Sermon Tone Analysis

NIV Deuteronomy 6:5/ Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength./

Combine with

NAU Deuteronomy 11:1/ "You shall therefore love the LORD your God, and always keep His charge, His statutes, His ordinances, and His commandments./

Jesus said that this is the greatest commandment and to love your brother was the second greatest.

He said that if we would do all that we can to fulfill these two commandments then we would fulfill all the commandments.

What we have to pay attention to is the fact that these commandments involve our whole being, every part of us.

·        Heart: In Scripture the heart is the central focus of our being.

It is where our emotions are, our reasoning takes place, our choices are made, our understanding is stored, and where our will and thoughts take place.

·        That is why Scripture commands us to protect it above everything else

o   /NAU /*/Proverbs 4:23/*/ Watch over your heart with all diligence, For from it flow the springs of life./

o   /NIV /*/Proverbs 4:23/*/ Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life./

·        The heart is the place God searches to form His opinion of us

o   /NIV /*/1 Samuel 16:7/*/ But the LORD said to Samuel, "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him.

The LORD does not look at the things man looks at.

Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart."/

o   /NIV /*/1 Chronicles 28:9/*/ "And you, my son Solomon, acknowledge the God of your father, and serve him with wholehearted devotion and with a willing mind, for the LORD searches every heart and understands every motive behind the thoughts.

If you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will reject you forever./

·        The heart is sometimes called the spirit of man because it is so closely related to the soul, and, it can be broken and crushed.

But God looks for those who are repentant, with a broken or crushed spirit, they are the ones God will save

o   /NAU /*/Psalm 51:17/*/ The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; A broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise./

o   /NAU /*/Psalm 34:18/*/ The LORD is near to the brokenhearted And saves those who are crushed in spirit./

·        If our hearts were pure~/clean our spirits would be immovable

o   /NIV /*/Psalm 51:10/*/ Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me./

o   /NAU /*/Psalm 51:10/*/ Create in me a clean heart, O God, And renew a steadfast spirit within me./

·        Soul:

·        /NIV /*/Genesis 2:7/*/ the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being./

·         God ‘breathed the breath of life’ into Adam and he became a ‘living soul,’ notice it is the combination of the breath, ‘ruah,’ of life and the body that make the living soul, the ‘nephesh.’

·        This speaks of the whole person through and through, these ideas are often misunderstood because we have to study them in parts but they actually describe the unity of a human person.

In Hebrew thinking we are living bodies, we do not possess bodies.

·         Notice that the whole person is described or implied

·        You can  fear for your soul

·        /NIV /*/Ezekiel 32:10/*/ I will cause many peoples to be appalled at you, and their kings will shudder with horror because of you when I brandish my sword before them.

On the day of your downfall each of them will tremble every moment for his life.

(soul, nephesh)/

·         You can risk your soul

·        /NAU /*/Judges 5:18/*/ "Zebulun was a people who despised their lives even to death, And Naphtali also, on the high places of the field./

·        /NIV /*/Judges 5:18/*/ The people of Zebulun risked their very lives (nephesh); so did Naphtali on the heights of the field./

·        Your soul can be taken

·        /NAU /*/1 Kings 19:4/*/ But he himself went a day's journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper tree; and he requested for himself that he might die, and said, "It is enough; now, O LORD, take my life (nephesh), for I am not better than my fathers."/

·         ‘Soul’ implies the whole being and it often refers to the individual person: Leah bore sixteen ‘souls’ (children) to Jacob (Gen.

46:18).

·        In the NT, ‘soul’ has the same basic meaning.

Soul refers to one’s life: Herod sought Jesus’ soul (Matt.

2:20); one might save a soul or take it (Mark 3:4).

Death occurs when God ‘requires your soul’ (Luke 12:20).

‘Soul’ may refer to the whole person, the self: ‘three thousand souls’ were converted in Acts 2:41 (see Acts 3:23).

·        But Scripture reminds us that the human heart is desperately sick and whatever impresses the soul is written on the heart.*

*

o   /NAU /*/Jeremiah/**/ 17:9/*/ "The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can understand it/

o   /NIV /*/Jeremiah/**/ 17:9/*/ The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.

