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
0.08UNLIKELY
Disgust
0.09UNLIKELY
Fear
0.11UNLIKELY
Joy
0.66LIKELY
Sadness
0.18UNLIKELY
Language Tone
Analytical
0.01UNLIKELY
Confident
0UNLIKELY
Tentative
0UNLIKELY
Social Tone
Openness
0.87LIKELY
Conscientiousness
0.75LIKELY
Extraversion
0.25UNLIKELY
Agreeableness
0.66LIKELY
Emotional Range
0.78LIKELY
Tone of specific sentences
Tones
Emotion
Language
Social Tendencies
Anger
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9
Church History
We started church history last Spring.
We first took time to define the church.
What is the church?
How would you define it?
Church - A group of people who have received Christ by faith, and have been baptized into His body by the Holy Spirit.
Does anyone remember a verse which gives us our definition?
Another passage we looked at was Ephesians 2:14-22.
This an extended passage shows that it does not matter whether you are Jew or Gentile.
God is taking whoever believes and making them a part of this body, or another metaphor is the building, the church.
One of the key differences between believers now, who are a part of what God calls the church, and those who were saints before this age of the church, is the work of the Holy Spirit.
We took time last Spring to look at who the Holy Spirit is, and what His work has been, and what it currently is.
We literally looked at all passages where the Holy Spirit is mentioned!
We concluded that:
The Holy Spirit is
Fully God - Acts 5:3-4
A Person (not a force/power/energy) - John 16:13
We also concluded that the Holy Spirit, up to the time Jesus sent the Spirit after returning to the Father did the following:
Prior to Messiah, the Holy Spirit:
Was act work in Creation
Convicted of Sin
Filled, Came upon, or temporarily indwelt
only select Individuals
Gave them power or ability to perform a task for God’s purpose to be fulfilled
Inspired men to proclaim and write God’s Word
The prophets also foretold how the Holy Spirit was do different work in the future.
Future work Prophesied:
Will be upon the coming Messiah
Will indwell all of God’s people, writing God’s laws on their hearts.
Jesus also had a lot to say about the coming Holy Spirit.
Jesus said the Holy Spirit will be given:
To all who believe in Him
After Jesus was glorified and returned to the Father
Jesus said the Spirit will:
Be ‘rivers of living water’
Be with you forever
Be in you
Teach all things
Bring to remembrance
Testify about Christ
Guide into truth, disclose what is to come
Give power to be witnesses
Jesus taught about the Spirit because the Spirit is a big part of what He is doing building His church.
We then looked at the coming of the Holy Spirit, as prophesied, on the day of Pentecost.
When the Spirit came, it came upon the believers and they were given power to be witnesses.
They spoke boldly, and preached the truth of Jesus, quoting from the scriptures.
The Spirit convicted many, and they repented (changed their minds about Jesus), and were baptized.
The church was born as the Holy Spirit indwelt these believers and made them a part of the body of Christ, something that never happened before this time.
That does not mean the Old Testament saints are any less a part of God’s kingdom.
They were saved as we were by grace through faith.
However, they did not receive the Holy Spirit, nor were they baptized into the body of Christ, the church.
In the end, that doesn’t matter in that we and they will all be glorified together and brought into God’s kingdom, and eventually the new Earth to dwell with the Lord forever!
Amen!
The next thing we looked at was what the church did.
We see that in Acts 2:42-47.
Of key interest to us is verse 42.
The apostles teaching was the apostles teaching all that Jesus commanded.
Likely doing like Jesus did when he taught the disciples on the road to Emmaus, and the disciples when he appeared to them.
Teaching The Scriptures
Teaching the scriptures were a key part of the church.
The word of God is the truth, and has all we need for life and godliness.
Jesus set the example teaching His disciples, and also commanded them to do likewise.
Teaching them to obey everything I commanded would involve teaching them the scriptures, both the Old and New Testaments.
So the apostles were teaching, and the believers devoted themselves to learning.
Fellowship
They were also devoted to fellowship.
Fellowship is not just eating food together.
We took time to study that word as it is used in the scriptures and found the following.
Fellowship occurs 19 times in the New Testament.
It is translated as ‘fellowship’, ‘participation’, ‘sharing’, ‘partnership’, ‘contribution’, ‘common sharing’, ‘participation in’, and ‘share with others’ in the NIV.
The common element is that there is a partnership or working together for a common goal.
That goal is the goal of Christ: to build His church, loving God and loving one another.
Breaking of Bread
The final key work of the church was breaking of bread.
This spoke of them coming together to remember what Christ has done for us when He died and rose again.
This is the foundation of the church, and we must always be firmly fixed on Christ and His work as the foundation.
Prayer
We cannot live our Christian lives on our own.
We need to be in reliance on the Lord who is at work in and through us.
As Jesus told His disciples, apart from Him we can do nothing.
Prayer is a big part of the church.
That brings us to where we are in church history.
Acts 3.
Let’s read it together.
This is not the end of the account.
Acts 4 continues the account, but let’s work through what we are seeing so far.
This is the temple.
The beautiful gate where the man was healed (Acts 3:2) was toward the front of the temple courtyards.
This second image shows the Temple in the midst of the Temple mount.
Note Solomon’s portico/colonnade.
This is likely where the believers were coming to hear the apostles’ teaching, and where they went after the healing of the man at the gate (Acts 3:11).
Peter and John healed this man in the power of Jesus’ name.
And the man was understandably excited!
He was jumping and yelling!
People came running to see what was going on.
Miracles were to be a sign of God at work.
The power came from God, not from Peter and John.
According to Acts 2:22 - Jesus’ miracles were given by God to accredit him to the people.
Jesus submitted to the Father when He came to the Earth and only did what He saw the Father doing.
God had Jesus perform miracles to show the people He was God.
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9