Sermon Tone Analysis

By Pastor Glenn Pease

When Julia Ward Howe toured a battlefield during the Civil War her heart was heavy for things were not going well for the union cause.

The soldiers were trying to keep their moral up by singing snatches of then popular army song-John Brown's Body.

Mrs. Howe's minister, James Freeman Clark, urged her to write some good words to that stirring tune.

The next morning she leapt out of bed and poured out unto paper the words that had formed in her mind.

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;

He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored.

He hath loosed the fateful lightening of his terrible swift sword.

Tis truth is marching on.

The song was published in the Atlanta Monthly, but nothing came of it for a year.

Then Chaplain McCabe learned it by heart and taught it to those in Libby Prison.

Soon the whole prison echoed with this stirring hymn.

Lewis Dunnington writes, "From that moment, the Battle Hymn Of The Republic took wings and flew through all the camps of the army.

Soldiers sand it in bivouac at night.

They sang it on the march.

They sang it rushing into battle.

And where it was sung, it did more than many men for victory.

It gave discouraged men the certainty that His truth is marching on-now!"

Nothing is so necessary as for a soldier to know that he is fighting for the truth.

It is not enough to be brave and courageous.

He must also be right and just.

A brave man pursuing a wrong course is a curse to himself and all in his way.

Peter commands those who would be soldiers of the cross to hasten to be heroic.

Be diligent in adding to your faith virtue, and that means manly courage and boldness.

Now Peter does not stop there, and we dare not stop adding either, for Peter says go on to add to your boldness-knowledge.

Unless we are equipped with knowledge our boldness can be dangerous, and it can do harm to the cause of truth rather than aid it in marching on.

Zeal without knowledge is a vice.

John Brown wrote, "Without appropriate knowledge, with due consideration, a man with the best intentions may do evil rather than good; and after running himself out of breath, find that it would have been his strength, his duty and interest, to have stood still.

This was the case with Paul.

He thought he was doing a great service in persecuting the Christians, but he says after his conversion that he did it in ignorance.

Jesus said that those who crucified Him did it in ignorance, and he said to His disciples that will think they are doing God a favor by killing them.

Ignorance is no friend to God or man, and to be bold but ignorant leads only to folly.

No general wants courageous soldiers who do not know how to use their weapons.

A brave man who is not trained is of less value than a coward who knows what he is doing.

On the other hand, no soldier wants a brave general either who has no sense of judgment.

Never was there a greater demonstration of boldness and bravery than when 600 English cavalry charged the Russian battery at Balaklava.

It was a wholesale sacrifice of heroism to no purpose.

The poet described it-

Stormed at with shot and shell,

Boldly they rode and well,

Into the jaws of death,

Into the mouth of hell.

"Grand, terrific, magnificent!"

Exclaimed the general.

Thank God we have no such general in Peter.

He commands us to be bold, but not for boldness sake as an end in itself.

It is of value to have blind zeal that courts martyrdom.

Peter demands that his troops be equipped with knowledge.

Peter stresses knowledge so much that you would think he was an ex-professor rather than an ex-fisherman.

His reference says to knowledge are as thick as commercials around station breaks.

There is no other chapter in all the Bible that so stresses knowledge.

Paul comes close in I Cor. 8 with 5 references.

That is what Peter has here also, but all 5 of Paul's are on the Greek word gnosis, which simply means knowledge, but 3 of the 5 Peter has here are epignosis, which means full knowledge.

We are in the great knowledge chapter of the Bible, and the fact that Peter makes so much of it tells us 2 things quite clearly.

I. KNOWLEDGE IS IMPORTANT.

It is important to the Christian life, and to being a successful soldier of Christ, and for the same reason it is important in every other realm of life.

No-how is the key to success and effectiveness.

Benjamin Franklin said, "An investment in knowledge pays the best interest."

J. M. Clark in Overhead Costs in Modern Industry said, "Knowledge is the only instrument of production that is not subject to diminishing returns."

Business is always ahead to have people employed who are growing in knowledge.

A lack of knowledge can be expensive.

For example, a small factory had to cease operations when a vital piece of machinery broke down.

The firms own mechanics couldn't get it working again, and so an outside expert was called in.

He looked the situation over for a couple of minutes.

Then he took a hammer and tapped on the machine at a certain spot, and it started running beautifully.

When he submitted a bill for 100 dollars the plant owner hit the ceiling and demanded an itemized bill.

The expert cooperated and this is what he sent.

"For hitting the machine one dollar.

For knowing where to hit 99 dollars."

It was not labor but knowledge they were paying for.

The majority of people who get rich do not do so by means of physical labor, but by means of knowledge.

A New York socialite came into the salon of Walter Florell, a famous milliner to movie stars.

She announced that she needed a hat at once for a party she was attending.

Walter took a couple of yards of ribbon twisted it around, and put it on her head.

He said, "There is your hat madam."

She looked into the mirror and exclaimed, its wonderful."

Florell said, "Twenty five dollars."

"But thats to much for a couple of yards of ribbon," she gasped.

Florell unwound the ribbon and handed it her saying, "The ribbon madam is free."

It was not material but knowledge she was paying for.

Know-how is what is expensive, and that is what leads to success.

The Bible confirms what we see to be true in life.

Prov.

24:3-5 says, "By wisdom the house is built, and by understanding it is established.

By knowledge the rooms are filled with all precious and pleasant riches.

A wise man is mightier than a strong man, and a man of knowledge than he who has strength."

Riches in power belong to the man who knows, and this carries right over into the spiritual realm.

There is no salvation apart from knowledge.

The Gospel is hid to those who are lost.

The god of this world has blinded their minds.

Shakespeare said, "Ignorance is the curse of God, and knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven."

Jesus said, "This is eternal life that they know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent."

No one can believe the good news of the Gospel until they have knowledge of it, and so knowledge comes even before faith as a means to salvation.

Peter, however, is not referring here to this knowledge which his readers already have.

He is writing of knowledge which is to be added to faith after one is saved.

If our goal is to be Godlike and Christ-like, then to be equipped with knowledge is essential to reach that end, for as Hannah said in praising God in I Sam.

2:3, "The Lord is a God of knowledge."

Jesus is the wisdom of God and in Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

Jesus spent a great deal of His short life on earth teaching and preaching, for knowledge was important to the building of His church.

All the Epistles are written for our instruction and learning.