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
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Disgust
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Fear
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Joy
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Sadness
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Language Tone
Analytical
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Confident
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Tentative
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Social Tone
Openness
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Conscientiousness
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Extraversion
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Agreeableness
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Emotional Range
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Tone of specific sentences
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Anger
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Start:
Entice: Virtually every story in Mark introduces a feedback loop where “familiarity breeds contempt.”
This is a familiar story, frequently preached.
In fact, I remember in college, several of us working on what we called our “Pig sermons” together.
Thankfully, I couldn’t find any of my old Pig Sermons.
This is one of the most familiar miracle stories in the Gospels and certainly the best-known exorcism.
Yet that familiarity can obscure some important details which give the story greater depth.
When we read scripture there are times when we need to be looking for and applying the right answers; “do this, don’t do that.”
There are other times where our task is to discern and ask the right questions.
I think this text falls into that category of inquiry.
Engage: What can a text like this teach us about Jesus?
What can we learn about our own Christian life?
Do we learn something about our world and the spiritual debris we see around us?
Expand: This text is one of those that explains how to read, how to understand, how to draw conclusions from a Biblical story.
This text also reminds us that not every text contains discernible, doable action items.
There are not many “go thou and do likewise’s” here.
There is one smidgen of implied guidance at the end, but mostly Mark records the story to remind us of the liberating power of Christ and His Kingdom.
This text also tempts us to focus on the wrong things.
Whether or not demons did then and do now exist, their power in relation to God, etc. Until the last 300 years all cultures and religions accepted the reality of the unseen, spiritual realm.
I don’t think that there is much reason or need to pull on that thread.
We should focus on the relationship between spiritual, physical, political, social, and cultural forms of oppression.
They are all connected.
Excite: Empire is the marketplace of enslavement.
Whether by demons, addictions, trauma, drama, riches, poverty, diversions, or perversions Empire enslaves and Kingdom shuts that marketplace down by the power of the
redeeming word
of the
Crucified Word
made flesh.
Explore:
The Kingdom story of Jesus is the beginning of liberation.
Expand: The elements of today’s story describe how the liberation occurs.
Body of Sermon: The first element is to Explore the
1 Details in the Word.
The Word became flesh, and His words are the Word, proclaimed and then recorded.
The details of stories like this matter!
We must read slowly with particular attention.
Unclean man.
possessed by an
Unclean spirit.
inhabiting an
Unclean place.
surrounded by
Unclean animals
likely there because of the corrupting presence of an
Unclean Empire.
Mark’s first readers, who were themselves Roman, certainly grasped the subtle criticisms of Roman Imperial power.
Legion’s brought demons.
The political and social oppression resulting in spiritual, demonic oppression.
Before we move on, I want to point a couple of other conclusions we can deduce from the text.
This demonized individual expected, watched for, and “feared” Jesus’ presence and power.
This is Gentile territory which can be deduced by the presence of the Pigs.
Additionally, we can deduce that there was a Legion or Legionaries stationed close by from the number of Pigs.
We can also conclude that the man was likely “outcast” before he was possessed given the dismissive, uncaring attitude of the locals.
That is the “How” of the story.
The next element requires us to observe the
2 Demonstration of the Word.
When the Kingdom Word liberates, it
2.1 Removes Masks.
Jesus may have asked the demon’s name, but He knew the man and his need.
The Word in flesh removed the mask…
And the written Word does as well..
Next the Word
2.2 Restricts Evil.
Empire will always find someone or something to exploit.
There is always another victim or another herd of pigs.
Once Jesus is risen…the real work can begin.
And of course, the Kingdom word of Jesus
2.3 Releases Captives.
All of us are liberated from the oppression of sin by a demonstration of the Word.
Removing our masks.
Restricting evil.
Releasing captives.
Hallelujah!
The last element is to Celebrate the
3 Deliverance by the Word.
Jesus liberates personally, locally, globally.
The Word
3.1 Exposes Empire.
Have you ever been curious about the reaction of the people in the region to the miraculous delivery of the demoniac?
They had been infected by Empire...
Australian poet Joel McKerrow puts it poignantly describing the
“far-reaching grasp of the empire
and its programme of consumer sedation, … “
To understand the freedom we enjoy we must grasp that there will always be townspeople, invested in Empire, who tell Jesus to get lost.
Deliverance also
3.2 Explains what has happened.
Clothed and in His right mind...
How much the Lord has done
…How he has been merciful.
Those who are delivered
3.3 Exalt Jesus.
Jesus tells the man to go tell other’s What God has done
He goes and tells them what Jesus has done!
Shut Down
I learned some things preparing to preach this text.
Who would’ve thunk it!?
After more than 40 years of this text it comes full circle.
Let me tell you what I’ve learned.
We don’t need pig-sermons, we need Jesus-sermons
We need to learn how to read scripture.
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