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
0.09UNLIKELY
Disgust
0.05UNLIKELY
Fear
0.15UNLIKELY
Joy
0.52LIKELY
Sadness
0.64LIKELY
Language Tone
Analytical
0.8LIKELY
Confident
0UNLIKELY
Tentative
0.49UNLIKELY
Social Tone
Openness
0.74LIKELY
Conscientiousness
0.71LIKELY
Extraversion
0.05UNLIKELY
Agreeableness
0.83LIKELY
Emotional Range
0.35UNLIKELY
Tone of specific sentences
Tones
Emotion
Language
Social Tendencies
Anger
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9
Introduction
Picture these situations:
A close friend calls, his wife just died in a tragic accident.
One of the members of your small group just got fired from work.
Your wife suffers with chronic pain that affects everything she does.
A young wife comes to your door in tears.
Her husband has just packed up and said he is leaving her.
How do you respond to these situations?
What do you do?
What do you say?
What do you pray?
How do you pray for this person?
Where do you go in Scripture?
How do you bring comfort?
We live in a fallen world that often brings pain, difficulty and suffering.
In order to be a good discipler, it’s important to think through how to minister to those who are hurting.
While our study today won’t be comprehensive, I hope it will be a good introduction to the topic.
What we are thinking about today is what theologians refer to as a theology of suffering.
In studying a theology of suffering, we forced to ask a few questions:
· How do I understand suffering?
· How does my view of suffering shape my faith?
· Are any of my thoughts on suffering unbiblical?
· How does my views on suffering shape the way I care for others?
For most people (including many Christians!), a general rule of thumb is to seek pleasure and to avoid pain at all costs.
Yet, what we find in Scripture is that God uses suffering as a means to help us grow closer to him and to bring him great glory.
John Piper writes:
“We must talk so as to make suffering seem normal and purposeful, and not surprising in this fallen age.
The forces of American culture are almost all designed to build the opposite worldview into our minds.
Maximize comfort, ease, and security.
Avoid all choices that might bring discomfort, trouble, difficulty, pain, or suffering.
Add this cultural force to our natural desire for immediate gratification and fleeting pleasures, and the combined power to undermine the superior satisfaction of the soul in the glory of God through suffering is huge.”
(John Piper, Counseling Suffering People, JBC, Winter 2003)
What does the Bible say about suffering?
The Bible is realistic and honest about suffering in a fallen world.
It does not paint a “rosy” picture of the Christian life, but is straightforward about the difficulties we face as believers (; -22; 4:12-19).
God is totally sovereign and totally good (; ).
We know from Scripture this is true, though in difficult times our intellect or feelings lead us to deny this.
Our minds ask, “Why does a good God let bad things happen to good people?”
Our feelings signal to us how much we are hurting, and consequently doubt God’s goodness.
Truth is truth, even when we are struggling.
That’s a reality we need to grab hold of RIGHT NOW.
Rather than denying God, we need to cry out to God.
Crying out to God is a way of acknowledging his sovereignty and goodness, even in the midst of confusion and pain.
The Cross (Christ’s death for us) is in fact the ultimate evidence of God’s sovereignty () and goodness ().
At the same time, man is sinful and responsible for his actions (; ; ).
Sin comes from man, not from God.
To say contrary would be blasphemy against a Holy God.
Man has full responsibility for the sinful choices he makes.
Solomon describes how the fool reaps folly on his own head by the life he lives.
God uses everything for His good purposes.
Men and women make sinful choices that hurt themselves and others, and reap difficulties in their own life and the life of others.
God uses everything (including our foolish decision and their consequences) for his good purposes (; ).
God builds good things into the lives of His children, even through difficult circumstances.
Difficult circumstances are not pleasant.
The pain is real and it is not enjoyable.
Consequently, people often interpret suffering as punishment from God.
Yet, Scripture says that God uses suffering to shape and mold his children.
We are to not lose heart because our suffering produces “a harvest of righteousness and peace” for those who are trained by it ().
How should we respond to suffering as Christians: Turn to God, not away from Him. [Chapliancy examples.]
For those who are undergoing hardships, there are lots of questions that must be sorted through, like “What do we do to make things better?” or “Why is this happening?”
Yet, the most fundamental question a person can ask and answer is: “Who do we turn to in the midst of our suffering?”
We must trust in God’s sovereign goodness (,; ).
What are God’s Purposes in Suffering?
In a world that typically lives for pleasure and avoids pain, Christians must fight the tendency to avoid suffering.
Suffering is not meaningless.
God has purposes for our suffering.
We certainly can’t understand all of God’s purposes for suffering, but we can understand a few because they are revealed in Scripture.
· Suffering gives us an opportunity to stand out as Christians in a world that does not honor God.
We should count it a privilege to suffer as a Christian; there should be no shame in it.
“If you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name” ().
· Suffering teaches us to rely on God, not on ourselves.
What suffering often does to us is it peels away all of the superficial layers of our life, much like an onion peeled to its core.
What we find when we get to our core is the ugliness and treachery of our sin; we don’t want to trust God or build our lives around him.
We want to be self-dependent and self-reliant.
Yet, suffering teaches us to turn away from our self-dependence and to turn to God instead.
“We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia…this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead” ().
· Suffering teaches us God’s decrees.
“It was good for me to be afflicted so that I might learn your decrees.”
().
· Suffering matures us into godly people the Lord is molding for himself.
“Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.
Perseverance must finish its work, so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything” ().
· The Savior receives glory through our suffering.
“But rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed” ().
· Suffering even allows us to share in the Son’s glory.
“Now if we are children then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory” ().
It is God’s prerogative to permit suffering.
Pain can be meaningless, or it can be meaningful.
Consider this for a moment: God could have chosen to leave us in our pain, and to make nothing of it.
Yet, out of his mercy, and because pain is not beyond God’s sovereignty, He uses suffering to bring greater glory for himself and to shape us to look more like himself.
It is our privilege and joy to partake in suffering, since God receives glory through it.
[PAUSE FOR QUESTIONS]
How do we prepare our discIpling friends for suffering?
The best time to learn about suffering is not in the middle of a crisis.
The best way to prepare someone for suffering is to think through a theology of suffering when times are good.
· Take some time to talk about suffering.
Typically, in our discipling relationships, we only talk about difficulties when we are experiencing suffering.
Don’t wait until suffering comes to finally talk about it.
If you are discipling someone, make it a priority to talk about suffering before it comes.
We know that everyone will undergo some suffering (to greater or lesser degrees) in their lifetime.
So it is not a matter of if suffering will come, but when.
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9