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
0.09UNLIKELY
Disgust
0.16UNLIKELY
Fear
0.11UNLIKELY
Joy
0.56LIKELY
Sadness
0.58LIKELY
Language Tone
Analytical
0.5LIKELY
Confident
0UNLIKELY
Tentative
0.49UNLIKELY
Social Tone
Openness
0.84LIKELY
Conscientiousness
0.93LIKELY
Extraversion
0.26UNLIKELY
Agreeableness
0.64LIKELY
Emotional Range
0.7LIKELY

Tone of specific sentences

Tones
Emotion
Anger
Disgust
Fear
Joy
Sadness
Language
Analytical
Confident
Tentative
Social Tendencies
Openness
Conscientiousness
Extraversion
Agreeableness
Emotional Range
Anger
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9
The passages that we read last week and this week go together.
We cannot fully understand the light with having an understanding of salt.
So if you missed last week, this week will be difficult for you.
So let me recap the best I can for us this morning.
Let’s ask the Lord for His help and His blessing first, to be upon us, as His word is unfolded into our hearts.
Let’s lift up our heart to the Lord in prayer, and as we pray together intentionally set ourselves before the Lord, settle ourselves to hear the Word.
“Our God and Father in heaven, once again we come before Thee and we enter in Thy presence, in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
We pray for help, that You will come and minister to us, as we take the Word and come to the message of God.
Bless us we ask and continue with us, we ask in Jesus name and for His sake, AMEN.
We’ll be reading from verse 13, This is the Word of the Almighty Christ:
— 13 “You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned?
It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men.
14 “You are the light of the world.
A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden.
15 Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house.
16 Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.
Amen, we thank God that He has spoken in His holy Word.
Last week we mentioned some of characteristics of salt and the parallel given to us as the church.
We said:
Salt is a preservative.
So then, we are as the church a preservative against moral decay in society.…
And we’ve said, “Salt flavors stuff, and so we add zest & flavor to the world as the church.
We give life vitality and meaning.…
Salt brings flavor,
And salt is a fertilizer, and so we fertilize stuff.
We make the ground fertile to grow.…
Salt creates thirst, and so we create a thirst for God when people are around us.”
so we as the church zest & flavor society.…
Salt is a fertilizer,
so we as the church create fertile ground where spiritual growth can occur.…
When you eat salt, you become thirsty,
so we as the church, when people are around us see our lives and how we live,
they become thirsty for the things of God.
And as we thought about the church being those things, we went a step deeper and saw what’s underneath it all.
What is more foundational to being the salt, which is what happens when the Holy Spirit begins to
work in us,
chisel on us,
shape us and
mold us
into the type of men and women
who do preserve against moral decay,
who do make others thirst for God,
who do make the ground able to support growth.
That ultimately it’s the work of the Holy Spirit that leads us to become salt and
we acknowledged our deep need to submit to God the Holy Spirit
as He speaks and shapes us through His Word.
We also spent time on the second part of verse 13 which says that salt, if it’s lost its saltiness is worthless.
And that we can go and possibly are going to the direction of losing our saltiness,
by way of gaining information and having the right beliefs, but not actually changing and being transformed.
This is the path way to losing our saltiness.
We spoke of the larger evangelical church as a whole in America.
Then we spoke specifically to us.
We are currently on information melt down.
Piles and piles of biblical truth gets heaped on you every week.
But there’s nothing built into our structure that will lead us into having accountability, as to whether we’re actually living this stuff out.
So if we become masters of information, but not masters of life, then we lose our saltiness.
So we spoke of our need for a healthy, balanced change in our diet.
So as we move now from salt (becoming salty by submitting to God’s word in obedience) to light.
“You are the light of the world.
A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden.
15 Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house.
16 Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.
I think a lot of us, when we think of light and in terms of light, we think of evangelism.
We think, “Okay, light.
(knock on the door) If you were to die today, …” which almost sounds threatening, a stranger on your porch.
It just sounds a little scary.
“I’m a stranger on your porch.
If I were to kill you right now, …” So, I don’t think evangelism is bad.
In fact, we need to do it, we need to get better at it, we need to more fully understand what the gospel is.
Honestly, I think this salt problem is why evangelism dies pretty quickly in our lives
because we feel like our lives don’t match up to the gospel we proclaim.
So we keep our mouths shut because we know everyone around us will call us out on it.
But that’s another sermon.
So then, although I do believe that we should
share the gospel and
share with our neighbors and
share with our coworkers,
I don’t believe that that is what this text is talking about at all,
but rather something different.
So let me try to unpack this.
The word “You” in v14 isn’t applied to the world at large, but to committed followers of Christ.
When the Lord says that we are the light to the world, the implication is, is that the world is a world of darkness despite its claim on enlightenment!
Just as last Lord’s day evening a title for Jesus is “the Living Stone” and then Peter calls us, “living stones”.
So to Jesus ascribes to us a title that He claims for Himself.
He calls us the light of the world.
So Christ is Himself the light and then, as His followers we become pointers to that light.
As says, that we are light in the Lord.
Or as says, ‘we shine as lights in the world’.
And if we be who we really are, as laid out in the previous verses, then light bearing is inevitable.
It’s as impossible that the city of Chicago can be set on a hill and be hidden.
Its situation makes concealment impossible.
The same is true when we be what we are in Christ.
In Scripture the obvious symbolism of light is: holiness and truth, in opposition to every kind of darkness ().
However, the stress here is not on the intrinsic nature of the light, though that is
presupposed in the goodness of the ‘good deeds’ (5:16),
but on its shining forth to enlighten others.
God’s light is received in Christ and then sent out into the darkness to bring light and salvation.
Thus David rejoices, ‘The Lord is my light and my salvation’ (),
while the prophesied Servant of the Lord is described as ‘a light for the Gentiles’ ().
It is noteworthy, in connection with the present verses, that in
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9