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
0.5LIKELY
Disgust
0.13UNLIKELY
Fear
0.14UNLIKELY
Joy
0.59LIKELY
Sadness
0.56LIKELY
Language Tone
Analytical
0.68LIKELY
Confident
0UNLIKELY
Tentative
0.33UNLIKELY
Social Tone
Openness
0.83LIKELY
Conscientiousness
0.4UNLIKELY
Extraversion
0.06UNLIKELY
Agreeableness
0.52LIKELY
Emotional Range
0.53LIKELY
Tone of specific sentences
Tones
Emotion
Language
Social Tendencies
Anger
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9
On September 17, 1862 the Battle of Sharpsburg took place during the second year of the American Civil War.
Sharpsburg is a town in Maryland which was part of the Federal Union territory.
Robert Lee had taken his Confederate Army of the South and crossed the Potomac River into the North in order to draw the Union Army away from occupying southern cities.
It worked.
The Union Army under the command of George McClellan descended upon Sharpsburg with a force that was easily twice the size of Lee’s Confederate troops.
As an overwhelming line of Federal soldiers were approaching, the Confederates employed an unusual strategy.
In a wooded area near Antietam Creek, a small Confederate regiment snuck forward and positioned itself among the trees right between the 9th New York regiment and 5th Massachusetts regiment.
Conserving their limited ammunition, the Confederates shot a quick burst of musket fire towards the New York regiment of the Union army.
The union troops realized they were under attack and turned to begin returning fire.
Meanwhile the small Confederate regiment slipped out of the way, so the advancing New York regiment was now turned and firing directly towards the Massachusetts regiment.
The Massachusetts regiment took defensive positions thinking that it was the Confederate forces attacking them, and they fired back.
Thus a small group of Confederate troops tricked the Union army into attacking itself and successfully delayed the advancing Union army long enough to allow time for Lee to withdraw and escape back across the Potomac River.
President Abraham Lincoln did not allow McClellan to remain in command of the Union army after that.
And it shows us that sometimes we don’t even realize just how much we can be our own worst enemy.
We have moments of causing harm not only to ourselves, but to everyone else around us, and we don’t even realize it.
Acknowledge sin
David arranges for Uriah to be killed and takes Bathsheba
Something like that happens in the story we see today with David and Bathsheba.
2 Samuel 11 tells the story of everything David did to take Bathsheba—a woman who was not his wife—essentially rape her, and then orchestrate an elaborate coverup scheme by murdering Bathsheba’s husband Uriah so that David could take Bathsheba as his own wife.
After all of this happens and no one seems to be the wiser, the prophet Nathan comes along in chapter 12 and shares this little story about a rich man, a poor man, and a ewe lamb.
We see those stories back-to-back in chapters 11 and 12 and the connection is obvious.
But apparently for David the connection is not evident.
He has no idea and is completely unaware that this fable brought to him by the prophet Nathan is actually about him.
Nathan tells David a story about a rich man’s abuse against another
Nathan doesn’t waste any time or sugarcoat the truth in any way.
David decrees the death penalty for the rich man who committed such a merciless act of injustice.
Nathan immediately responds, you are the man!
Nathan goes on to level the accusations against David.
You committed murder to take a woman who was not your wife to be your own.
David does not realize what he has done until Nathan makes the connection
Catch the moment here.
This is not an example of David getting caught with his own dirty laundry.
Maybe we make that mistake.
David commits a terrible sin and then tries his best to hide it and cover it up.
And maybe David thinks, I got away with it; nobody else knows the horrible thing I have done.
That’s not what is happening here.
David himself doesn’t even know the horrible thing he has done.
David himself has justified and his own actions as acceptable.
And only when Nathan reframes the events into another story does David make the connection.
He did not know how deep his own sin went.
Up until that moment, he was unaware of his own transgressions.
We cannot overlook that feature of the story because we all need to admit that there is hidden sin in each one of us.
And it is sin that is hidden so deep, we ourselves don’t even know or acknowledge it.
We have justified and rationalized our own broken and harmful behaviors as normal and acceptable.
This story is about acknowledging the sin that we don’t even know about in our own lives.
Sin is a touchy subject we do not talk about much.
It seems we always have a ton to say about love and grace and mercy.
Those are features of the gospel story that always make the highlight reel.
But we ignore sin.
Well, that’s not exactly true.
We are really good at pointing fingers at the sin of other people.
But we are also really good at ignoring our own sin.
This story today confronts us squarely between the eyes with the knowledge that sometimes we are not even aware of the all the ways we harm ourselves and those around us.
We don’t even know.
Jesus says exactly the same thing in Matthew 7
Can we admit how blind we all are to our own sin?
Nathan’s confrontation of David is a confrontation to every single one of us.
I am far more broken by sin than I know.
I am far more broken by sin than I know.
Santa Claus doesn’t help us with this.
In the Santa Claus story, if you are good you get a present, but if you are bad you get a lump of coal.
It reinforces the idea that a gift only comes to people who deserve it.
It feeds into an idea that we hold somewhere in the back of our minds that misses and ignores my own sin.
Yes, salvation means I am being renewed and restored into the image of Christ by a powerful work of the Holy Spirit; but I was kind of okay to begin with.
That’s wrong.
The gift of salvation did not come to me because I am on the nice list.
In fact, just the opposite.
I am on the naughty list; I didn’t even realize it; and I got the gift anyway.
Matthew writes his gospel to a Jewish audience.
The Hebrew people had been waiting for a Messiah they believed would arise to the legendary ideal of king David.
Matthew gives a family tree of Jesus which reminds us that even the mighty king David needed God to rescue him from his own sin.
Acknowledge repentance
David - “I have sinned against the LORD”
After Nathan finishes telling his story and connecting the dots so that David can realize what he has done, the response is immediate.
David says, I have sinned against the LORD.
There are no excuses.
There is no passing the buck or spreading the blame.
There is no attempt by David to justify his actions.
You know, that Uriah was a Hittite; not even one of us; it’s not really that bad.
Nope.
David owns it all.
And he acknowledges that his sin is not just an offence to others around him.
It is an offence against God.
judgment is already pronounced - “the man who did this must die!”
The worst part is that David himself has already pronounced judgement.
When Nathan tells the story of the rich man, poor man, and ewe lamb David decrees that the crime was punishable by death.
David is the king.
He is the highest authority in the land below God.
his words carry legal weight.
The sentence for this crime has already been declared.
David’s confession of sin is an acceptance of that penalty.
This is a rather heavy confession to make.
David cannot undo his actions.
In acknowledging his sin before God, he also acknowledges his own death sentence which he has placed upon himself.
In this moment, David realizes that the LORD has every right to take David’s life—David’s own words have decreed it to be so.
repentance - David acknowledges his sin and accepts the consequence
And David accepts it.
He accepts that the LORD is right to carry this out.
This is the moment of David’s repentance.
This is the moment David fully grasps the enormous weight of his sin and the consequence is carries.
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9