Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Story- about a team working together

How many of you are Minnesota Vikings Fans?

How many of you know what happened on December 17, 2022?

The Minn.

Vikings did something that had never been done before.

It was the week before Christmas last year and the Minnesota Vikings were set to win the NFC North title at season record 10 wins and only-3 losses.

And on Dec. 17 they were expected to have another easy win against the Indianapolis Colts who had only won 4 games all season.

But as the end of the first half came to a conclusion instead of being in the lead, the Vikings trailed 33-0.

You see the problem was that even though everyone on the team had great talents they were all trying to do it on their own They were not playing as a team.

But halfway through the third quarter something changed, They started to play like a team.

Instead of trying to win on their own abilities, They started to use their gifts as a team.

And the score of the game got closer and closer- 36-7, and then it was 36- 14, as the fourth quarter opened up they scored again making it 36-21, The Vikings no longer looked like a 12 individuals on a field they looked like a team that moved together in unison, that seamed to be able to read each others minds, One touchdown, two touch downs and and with just about 2 minutes left in the game they were still down by 8 and needed to go 64 yrds to go to get into the end zone for a chance to tie the game, a deficit no other team has been able to accomplish.

The ball was hiked, and the quarterback quickly sent a short pass outside of the pocket to his running back,, with his team blocking and leading the way— He ran the entire 64 yards to score the touchdown.

And then the got the 2 point conversion making the game all tied up and going into overtime where the Vikings struck first and and won the game by three, giving them the record of greatest comeback ever in NFL history.

So what was it that changed at half time for the vikings.

They didn't bring in extra players, they didn't go out and find better players, it was the same group of guys but something drastically changed, and it was awesome to watch , Every player did his part, No one missed his assignment.

They no longer played for themselves but they began to trust one another to do do the job that they were each gifted to do, and this caused them to play as a team.

There is so much power in Unity, When people come together and are unified with one purpose, they can always accomplish so much more.

We see it in politics, We see it disaster relief, We see it in sports, We see it in fund raising for the needs of others, We see it in community projects

And the church shouldn’t be any different, In fact Jesus spoke about this very thing in his prayer for the church in John 17:20-23

Jesus Prayed for our church, He prayed that the Baptist Church in Clear Lake, Iowa would be as One.

He prayed that we would be a picture to the world of His relationship with God the Father,

Jesus’s’ intent for His church is that we are a unified Body of Believers.

just imagine with me for a second, what could happen in a church when all of it’s members become unified in their love for Jesus and their desire to build up one another in Christ.

Jesus said “ It would be a picture of His perfect relationship with God the Father to the World”.

Simply put, Jesus is saying that when a church is perfectly one it will point people to the Savior.

Which is what the church should be all about.

Our purpose as a church

is not to make better baptists, although we are Baptist and thats the theology we teach,

it’s not to make moral citizens, although that is a good thing as well,

Our Purpose is to point people to Jesus. to “make and Equip Disciples of Jesus”,

This morning we are going to be in Romans 12 and I want to encourage you, that as this study on the One anothers begins to bring your Bible w/ you to church, to make notes in it so that you can go back and remeber what God has been teaching you, and if you dont have a good Bible I would love to give you one that you could use for your own studies.Come see me after church.

Turn with me to Romans 12 and follow along as I read our text for this morning starting in verse 1 and going to verse 8

In this Passage I believe we can see what it takes to be as One in the Church.

In order for us to be as One We must first

Think Rightly about Your Priority in the Church

Romans 12:1–3 (ESV)

1 I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to

-present your bodies as a living sacrifice, -holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. 2

-Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind,

- that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

3

-For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think,

but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.

Paul in this passage, is speaking to the church about what a healthy Church member should look like

and in verse 1-2 He gives us the foundation of someone who is a healthy church member, “ I Appeal to you brother sin Christ by the Mercies of God that you will Present your bodies as a living Sacrifice.-

holy and acceptable to God. which is your reasonable worship.

Too many times I believe Christians get their priority in the church backwards.

They think that Church somehow is all about them and what they can get out of church.

Too many Christians come to church looking for ways that they can be served and taken care of, ,they come looking for something to make their pwn life seem more important, and this way of thinking couldn’t be farther from the truth that Paul is preaching to the church.

