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Prayer
In the book, Disappointment with God, Phillip Yancey tells as story of a man named Richard.
Richard was converted to Christ while in college.
Not long after that, his parents announced they were getting a divorce.
Notwithstanding Richard’s fervent prayers for the preservation of their marriage, they split.
This was his first experience of feeling let down by God.
Every decision he made in life was preceded by prayer and Bible study.
But everything he did seemed to backfire.
A lucrative job offer was withdrawn and given to someone less qualified.
He soon found himself in debt, his fiancé left him, and he began to experience a series of physical problems.
Finally, feeling that he had reached his wit’s end, he decided to seek God in an all-night prayer vigil.
He fasted and prayed and zealously sought the Lord.
But all he heard was silence.
Nothing.
After it was over, he said: “I staked my life on God, and God let me down.”
Even in the darkest moments, lament offers a well-traveled path of faithfulness in the midst of human anguish.
Today’s message is really divided into two parts.
Part 1…
Watching Loneliness
“Observing Loneliness”
Job 2:11 (ESV)
Now when Job’s three friends heard of all this evil that had come upon him, they came each from his own place, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite.
We will discuss these friends later on at length, but for now suffice it to say that there were three friends from three different locations.
Job 2:11 (ESV)
They made an appointment together to come to show him sympathy and comfort him.
Exemplary Friends
“You’ve Got A Friend in Me”
If you know the story of Job, its easy to think about Job’s friends as “real jerks”
But we have to understand the picture that the author is painting for us of these friends.
The same word that is used here for friends is used in other places of the Bible to describe the friendship that David and Jonathan had.
1 Samuel 18:1 (ESV)
the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul.
They were not “fair-weather friends” or “Facebook friends”
They were NOT just trying to get something from Job.
These guys were NOT just three acquaintances of Job, they were deep abiding friends.
They were LOYAL friends who went to extreme lengths to be with their friend.
These friends made an “appointment” with Job to see him for two main reasons.
Job 2:11 (ESV)
They made an appointment together to come to show him sympathy and comfort him.
The intentions of the friends were to show him sympathy and comfort him.
Show Him Sympathy
This word means “to shake the head” meaning a deep sense of sympathy or condolence.
It would be the kind of sentiment that one would have when going to a viewing or funeral.
Comfort Him
They also came with a desire to “comfort” and “console” their friend.
Now comfort here is NOT the same thing as empathy.
Empathy is the entering into and experiencing of suffering with the sufferer
Empathy may be silent, but comfort must include speech.
To comfort involves speaking to the mind and heart of the sufferer in such a way as to change his or her mind and heart.
Comfort is an action, sometimes called “speaking to the heart,” that hopes and intends to bring about a change in how the sufferer thinks and feels about his or her suffering.
So these friends came with the best of intentions.
They came to support their friend.
They came to help their friend.
They came to be there for their friend.
But just because a person intends to be a “help” to someone else does not mean they will be.
If we are to think about this as Christians, these friends give us a helpful pattern to understand how we should approach other sufferers.
In another place in Scripture we are called to “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.”(Romans 12:15)
Weep With Those Who Weep
I want you to notice three key elements that these men did which were helpful to a friend who was suffering.
Show Up
“Attending to Suffering”
Upon arrival, they realized that their friend was far worse off than they imagined he could have been.
He was a "shell of a man" which he once was.
To the point that they could no longer recognize that Job was even their friend they formally known.
As these friends come toward Job, they see him from a distance and they are deeply disturbed.
Their friend they once knew is now a shell of his former existence.
He was once a great man of the East, now he sits upon the ash heap of the East.
They are so disturbed that they raised their voices and cried out in anguish for him.
They cried out in anguish for their friend, they tore their robes to mirror his robe tearing.
Often times, when tragedy strikes, we are afraid to be around grieving people.
In fear that we will do the wrong thing
Say the wrong thing
Just plain not know what to do
This fear DID not deter them, and it should NOT deter us either.
Gospel centered people move toward suffering.
Not AWAY from suffering.
Shut Up
“Silence before Speech”
These men did NOT come to be Job’s answer men.
They DIDN’T try to explain away all the suffering and pain.
They DIDN’T try to give him some happy-slappy answer.
For seven days and nights they sat in silence with their friend.
Tear Up
“Weeping with those who Weep”
They sat on the ground with him in silence.
For a week straight, they did not say a word to him.
There were no words which could fix what had happened.
Nothing could change the situation.
These friends were not trying to harm Job.
They intended to bless him.
They intended to mourn with him.
They intended to be a friend to their friend.
The narrative now shifts from silence to speech.
Does suffering have a sound?
Does suffering make noise?
The answer is “yes, it does”
And it’s the sound of lament.
I also want to qualify upfront, that if there are moments that Job sounds as though he is overstepping the bounds of faithful submission, we MUST remember that he is a type of Christ.
He IS NOT on the same level of the LORD Jesus.
[Some have suggested that] perhaps it was a social requirement for visitors that they not presume to speak until their host should begin the conversation or invite them to do so.
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