Sermon Tone Analysis

Transformers

Does anyone know what a transformer is?

No, not this...

But this.

This transformer takes 24 Volt electricity and transforms it into 12 Volt electricity.

The toy transformers transform themselves into something else, but real transformers change something else into something new.

What other things transform stuff?

What does this transform?

I’ll give you a clue: it transforms a lump of something into something you can eat or drink from.

Yes, it’s a potter’s wheel, which transforms clay into pots.

And what about this?

Yes, these are measuring spoons, which can be used in the transformation of flour, sugar, eggs, etc. into something like this cake.

Now here’s a harder one.

Anyone recognise this?

Any adults?

This is a machining tool, which is used in a CNC machine to create metal parts.

Notice how in this picture the block of metal has been carved away into a wheel.

Lots of quality metal objects are made this way.

My brother-in-law has one of these in his back shed—he’s a fitter and turner and he uses his machine to make parts for all sorts of machinery.

What do you think it is that transforms us into people who are like Jesus?

That’s right, it’s Scripture.

But it takes time.

Let’s watch a video that explains how the Scriptures slowly transform us.

[Watch Bible Project video on Jewish meditation literature.]

Kids Church

Understanding 2 Tim 3:16-17

Now, let’s work through 2 Timothy 2:16 and 17.

This is a single sentence, and yet is it incredibly packed with meaning.

In fact, this verse gives us a good summary of what Scripture is, where it comes from, what it does to us, and how it does it.

So it’s a good place to start our journey through the Bible over the coming year.

So let’s dive in.

God breathed

The ESV version of verse 16 starts with the words, “All Scripture is breathed out by God.”

The Christian idea of Scripture is unique.

Paul uses a unique word here that literally means “God-breathed.”

The first point to note is that God is the origin of Scripture.

But the Bible has a diversity of styles which match the authors’ cultural backgrounds.

So it wasn’t simply dictated.

Peter gives us a glimpse of how God breathed out Scripture:

Peter explains that “men spoke,” but that they spoke “from God,” and that they did that while “they were carried along by the Spirit.”

God used the words of the authors to communicate his word.

This reveals to us something of the character of the Christian God: he values his children and their creativity, and yet he is so sovereign that he can use their own free choice of words to communicate precisely what he wants.

This is a much bigger God than any other!

Profitable for teaching

Because all Scripture comes from God it is genuinely useful.

Imagine that you just got a wonderful new Miele coffee machine, and the whole church was coming around to check it out.

What would be more useful to you, given the mysterious buttons on this device:

This?

Or this?

Obviously you would want the manual from Miele, who made the coffee machine, right?

A Lego instruction manual, as interesting as it might be isn’t going to be much use.

Now, the Bible isn’t an instruction manual, it’s so much more than that.

But just like an instruction manual, a guide for life is not much use if its written by someone who has no real insight into life, or if it’s just guessing.

Other religious texts, and human science of course, all come from a human perspective, and so they inevitably make huge mistakes about this world of which we still know so little.

The Bible isn’t like that.

In fact, the word used here for “teaching” is sometimes translated as “doctrines.”

The Bible has lots to say about the world, about how it works, what is good, what is evil.

And because it comes from the one who made the world, it gets it all correct, and so it is genuinely useful in transforming us into people who live the way we were built to live.

Just as a complex cake recipe needs to be followed if you want to get a great result, or a good coffee only comes from using the machine properly, so we only really live well when we live properly, according to God’s instructions.

For reproof

Scripture is also useful for reproof, or rebuke.

The word Paul uses here means that Scripture shows us our sin and so calls us to repentance.

It can do this because it’s true, because it reflects a true understanding of reality.

It’s important to recognise that the truths that Scripture teach are God’s truths, not ours.

If we just take our own truths out of Scripture then we are like someone who looks in the harsh objectivity of a mirror and walks away with a messy face, as James says:

During my first year in Japan I worked with a pretty Japanese girl who flirted with me.

She wasn’t a Christian, though, and I was very much aware of Paul’s advice:

I wrestled with that Scripture day after day as I walked home from work.

I was lonely and yearned for friendship, and more, but I knew that God was warning me and asking me to choose him.

Years later I wrestled with the same scripture when I was offered the opportunity to partner with some coworkers in a new enterprise.

This process is a bit like the CNC milling process, cutting away the material to create something useful.

For me, in both cases, I fought with God’s word, because it wasn’t what I wanted, but God cut away that wrong desire.

Because God’s word is true, because it’s independent of us as humans, because it comes from a higher source than us, we will sometimes find ourselves in conflict with it.

In those times, let it correct us, let it point out how our desires are misdirected, let it lead us to repentance.

For straightening out

If we let God’s word lead us, it will make us the right shape.

That’s what the word Paul uses here means: to straighten out.

When we’ve turned away (repented) from our harmful desires we can focus on what is good, not only for us, but for those around us.

We’re like clay on a potter’s wheel, being moulded into the correct shape.

Paul talks about this in

Notice that this is not something that we get done before we die—it is a process that we continue in throughout our lives.

It’s incremental.

We figure one thing out at a time.

As Paul says, “only let us hold true to what we have attained.”

We grow, step by step.

For discipling

All Scripture is useful for discipling in righteousness, that’s what “training” means here.

I’m reminded of the image or Psalm 1, which we saw in the video.

When we meditate on Scripture it gives us life and fruit.

Psalm 119 is the longest chapter in the Bible, with twenty-two stanzas, one for each letter in the Hebrew alphabet.

Each stanza celebrates God’s word, or his law as it is often called in the Old Testament.

For example, stanza 17 celebrates the way God’s word transforms us, if we let it:

The result?

And what is the result of these processes?

God’s word has given us truths about the world and ourselves, it has pointed out what we’re getting wrong and then helped us get straight, and it has trained us up.

What is the fruit of this process?

To quote from my bogan translation, the result is a person who is “fully polished:” a person of God who is wise—who knows how to live well—and is therefore ready to go out into the world doing good, doing what God made them to do.

Remember that James talks about this sort of person in

God doesn’t give us the Scripture to fill our heads with useful knowledge or Bible trivia.

No, he gives us his word to transform us into little Christs who go around making little bits of heaven in this messed up world!