’; a new way of being human.

They were abandoning their own Babylon and it’s way of doing things and following Jesus into the kingdom of God where everything is different, it’s upside down, but it’s good.

It’s good because everything in it flourishes because everything lives from the ultimate principle of self-giving love.

Then, after Jesus is resurrected, he spends forty days with them preparing them to be emissaries.

We obviously don’t know all the details of what was taught but we do know the overarching theme that was discussed:

King Jesus

When you read these verses and then you read the gospels, especially Matthew, it would appear that Jesus is obsessed about the kingdom of God.

How many parables are related to the “kingdom of God?”

What is the “good news”?

Isaiah 52 talks about a moment after Jerusalem has been decimated by Babylon and most of the people taken away as exiles and so there a few still left in the city wondering what has happened?

Is God still with us?

But how will God bring about this salvation to the captives of Israel?

Even though Israel came back from Babylon and re-built Jerusalem they still felt like exiles always coming under rule by other world powers, eventually Rome.

And so for the Jews, the good news would be the Messiah ushering in His kingdom by raising up an army and defeating the enemies of Israel and setting them up above the nations of the earth.

But then you continue reading Isaiah 53 and you read about a “Suffering Servant;”

A king who would not appear beautiful or majestic for us to be attracted to;

A king who would be despised and rejected, oppressed and afflicted;

A king who would be “cut off from the land of the living” and would be punished for their transgression.

The king would pour out his life unto death; and it will be known that He is the righteous One when bears the iniquity of the people.

Then in Isaiah 54 there is a reassurance that Yahweh’s commitment to the covenant will never be removed and in Isaiah 55 is an invitation to us to enter into it:

Isa 56 God then invites all the nations into this covenant and to live in a whole new way:

God promises to the foreigners who “attach themselves to Yahweh, to minister to Him and to give themselves to Yahweh’s name, to be His servants.

The foreigners who will keep His ways and hold strongly to His covenant:

Kingdom Come

Jesus is the true Human, the Image of the invisible God and He all things in heaven and earth

visible or invisible

thrones, powers, rulers, authourities

were created through Him and for Him.

Despite the rulers of darkness opposing the presence of God in the world, through and in Jesus all things in heaven and earth have been reconciled to Himself by making atonement through the blood of His cross.

What’s the fruit, the wisdom and knowledge that we find in Jesus?

The latter part of the letter reveals a glimpse of this, and it’s not handing pamphlets or hold evangelical meetings...

It’s to be loving, peaceful and thankful

It’s wives submitting to their husbands.

It’s husbands putting the needs of their wives above themselves, loving them as Christ loved them.

It’s children learning to obey and respect their parents.

It’s parents loving their children and provoking them to anger.

It’s slaves being faithful to their masters because in everything they do, they do it for another Master.

It’s masters being just and fair remembering they indeed are slaves themselves to a loving Master in heaven.