Sermon Tone Analysis
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Introduction
Life slaps (mom’s slap)
Talk about my graduation experience and moving away to college.
Talk about my graduation experience and moving away to college.
May 1996 it was on, I was done with High School
August 1996 on my way to Southern Union, living in Auburn, riding in a 1994 Ford Ranger.
My buddies joining me, Patrick Fuller, Randall Murdock, Brian Hale, Greg Ling, Adam Blasmauh, and my self in College Park II in the middle of deepest, darkest, and foulest place on this earth “Auburn.”
Could not wait to leave.
Of course our moms were there stocking our cabinets , fridge, and cleaning the entire apartment.
Within a week the food was gone and we were stuck with pretzel and mustard sandwiches and clothes pilled up to the sealing.
But I was free, “thank God almighty I was free at last!!!!!”
Then something stopped me in my tracks, the words of my granddad flooded my thoughts, and I heard him saying, “Son you will never know how good you got it until it’s gone.”
In my mind: For me to live was freedom and to leave my parents house and live on my own was gain.
In reality it was went something like this, For me to live was mom and dad and to stay at home was gain.
At this point I had no idea how to live on my own.
I had no idea what I was to gain by living on my own, all I knew was the context of what me and my buddies thought about, “we are about to live in freedom.”
We completely took the phrase “to live” out of context.
We had no idea what living was all about.
Sometimes things aren’t what they seem.
I thought by moving out of mom and dads house was freedom.
I thought this is how I became a man.
In my mind I now got to make my own choices and no one could tell me how to live my life.
Well some of that was true.
I did have freedom, and I did not have mom and dad telling me what to do everyday, even though they did check on me daily to make sure I was doing my school work, which I was not doing.
It was like I took what I thought I knew and took it out of context.
In other words it would have been like me reading the side of a coffee mug that said, “ true freedom is moving out of your parents house.”
Taking things out of context can get us into trouble.
I don’t like it when people take bible verses out of context and slap them on coffee mugs, put them on bookmarks, put them on bumper stickers.v
Philippians is the book of the Bible that has the most “life motto” verses that get taken out of context.
Think about all of the verses that come from Philippians:
“ Do not be anxious about anything.”
“ Rejoice in the Lord always.”
“Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.”
“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” (One of my favorites that is out of context)
“To live is Christ and to die is gain.”
Philippians is full of these verses.
We are actually going to memorize one of these verses today, because it’s our passage.
So you can go home and tell your friends, “I memorized a Bible verse in church today.”
Phili
: “To live is Christ and to die is gain.”
Repeat after me: “To live is Christ and to die is gain.”
One more time: “To live is Christ and to die is gain.”
Most people hear that verse or see it on a coffee mug and think, That's a great life motto, I'm going to live by that.
But we need to hear the context in which this was first spoken.
The Apostle Paul is in prison in the city of Rome, facing trial, knowing he's going to be executed for his faith in Christ.
So he writes a letter to the church in Philippi, and tells them, "This is what I believe: to live is Christ and to die is gain."
This is a man facing execution.
We've got to wrap our heads around what he's saying.
Nero was the emperor of Rome at this time.
Paul would have to stand before Nero and give his defense for why he came under charges.
Besides being put to death, the Christians were made to serve as objects of amusement.
They were clothed in the hides of beasts and torn to death by dogs.
Others were crucified.
Others were set on fire to serve to illuminate the night when daylight failed.
Christians were being killed for no other reason than the emperor did not like them.
This is how Christians were being put on display in Paul’s day.
This is what's going on in Rome when Paul wrote, "To live is Christ, and to die is gain."
There is an emperor who is torturing Christians to satisfy his own wicked desires.
This is the guy that Paul is going up against.
So now lets go put that verse on a coffee mug!!!!
Everyone of you seniors and everyone in this building has to answer the questions:
“What is life?”
“What is death?”
Some may say “to live” is to:
“to Live” = Achieve good Karma “to die” = is hope for a better reincarnation
“to live” = Allow your good to outweigh your bad “to die” = is to achieve a personal paradise
“to live” = is self (that’s the world’s view) “to die” = is loss
The average person or teenager has the “world view” “to live” = self and “to die” = loss
In other words life is all about self and to die is to lose everything.
This is very different from what Paul is saying in:
Read:
Philippians 1:18-30
Remember, Paul is in prison in Rome, and he's writing to this church he loves in Philippi.
And he says, "I don't know how this is going to turn out.
I'm in prison.
My trial is coming up.
I don't know if I will be found guilty and executed.
But if I die, I count it as gain because I get to be with Jesus, and I really want that.
Or maybe they'll release me instead.
If they release me, that's great, too.
Because I get to be with you.
I'll come to Philippi, I'll see you, I'll encourage you.
But no matter what happens, I want you to continue moving forward in the faith, advancing the gospel."
As we look at this passage, we’re going to dissect this passage word for word and find out exactly what Paul means when he says, “to live is Christ and to die is gain.”
We live in a world to revolves around “self,” our dreams, our hopes, our ambitions, and our plans.
G.K. Chesterton told a parable about a boy who was given the magical opportunity to become small or big.
Predictably, the boy chose to be made gigantic.
And in a matter of three minutes, he could stride across North America.
He could go up to Mount Everest and kick it over like a sand castle.
But after a few days of this he got bored because the whole earth felt as big as his back yard.
There was no one to play with and nothing to do.
Had that boy instead chosen to be made small, his back yard could have been like the Amazon rain forest.
He could have spent his whole life exploring just his back yard, just his neighborhood.
We like to make ourselves big.
We place ourselves at the center of the solar system.
But I really want to get smaller as I get older, not bigger.
I want God to be bigger so I can get lost in who he is.
There is a lot of superficial Christianity in the World today.
This is because Jesus is merely added to our lives.
We stay at the center of the universe, and we ask Jesus to orbit around us.
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