Sermon Tone Analysis

prayer

Slide-Title

Hopefully, when you read the title, you did not roll your eyes and say ugh, I don’t even know what those words mean.

This sounds a lot like school---I hated school.

It is not that bad I promise, I am just using those terms from grammar to explain what is going on in today’s passage of Romans chapter 6.

Let me begin by defining the first term in the Title-indicative.

Simply put, in grammar the indicative is a statement of fact.

Next we have the other “grammar word in the title” Imperative-

For our purposes and quite simply and imperative is a command-Do this or do that.

We will begin today with an indicative statement, or a statement of fact found in verse 18.

You have been, and you have become.

The two actions in that verse.

That is in its most basic form the essence of the Christian life.

You have been, and you have become.

The Christian life can be summed up by looking at three stages.

Slide CL1

Who you were.

What Happened.

Who you have become.

This is the way we teach people to give testimonies.

Who you were, what happened, who you have become.

Very simple.

It is the basic formula.

Let’s take a minute and look at a couple of quick examples from Scripture.

The first is one most of us are familiar with, from John 11, Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead.

Remember the story of Lazarus?

If you need to refresh your memory, John chapter 11.

Basically, for our purposes today the story is that Lazarus was a good friend of Jesus, and he got sick, and he died.

So, back to our slide, Who was Lazarus?

We may be tempted to add all these other things, like what he did for a living and that he was a friend of Jesus, and a brother of Martha, but simply Lazarus was a dead man.

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Now What happened?

Remember what Jesus said in John 11:43, In a loud voice Jesus said-Lazarus Come out.

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Jesus called.

Or he issued an imperative, a command.

What did he become-Then we read in John 11:44, The dead man came out.

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What he has become-Alive!

Very basic, very simple, He was a dead man, What happened Jesus called, and then who he has become-Alive.

Now let’s look at another example this one is a little more complicated

This from Mark chapter 2 verses 1 through 12, the paralytic and Jesus, I will read it to refresh you memory Mark chapter 2, verse 1.

Let’s go back to our slide.

Slide-CL1

Who he was, What happened, Who is he now.

Slide Par1

Who was he-well that’s pretty easy, he was a paralytic.

He can’t walk.

He can’t even come to Jesus on his own, I suppose in that respect he is not much different than Lazarus.

Both of these people have found themselves in a predicament that they cannot get out of on their own.

In fact, he needs his friend to bring him to Jesus.

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Now what Happened?-Simply

Jesus healed Him.

With the imperative, or the command-take up your mat and go home.

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Then What he has become-He got up and walked.

However, what makes this passage so powerful, is that the gospel writer doesn’t leave us only with that surface interpretation.

Instead, he includes more information that help us see beneath the surface.

Let’s look a little deeper.

The first thing Jesus says to the Paralyzed man is not get up and walk, but Son, your sins are forgiven.

This would lead us to believe that the man is not only a paralytic, but a sinner as well, so let’s add that as well.

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Now, that brings up plenty of discussion since it since it is God alone who can forgive sins..... Jesus as God can then issue the command or the imperative, but he does not-He instead declares this statement of fact-Your sins are forgiven, The imperative occurs after the man sins are forgiven.

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We cannot really see that but Jesus says it happened.

Then Jesus says in verse 2.10

The paralytic is a sinner, this may or may not be obvious to everyone, but is known to the paralytic.

This is a statement of fact.

Then Jesus issues a call, a command an imperative-Come out, Pick up your mat and walk, Come out,

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Now Here is the point.

The command issued through and in relation to the gospel.

The imperative comes through faith in the Gospel-Mark 2:5 it was just on the screen-When Jesus saw their faith- He said, son your sins are forgiven.

In the case of John 11, before Jesus issues the command for Lazarus to come out He says this,

The issued command is through the Gospel.

It starts with The statement of fact is who we are.

Paralyzed, can’t walk, or dead in sin, or sinners, or slaves to sin-That is a fact who we were, The command is issued through the Gospel-Repent, Place your faith in Jesus, Be born again.

Who we have become is the evidence that we have responded to the imperative and that there is a transformation of the indicative.

Did you follow that?

One more time-Who we were is transformed into who we have become THROUGH the command issued in the Gospel.

Who we have become is evidence that a transformation has taken place, that the faith was effective.

Look-we can’t see that the paralytic’s sins were forgiven-who would we know?

We wouldn’t we would just shrug our shoulders and go on our way and say that’s nice-But we can see that he walked-So that you may know that the son on man has power to forgive sins.

How would we know Lazarus has eternal life?

He walked out of the grave.

This applies to us, what is your statement of fact?

What is your indicative?

Look at Romans 6:18 .

You have been set free from sin-You were a slave to sin, a few verses back in verse 16-and in verse 6 You were a slave.

In verse 13 Paul says we were brought from death to life.

We were slaves, and were dead, we were not unlike Lazarus or the the paralytic.

That was our indiciaive, our statement of fact about ourselves.

What was it?

What had you enslaved?

Was it Pride?

Did you think you could work your way to Jesus, by doing good.

Were you a liar?

covering up your own wrongs by denying and lying about what you have been doing?

Were you a lustful person desiring other people, or even other things that God did not intend you to have?