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
0.14UNLIKELY
Disgust
0.1UNLIKELY
Fear
0.12UNLIKELY
Joy
0.63LIKELY
Sadness
0.58LIKELY
Language Tone
Analytical
0.48UNLIKELY
Confident
0UNLIKELY
Tentative
0.81LIKELY
Social Tone
Openness
0.71LIKELY
Conscientiousness
0.87LIKELY
Extraversion
0.23UNLIKELY
Agreeableness
0.92LIKELY
Emotional Range
0.61LIKELY
Tone of specific sentences
Tones
Emotion
Language
Social Tendencies
Anger
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9
The New Command & Power
5.15.22 [John 13:31-35] River of Life (5th Sunday after Easter)
Mercy, peace, and love are yours in abundance you who are loved in God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ.
Amen.
Life in this world leaves you with bumps & bruises.
Bad things happen when you least expect it—even though history and past personal experience maybe teaches us that we should expect bad things.
For some of us, the bad things that have happened to us would be small things to other people.
Bad financial deals pale in comparison to going through bankruptcy.
But each leaves its bumps and bruises.
Breakups can be messy—even sting—but they can’t hold a candle to divorce or death.
Life leaves you with bumps & bruises.
Some of us deal with it & develop calluses from it all.
Resiliency to help navigate life in the real world.
We learn to bounce back from the bad things.
Though we wouldn’t wish what we went through on anyone else—with the benefit of hindsight—we can now see the benefit.
We’ve learned something.
We’ve grown.
We’re better equipped.
When we see someone else going through the same, we’re there for them.
But there are some bad things that happen to you that seem to change you at a very deep level.
Because of what someone did, you don’t just think or talk differently.
You are different.
That bad thing has transformed you to the point where you don’t recognize that “old you” anymore.
There are few bad things in life that are harder to bounce back from than betrayal.
Betrayal changes you.
Betrayal makes you suspicious of nearly everyone—even people who are honest & unblemished.
Because in your mind, no one can be that good.
Betrayal leaves you jaded at institutions.
Cynical towards rules & authority.
Case-hardened.
Being betrayed by someone you trusted doesn’t typically make you a better person.
Perhaps you have been wounded by betrayal.
Maybe it was a company who demanded your very best and then cruelly cut you loose when it “good business”.
Perhaps it was more personal.
A loved one turned their heel on you when you needed them to have your back most.
Maybe you’ve even been betrayed by your spouse.
It’s not something you just bounce back from overnight.
When someone betrays you, it feels impossible to trust them again.
It seems cruel to be commanded to love them.
That’s because betrayal makes us feel inferior and even worthless.
Vocational betrayal is when your company tells you’re expendable.
Relational betrayal is when a loved one tells you that they value someone or something else more than they value you.
Betrayal is usually, at its core, transactional.
And that business is deeply personal.
The most famous betrayal in the history of the world is the backdrop for today’s Gospel.
John simply says: (Jn.
13:31) When he was gone.
The ‘he’ is ominous.
Judas.
Judas had just left to meet with the chief priests and to lead the temple guards to arrest Jesus under cover of darkness in the Garden of Gethsemane.
The other disciples did not realize that Judas was about to betray Jesus, but they knew one of them would.
Jesus had just said to them plainly: (Jn.
13:21) Very truly, I tell you, one of you is going to betray me.
Jesus’ imminent and ignominious betrayal was the backdrop for what he has to say to us.
If you’ve been betrayed before—whether by your company, your commanding officer, or a coworker you thought you could trust—you know how humiliating that experience is.
It made you mad.
It made you treat people differently.
It made you look at yourself differently, too.
But we kind of expect companies, executives, and coworkers to do that.
It still hurts, but we’re not really surprised.
But what about when it’s someone you trusted?
Or a loved one?
Or even more painfully, someone who says they love and trust in Jesus?
Being betrayed by a believer isn’t something you just bounce back from overnight.
But, today, Jesus shows us how to deal with betrayal.
His approach is mind-boggling, isn’t it?
Two words stick out in this section.
Glory (5x) and love (4x).
Those are the last things we’d respond to betrayal with.
Being betrayed is degrading, not glorious.
Loving people who’ve betrayed you seems impossible.
Foolish, even.
Because when anyone humiliates us like this, we want to lash out.
When anyone stabs us in the back, we want our pound of flesh.
When anyone turns their heel toward us, we want to turn our backs on them once and for all.
When a fellow believer betrays your confidence or gossips behind your back, you want to burn the relationship to the ground.
When someone who knows all that Jesus has done for sinners does you dirty, you want to just look them in the eye and tell them “I’m done with you.”
When a body of believers behaves foolishly, out of fear or self-interest, when they don’t practice the truth they espouse and even preach, we just want to tell them: I don’t need you.”
When we are betrayed, the relationship just isn’t worth it to us.
Betrayal is usually, at its core, transactional.
On both sides.
Which is why the betrayed usually walk away from the relationship as soon as they discover they’ve been betrayed, sold out for something else.
But Jesus shows us a different way of dealing with betrayal.
Jesus is the only human being in history that knew he was going to be betrayed this far in advance.
Yes, there are many who had their suspicions and were proved to be right.
But no one else ever knew this far in advance.
God prophesied his own betrayal.
(Ps.
41:9) My close friend, someone I trusted, one who shared my bread, has turned against me.
Yet, even though Jesus knew Judas would betray him, he still loved him.
He taught him for three years.
He gave him the honored responsibility of being the group treasurer.
The same night that Judas would betray him with a kiss, Jesus stooped down and washed Judas’ feet.
Jesus loved Judas like he did every other disciples, so much so that the other disciples were surprised when Judas betrayed Jesus.
But that was just one betrayal Jesus knew of in advance.
When God created the world, he knew how mankind would betray him.
That’s exactly what Adam and Eve did by deciding they’d rather be like God than love God.
Yet, even before they made that fiendish, foolish choice, God chose to take on flesh and blood & bear the sins of his betrayers.
Eph.
1:4-6 God the Father chose us in Jesus before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight.
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9