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.
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Emotion Tone
Anger
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Joy
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Analytical
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Openness
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Conscientiousness
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Extraversion
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Tone of specific sentences
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Anger
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to rejoice is to celebrate.
What would it look like to live a life of celebration?
Not a hollow celebration but one with meaning and purpose.
One filled with rich relationships.
People rejoice all the time.
And rejoicing often always has a reason.
When we are full of joy it is rarely for joy’s sake.
Our joy is often aimed at something.
We are joyful for a reason.
Maybe a birthday
or anniversary
or holiday
or relationship
a promotion
we rejoice.
We swing from joy to joy based on the events or people we have joy in.
But they don’t always last.
What happens when what you rejoiced in turned out to be something else?
the relationship turned out to be something else?
Your hope turned into something else?
I was a youth pastor my first five years in ministry.
And every Fall we would do a big fall festival party.
We had candy and games and kids from all over showed up.
One year I did bobbing for apples and it became a big competition.
I had a big bin and we would time the kids to see how quick they could bob for an apple.
The kids loved it.
As a surprise I put one red onion in the bin full of water.
At a glance it looked like an apple, was the same color, size and it floated.
And sure enough, in the excitement of the kids bobbing for apples, one of them bit into the onion and pulled it out of the water.
The excitement on their face quickly turned.
Imagine biting into an onion thinking it was an apple.
sometimes we try to find joy in things and at first glance we rejoice but then that thing either doesn’t last or is something other than we thought.
What we were waiting for turned out to be something else.
What have you rejoiced in that turned out to be something else?
This morning we are going to look at 2 women, cousins, who meet and rejoice, not in somethign that is passing or is other than what they thought.
They rejoice in the fulfillment of God’s promises.
Lasting Joy is found in knowing that Christ is the fulfillment of God’s promise
English Standard Version (Luke 1:41–45)
Joy is found in the purposes of God
- There is just a simple greeting.
Two women, cousins, one welcoming the other into their home.
This moment, this simple greeting became a holy moment.
A moment for worship.
There was something additional in the greeting.
The greeting itself becomes Holy because of what these women find in God.
We moved to Oregon in the winter of 2010.
We split up into three groups to get there.
Our stuff was driven by movers.
Josiah and I picked up my dad in Wisconsin and drove the 5 days to Oregon from Ohio.
And Robin and the girls flew to Oregon a week later.
Josiah and I picked the rest of the family up at the airport and the arrival was sweet.
I hadn’t seen the girls for over a week and the same for them.
So the re-connection was filled with joy.
But there was more to it than just a connection.
This was also the realization that we had moved our family and this was the first time we were seeing each other in our new lives and new state.
There was hope and expectation and a bit of fear.
IT was more than just a ride at the airport because there was so much beneath the surface
The arrival of Mary at Elizabeth’s home is more than just an arrival, more than just a place to stay.
There is much going on beneath the surface.
Everything, both these women realize, is changing and had changed.
We see that from their pregnancies, we see that from Mary wanting to stay with Elizabeth.
God is doing a deep work in their lives and the lives around them.
And the Holy Spirit shows up to fill Elizabeth and she see and worships the God responsible for that work.
She recognizes the fulness of God in His working through this arrival.
- Elizabeth understands who exactly Jesus is in calling Him the Lord.
The title, “Lord” occurs 25 times in ch 1 and 2 in the book of Luke.
We are told right away who this is in Mary’s womb.
Mary understood her purpose in God’s calling in her life.
Elizabeth the same.
Both had encountered God in the process.
How has God shown you His purposes in your life?
Jesus tells us that we have joy in what HE speaks, in His will.
These women understand that there is an incredible joy found in knowing God’s purpose in our lives.
And they find that joy together in community
Joy is found in the community of believers
- Elizabeth did not just feel the baby move but at the same time was filled with the Holy Spirit.
The Role of the spirit was to confirm what God is doing in the world.
Elizabeth had confirmation of what was actually happening.
It wasn’t one prophetic event, it was communal.
- Joy is communal
As Elizabeth speaks through the Spirit about the Christ, Mary responds with her song of Joy and triumph.
Both participate, and Christ works through both of them as they find joy not just in hearing and not just in participating, but both in community
We find joy together.
Christmas is great but Christmas together as a church is even better.
Christmas cookies are great but Christmas cookies together are even better.
And it’s not just Christmas.
If joy is something that is often found something else, it stands to reason that we can find joy in one another.
This is what was happening throughout the OT.
The subject of the OT is mostly the nation of Israel and their relationship with God.
The Jewish calendar is filled with feast days.
Days where they celebrate the work of God in their lives.
We are in one now, Hanukkah.
Feast days are associated with rejoicing.
In the OT rejoicing is frequently expressed in connection with the feasts; in fact, they are called “times of rejoicing” (Num 10:10).
Recalling God’s marvelous act of delivering Israel from bondage, the Feasts of Passover and Unleavened Bread were occasions of great joy (2 Chr 30:21–27; Ezra 6:22; cf. also Psalms 95 and 98).
Communal exultation also characterized the Feasts of Pentecost and Tabernacles (Deut 16:11, 14, 15; Lev 23:40) at which times the people of Israel were enjoined to remember that they were once slaves in Egypt (Deut 16:12).
Similarly, the Feast of Purim was celebrated with joy and gladness to celebrate divine deliverance from potential annihilation under Persian rule (Esth 8:17).
- Joy comes often in connection with the feasts.
The feasts are all about what God has done.
There is rejoicing in what God Himself has done.
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