Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Well, good morning.
[00:00:04] I am not Chet.
[00:00:07] I know.
[00:00:08] Bald beard. I know all that, but I am not Chet. If you ever get us confused, I'm a little bit chubbier than Chet, eat a little bit better, but I didn't skip leg day.
[00:00:21] So my.
[00:00:24] Am I allowed to say that?
[00:00:26] I don't know if I'm allowed to say that.
[00:00:29] That's pretty harsh, isn't it, man?
[00:00:34] So two weeks ago.
[00:00:35] That's terrible.
[00:00:37] Shame. Shame on me. Two weeks ago, Chet started a new series in the Book of Jonah. He started a new series for us in the Book of Jonah, and he asked me to fill in for him because he was at a men's conference, which I heard went well. Anybody able to make it to the men's conference?
[00:00:53] All right. Wow.
[00:00:56] Again, shame this time. Not on me, though. I didn't go.
[00:01:01] So it's. The Book of Jonah is a truly surprising story for a number of reasons, and it's surprising because Jonah is an Old Testament prophet. This is an Old Testament responsibility where the prophet was charged with hearing words from God and then communicating them out to the people. So he hears a message from God, and then he takes that message to reflect the character of God or the very words of God out to the people in order to get them to follow God a little bit more closely and know God a little bit better. So basically, they carried out God's instructions to help God's people to know him better and follow him more closely. And sure enough, God has a word for Jonah.
[00:01:45] As Chet shared with us, Jonah didn't want anything to do with God's call on his life. He refused to go warn the brutal and really terrifying Assyrians that God was going to judge their evil. God was going to come in and he was going to judge their evil, and he refused to go and warn them because they were his enemies.
[00:02:09] The. The Assyrians were the super empire of the day. They were shockingly brutal in their conquests and the way that they maintained their control over the people that they had conquered. They were effectively universally hated and universally feared. That's how terrifying they were.
[00:02:25] So has anyone here ever had an enemy? Anyone? An enemy?
[00:02:31] Wow. Yikes. What are we doing?
[00:02:34] Well, I had an enemy. Do you guys want to hear the story about my enemy?
[00:02:39] Oh, I don't know if you're ready for this. It's pretty rough.
[00:02:42] So my son James, who turns 10 today. Today is his 10th birthday.
[00:02:48] Happy birthday to James.
[00:02:51] We had a party for him yesterday. It was a paintball party.
[00:02:55] So all of his friends got Together, played a game of paintball. And then it was as if a voice from heaven was speaking through the ref. And the voice from heaven said, dads, do you want to join?
[00:03:09] And I did. I very much wanted to join. And it went better than expected because only two of the kids ended up leaving crying. And I was only directly responsible for one of them.
[00:03:23] The dads get it. The moms may be judging me, but the dads get it.
[00:03:29] So James, when he was two years old, while Kristen and I were at work, he would stay with a family friend named Ms. Becky.
[00:03:36] Ms. Beth had a delightful daughter who was a few years older than James, and she would greet him every single morning when I dropped him off with hi, cupcake head. And it was super sweet and it was super precious. And I was getting ready to leave one day and I hear another boy, a four year old boy, as I'm walking out. And he goes, he's not a cupcake head, he's a poop head.
[00:04:00] And church, in that moment, I had an enemy.
[00:04:07] So I stopped and I turn around and I start heading back in. And Ms. Beth says, we don't talk like that. And I mumble under my breath, not more than once.
[00:04:17] And that's the story of me having an enemy for all of about 12 seconds.
[00:04:24] It's hard for me to understand what it's like to harbor significant amounts of anger and fear toward an entire group of people.
[00:04:37] I think maybe that's true for most of us, that we're so removed from the world in which Jonah lived that it's really difficult for us to harbor anger, to harbor fear, and to have enemies that are so ingrained that we would rather see them destroyed than.
[00:04:56] Than turn and become like us.
[00:05:00] We would rather see God's judgment poured out on them rather than them change, repent, own their mistakes, and become like us.
