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
0.47UNLIKELY
Fear
0.15UNLIKELY
Joy
0.5UNLIKELY
Sadness
0.56LIKELY
Language Tone
Analytical
0.65LIKELY
Confident
0UNLIKELY
Tentative
0.34UNLIKELY
Social Tone
Openness
0.84LIKELY
Conscientiousness
0.62LIKELY
Extraversion
0.03UNLIKELY
Agreeableness
0.72LIKELY
Emotional Range
0.59LIKELY
Tone of specific sentences
Tones
Emotion
Language
Social Tendencies
Anger
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9
*Intro* – In the movie, Ben-Hur, set in the time of Christ, the hero, believes his sister and mother have died while he’s wrongly imprisoned.
But he finds they’ve become lepers and are living in the Valley of the Lepers.
In a touching scene he visits them, but without touching or even seeing them – hiding behind a rock.
Leprosy was literally a death sentence.
Thus leprosy in the Bible fittingly depicts sin.
It was the worst thing that could happen to a living person.
Leprosy was a debilitating, disfiguring, disease consisting of cancerous sores that ate away at the flesh, leading to loss of body parts.
It caused numbness that left the victim helpless against rodents and insects he or she could not feel.
Lepers were unclean according to Lev 13:14-15.
They were excluded from society.
If anyone approached them, they were required to cry out, “Unclean, Unclean.”
It was a hopeless, helpless slow death.
That’s the man who approaches Jesus today.
He came hopeless, yet minutes later is completely whole.
His condition symbolizes the human condition.
We are not lepers physically, but we are spiritual lepers.
Left unattended, our condition will eat us alive and we will die still separated from the God who made and loves us.
No problem you will ever face in life begins to compare with that sin problem.
It can be solved; it can be solved instantaneously, like the leper was cleansed instantaneously --but in only one way.
Like the leper, we must bring our hideous condition to Jesus and do 4 things he did.
*I.
Conceded that He Was Diseased*
V. 12, “While he was in one of the cities, there came a man full of leprosy.”
Why did he come?
Because he had leprosy – Luke says he was full of it.
Imagine the despair in his life.
He had a problem he could not solve, so he came to Jesus.
Had he not come, there would have been no cure.
Had he been in denial, he would not have been cleansed.
Spiritual salvation requires the same confession.
Many scoff at that notion.
They say everyone makes mistakes.
We are all in the same boat; it can’t be so bad.
They’re right that all are in the same boat – but wrong that it’s not so bad.
It could not be worse, and all we have to do to maintain the problem is – nothing.
Sin is a horrendous problem.
It is blinding; debilitating; deceitful and hideous.
It eats away at the soul just as leprosy eats away the body.
And it touches every part of our being.
*Physically* – Sin causes physical problems.
The book None of These Diseases, documents how ignoring God’s commands leads physical issues.
Worry leads to ulcers and colitis.
Dishonoring father or mother leads to shortened life.
Our bodies suffer from excesses we harbor.
And, worse, death awaits!
Why?
Because God told Adam, “In the day you disobey, you will die.”
He did and we will.
Death is the direct and very physical result of sin.
*Emotionally* – Sin brings mental problems.
Look at it this way.
Sin moves us from reality.
Reality is God.
Reality is accountability.
Reality is life lived in accordance with God’s laws – physical, emotional and spiritual.
Sin is the denial of accountability -- a movement away from reality.
Move far enough and mental illness results.
Sin and guilt drive people crazy – sometimes literally, but always in that they build a world without accountability to God.
Reality is the day of accounting is coming!
Meantime – anxiety, depression, guilt, fear, bitterness and other emotional problems are the result of sin.
*Spiritually* – Sin destroys a relationship with the God.
Psa 66:18, “If I regard iniquity in my heart, The Lord will not hear me.”
Sin leaves us without spiritual resource.
Outside Christ we are “dead in trespasses and sin.”
What would happen if you stuck a pin in a corpse?
Absolutely nothing.
Dead people don’t respond to physical stimulus.
Neither do the spiritually dead respond to things of God.
If you have no response to the Word of God, to the person of God – no desire for God it a sign you are spiritually dead.
The Bible says in Rom 6:23, “For the wages of sin is death.”
God is speaking there of eternal separation from God that the Bible calls the second death.
Rev 20:14-15, “Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire.
This is the second death, the lake of fire.
15 And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.”
Is your name written in the book?
Not unless you concede your devastating sin problem.
The good news is Jesus paid the penalty for our sin.
Romans 6:23 reads, “For the wages of sin is death, BUT the gift of God is eternal life – through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
When we repent our sin we get eternal life.
The 2nd death will not touch such people.
Rev 2:10-11, “Be faithful (full of faith, always believing) unto death, and I will give you the crown of life.
11 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
The one who conquers will not be hurt by the second death.’”
There is hope, but only for those who admit, like the leper, that they have a deadly problem.
Sin kills.
*II.
Confessed that He Was Unclean*
V. 12 “While he was in one of the cities, there came a man full of leprosy.
And when he saw Jesus, he fell on his face and begged him, “Lord, if you will, you can make me clean.”
He not only conceded his disease – but he acknowledged it left him unclean.
He doesn’t cover, deny or ignore.
He does not claim his case is not as bad as someone else’s.
He doesn’t profess he’s only partially infected.
He owns his unclean condition.
This man was “full of leprosy”.
Had it head to toe.
But even one small spot would have condemned him.
He still would have had to holler, “Unclean, unclean.”
He still would have needed Jesus to cleanse him.
It would never have done to say, “I am the cleanest leper I know.
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9