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
0.1UNLIKELY
Disgust
0.09UNLIKELY
Fear
0.14UNLIKELY
Joy
0.63LIKELY
Sadness
0.46UNLIKELY
Language Tone
Analytical
0.52LIKELY
Confident
0UNLIKELY
Tentative
0.44UNLIKELY
Social Tone
Openness
0.84LIKELY
Conscientiousness
0.92LIKELY
Extraversion
0.46UNLIKELY
Agreeableness
0.92LIKELY
Emotional Range
0.74LIKELY

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
Philippians 1:1-2
Introduction
Good morning and welcome to this gathering of Hope Bible Fellowship.
I am so overjoyed that you decided to gather with us to worship the Living God.
Today we begin a series of messages that will take us on a journey through the book of Philippians.
I know this is a favorite book for many and I’m excited to mine the depths of what God is saying to His people through it.
I am indebted to Tony Merida for his diligent study and cohesive writing on this letter.
He has helped me greatly.
I would recommend his wonderful commentary on Philippians if you want to dig even deeper.
As we wade deeper and deeper into the glorious truths of this letter, you will find that it is extremely relevant to the very life situations you find yourself in day by day.
We ask questions like:
Is it easy to be a Christian in today's world?
Where should we look for true joy?
Where do we find meaning and purpose in life?
Do you need deep and encouraging friendships?
How does a church grow in unity?
Be on the lookout for the answers to those as we go on this journey together.
Philippians is a favorite book of the Bible for many.
This is evident in how many "life verses" we see in the book.
Philippians 3:10-11, 13-14
Philippians 3:20
Philippians 4:6-7
In Philippians 2:6-11 there is this amazing Christ hymn that glories in the humiliation of Christ and His willingness to serve and give His life willingly.
This brings us to the beginning of how we are going to break down this introduction to Philippians for you.
We are going to make a play on a popular meme or internet trend and look at HOW IT STARTED AND HOW IT'S GOING.
I. How It Started
We need to get a little context to the letter so we can understand what is going on and what it meant to those first people to hear it.
This letter is written by the Apostle Paul and there are very few who would dispute that.
He is writing from prison, ten years after having established the church in Philippi.
His tone is warm and friendly as this is a church that he loves.
Throughout the letter, his theological instruction is woven into the fabric of his words and he gives care to those words because of his relationship with the church.
This group at Philippi, this church, had special significance for Paul.
It was the first church that he planted in Europe.
Philippi.
It is written of Philippi that it was the most Roman city that Paul visited.
It was so like Rome that when someone would come to Philippi they might look around and think, "this reminds me of Rome."
Paul is writing this letter to Christians in this colony of Rome, Philippi.
In order to more fully understand what is going on in the book of Philippians, we are actually going to spend some time today in the book of Acts.
Turn to Acts 16:6 and as we read it and the following verses we will see the beginning of the Philippian church.
As Merida points out, we see two things that factor heavily into the beginning of the church at Philippi.
A. Submission/Surrender to the Spirit
This is submitting to God working out His plan to get the gospel to the ends of the earth.
We see this pattern forming of God using ordinary guys to fulfill the mission.
His mission.
He directs them by His "gracious providence" and the leadership of the Holy Spirit.
Friends, sometimes we just need to recognize that in His providence and sovereign plan, God OFTEN directs our path by shutting doors."
Many of the most well known missionary giants that we look to as hero's had the experience of wanting to go somewhere but ending up serving somewhere else.
Your task is to simply faithfully carry out the work that God gives you day in and day out.
And always be ready and willing to change directions as the Holy Spirit leads you.
Maybe you are spending too much time on your five year plan and not enough on your next ten day plan.
Don't waste your life.
Follow Jesus now, not just in the future.
What is there that you've been putting off?
Telling someone about Jesus?
A new work that the Spirit is leading you to start?
Have you recently had coffee or lunch with someone who doesn't know the Lord Jesus?
These are important questions because a second point that factored into the beginning of the Philippian church was also: evangelistic encounters.
B. Evangelistic Encounters
The church in Philippi didn't really start with a bang.
It didn't start with a big team of people and a band and a smoke machine.
It started small, quiet, and lowly.
It starts as Paul encounters this women's prayer meeting.
He meets a woman named Lydia who was a God-fearer in all likelihood.
She wasn't a Christian... yet.
Paul begins teaching and God opens her heart and her mind to believe the gospel.
You are not alone when you share the gospel.
The Spirit is working.
We have to trust this truth that God is one who opens hearts.
Paul went to a new area where no one had reached with the gospel.
He preached the Bible and you know what happened?
People got saved.
People came to know Jesus.
It still works like that.
This should act as encouragement for us to do the work of evangelism and church planting.
II.
How It's Going.
Paul's chief theme in the letter is encouragement.
He wants to encourage them to live out their lives as citizens of a heavenly colony/kingdom.
This would be evident by the outflow of increased service to God and one another.
The way of life described by Paul was shown perfectly and uniquely in Jesus Christ.
As we will see though, it was also evident in the lives of Paul, Timothy, and their good buddy Epaphroditus.
Paul and Timothy who is with him are sending this letter to the saints (Christians) in Philippi with the overseers and deacons.
Their message was grace and peace, gratitude and affection.
Let's take a look at the first two verses in the letter to the Philippians and see how Paul addresses them and what we can take away from that to set ourselves up for the rest of the series.
Read Philippians 1:1-2 “Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus, To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi, with the overseers and deacons: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”
At the beginning of the letter we have this salutation or greeting.
Paul does some things in this section that if we aren't careful, we might zip right by.
First, he designates Timothy and himself as servants.
This emphasis will carry on throughout the rest of the letter.
It is especially evident in the section on the humiliation of Christ from Philippians 2:5-11.
We see God’s amazing grace in the stories of the lives of the senders of this letter.
Paul - from persecuting the church to planting churches
Timothy - taught about the Lord by his mother and grandmother and raised up as a pastor-elder by Paul
Paul refers to the Christians that he is writing to as saints.
There is grace displayed in the simple fact that he can call them saints.
What is a saint?
It’s not some special designation of some super beyond amazing person or a turbo Christian.
They had become saints because they had heard the gospel of Jesus Christ and repented of their sin and believed the good news.
Paul preached pure gospel.
Jesus Christ, the Son of God, perfect in every way, crucified as a substitute for us, sinners, died in our place, and risen from the dead three days later.
< .5
.5 - .6
.6 - .7
.7 - .8
.8 - .9
> .9