[00:05:13] But Jonah did.
[00:05:15] Jonah harbored this kind of anger and this kind of fear against this group of people. So when God calls Jonah to Nineveh, the capital city of the Assyrian Empire, to warn them, he heads in, like Chet said, the exact opposite direction.
[00:05:30] He falls in with a ship of pagans. Pagans, meaning they didn't know God, so he wanted nothing to do with God's call on his life.
[00:05:39] He runs away and God sends a storm to bring him back. So Jonah, who was fleeing from God's call on his life, is sleeping in the bottom of the boat. He is asleep in the midst of this storm.
[00:05:52] He's so filled with anger and with spite toward the people of nineveh that he's willing to go down with the boat.
[00:05:58] And I want us to think about that for just a second, because while he's willing to go down with the boat, he's not the only one on the boat.
[00:06:11] His spite is so great that he's willing to take all of those sailors down with him.
[00:06:18] So Jonah's willing to go down with the ship. But the pagans, on the other hand, they respond a bit more appropriately to the very real danger that they are in.
[00:06:29] They're each calling out to their gods to save them.
[00:06:32] Each one of them their own God. They're calling out to their own gods to save them, and it just does no good.
[00:06:40] So in a panic, the captain wakes Jonah and tells him to cry out to his God, too. Maybe this guy's God can help. And that's where we left off. And I got to be honest, while the story itself is pretty simple, it can be a little bit uncomfortable for us to work through. It could be a little bit uncomfortable for us to actually wade into the details of this story.
[00:07:03] We have a hero character who fails.
[00:07:07] The hero fails and he runs away from the Lord.
[00:07:11] He's chastened through the storm, through the fish. And he's brought back to his senses in chapter two, mostly.
[00:07:18] And then he kind of gets back on track and he fulfills God's instructions with the call to the people at Nineveh, barely.
[00:07:27] And then in chapter four, when Nineveh, the people of Nineveh respond and they repent, and they hear the word of the Lord and it changes them.
[00:07:34] He pouts his response, and his reaction is one of pouting.
[00:07:41] So this hero character, this prophet who reveals God and his word is just filled with. With regret for the grace of God.
[00:07:52] So let's keep looking into Jonah. We're going to read the rest of Jonah chapter one this morning. You can listen or follow along as I read. We'll be in Jonah, chapter 1, verses 7 to 17.
[00:08:06] And they said to one another, come, let us cast lots, that we may know on whose account this evil has come upon us.
[00:08:14] So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah. Then they said to him, tell us on whose account this evil has come upon us. What is your occupation? Where do you come from? Where is your country? And of what people are you?
[00:08:28] And he said to them, I am a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.
[00:08:36] Then the men were exceedingly afraid and said to him, what is this you have done for the men? Knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord. Because he had told them.
[00:08:47] Then they said to him, what shall we do to you that the sea may quiet down for us. For the sea grew more and more tempestuous. He said to them, pick me up and hurl me into the sea. Then the sea will quiet down for you. For I know it is because of me that this great tempest has come upon you.
[00:09:04] Nevertheless, the men rode hard to get back to dry land. But they. But they could not. For the sea grew more and more tempestuous against them.
[00:09:12] Therefore they called out to the Lord. O Lord, let us not perish for this man's life. And lay not on us innocent blood. For you, O Lord, have done as it pleased you.
[00:09:23] So they picked up Jonah and hurled him into the sea. And the sea ceased from its raging. Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly. And they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows.
[00:09:34] And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. This is God's word. And it's given to us for our good. Let's pray.
[00:09:48] Lord, it is my prayer this morning. That we would be able to hear from you.
[00:09:56] You have appointed your prophet. Your prophet failed. May we hear in ways that he didn't. And may our hearts be opened in ways that his.
[00:10:05] His wasn't.
[00:10:07] Help us to know you better. Follow you more closely. This we pray in Jesus name. Amen.
[00:10:13] You know, if I were God.
