Sermon Tone Analysis
Overall tone of the sermon
This automated analysis scores the text on the likely presence of emotional, language, and social tones. There are no right or wrong scores; this is just an indication of tones readers or listeners may pick up from the text.
A score of 0.5 or higher indicates the tone is likely present.
Emotion Tone
Anger
0.15UNLIKELY
Disgust
0.14UNLIKELY
Fear
0.09UNLIKELY
Joy
0.57LIKELY
Sadness
0.52LIKELY
Language Tone
Analytical
0.63LIKELY
Confident
0UNLIKELY
Tentative
0.61LIKELY
Social Tone
Openness
0.94LIKELY
Conscientiousness
0.67LIKELY
Extraversion
0.14UNLIKELY
Agreeableness
0.33UNLIKELY
Emotional Range
0.63LIKELY
Tone of specific sentences
Tones
Emotion
Language
Social Tendencies
Anger
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9
Every hour in the 24 hours that make up any Sunday on planet earth, the words are heard countless millions of times.
Millions pray these words each week in worship and some pray these words every day.
Do you know them?
…
/"Thy kingdom come..."/
Of course you do.
These words come from the best known prayer in the Christian world...
The Lord's Prayer - But let me ask you a question.
When you pray, /"Thy kingdom come," /what exactly do you mean by this "/kingdom/?"
What is it that you want to come?
It would seem to be a pretty straight forward question with an easy answer.
The "/Thy/" in the phrase refers to God – so obviously it is /God's Kingdom/ we want to come.[1]
The gospel reading for today can help us toward understanding what God's kingdom is all about.
Yet, Understanding the kingdom is no little thing
Last week, you may remember, I questioned you when was the last time you heard a sermon about Hell
I did so because the parable that we were addressing, “The Parable of the Wheat and the Weeds”, has historically focused on the fear mongering of God’s judgment
And Hell has played predominately in that
So this week, our focus shifts – and shifts to Heaven – you may hear it as “The Kingdom of Heaven”
In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus tells several parables concerning the ‘Kingdom of Heaven’
Mark, Luke and Paul use the phrase ‘Kingdom of God’
It should be said that the "Kingdom of Heaven" and the "Kingdom of God" are interchangeable, both mean: God's eternal reign of love.
We have also been on a bit of a sermon series, these past few weeks on the Parables of Jesus
Today is the last Sunday of that and so a little bit of a summary, albeit oversimplified, is necessary for Matthew's 13th chapter
"Parables of the Kingdom" chapter goes something like this:
· At the beginning of the teaching session, Jesus sits in a boat and teaches a large crowd that had gathered on the Northern shore of the Sea of Galilee.
· Jesus begins with the well known parable of the sower.
God's word goes out into the world and there are varying responses.
There are various soils in which the seed finds a home
o Jesus explains to his disciples that some will hear and become a part of God's kingdom - while others do not hear, and the word will have no effect on them.
· Then Jesus tells the parable of the wheat and tares (or the Wheat and the Weeds)
* He will later explain the parable to His close followers, the disciples.
He explains a very critical point – God and not we - will separate the wheat from the weeds.
· The remainder of chapter thirteen is a series of parables which point to the meaning of the Kingdom.
This Kingdom is like this... [2]
* Each parable gives us an idea of what the kingdom is like and tells us why the kingdom is priceless.
Of course, The Kingdom of Heaven can not be contained in any simple analogy
Yet we are given a window into understanding a layer of what God’s Heaven is with each one
It is all encompassing idea…
All of the Bible – all of Jesus’ teaching is pointing us towards greater understanding of /“thy kingdom”/
And when taken to heart, knowledge of The Kingdom of Heaven changes everything about our world, our values and our priorities
I said a couple of weeks ago, that one New Testament scholar, which I found in my studies, said: Parables are “stupid”[3]…
I suggested that I would rather use the term – Absurd or challenging
Because I find them deep with meaning and the farthest thing from Stupid
But, what he was getting at, is that Jesus tells stories to lead people in a certain direction that is completely against the grain - Completely against common worldly wisdom
So *by* the world’s understanding of wisdom – Parables are Stupid
He was being intentionally controversial – and in that way, completely ‘*in*-keeping’ with Jesus’ technique with these stories we know as Parables
In order to fully understand the parables of Jesus, we need to strive to retain just how absurd or controversial they were at the time,
We need to guard against the reality that just because they are well known – we don’t fall into the trap of domesticating them
Taken to heart, they do change everything about our world, our values and our priorities
Starting with the parable of the mustard seed…
On first glance this is a charming story about how God might make use of things beyond our common expectation
How the mustard seed, a tiny seed may grow to great size and even be a home for birds to nest in,
The moral of the story… God can use even the smallest of faith to grow something plentiful – even abundant, enough for many others
The Mustard Seed parable is dynamic and has often been sadly reduced to… "From small beginnings come great endings."
