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.
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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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We are inundated with all kinds of construction around us these days.
You can’t go anywhere without seeing orange signs pointing out that there are workers ahead, lanes closed ahead, slow moving vehicles, vehicles changing lanes, lanes shifting, and on and on.
Miles of miles of orange cones, barrels, and vested people.
We sit in our cars at standstill.
We struggle with the lack of movement.
We want to honk our horns or find alternate routes.
We ask Google and Waze to get us out of the mess!
We absolutely hate the congestion and the way it messes with our transition from point A to B and back to A. And then we want to pull our hair out if we have to imagine a point C is in there somewhere!
So much of this is like what Solomon is saying to the readers of his sermon in Ecclesiastes.
We often seek a better way.
We believe that there is a way, a life, a goal that is better and if better it has to be good, and yet we get frustrated when the orange cones go up and all of a sudden our favorite route seems to be “Under Construction.”
Let’s remind ourselves of the proverbs that Solomon is expressing here.
In many ways they are quite different from some of the Proverbs you might read in the book of Proverbs found just prior.
Solomon has offered that there are some things better.
Again this is that Hebrew word, טוֹב (tob - “tove”).
It is used all throughout this passage and in the book of Ecclesiastes.
It is what God called His creation.
It is what Job said comes from God.
It is the hand of God seen in our realm of earth and life.
Thus we see a play on the concept of what is good.
This all comes out of 6:12 - For who knows what is good for a man during his lifetime, during the few years of his futile life?
Then Solomon goes on to do what seems to us as very odd.
He begins to name things that are better, but what he offers are not things that we would ever assume to be better.
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update (La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995), .Names versus ointment of wealth.
Death vs. Birth.
The house of mourning vs. the house of feasting.
Sorrow is better than laughter and the rebuke of a wise man is better than the song of a fool.
The end is better than the beginning.
Names (reputation) vs. ointment of wealth.
Death Day vs. Birthday.
The house of mourning (Funeral) vs. the house of feasting (Wedding).
Sorrow is better than laughter and the rebuke of a wise man is better than the song of a fool.
The end is better than the beginning.
All of these are sentiments of perspective.
Keep remembering that what Solomon is referring to is a perspective, “Under the sun.”
Amongst the other things Solomon has said, note vs. 10 and following.
Solomon offers an interesting statement here in vs. 10
Do not say...For it is not from wisdom that you ask about this.
This is no appropriate…This is not fitting...
This is no appropriate…This is not fitting...
This is no appropriate…This is not fitting...
The former days are better than these.
Solomon takes the words of others and addresses them.
These types of words, this sentiment is not right.
What isn’t right about them?
Have you ever said that?
“Well, the good old days....”
Have you ever alluded to how things were before?
As if to say that when they happened back then that life was better and that things were in their place and that all would be right with the world if we could just go back to a more saner day?
Some might argue that for the political wrangling of our day.
Well, you know, back in my day we didn’t have all of these issues.
Ok, so what you are saying is that there were no issues, or just that the ones you are focused on now didn’t exist?
Solomon is pointing out that their is nothing new under the sun.
You just were not aware or just not in a place where the corruption and the violence, and the greed and the evil directly affected you like it does in one particular way or another.
Every generation has dealt with the handouts of the previous generation.
Every generation has struggled with the decisions of the generation after them.
Garrett put it this way, Apart from the fact that such longing does no one any good, every period has its hardships and opportunities.
Duane A. Garrett, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, vol.
14, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1993), 320.
Duane A. Garrett, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, vol.
14, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1993), 320.
Then you get to vs 11-12 and you find this place where you would expect Solomon to say that Wisdom is better than Inheritance.
That the Wisdom is the principle thing.
With all your getting, get her.
That is what he had written in Proverbs.
Here the language places Wisdom and Inheritance on an equal estimation of value.
The point that Solomon making is again, both will fade.
You will die.
You will face life and deal with the good and the adversity.
Wisdom is good to have when you have money because you will use it wisely to secure the days you have “under the sun.”
But “consider” or another word, “see.”
It is the idea of “observe.”
It is the same word Solomon will use in v. 15 - “I have seen...”
He wants you to see, to observe, to consider.
Solomon is taking our face, turning it away from the narrowness of our perspective, asking us to look, see.
See what?
See the Work of God.
I want to just focus on the things that Solomon wants us to see about the Work of God in these next two verses.
In the middle of these two verses is that statement we focused on last time.....
In the day of prosperity be happy
In the day of prosperity be happy
Prosperity here is referring to good things.
It is basically that same Hebrew word tove.
In the day of…when all is going great!
When all is awesome!
In the days when you have plenty be…merry, good, happy, joyful!
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update (La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995), .
Oh, now that is easy.
God is good!
Amen!
You that are discouraged, lift your heads.
You that are struggling, just know that God is on your side.
I am having a tove tove day!
You should too!
Come on!
Why so glum?
Why so down?
Can’t you trust in God?
But note the next part of vs. 14 - But in the day of evil, adversity, misfortune, disaster —
Consider
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