[00:10:18] I'm not. If I were God, this would be a pretty short story.
[00:10:26] Even shorter than we have recorded for us.
[00:10:29] I would be inclined to stamp out Jonah's rebellion the first time he did it. And move on to the next prophet to send word. And I have a feeling that maybe I'm not alone in that. Anyone run a little bit shorter on patience than maybe we should?
[00:10:44] All right.
[00:10:46] That's not how God handles Jonah. That's not how God handles Jonah. God is going to accomplish his purposes. We know that about God. If we've kicked around church for any length of time.
[00:10:56] Maybe we've heard about God's sovereignty. Maybe we've heard about God's sovereignty. It simply means God has the right to do what he wants. He's God. He has the right to do what he wants. But he's also God. That means that he has the power to accomplish his purposes. And no one and nothing can stand in his way.
[00:11:17] God can do what he wants. And there's not anything that can stop him from doing that.
[00:11:23] God wants a message to go to Nineveh.
[00:11:26] Jonah doesn't want to take it. Jonah flees, God sends a storm, then we get the fish. Nothing is going to stop God.
[00:11:37] The problem is, if our understanding of God stops at sovereignty, that can be a little bit frightening, and that can be a little bit intimidating, can it?
[00:11:49] The right to do and the power to accomplish that is always frightening when it falls into the hands of human beings, isn't it?
[00:11:57] To have the right and nothing could stop them from doing it.
[00:12:01] As true as that is, God does have the right and does have the power. If that's the sum total of our picture of God, it's a pretty bleak picture of God.
[00:12:10] Thankfully, we don't just see God's sovereignty. Amen.
[00:12:16] Yeah. All right. There we go.
[00:12:21] God is more than just unchecked power in our lives.
[00:12:26] We see in Jonah's story providence. Providence means that God just doesn't have the right and doesn't just have the power he does, but that he is at work. And as God is at work, he is at work to accomplish his purposes. And his purposes are for salvation and for redemption and for restoration of the entire created order. God is at work for our good.
[00:12:49] God has the right to do what he wants. It will be accomplished. And his work is for good and salvation and restoration.
[00:12:58] God's actions are not just him flexing his muscles. They are him demonstrating his love for us. God acts to demonstrate his love for us.
[00:13:10] But who is the us? And I understand that that's a terrible way to phrase that. Who is us? If God is demonstrating his love for us, then who is the target audience of God's loving work?
[00:13:24] I think that's what the story of Jonah is getting at.
[00:13:27] It moves our understanding of God. And maybe, just maybe, it shines a bit of light back on us.
[00:13:34] So let's walk through the story and see if we could see both God's power and his goodness.
[00:13:40] In verse seven, the sailors, they cast lots to see who brought this evil on them. And it just so happens that the lot fell to Jonah.
[00:13:51] In verse 8, they immediately fire off a laundry list of questions. They want to know who he is and what he did to put their lives in danger.
[00:14:00] Jonah, he knows how to handle the situation. He knows how to talk to a group of pagans. I mean, he's a prophet, right?
[00:14:09] He could certainly handle some frightened pagans. And sure enough, in verse nine, he answers with a lot of strength.
[00:14:15] He says, I'm a Hebrew.
[00:14:19] He identifies his people, and that immediately is going to put him in a completely different category with everyone else in the region and everyone else on the boat, the rest of the crew. Because he adheres to God's law, it's safe to assume that Jonah did. Even if he rejected this call that God gave him in his life, it's safe to assume that Jonah obeyed the call. And that means his diet is different. The very food that he eats is different than everyone else around him. His clothing is different than everyone else around him. At a fundamental level, every single aspect of Jonah's life is going to set him apart significantly from the rest of the people in the region and certainly from the pagan sailors that are on the boat with him.
[00:15:02] And in case they don't catch from him saying he's a Hebrew, he starts talking about his God.
[00:15:08] Jewish beliefs on God were radically different than beliefs of pagan or pantheistic religions of the day. He says, I fear the Lord, the God of Heaven, who made the sea and dry land.
