Sermon Tone Analysis

Cleopas:

vs. 19 - “...The things concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a Prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered Him to be condemned to death, and crucified Him.

Jesus:

John Stott, who taught Christians that their minds mattered and led them out of their safe, comfortable and guilty cultural isolation, died last week.

Will we return to where he found us?

📷Soon after he became a columnist for the New York Times, David Brooks wrote that people were “misinformed” about Evangelicals.

Part of the reason, Brooks reasoned, lay in whom the media chose to speak for us: choices that made as much sense as having “Britney Spears and Larry Flynt discuss D. H. Lawrence.”

So he introduced his readers to an evangelical whom many had never heard of but was, in Brooks’ words, “actually important,” John Stott.

vs. 25 - “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken!

Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into His glory?”

And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.

Stott died last week at the age of ninety, once again with a very favorable eulogy in the New York Times.

We will miss him in more ways than one.

In some respects this broadcast can be traced back to Stott.

Over 30 years ago, I spoke at the London Lectures in Contemporary Christianity, an event founded and hosted by Stott.

I spoke about the connection between culture, conscience, and crime.

This was during the period when I beginning to understand the question of worldview and its relationship to Christian mission.

I am far from the only Christian influenced by Stott in this way.

In 1967, at a time when most Evangelicals were content to remain safe behind the walls of their churches, ignoring the larger world around them, Stott wrote a book entitled, Our Guilty Silence.

Notice that there is an enormous difference in the two descriptions of Jesus.

In it Stott made the case that because the Gospel is “Good News” we are under an obligation to share it with others.

This sounds obvious, but in 1967 this kind of witness, and that kind of engagement with the larger society, was the last thing many Christians wanted to do.

They much preferred their comfortable worship and cultural isolation.

Among its many benefits, this isolation didn’t require them to think too much, especially when it came to matters of faith.

So five years later, Stott wrote Your Mind Matters, a book whose title could serve as a mission statement for this broadcast.

In it Stott criticized the “spirit of anti-intellectualism” that pervaded Evangelicalism at the time.

This “spirit” often produced “zeal without knowledge” that was mistaken for Christian maturity.

True Christian maturity is impossible without understanding what it is we believe and how it applies to our lives.

The connection between Stott’s work and ours should, again, be unmistakable.

I’ll also have you know, that Cleopas’ description seems to be the one embraced by the multitudes today, and is at best the belief of cults.

That I cared about prisoners drew John Stott and me close together.

He was over and over the conscience of Evangelicalism, reminding us of our duty to the poor and the suffering.

But there is another description, and this one is by Jesus Himself!

Stott’s central role in the 1974 Lausanne Covenant, which brought the Evangelical world out of its self-imposed exile, caused Billy Graham, when he was named one of the most 100 influential people in Timemagazine in 2005, to say that Stott deserved the designation instead.

As Graham told Time, “I can’t think of anyone who has been more effective in introducing so many people to a biblical world view.”

“While intellectualism seeks to qualify the data choosing the most plausible argument, Faith, through the same channel engages with the emotions.”

The pure difference between the two is that you can have intellectualism without emotion, but you can’t have true faith without intellect.

The pure difference between the two is that you can have intellectualism without emotion, but you can’t have true faith without intellect.

Quotes from Christian Apologists:

"Knowledge is indispensable to Christian life and service, If we do not use the mind which God has given us, we condemn ourselves to spiritual superficiality."

- John Stott

"Knowledge is indispensable to Christian life and service, If we do not use the mind which God has given us, we condemn ourselves to spiritual superficiality."

John Stott

An Excerpt from Beak point with Chuck Colson, Aug 2, 2011:

John Stott, who taught Christians that their minds mattered and led them out of their safe, comfortable and guilty cultural isolation, died last week.

Will we return to where he found us?

📷Soon after he became a columnist for the New York Times, David Brooks wrote that people were “misinformed” about Evangelicals.

Part of the reason, Brooks reasoned, lay in whom the media chose to speak for us: choices that made as much sense as having “Britney Spears and Larry Flynt discuss D. H. Lawrence.”

