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
0.13UNLIKELY
Disgust
0.49UNLIKELY
Fear
0.64LIKELY
Joy
0.08UNLIKELY
Sadness
0.57LIKELY
Language Tone
Analytical
0.61LIKELY
Confident
0UNLIKELY
Tentative
0.05UNLIKELY
Social Tone
Openness
0.87LIKELY
Conscientiousness
0.74LIKELY
Extraversion
0.17UNLIKELY
Agreeableness
0.54LIKELY
Emotional Range
0.66LIKELY

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
! Security—Will God Protect Me?
If we do not learn to dwell in the secret place of the Most High, to abide in the shadow of the Almighty, the years to come are going to fill our hearts with increasing fear.
He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High
will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say of the Lord, "He is my refuge and my fortress,
my God, in whom I trust."
Surely he will save you from the fowler's snare
and from the deadly pestilence.
He will cover you with his feathers,
and under his wings you will find refuge;
his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart
You will not fear the terror of night,
nor the arrow that flies by day,
nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness,
nor the plague that destroys at midday.
A thousand may fall at your side,
ten thousand at your right hand,
but it will not come near you.
You will only observe with your eyes
and see the punishment of the wicked.
If you make the Most High your dwelling—
even the Lord, who is my refuge—
then no harm will befall you,
no disaster will come near your tent.
For he will command his angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways;
they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.
You will tread upon the lion and the cobra;
you will trample the great lion and the serpent
"Because he loves me," says the Lord, "I will rescue him;
I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.
He will call upon me, and I will answer him;
I will be with him in trouble,
I will deliver him and honor him.
With long life will I satisfy him
and show him my salvation."
Psalm 91
Scared to death.
There's enough in this world to scare us to death, isn't there?
But did you know that you can actually, literally, be scared to death?
As recently as 1980, studies have verified that people can literally be frightened out of their lives /(Science Digest,/ Nov.~/ Dec, 1980, p. 105).
A prominent scientist examined fifteen cases in which people, four of them children, were assaulted.
They could not flee and they could not fight, so even though they received only minor injuries, they died.
They were so afraid, it seems, that they were actually scared to death.
How is this physiologically possible?
Upon examination, the evidence indicated that stress caused by fear had literally destroyed the victims' hearts.
Heart cells were destroyed by the body's violent reaction to fear, said the study.
Because the people were utterly helpless, they couldn't fight back and they couldn't escape, their adrenalin kept on pumping into their hearts, and their hearts, overwrought, destroyed themselves.
We live in a scary world.
And the impact of the fear we live with is real and deadly.
I remember a cartoon in /The New Yorker/ several years ago in which an elderly apartment dweller was in the process of locking the seven different locks on his door—deadbolts, sliding locks, security locks.
All the time the blade of a saw was cutting a circle in the floor under him!
It was a humorous attempt to make a serious point.
There really is no possible escape from everything that threatens us in our world.
That is why the words of Psalm 91 are more poignant today than ever.
Someone has said that Psalm 91 is an expanded commentary on the great cry of the apostle Paul: "If God is for us, who can be against us?" (Rom.
8:31).
What is the message of the Psalm?
Its message is a promise for God's people in an increasingly frightened and insecure age.
It's a promise we must take to heart in today's world—or live our lives in fear and timidity.
!! The Promise of Protection
And what is that promise?
God promises us shelter, covering, and comprehensive protection based on His very nature.
Those who claim the promise and dwell in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
God offers us security, says the psalmist, by providing secret shelter.
In the first verse of the psalm, we find the act of faith, the steps we must take.
What we must do is search for that shelter.
And then we must be willing to use it.
What does that mean?
To dwell in that shelter is continually to commune with God, reposing our trust in Him, depositing our confidence in Him.
The psalmist says that the promise of security is for the individual who is willing to do this.
But it is an act of faith to dwell in such a way.
And this keeps many of us from ever experiencing that special treatment.
But why do we shy away from this act of faith?
Because we know that being a Christian doesn't keep us from harm.
It doesn't keep us from death and accidents and illness and pain and crisis.
So it's hard to understand fully what "protection from God" could be if we still experience such danger.
Yet let's look at what kind of protection this promise calls forth from God.
If we make the choice to dwell in His secret place, as the psalmist puts it, then God's response will be to treat us as His guests.
In the ancient eastern world, the duty of the host was the most sacred duty a man could have.
Even to this day, if you come into the tent of a Bedouin or another nomadic desert dweller, he will protect you with his very life.
This is the background from which the psalmist was writing.
Almighty God is saying, in effect, "When you dwell in My most secret place, I promise to be your divine host with the sacred responsibility of covering and caring for you."
When we deposit our trust in Him, then He guarantees He will give us His sheltering protection against all that harms us—/until our duty is done and our race is finished in His service./
We will still go through trials.
That is part of life.
But the psalmist says we can go through these trials with confidence.
If we are "dwelling" in communion with God, if we are accepting the shelter only He can give, then we will be safe until our work for the Lord is over, until our time on this earth is done.
How does this protection work?
I believe He protects and secures those of us who take that step of faith to dwell with Him in several very interesting ways.
Look back at the figure of speech used by the psalmist.
He speaks of a God who covers us with "His wings."
"He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge."
The reference is to the great wings of an eagle as they stretch out to stabilize the young eaglet in flight—or to cover it if it tumbles from the nest while trying to fly.
The very first word that God spoke to Moses on Mt.
Sinai was to remind Moses that He brought the people out of Egypt "on eagle's wings."
Think of it.
The God of the cosmic universe—of unfathomable, immeasurable space—that great God condescends to relate to us like an eagle who spreads out its wings to protect its young.
!! On Eagles' Wings
I can't help but think of an enlightening article I read recently.
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9