[00:15:24] The pagans would fall into one of two camps.
[00:15:29] They'd fall into one of two camps. First, they would have a bunch of different gods, Gods over different things, like God of the harvest, or God of the moon, or God of the sun, or God of fertility, whatever the case may be. They would have a bunch of different gods that each had their own little category, their own little niche in which they were in charge.
[00:15:47] That's one category. Or they would have a God that was specific to their region or specific to their people group.
[00:15:53] But here is Jonah, and he says, the God of heaven.
[00:15:58] So right away, they're going to think, ooh, this is an important God. I better pay attention. If it's the God of Heaven, this is an important God.
[00:16:06] And then he goes on to say, maker of the sea and dry land. Well, they don't really have a category for that. They don't have a category for the God who is creator of everything.
[00:16:20] Wait, not just our little local God, not just the God of the dirt, but the God of sea and dry, the God of everything. Creator of everything.
[00:16:33] But they hear what he says.
[00:16:34] They hear this one God over all creation, and they believe him. And they're terrified.
[00:16:41] What have you done?
[00:16:44] And now it's frankly amazing that they hear the most basic description of God imaginable. And their response is to believe and to fear.
[00:16:55] And all the while, here's Jonah, Jonah saying, I know God. I've spoken for him. I fear God. I have this reverence and this awe for who God is, but, you know, not quite enough to obey.
[00:17:11] This is really on the nose. This is really on the nose.
[00:17:16] By outward appearances, Jonah is better, right? By all outward appearances, Jonah is the better person. He's like me, you know, I'm a good church guy. Shoot. I even went to seminary and was a pastor for a long time. I know the right things about God. I can say the right things about God. But here's the rub. There is something that is wrong with Jonah's heart.
[00:17:42] He knows the right things, he's saying the right things, but it just doesn't match with how he's living.
[00:17:50] The. The pagans, on the other hand, I mean, they're pagans. The opinion of the godly Jewish people who would have been the first to hear the book of Jonah, the first to read the book of Jonah would have been universally to condemn and to look down on the pagan sailors.
[00:18:08] Because if Jonah the prophet is the hero, if Jonah the prophet is the hero, then the pagans would of course, be the villains.
[00:18:18] And yet they hear one sentence about God and they immediately believe and respond.
[00:18:28] Their belief is evident in their response. Verse 11. They asked Jonah, what do we do to you to survive?
[00:18:37] And here, for the first time, it seems like Jonah is doing something unselfish.
[00:18:45] He says, just throw me in the sea.
[00:18:48] Well, is he going to sacrifice himself to save them?
[00:18:53] Yes.
[00:18:54] But also, maybe this is just Jonah trying one last time to avoid the call God placed on his life.
[00:19:05] Is this just another way to run away?
[00:19:09] And I don't know if there's a clear answer to that question, but I do know that if Jonah really did know the Lord and really did fear the Lord, then maybe he should start with humbling himself. Maybe he should repent. Maybe he should call out to God to rescue him and to rescue those with him. But he doesn't do that. He says, toss me overboard and you'll be fine.
[00:19:35] I mean, is he saving them if he turns them into murderers?
[00:19:42] Because a storm is threatening the boat? It's bad enough that the boat itself is in danger. And if the boat isn't going to survive, then tossing someone overboard is absolutely a death sentence. It is effectively, for all intents and purposes, it is effectively murdered.
[00:20:00] And the pagans, I don't know if we can still keep calling them pagans at this point. They understand this, so we're told. They try to roll back to dry land, only to find the storm against them even more. So Jonah, who is maybe still running and maybe still trying to foil God's call on his life, finds himself in the care of a surprisingly compassionate crew pagans who want to save his life when he is the one who brought them into danger. They're in danger because they brought Jonah on this passage. And they can save themselves by throwing him overboard. And they still try to row to dry land and still try to save Jonah.
