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
0.13UNLIKELY
Disgust
0.12UNLIKELY
Fear
0.12UNLIKELY
Joy
0.57LIKELY
Sadness
0.62LIKELY
Language Tone
Analytical
0.34UNLIKELY
Confident
0UNLIKELY
Tentative
0.26UNLIKELY
Social Tone
Openness
0.6LIKELY
Conscientiousness
0.89LIKELY
Extraversion
0.04UNLIKELY
Agreeableness
0.66LIKELY
Emotional Range
0.7LIKELY
Tone of specific sentences
Tones
Emotion
Language
Social Tendencies
Anger
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9
Intro
Are you harried?
Are you weary?
Are you tired of your sufferings?
What are you longing for in life?
What are you expecting?
What are you preparing for?
Are your trials a burden to you? Do you feel lost and homeless in this world?
Setting Expectations
Perhaps you know something of what it was like for the people of Judah in about 700BC.
Isaiah wrote to a people who had suffered .
They had experienced the trials of a godless government, of uncertainty about the future, of other countries attacking them.
They had known slavery, and drought, and disease.
They knew the ongoing despair of being a people who kept falling into sin and idolatry, being deserving recipients of God’s judgement.
Yet here, through the Prophet Isaiah, God speaks to comfort his people.
He speaks kind and tender words:
“Ah, there is an end in sight.
Perhaps we will know peace and joy in our days?”
Really?
Warfare ended?
Our sins and iniquities done away with?
Could it be?
You may remember what it was like a few years ago when we lived in expectation of a second range crossing.
When there was talk and rumors of funding, when there was blame shifting for why it wasn’t happening, when there was nothing but hills and trees along the route.
In these days Israel is looking square down the barrel of the rising world super-powers set to dominate the region.
The the northern tribes are already decimated.
Jerusalem still stands, but the prophets have long predicted doom for Judah as well.
And in the midst of that, God speaks these comforting words - “Jerusalem’s warfare is ended.”
There were promises made.
There were routes proposed.
There were land resumptions.
Comfort in the midst of uncertainty.
But there was no second range crossing.
We hoped and we waited in expectation that one day, maybe one day we might have the fabled Second Range Crossing.
Then of course, one day the money was made available, the contractor engaged and the construction started.
Our expectation became reality.
And the rough terrain has now given way to a smooth highway.
The grades are gentle.
The speed is relatively high, and the way is easy.
Expectation has become reality.
Anticipation has given way to it’s existence being normal.
I’ve used it so many times now that it feels like it’s just the usual way to travel.
It’s easy to forget the days before the blessings, before our hopes and dreams were a reality.
But when the way is opened up we rejoice for a time, before it becomes the new normal.
We wait eagerly for the new job, new house, new relationship, new movie, new child...
Our anticipation of
When the reality arrives, when the wait is over, the wait is usually forgotten.
Today, we have a passage that speaks of the wait, the anticipation, the expectation of God’s work.
It reminds us of what it was like in the wait.
Long years , decades, even centuries of waiting leave people wondering: will our expectations ever become reality?
We’re going to start way back in Isaiah and put ourselves in the shoes of the OT people of God.
We’re going to see their expectations.
We’re going to see three ways to set our own expectations.
Expect God’s Promises
God speaks to an oppressed and weary people, who have suffered.
But,
Soon enough war would come to them, Jerusalem will fall.
They will be exiled.
So how can Isaiah pronounce these gentle words?
It’s because he speaks of a future day, a day that was to come when the war would indeed be over, and when their sins can be pardoned.
Isaiah announces a prophetic oracle that looks into the misty future and paints a picture of hope.
These words let the suffering and downtrodden dare to dream of the day when the heavy hand of God’s judgement might be lifted.
What will that day look like?
How will we know it’s coming?
How can we prepare?
Isaiah’s prophecy gives the answer:
When the days of God’s comfort arrive, there will be a voice, one crying out, a prophet, who will call out for preparations to be made for the coming of God.
This voice will call people to make things ready for God’s glory to be revealed.
Smooth out the way, fill in the potholes, do the earthworks.
Remember what it was like before the Second range crossing was built?
There was nothing but trees and hills.
The terrain was rough, the slopes steep.
Now though?
The way is easy and smooth.
They moved mountains to cut a highway through the bush.
The high spots were excavated, the low spots filled.
They prepared the way for us.
This voice calls out in the wilderness for such a highway to be made.
In the dessert, in the wilderness where the way is hard and rough, this voice calls out!
Is
For the wandering and oppressed people of God a way will be opened to God - for him to come to us, and for us to go to him.
In that day, Isaiah prophesies, God’s glory will be revealed to all!
All peoples, both those who love God, and those who oppose him will see the revealed Glory of God!
The hidden nature of God will be shown to the world.
The mystery will be revealed.
The Curtain pulled back!
This is the sure promise of God, it is his Word, and God always keeps his word.
This is the sure promise of God, it is his Word, and God always keeps his word.
When God makes promises, he keeps them.
He did back then, and he does now.
Our God is unchanging, from everlasting to everlasting he remains the same.
He always delivers.
He never fails.
He never falters.
But his ways are not our ways!
His ways our higher than our ways!
Brother, Do you believe this?
Sister, Do you trust that God will come though?
Or are you doubting?
Do you think that God doesn't care about you because you suffer in this life?
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9