So he introduced his readers to an evangelical whom many had never heard of but was, in Brooks’ words, “actually important,” John Stott.

Stott died last week at the age of ninety, once again with a very favorable eulogy in the New York Times.

We will miss him in more ways than one.

In some respects this broadcast can be traced back to Stott.

Over 30 years ago, I spoke at the London Lectures in Contemporary Christianity, an event founded and hosted by Stott.

I spoke about the connection between culture, conscience, and crime.

This was during the period when I beginning to understand the question of worldview and its relationship to Christian mission.

I am far from the only Christian influenced by Stott in this way.

In 1967, at a time when most Evangelicals were content to remain safe behind the walls of their churches, ignoring the larger world around them, Stott wrote a book entitled, Our Guilty Silence.

In it Stott made the case that because the Gospel is “Good News” we are under an obligation to share it with others.

This sounds obvious, but in 1967 this kind of witness, and that kind of engagement with the larger society, was the last thing many Christians wanted to do.

They much preferred their comfortable worship and cultural isolation.

“God is no fonder of intellectual slackers than of any other slackers.”

—C. S. Lewis

Among its many benefits, this isolation didn’t require them to think too much, especially when it came to matters of faith.

So five years later, Stott wrote Your Mind Matters, a book whose title could serve as a mission statement for this broadcast.

In it Stott criticized the “spirit of anti-intellectualism” that pervaded Evangelicalism at the time.

This “spirit” often produced “zeal without knowledge” that was mistaken for Christian maturity.

True Christian maturity is impossible without understanding what it is we believe and how it applies to our lives.

The connection between Stott’s work and ours should, again, be unmistakable.

“Intellectual slothfulness is but a quack remedy for unbelief. . .

.” —J.

Gresham Machen

That I cared about prisoners drew John Stott and me close together.

He was over and over the conscience of Evangelicalism, reminding us of our duty to the poor and the suffering.

Stott’s central role in the 1974 Lausanne Covenant, which brought the Evangelical world out of its self-imposed exile, caused Billy Graham, when he was named one of the most 100 influential people in Timemagazine in 2005, to say that Stott deserved the designation instead.

As Graham told Time, “I can’t think of anyone who has been more effective in introducing so many people to a biblical world view.”

I. Why is the Intellect important to Faith?

In this scene on the road to Emmaus, Jesus says something worth pointing out.

In fact, I believe it’s one of the most overlooked positions of the scriptures in the modern church today!

“O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken!

Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into His glory?”

Now, in the N.T. Christ is referred to 554 times in the NKJV.

Of those 554 times 173 are with the definite article, like our text which reads, “the Christ”.

It is in these 173 times that the position and title of Christ is accentuated for the purpose of reveling His divinity.

The Greek word CHRISTOS in the N.T. is the equivalent of MESSIAH in the Hebrew O.T.

But guess what?

Messiah in our English version is only mentioned twice in the O.T. - They are found in

So one could say that perhaps then we should not make such a big deal about this seeing the term is only mentioned two times?

,

, .

Yet, there’s another side to the coin so to speak:

The Hebrew for Messiah means anointed one.

The same word in various forms of the root MISHKAH, is used as anoint, anointed, anointing, 557 times in the O.T.

The English Anoint and Messiah are derived from the same Hebrew word.

Why is this important?

Because the first century Jew would have understood immediately the implication of the term “The Christ”.

The books of Exodus and Leviticus demonstrate clearly that nothing in the temple service, even the priests, could enter or be engaged unless they were anointed.

Exodus 30:

The O.T. picture of redemption surrounds itself with anointing, and the foretelling of the Anointed One.

Psalm 132

The N.T. fulfillment of redemption is accomplished by the Anointed One, precisely why He is referred to with this title in Daniel because it is a prophecy of the future .

Equally as important, is that no where in the N.T. is Jesus ever anointed by man for this role, but comes into this world as having already been anointed by God in His deity and infused in his birth as the man Jesus of Nazareth.

Now, why all of this?