[00:20:43] Do we feel how backwards this seems? That the one who most closely knows the Lord is the one whose behavior is wrong at every step of the way? And these pagans who just heard one sentence about God are now doing everything they can to preserve and to protect life, not just their own lives.
[00:21:03] They also ask.
[00:21:05] They also call out to God. At this point, when they realize they're not going to be able to make it back to dry land, they call out to God and they have two requests for God when they pray. First, they don't want to die for this man.
[00:21:18] God is and has been clearly working against Jonah. And they cast lots which God used to point to Jonah. Then Jonah even admitted it. So there's no question that God is the one that has been working against Jonah.
[00:21:31] The storm that is after Jonah is a very real danger to them. Since the storm is from God. They cry out to God to save them from it.
[00:21:41] And they also ask that Jonah's death not be held against them.
[00:21:46] They don't want to be responsible for his murder. They don't want his blood on their hands. And I can understand that.
[00:21:54] I can absolutely understand that.
[00:21:56] So the crew of the ship toss him in. The sea calms. They recognize that all of this is God at work in their midst.
[00:22:06] And so they offer sacrifices to God and they make vows to God.
[00:22:11] Everyone, including Jonah, believed that would be the end of Jonah's life.
[00:22:18] But it's not.
[00:22:19] Verse 17 tells us.
[00:22:22] You know what? I'll let Chet cover that next week. He can talk about the fish.
[00:22:26] Kidding.
[00:22:28] God sends a fish. God. The word there is. God appointed a fish God directed behind the scenes. God directed this fish to come up and to swallow Jonah. So the fish swallows Jonah, and then it carries Jonah in its belly for three days and three nights.
[00:22:44] Church. How big is the ocean?
[00:22:48] Anybody been on the ocean?
[00:22:49] How big is the ocean?
[00:22:52] I mean, there are times when I think Lake Erie can be large and intimidating. And it's a mud puddle. Like, here is the ocean and here is one man in the ocean. And it just so happens that there is a fish large enough to take hold of Jonah in the right place at the right time.
[00:23:12] Great fish, guided and controlled by God, takes hold of Jonah. It's wild.
[00:23:18] An unbelievable story, isn't it? I Mean, we could. We could say that, right? This is a wild and unbelievable story.
[00:23:25] This is some of that weird Bible stuff that we get.
[00:23:30] Anybody going to be comfortable? Okay, yeah, this is weird Bible stuff.
[00:23:36] But church, this is not even close to the most miraculous or supernatural thing that we believe.
[00:23:41] Not even close to the most supernatural or miraculous thing that we believe.
[00:23:46] But Jonah's time in the fish points to the most miraculous thing that we believe.
[00:23:50] We are in the Old Testament. We were in Jonah's time. If we fast forward from Jonah's time to Jesus time, we'll see Jesus make a clear reference to Jonah's time in the fish.
[00:24:00] In Matthew 12, Jesus is having a conversation with a group of religious leaders. And I want us to understand a bit about these guys that Jesus is talking to.
[00:24:11] Church. No exaggeration, no hyperbole. These guys spent their entire lives studying the Scriptures. Some of them would have even memorized the first five books of the Bible. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. They would have memorized the first five books of the Bible word for word. They knew more words about God forwards, backwards, and inside out than me.
[00:24:37] They were fanatical in their study of Scriptures. And these people are having a confrontation with Jesus. And they demand a sign for Jesus to validate his authority. How is he doing these things? How is he making the claims that he is? And they come to Jesus with all of their knowledge about God, and they demand a sign from him.
[00:24:58] Now, Jesus had already done a ton of stuff in his life and ministry when he has this interaction with them. He had healed countless people. He had cast out countless demons. There have been hundreds, if not thousands of witnesses that have seen him lovingly take broken people and piece them back together physically and emotionally and spiritually, and make the broken people around him whole, complete and whole and well. And yet they demand a sign from Jesus.
[00:25:30] And Jesus says, with all of the signs that he has already done, with all of the witnesses that could testify to the work that he has done on behalf of us.