Since it is set among the accounts emphasizing abundant harvests,
Matthew likely has this idea in mind as it pertains to the ultimate triumph of God's dominion, but such a reading also overlooks the absurd context from which the story originates
You see, mustard is closer to being a weed than wheat.
When we think of mustard it is often in the yellow squeeze bottles that are used for hamburgers and hot dogs
In reality it is an invasive plant – mustard seed was basically like a weed – more like our dandelions
Once mustard seed gets a corner in your field – watch out
The Roman naturalist, Pliny the Elder, who died in 79AD while investigating the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, writes:
Mustard grows entirely wild, though it is improved by being transplanted:
But on the other hand when it has once been sown it is scarcely possible to get the place free of it, as the seed when it falls germinates at once.
Pliny then describes in great detail the medicinal uses of the mustard plant, but it is important to remember that it was then, as it is now, in modern Israel, a weed.[4]
The cedar tree is a better choice.
According to Ezekiel 17:23, the "noble cedar" provides the kind of shelter birds' need,
So… Jesus is providing a stark and surprising contrast here.
Is there any other "tree" that could so scandously become part of God's plan?
A foodie is someone who has an ardent or refined interest in food.
It used to be a term that was interchangeable with gourmet.
It has taken on a bit of a snobbish slant however, and a foodie isn't generally seen in a positive light.
Why the discussion over food, you may ask?
Well, foodies generally see that the smallest of herbs can bring the greatest delight to the simplest of dishes.
Herbs like lavender, rosemary and thyme have all come into favour in regards to food.
But an oft overlooked herb is the mustard seed.
A mustard seed is an overlooked herb and even 2,000 years ago, wasn't regarded as something great and grand.
This is the herb to which Jesus compares the kingdom of God.
Mustard?
Why not juniper, ancho or even chipotle?
These are great herbs!
These are what the kingdom of God should be like!
…If we think like this, we can miss the point of the parable.
The kingdom of God is already here in the oft overlooked things, in the forgotten, the lowly and the mundane, in the mustard seeds of everyday life.[5]
Moving on the parable of the Yeast
Again – to the ancient hearer this would have immediately raised attention
Yeast or Leaven everywhere else in scripture is used to represent the world and almost always as a negative symbol of corruption.
The only thing more astounding in this parable is that the woman uses "three measures" of wheat, enough to make bread to feed more than 100 people.
What person in their right mind would use so much yeast – certainly
no wise impoverished widow would ever do such a thing…
Another example of a little can make a lot?
Yes, but it also indicates that the dominion of God may take hold in hidden and unexpected ways.
And do so in such overwhelming, dramatic ways
The Kingdom of Heaven is to be thought of as absurd by the standards of the world – yet abundant beyond imagination
Our next two parables are the treasure found in the field and the precious pearl
One way of thinking of these might be to compare it to winning the lottery
We might all, at some point, have had dreams of winning a huge sum, or inheriting a fortune from some long lost uncle and how that might change our life dramatically
No more debts – new vehicles – new home, a cottage in the Muskokas
And while understanding that the treasure found in the field by the labourer – was such a great treasure that the labourer sold all that he had just to buy the field where it was hidden
And winning the lottery would dramatically change our lives as the treasure in the field did for the labourer
It is the change in life that is to be the focus and not the questionable business ethics of the labourer, or the misplacement of trust from God to something external such as gambling on the lottery
The parable about the Pearl or of the found treasure, where again everything is sold in order to obtain the one prized thing...
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9