Who can understand it?/

o   /NAU /*/Psalm 24:3/*/ Who may ascend into the hill of the LORD?

And who may stand in His holy place? 4 He who has clean hands and a pure heart, Who has not lifted up his soul to falsehood And has not sworn deceitfully./

·        This is why the passage in Deuteronomy 11 is so important to us, /"You shall therefore love the LORD your God, and always keep His charge, His statutes, His ordinances, and His commandments,/ it tells us what is involved in loving God which is the only cure for a sick heart; i.e. keeping God’s charge (doing His will), His statutes, His ordinances, or His commandments

·        Scripture tells us that obedience is more important and that means self-sacrifice and dying to ourselves comes before all other forms of worship

o   /NIV /*/Mark/**/ 12:30/*/ Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' 31 The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'

There is no commandment greater than these."

32 "Well said, teacher," the man replied.

"You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him.

33 To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices."/

o   /NIV /*/1 Samuel 15:22/*/ But Samuel replied: "Does the LORD delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the voice of the LORD?

To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed (honor~/respect) is better than the fat of rams./

The act of obedience is not what saves us because we are saved by the grace of God through putting our trust in Jesus.

But obedience is the means that God uses to help us reach our full potential, i.e. to be completely saved.

·        We have to remember that our Salvation is threefold: We are saved in  the past, we are being saved now in the present, and we will be saved in the future (glorification).

·        We have to recognize that we are a fellowship of sinners saved by grace and God has to sanctify us so that we can spend eternity with Him.

You see God cannot fellowship with us if there is any hint of sin in us.

So He must remove it and this process (the sanctification process) is accomplished when we respond to God in obedience.

God is Holy and cannot tolerate sin in any form.

That doesn’t mean that God is looking to destroy sin because He cannot stand it.

It means that because God is Holy anyone or anything that is not perfect would be destroyed simply by God’s presence.

Scripture describes Him as “a consuming fire.”

·        /NIV /*/Deuteronomy 4:24/*/ For the LORD your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God./

·        /NAU /*/Hebrews 12:29/*/ for our God is a consuming fire./

So God commands us to be holy because He is holy or to be perfect because He is perfect and that without holiness no one will see God.

·        /NIV /*/Leviticus 11:45/*/ I am the LORD who brought you up out of Egypt to be your God; therefore be holy, because I am holy./

·        /NIV /*/1 Peter 1:15/*/ But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; 16 for it is written: "Be holy, because I am holy."/

and

·        /NIV /*/Hebrews 12:14/*/ Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord./

·        /NAU /*/Hebrews 12:14/*/ Pursue peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord/.

What am I talking about when I say that God is Holy?

In the OT the basic idea of “holy” is “separation.”

In its verb form it is “to set apart to” or “dedicate.”

·        The pagan religions during OT times used the word holy to refer to something unique or different, and it carried the idea of a mysterious power.

Holy often referred to particular, impersonal objects that were removed from common life.

·        The OT writers based their idea of holiness on the fact that God is divine

·        He is separate from creation

·        He is holy; His very essence is holy, everything about God is holy!

·        God is not holy because He is absolutely moral; He is holy because He is the “Only Holy One.” Holiness is what God is which is way beyond the idea of  a mysterious power.

This means that God is unique and pure and far above all creation.

·        Because He is the “Only Holy One” holiness can only come from Him

·        Therefore God makes us holy!

Anything that is associated or related to God must be holy and that can only come from Him.

·        The nation of Israel was set apart~/sanctified or made holy simply because they belonged to God.

·        In the same way people, places and things are made holy because of God.

Another concept of holiness that comes from OT is found in the “purity laws” of Israel.

They showed the people that there must be an outward expression of holiness that showed a difference between the sanctified and the wicked.

·        The idea developed so that Holiness became a condition, a personal quality that the people carried as they put these rituals into practice.

So it became a two-fold concept:

o   Persons and things were set apart and had to be made holy

o   These had to become more and more morally holy.

·        Christians are called to do the same in the New  Testament.