Sermon Tone Analysis

I. God’s People Confuse God’s Symbol for God’s Presence

1 sam 4

Two things have happened just before this takes place:

God has confirmed Samuel as a Prophet.

God has pronounced judgment on the house of Eli.

The elders were quick to recognize that God was the cause of their defeat.

When we suggest that God could be the cause of modern calamities, how do people react?

What are some symbols of Christianity we can revere without honoring the God behind the symbol?

Church attendance.

Giving.

Church membership.

Modern Christians focus ONLY on the compassion passages recorded in the Bible and take those passages either to be the sum of Christ’s person or the most important aspect of Christ’s ministry.

Where should our focus be as Christians?

Quest. 1.

What is the chief and highest end of man?

Ans.

Man’s chief and highest end is to glorify God, and fully to enjoy him for ever.b

God is exalted in our weakness

7-10

The People Receive the Symbol of God’s Presence with Joy and Worship

What role do God’s people have in God receiving glory?

God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.

To glorify God is not to add anything to God that God does not already possess.

We cannot lift God any higher, objectively speaking, than he already is.

God is lifted up and magnified in us, not in reality.

Ethics in Philosophy asks the question, what is the Summum Bonum?

Christian ethics says that the greatest good is God’s glory.

What should worship look like?

We are to present our bodies as living and holy sacrifices.

Acceptable to God.

This is our spiritual service of worship.

Do not be conformed to this world.

Be transformed

By the renewing of your mind

SO THAT…you may PROVE what the will of God is

Prove: dokimadzo - to make a critical examination of something to determine determine genuineness.

Richard Longenecker says:

The result of this inner renewal of the believer’s mind, which is brought about by the work of God’s Spirit, is this: “Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing, and perfect will.”

What the apostle means by his use of the three articular substantival adjectives τὸ ἀγαθόν (“the good,” “what is good,” “the right”), τὸ εὐάρεστον (“the pleasing,” “the acceptable”), and τὸ τέλειον (“the perfect,” “the complete”)—which he uses in characterizing the nature of God’s will that the Christian, by means of the renewing actions of the Holy Spirit on the believer’s mind, comes to experience—can be aptly summarized as “that kind of life which the renewed mind of the Christian person can see to be good in itself, satisfying, and complete.

Other texts to speak to Christians presenting themselves to Go

The People Fail to Honor the Holiness of God’s Presence

How many of you noticed that your translation might say 50,070 instead of 70?

God’s holiness refers to His uniqueness in being separate from all He has created.

The Hebrew word for “holy” means “separate” or “set apart.”

God’s holiness also refers to His absolute purity.

God is unstained by the evil of the world.

How can repentance distinguish Christians from the world and be a witness to the world?

What is the problem with focusing too much on outward expressions of worship?

Rock bands; light shows; loud rocky music; etc?

They appeal to the most shallow side of human beings and leave the heart unchanged.

Repentance is a heart issue.

1 cor 3 16-17

שְׁמַ֖ע יִשְׂרָאֵ֑ל יְהוָ֥ה אֱלֹהֵ֖ינוּ יְהוָ֥ה׀ אֶחָֽד׃