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
0.07UNLIKELY
Disgust
0.1UNLIKELY
Fear
0.07UNLIKELY
Joy
0.62LIKELY
Sadness
0.56LIKELY
Language Tone
Analytical
0.75LIKELY
Confident
0UNLIKELY
Tentative
0.44UNLIKELY
Social Tone
Openness
0.79LIKELY
Conscientiousness
0.37UNLIKELY
Extraversion
0.71LIKELY
Agreeableness
0.35UNLIKELY
Emotional Range
0.47UNLIKELY
Tone of specific sentences
Tones
Emotion
Language
Social Tendencies
Anger
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9
Hey You!
The Thriving Church
Vine tractor crash.
At least there were plenty of other vines.
After all, it was a vineyard.
If there is only one vine it’s not called a vineyard.
Just called a vine.
I could have done everything possible to keep that vine healthy and producing fruit.
By not running over it with my tractor, for starters.
But no matter what I did, it is inevitable, that vine would have grown old.
Not sure when or how a vine will meets the end of its life expectancy.
Until Jesus returns, Growing old is inevitable.
Indicators are helpful…
find story ark.
Old isn’t bad.
in a vineyard.
They can withstand the elements better, the fruit can be more high quality, develop resistance to pests, and offer benefits to the vineyard.
In a vineyard, old vines can withstand the elements better, the fruit can be of higher quality, develop resistance to pests, and offer other benefits to the vineyard.
However, if the vineyard grows old without parts growing young, it will have a short life expectancy.
It will end in a dead vineyard.
Because every vine has a life expectancy, new vines need to be cultivated in order for the vineyard to have longevity.
A goal of vineyard management is a thriving vineyard.
Good numbers of mature vines, good numbers of healthy vines, with stable trunks, roots, and foliage, and an ecosystem fed with ample nutrients while maintaining integrated pest management.
All that is needed for stability.
And they are indicators of a vineyard that is alive and perhaps stable.
But a thriving vineyard will have all of indicators of a stable vineyard with the addition of crops of fruit and rejuvenation by way of new and young vines.
When fruit is absent or low yielding in a vineyard, and when the vines that die off aren’t replaced with new or young growth, the voids becomes very obvious.
We see places where things are missing.
And if nothing is done about it, if there is no intervention, the vineyard will eventually decline and die.
Helping the vineyard thrive is the goal in vineyard management.
When the vineyard ceases to thrive an intervention needs to happen.
Otherwise, as each vine slowly dies, and with no new growth, new vines, there is no rejuvenation, and the life expectancy of the vineyard will be cut short.
Because with good vineyard management, a vineyard can live indefinitely.
That’s where I came into the equation in those days.
To consult and help the vineyard owner turn his or her ailing vineyard into a thriving vineyard by applying an intervention.
More fertilizer, better pest control, irrigation, transplanting, grafting, etc. Keeping tractors from running over the vines.
As a vineyard manager, one should consistently assess the vineyard and ask, “is this vineyard thriving?”
If not, then an intervention is needed.
Otherwise, the vineyard will succumb to a short life expectancy.
You know, Christ uses the metaphor, of the vine and vineyard many times in his teaching when talking about the relationship of us, the church, and himself.
Let us draw on this metaphor in relation to the church as a vineyard.
And one of our jobs as members of the church, manager of the church, laborers of the vineyard, is to ask the question, “is our church thriving?”
And just as a goal for a vineyard is to thrive, so a goal of the church is to thrive.
Let us We can draw from the comparison and ask the question, “is our church thriving?”
And as a vineyard has an indefinite life expectancy, Shelf life relates to life expectancy.
Even local churches have a life expectancy that is inevitable unless there is an intervention to counteract.
Churches should be thriving.
And just as
Look!!
Look at the picture of the church in Acts 2:47
The church in was thriving.
I would say that the church was thriving.
Do we compare to this picture of a thriving church?
Look around the areas of your life and the church.
Can you think of people you know who you wish were in the vineyard?
Do you see empty spots where you wish someone was filling?
Do you wish for more fruit, new and young growth, growth of any kinds, and signs of thriving?
It’s important to understand our status as a church.
To look for the indicators of a thriving church.
Are we thriving?
Are other churches thriving?
And if not, what can be done about it?
We need to define our reality.
Our Reality
TC church growth stats
Age stats
Close to a plateau on growth.
We need to apply an intervention in order to thrive.
However, a higher percentage of young growth compared to the old growth.
In other words, baptisms are more from our own children.
It’s biological growth.
That’s great.
Surely we can agree we can try to do better and get more growth and young growth from outside.
We are placing young people in leadership and focusing huge amounts of attention to them.
Youth ministries, Pathfinders, Adventurers, family ministries.
Yet overall, we are a good spot to intervene so we get away from the plateau.
If you are wondering why we are observing numbers that suggest we are not thriving or growing as much as possible, we are not alone.
As we define our own reality, we also must define the reality around us, because it is part of our reality.
The reality is that most churches are not growing and not getting any younger.
Religious Affiliation
According to an extensive survey by the Pew Research Center, the share of adults in the US who identify as Christians fell from 78 percent to 71 percent between 2007 and 2014.
Nones = “religiously unaffiliated” (meaning atheist, agnostic, or “nothing in particular”)
Powell, Kara.
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9