Sermon Tone Analysis

INtro

80 years ago, (Movie)… GWTW…, made $…, re-release… one of the most impacting...

based on a book published 40 years before that, written just at teh end of the 19th C after its author, ___ Baum, had experienced the grandeur of Chicago as it had worn the glamour of the great Xhocago Exposition, where…, which became the inspiration for the great emeral city of OZ.

Concerned with the grim nature of grimm’s fairy tales, and bored…, he decided to write a whimsical children’s book that had no intention for teachinh morals, and every intention of avoiding the grotesque and creapy thnigs found in so many other Victorian era children’s stories like a witch cooking two siblings in her oven and other fun-loving ideas.

A nuber of its lines, especially as adapted for the 1939 movie, have remained in our language now for over 100 years.

The witch’s famous cry, “I’m melting.”

The nifty song taht was an adjustment from the boox, “follow the yellow brick road.”

And of course, the iconic phrase Judy Garland uttered so soberly, “Toto, I have a feeling we’re not in Kansas any more.”

(use clip instead?)

I think we know that feeling.

the pace of change in teh world is mind-blowing.

Even since Baum wrote this masterpiece, we have reshaped teh planet.

Consider teh technological change taking place.

Consider even the number of words we’ve added to the english language simply because our technology had outrun our vocabulary.

No one went scuba diving, or drove a limousine to a prom.

there was no concern for aids, and no arguments about whether vaccines caused _______.

I was never concerned about what my kids were watching on tv, and my electric bill was never a cause of concern.

The telephone couldn’t wake me up in the middle of the night,

Even the pace of language change itself has zoomed ahead—teh english language doubled in the last hundred years, to over a million words—and over 70% of that growth was in the last half century.

culture itself needed new words to capture its ideas, activities, and sentiments.

We started googling, and all sorts of other things on the web.

before the 1990’s, webs were things we usually avoided.

Then we began to surf them.

BUt it’s even more than using gps, learning infotainment systems, and microwaving our tv dinners.

we get crunk over news of the latest hollywood bromance, and have to learn to chillax when our diy project on hold because we made the mistake of mansplaining teh tool we needed to a newby associate and she got triggered when she took it as a microagression.

I told her to check out my blog and she could see taht I wasn’t being a hater, but she just said “whatevs” and told me I had to go.

So I stopped at a burger joint and picked up a little frankenfood and im headed home to bingewatch a whole year’s worth of Dukes of Hazzard.

Then there are the more sinister things—like cyber stalkers, identity thieves, click bait, and teh ever looming snapchat.

It gets worse.

We now raise school shooters and mall shooters in our fair country.

And 24 hour news programs make the most money when they do their best scandal reporting.

tax dollars support unhealthy lifestyles and in public middle and high schools around the country our kids can’t wear a cross around their necks but can freely pick up condoms and birth control without parental consent or even notification.

Don’t misumderstand this as simply complaint.

As far as I know, I’ll drive a car home with a working climate control system, and aome time today will have a glass of sweet tea with ice.

and last night’s frozen pizza was a treat!

But in some ways, we may be building brokenness into our future with what feels like progress today.

This has always been the case with people.

From the beginning, human beings made in the image of God have been question the judgment of that same God and doing things our own way when it seemed to make sense.

Consider.

(Pet Rocks, some terrible idea that people thought was great?)

Part of the problem we run into with this is the assumed conflict between two important things—faith and intellect.

I either have faith in God and whatever God says, or I think about things and arrive at a conclusion.

It’s a choince between trusting what God says and relying on what thinking people say.

And for some reason, it is assumed that to be a thinking person you must exclude God as teh source of things in the natural world.

This became a struggle in philosophers in teh past several centuries, with Locke echoing Aristotle in believing that only in experiencing and testing can whatever you believe to be true be validated.

There are some who reacted and have us a clarified idea about what was called “idealism”—that there are realities that exist whether we observe or experience them or not, and even that I can understand a thing without my own experience of the thing.

Eventually all of this gave rise to materialism—the belief that everything that exists only exists in a material way—there is no spiritual and no supernatural.

So by the time we get to the last half of the 20th Century, people who believed that God has no place in public sector, especially education, were increasingly in charge of the way things were working inside.

They set up a very clear distinction—there are those who think and those who believe.

Those for whom faith is at work and those for whom understanding and intellect are at work.

And even today, many Christians even see it this way, along with almost all of the world.

Recently a survey of 63 studies completed over the course of 80 years confirmed what many social sciences think is unavoidably true—those with higher iq’s are much more likely to leave their faith behind and lose their Christianity.

But these studies don’t tell why.

According to atheist sociologist Frank Furerdi, these researchers don’t really ask enough of the right questions, and prove what they believe—smart people are less religious people.

And here is the point he was making, according to author ______, “ Intelligent people don't simply reject religion because it's wrong; they reject it because their social environments lead them to think it's wrong.”

No one wants to seem dumb.

Especially people who think they are really smart.

But is God against thinking?

Not at all:

php

ps 119:1

Aspect of Holy Spirit (Is 11:2)

Info re: marvellous brain (—knit together)

Cf crazy things people believe

*** God isn’t against thinking—He is agains bad thinking

And here in this text, you see the real concern.

God wants both faith and understanding.

He designed us for both.

They are just two parts of knowing.

The issue, though, is which one precedes tha other.

Which one validates…defines… determines...

Cf crazi things people believe here???

three main kinds of flaws in thinking--

A- Connect the Dots (superstitions / gaps)

B- Stack the Deck (Kansas—definition of science) (Cf burger can’t use meat, so what can be a burger; gluten free donut, fat free ice cream)

C- Hedge Your Bets (bet on both sides—mix faith and humanist understanding together—theistic evolution, medical miracles)

scopes trial

flagellates

human eye

upside down trees

cave drawings—men and dinosaurs

fossilized hat (carbon tested)

*** Cf two? years ago, discovery of cut rock--”can’t be natural… this is the guy that eons of time, chance, and random mutation can produce a scientist who can get people to the moon and make self-flushing toilets, but can’t be responsible for a square rock?

that’s the intellectual group?

Hebrews- “By faith we know...”

Now and then, skeptic picks worst case to argue with (flat earth—like Rocky angainst Barney fife—try someone own size--

get Dawkins (God Delusion)—maybe aliens

God’s desire is not that we choose between faith and understanding.

God’s desire is that we allow our faith to lead us to the right understanding.

And the question for you is “does your faith precede, define, drive, and validate yuor understanding?

Cf GW Carver

This is not to say that there can be no understanding at all without faith.

“Heavens are telling...”

Romans re: invisible attributes—question is whether or not smart people are paying enough attention to notice and accept truth—many of the world’s most intellectual people see the great features of the cosmos, but completely miss the meaning.

Cf Jesus—If I tell you earthly things and you can’t accept...”

Cf Harvard professor… impractical...

How is this practical?? that’s the complaint—faith is fine—just not practical.

How does this get practical?

Actress this week… then supporter… In article, argues not abusive.

At the same time, courts are taking away parental rights… So here’s the thing—these ladies and I agree on loving and supporting our children.