Sermon Tone Analysis

Opening

Third Week Of Advent

Good morning everyone, it is such a joy to be with you today.

For those visiting or viewing this online I am Pastor Ben.

As we start our message for today let us have our minds brought to attention by looking towards our focus verse.

PRAYER

Let us now turned to prayer.

And as we did a couple weeks ago I would ask that you would please join me and saying these first few lines.

Please pray

Father we come before you this day humbled to be in your presence.

Encourage us to learn your ways and to walk in them.

We thank you for your gift of grace and ask that you bless our time together.

Father we ask your blessings upon this time as we come to the message that you have for us today.

We ask that your Spirit open our hearts and minds and lead us into understanding your truths from your word.

We thank you Lord for leaving us your word so that we may come to know you and how you would have us to live.

Use this time oh Lord to encourage us in our walks with you and to equip us to live all our days in a fashion that honors your name.

In Christ’s name we pray, amen.

In my message two weeks ago I talked about how I was coming to be an appreciator of this time of year.

As we wade through this time of year working our way through Thanksgiving and into Christmas, one of the things that I love the most is the nostalgia that comes from the usage of the charlie Brown holiday movies.

Albion Wesleyan Church had a float in the parade with the scene from a Charlie Brown Christmas with the sad looking Christmas tree and Linus’ famous monologue as he quotes Luke 2. If you listen close you can almost hear that iconic song.

And while getting lost in the nostalgia can be fun, if we are not careful we can miss what is truly taking place.

Charles Schulz used Linus, a boy who is depicted of not being the traditional adventurous boy, but rather a shy boy who did not want to stray far from his trusted blanket.

And yet from this boy, comes the true message of Christmas.

As his friend Charlie Brown stands there getting ridiculed for the sickly tree that he bought for their pageant.

Linus stands there watching clenching his blanket and sucking his thumb.

A frustrated Charlie Brown asks can anyone tell him what Christmas is all about?

To which Linus takes center stage and begins his iconic speech.

For those with a keen eye who watch they movie you will notice about 2 lines in, Linus drops his trusted blanket.

The very item that brings him comfort and joy he willingly lets go of.

Maybe you have noticed this in the past when you have watched it, but have you noticed what line he is stating when this takes place?

Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy.

Good news of great joy.

This joy, this great joy is the topic of our message for today.

The title of our message for today is A Joy Untold and we will be looking to the 35th chapter of Isaiah starting in verse 1.

If you brought your own Bible please turn there now.

If you are using the blue pew Bible it can be found on page 663.

Or you can follow along on the screen.

Let us hear the word of the Lord.

May the Lord bless the reading of his word.

As we approach our passage for today we need to keep the context in mind.

Remember we discussed two weeks ago that Isaiah was writing about the time that the Northern Kingdom was hauled off into captivity by the Assyrians.

Isaiah was trying to get the people of the kingdom of Judah to wake up and see what was going on.

Yet, the people had become blind and deaf.

God’s judgement was brewing.

It was getting ready to pour out on the people of Judah.

Yet, if we read just this passage we do not see a sign of judgement.

We read of joy everlasting.

That is where we need to understand what comes right before.

In chapter 34 Isaiah warns the people of a great and terrible day that is coming.

A day that will cause the earth to drink it’s full in blood.

Look at some of what Isaiah relays from the Lord.

Yet, this is not the end.

No it is not the conclusion.

For what comes after chapter 34 is chapter 35.

H.C. Leupold agrees with Luther that at the start of verse 1 of chapter 35 there should be a strong adversative such as the word “but.”

He continues to stat,

“Edom, the symbol of all the enemies of the people of God.

face a grim prospect of desolation;

but the land of the people of God, yea the people themselves have a most hopeful prospect of the future.”

Between these two chapters Isaiah paints for the reader a contrasted picture.

The first picture is that of death and destruction.

Of barrenness and a land uninhabitable to mankind.

The second is that of renewal and regeneration.

Of life replacing where there once was death.

And not for the temporary, but rather for eternity.

This is the picture that Isaiah paints for his reader.

After God has poured his wrath out on sin and death, he brings back to life that which was once dead.

As we consider this passage today we will see four stanzas that ought to fill us with a joyous anticipation.

The Land Renewed

Verses 1 and 2 paint or us this picture of the land being renewed as it is brought back to life.

The land was cursed during man’s fall.

What once was to be a lush tropical garden became a barren desert where thorns and thistle grew.

When we consider the first two verses of this passage we can see that this prophecy has not been completely fulfilled yet.

Paul’s word to us in Romans 8 would also indicate this.

We still experience this today.

Often times we forget that all of nature around us was also created by God in such a way that it responds to Him as well.

Yet within our first two verse for today we see that they respond to God, rejoicing with joy and singing.

When we consider this something that we need to keep in mind is that the wilderness to Israel was connected to the memory of a time of testing.

A time when due to their lack of faith they lost out on the ability to enter the promise land and had to wander int he wilderness for 40 years.

There was the ancestral memory of living through the harshness of the wilderness.

To hear that a day is coming when that physical area is renewed because of your God and the fact that he is working that out.

That God is causing a glory to shine forth from the land, not only should creation sing for joy, but man ought to sing along with it.

I want you to consider for a moment an area in your life where there is a memory that is connected to hurt.

Maybe it is a physical place.

Your parents house, an old work place, a certain street, maybe your own house, or a specific room within your house.

The thought of that place tends to bring you memories of pain.

It is a place that you would rather not think about or remember if you could.

Do you know that God is going to renew that place?

One day God is going to renew that place that has caused pain in your life to where it will sing to the glory of God.

Now you might sit there and think, “Pastor Ben you just said that this is not fulfilled yet, that this is for a future day.

I can’t wait for a future day.

This pain affects me now.

These memories haunt me now.

Where is my hope for now?”

These are fair and valid points.

Isaiah’s second stanza has some insight for us.

Your Mind Renewed

Amid Isaiah’s prophecy there is an exhortation to God’s people.

An exhortation that has some echoes 700 years later to a group of shepherds on a night outside of Bethlehem.

Isaiah records for us in verses 3 and 4