[00:25:41] Jesus says, no sign will be given except the sign of the prophet Jonah, the sign of the prophet Jonah. That's where my authority comes from. That's where you will see my authority. For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man, so will me, the Messiah, Jesus, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
[00:26:09] And so Jonah's time in the fish becomes a metaphor for Jesus death, burial, and resurrection. It becomes A metaphor for Jesus time in the grave. And it creates a connection between these two events. Jesus creates a connection between these two wild and improbable and impossible events.
[00:26:29] First, both of these events are miraculous.
[00:26:33] Jonah's boils down to effectively impossible odds. That's how we know it's miraculous. Where a fish swallows a man just before he drowns in a storm, holds him in his stomach for three days and three nights, and then regurgitates him, just happens to be right in the place where he can go and fulfill the mission that God has for him. It's impossible. It's miraculous.
[00:26:54] And Jesus, well, he was dead and buried and walked out alive.
[00:27:04] It doesn't happen.
[00:27:07] So they're both miraculous. And the heart of both these stories is a drive to repentance. In Jonah's story, it's a drive to his own repentance. He needs to change from fleeing from God and get back on track to where God wants him in his life. So it's for Jonah's repentance. It's all also repentance for the people of Nineveh.
[00:27:26] God loves these monsters.
[00:27:30] God loves these brutal murderers, and he wants them to repent and to come back to him.
[00:27:37] And it also includes these pagan sailors.
[00:27:42] God is out for their repentance as well.
[00:27:47] So for Jesus, his fulfillment of the sign of Jonah is to call each and every one of us to follow him through repentance and faith so that we too can share in his new life. Jesus, death and resurrection is all about us being able to experience his new life through repentance and faith. So miraculous stories that lead to repentance, which can bring us life. And so we get the wild and the improbable, Jonah and the fish, which point us profoundly to the hope that we have in Jesus and the response of the people of Nineveh to Jonah's message.
[00:28:24] Spoiler. The response was wholesale. Repentance and faith, that should be our response to the death and resurrection of Jesus. That's what Jesus was getting at by bringing up Jonah and tying these two stories together.
[00:28:37] Now I get it.
[00:28:39] We're kind of in the weeds. We're kind of in the weeds a little bit this morning. So let's get back on track. God miraculously and graciously uses a fish to save dying Jonah from the storm.
[00:28:53] That's the story.
[00:28:55] That's the story of Jonah and the ship's crew and the raging storm.
[00:29:01] Now, what do we do with this?
[00:29:04] What do we do with this? That's the important question.
[00:29:07] We can Answer this in two ways.
[00:29:11] And these two ways can be used when we read God's Word in our own lives as well. So what do we learn about God's word? God.
[00:29:18] What do we learn about God? And where is our place in the story? Those seem like good questions.
[00:29:26] How can I know God better? And what does this mean for me?
[00:29:31] So what do we learn about God? God is orchestrating events in ways we can't even imagine. And we see the storm and the very real danger that Jonah and the crew are in. And maybe we're inclined to think that God is out to get him.
[00:29:46] That whole he has the right and he has the power to accomplish his purpose, this thing. And. And if God is out to get Jonah, then that makes the crew collateral damage for God's anger against Jonah.
[00:29:59] And if our picture of God begins and ends with God having the right to do what he wants and the power to accomplish his purposes, then sure, God is out to get Jonah. And it doesn't matter who else gets damaged when God is acting for his own ends.
[00:30:16] But God is just. He's not just powerful.
[00:30:19] God is good. He is good. God is not out to destroy Jonah. He's working to bring him back.
[00:30:28] Jonah tried to stop God from accomplishing his purposes, but God's power and goodness were at work to save, and nothing Jonah could do would stop God from. From saving.
[00:30:39] You see, God is not gracious because he responds to our repentance.
[00:30:45] He does. He absolutely does.
[00:30:49] But God is gracious because he brings us to repentance, and he leads us to repentance.
[00:30:58] It took a storm, some pagan sailors, and a fish, but he led Jonah back to him and back to the call that he had placed on his life.
