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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Disgust
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Fear
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Joy
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Sadness
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Analytical
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Confident
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Tentative
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Openness
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Conscientiousness
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Extraversion
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Agreeableness
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Emotional Range
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Tone of specific sentences

Tones
Emotion
Anger
Disgust
Fear
Joy
Sadness
Language
Analytical
Confident
Tentative
Social Tendencies
Openness
Conscientiousness
Extraversion
Agreeableness
Emotional Range
Anger
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! The Church in Action*[1]*
 
James 5: 13-20
 
/13// //Is any one of you in trouble?
He should pray.
Is anyone happy?
Let him sing songs of praise.
//14 //Is any one of you sick?
He should call the elders of the church to pray over him and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord.
//15 //And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up.
If he has sinned, he will be forgiven.
//16 //Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.
The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective./
/17 //Elijah was a man just like us.
He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years.
//18 //Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops./
/19 //My brothers, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring him back, //20 //remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of his way will save him from death and cover over a multitude of sins./
The Letter of James has always been controversial.
Famously Luther had no time for it – and down through the ages many have found its intensely practical teaching either awkward or odd.
As the letter closes James touches on at least two difficult issues – the anointing with oil for the sick, and the “covering of a multitude of sins”.
Personally I do not find the idea of anointing difficult – and it seems to me that James closes his letter with encouragement to bringing sinners back to the Lord.
What these closing verses do offer is an interesting picture of the CHURCH IN ACTION.
Clearly James has much to say about PRAYER – so that is a mark of the Church in Action.
James also shows us how the spiritual family that is the Church *meets the varying needs of its people.*
He says nothing explicitly about OUTSIDERS.
We ask two questions:
 
    Who are the Church?
What do they do?
And suddenly the letter ends – almost as if the writer were interrupted.
There is no benediction or grace – yet it ends with this picture of a great hope, and a great ministry.
!
Who are the Church?
(a)    *Ordinary people – like Elijah*
 
Oh – you say – ordinary – Elijah?
Yes – “Elijah was a man just like us!”
 
(b)    *Righteous people*
 
“The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective”  v16
 
Not by effort
Not by works
Not by unusual faith
But by the grace of God.
 
(c)    *People with changing situations*
* *
/13// Is any one of you in trouble?
He should pray.
Is anyone happy?
Let him sing songs of praise.
//14 Is any one of you sick?/
/ /
/19 My brothers, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring him back,/
* *
    V 13  in trouble…?
o       Happy?
V14   sick?
V19   wandering from the truth
 
 
What a range of experiences
 
In trouble
Happy       (=deeply content)
Weak~/sick
 
Or
 
Wandering from the truth
 
His phrase “if one of you…”   goes nicely with  “just like us…”
 
But there are figures of authority too:
 
(d)    *Elders of the Church*
 
/He should call the elders of the church to pray over him and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord./
/ /
So someone is in charge then.
This is a mark of the Church in Action that there are spiritual leaders who exercise a range of ministries
 
 
(e)    *People who sin*
 
/If he has sinned, he will be forgiven.
//16 //Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.
The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective./
/Whoever turns a sinner from the error of his way will save him from death and cover over a multitude of sins.
(v20)/
 
The Church is made up of REAL PEOPLE
 
People with strengths and weaknesses
 
People like Elijah
 
Those in trouble
 
Those who are happy
 
Those in physical need
 
Backsliders
 
Elders
 
Those who sin
 
&
 
Those who restore…
This is a MIXED BAG – but POWERFUL BY PRAYER.
!
What do they do?
(a)    *They pray*
 
13     /He should pray/
14     /call the elders of the church to pray over him/
15     /15 And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well;/
16     /pray for each other so that you may be healed./
17     /Elijah was a man just like us.
He prayed earnestly/
18     /18 Again he prayed,/
/ /
(b)    *They turn their circumstances into opportunities*
 
In trouble  =      pray
 
Happy       =      sing songs
 
Sick          =      call for the elders
 
TWO of these reactions are personal – one is special
 
(c)    *The elders exercise a special ministry*
 
1.
they are AVAILABLE to be called in                (v14)
 
2.
they minister in a way that is:-
 
SYMBOLIC         oil
 
POWERFUL                prayer
 
PERSONAL         coming close into the circumstances
 
Like the Samaritan in Jesus’ story they “*come where the man was..*”
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