Understand what Paul is saying in these first 2 verses is that as a Redeemed Child of God As Part of His church, Your priority in the church is not about you and what You get from the church, Your priority is to present yourself as an example of Jesus Christ to your brothers and sisters in the church.

To be a living Sacrifice.

Which He says is your reasonable worship.

he doesn't say that being a sacrifice makes you extra Holy, he doesn't say that when you sacrifice yourself, God Gives you more blessing, He simply says that being a living sacrifice is just what Christian do.

Its not the extra credit its not the above and beyond its what should be normal for someone who claims to be a Follower of Jesus Christ.

a sacrifice is defined by "the act of giving up something that you want to keep especially in order to help someone else."

To be a living sacrifice in the church means that you give up your own preferences and desires for the spiritual good of others.

and this is our worship

To worship God is why we were created.

Our entire life’ s purpose is to lift up the praises and glory of God, and in our text this morning We see that when we sacrifice our lives for the spiritual good of others it brings God all the praise because we are exemplifying Christ to the world..

Understand church ,if you come to church and are not sacrificing yourself for the spiritual good of others than you are outside of the plan God has for your life as the church, and that means you are not worshipping God, You are just playing Religion.

To be a living sacrifice means that You sacrifice your time for the spiritual good of others.

When is the last time that you gave up a sacrificial amount of your time to invest in someone else in this church?

discipling someone is hard work, it takes lots and lots of time to invest in someone spiritually.

But its worth it , because God says our sacrifice is holy and acceptable worship to Him

To be a living sacrifice means that you sacrifice your Treasure for the spiritual good of others.

The main way you that a christian lives sacrificially with his finances is through the local church.

You give regularly and generously to the church

Do you give out of the abundance of your wealth or do you give out of a heart of sacrifice?

Sacrificial living will produce sacrificial giving

I think the conclusion on giving is simple.

The gift that pleases the Lord is a gift given in sacrifice - giving up something that you want to keep for yourself for the spiritual good of another..

To be a living sacrifice means that you sacrifice your talents for the spiritual good of others.

Do you use the gifts and abilities God has given you to build up the body of Christ?

I hope you dont just come to church to hear a good sermon- because frankly Your going to leave disappointed.

Dont just come to church to sing songs because you are going to leave disappointed.

Come to church ready to serve your brothers and sisters in Christ, Why - because this is your reasonable worship.

Paul wanted to make sure we get what he is saying in these first couple of verses so he sums it up in verse 3

Romans 12:3 (ESV)

3 For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.

Paul is telling the people in the church “dont be full of yourself.”

Stop making everything about you!

understand that when you make everything in the church about you , you are stealing the worship from God because you are acting just like the world without God.

If We are going to be one in Christ Than We each must first stop thinking that we are the center of the church, and start living a life of sacrificial worship.

Simply - in order for the church to be One our focus must turn from selfish motivations to outward service.

and that is what makes the church different form the world.

Secondly Paul moves on in this text and says that if we are going to exemplify the Oneness of God in our church than we must

Think Rightly about Your Position in the Church

Paul loves to use the human body as an analogy for the church.

And in this text , Paul is writing to the Church in Rome, and he assumes that they are spiritually mature enough to understand this metaphor of the body as the church, but when He wrote about the church as a Body to the Corinthian church, he went into a lot more detail.

The book of First Corinthians is really a letter of reprimand for all of the sin that is going on in the church that is not being dealt with.

So when he speaks to them about the body as a metaphor of the church He wanted to spell it out very clearly so that even the most immature christians would understand what he was illustrating,

look with me at....1 Corinthians 12:12-27

For just as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body—though many—are one body, so too is Christ.

12:13 For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body.

Whether Jews or Greeks or slaves or free, we were all made to drink of the one Spirit.

12:14 For in fact the body is not a single member, but many.

12:15 If the foot says, “Since I am not a hand, I am not part of the body,” it does not lose its membership in the body because of that.

12:16 And if the ear says, “Since I am not an eye, I am not part of the body,” it does not lose its membership in the body because of that.

12:17 If the whole body were an eye, what part would do the hearing?