[00:31:08] This is a bit of God's providential goodness at work. This is how God reveals himself.
[00:31:13] And so we look to another Old Testament prophet, a guy by the name of Moses.
[00:31:19] He was the one who brought the Hebrew people out of slavery in Egypt. He was the one who brought God's law to the people. He was the one that God used to bring the people through the wilderness to their home. Moses had a close and a unique relationship with the Lord.
[00:31:33] And he makes an incredible request of God that's recorded for us in the book of Exodus. In Exodus 33:18, Moses says to God, please show me your glory.
[00:31:46] Please show me your glory.
[00:31:49] And this is an absolutely audacious request, but this is. This is the right thing to ask of God.
[00:31:59] Please reveal your glory to me.
[00:32:01] And I like to think that if not now, but that there will be a time in my life where I will have that same degree of faith and that same degree of audacity in my relationship with the Lord that I will be able to call out to him and ask him to reveal his glory to me.
[00:32:19] Please show me your glory.
[00:32:21] So what's God's glory?
[00:32:23] Well, verses 19 and 20. Right after that, God said, I will make my goodness pass before you. And I will proclaim before you my name, the Lord. And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. But he said, you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.
[00:32:43] Show me your glory.
[00:32:47] I'll show you my goodness.
[00:32:49] I want to see your power and your majesty, God. That's what I want to see. I want to see your power and your majesty. And God says, you will.
[00:32:57] And it is my goodness.
[00:32:59] And I'm so good in my love and grace and mercy and faithfulness. I am so good that if you were exposed to all of my goodness, it would absolutely break you.
[00:33:12] You cannot see all of the goodness that I have for you. You cannot see all of my goodness and live.
[00:33:22] This is the good God that was at work in Jonah's life to bring him back.
[00:33:29] And he has to see that God has grace and mercy.
[00:33:33] Even for those people that Jonah doesn't think are worthy of God's grace and mercy.
[00:33:40] That would be his enemies. That would be the Ninevites. But it would probably also be those pagan sailors that were willing to risk their lives to save him. God is saying, I'm going to extend grace to the people that want it. I'm going to extend mercy to the people that need it.
[00:33:58] Church, we shouldn't, can't, don't limit the grace and mercy of God. We don't determine who is deserving of God's grace and mercy.
[00:34:11] I start to realize a little more each day, the more I learn of God, that God is far more gracious and inclusive than we are.
[00:34:23] He is.
[00:34:25] Listen to the way God describes himself when he finally reveals his goodness to Moses. Just one chapter later.
[00:34:32] This is God showing up. He's finally answering Moses requests. And he's showing up to allow his goodness to pass before moses in chapter 34. Beginning in verse 6. This is God speaking. He says the Lord passed before him and proclaimed the Lord, the Lord, a God, merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. Keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin. But who will by no means clear the guilty.
[00:35:09] God in his own voice is talking to Moses. He's not using a prophet. He's not using an intermediary. He's not even using his written word. He's not using that in his own voice. He is describing himself.
[00:35:24] He says, I'm more merciful than you can imagine. I'm more gracious than you can ever imagine. I'm patient and loving and faithful, and I will forgive you.
[00:35:40] Yes, God has the right and the power, and yes, that can be a fearful thing.
[00:35:46] It inspired fear in the crew that was carrying Jonah. But their reaction didn't stop at fear, because they also saw and tasted and experienced the goodness of God. And God's goodness, His grace and mercy and faithful love. It inspired worship in them.
[00:36:04] And there's this last phrase we read. But who will by no means clear the guilty.
[00:36:12] This was Jonah's mission.
[00:36:14] He was to go to Nineveh and tell them of their guilt before the Lord. He would tell them of their guilt before the Lord. Why? Why would he tell them of their guilt?
[00:36:25] So they could find God and so they could experience his grace and mercy and faithful love. So that they could experience his forgiveness.
[00:36:34] And I hope we see a compelling picture of God.
[00:36:38] And I hope we can see ourselves in this story.
[00:36:41] So where are we in this story?
[00:36:45] Are we Jonah?
[00:36:48] Are we the crew?
[00:36:51] Are we the storm? Because we just love to bring chaos. I don't know.
[00:36:56] And I have to say that far too many times in my life I have been Jonah.
[00:37:09] I've known the right things about God. He was my job for a long time. And I've also been. Well, maybe there have been times when I've had higher standards than God himself does.
[00:37:21] Maybe there have been times when I believe people were too far gone to receive God's grace. I don't know.
[00:37:27] I feel really uncomfortable saying this, but maybe there were even times when I haven't wanted people to receive God's grace. And that is a terrifying and a frightened thing to admit about your own heart and about your own life.
[00:37:40] And that's what Jonah 1 forces us to do. Implicit in the story is Jonah's self righteousness and superiority and influence to the people around him. And we have to see the areas in our lives where maybe, just maybe, we look a little bit more like Jonah than we care to admit.
[00:37:59] Could just be me. I don't know.
[00:38:02] And I have to say that I've been the crew of the ship at times as Well, I have seen the goodness of God and responded to him with faith and worship. And that's what they did. They responded with very simple, saving faith. And if we want to, we can have a conversation about the substance and the quality of their faith if we want to.
[00:38:22] Frankly, I don't want to have that conversation, because what I see from them is faith. It is faith in God for His salvation and his provision. They recognize the work that he has done for them, so they cry out to him and they offer sacrifices.
[00:38:38] Jonah describes God in a. In a very simple and truthful way that somehow compels these pagan sailors to recognize the difference between their God or gods and the God who created everything.
[00:38:52] And while Jonah, who knows God better than them, runs away, they meet God for the first time and they fall before Him.
[00:39:00] And I want to think about Jesus for a moment, how Jesus would talk about this kind of situation. He uses a simple story. It's not a true story, but it's a truth story. To illustrate what faith is, he shares a parable. He tells a parable in Luke 18. And the parable goes like this. Two men go in to the temple to pray. One man is a religious leader. He is professional and he's knowledgeable and he's trained, and he lives an incredibly upright life. And the other guy, he's a mess.
[00:39:30] And he makes his living ripping people off.
[00:39:33] The religious leader prays and he thanks God that he's so awesome. Not that God is so awesome, but that He Himself, the one who is praying, is so awesome. And what does the mess do? How does the mess pray? What could he even say to God?
[00:39:49] I mean, with the life that he's living, what could he even say to God?
[00:39:54] He says, God, be merciful to me, a sinner.
[00:40:04] God, be merciful to me, a sinner. And God will answer that prayer. Prayer offered in faith every single time.
[00:40:12] And that's what we see from the sailors. And that's what I have been at times myself. I have come to a point many times in my life where all I can do is cry out to God for His mercy and then be surprised and amazed when he provides it for me.
[00:40:30] I don't know why I'm still surprised when he pours out his mercy on me.
[00:40:34] So my prayer for myself and for each one of us is that our time as Jonah would fade. There would be a little less of Jonah in my life and in our lives, and there would be a little more of those sailors in our lives, that we would respond and react and live with that simple faith and that simple trust, more like them today than we did yesterday and more tomorrow than we do today that we would cry out for mercy and rejoice in the goodness of God. Let's pray.
[00:41:10] Lord God, we love you.
[00:41:15] We praise you. Help us to love you above all things in our lives and help us to praise you above everything, for you alone are worthy of our praise.
[00:41:24] As we look at the words that we see in the book of Jonah, may they be a point of transition in our lives and in our hearts where we could come to a point where we look more like the simple and beautiful faith of those sailors who just cry out to God for mercy and then cry out to God with thanks for the mercy that they receive.
[00:41:44] Help us to cast off the Jonah both individually and as a church. Lord and I thank you that we are such a church that welcomes those that doesn't have that religious superiority. God, in your goodness you have shaped us to be this. And I pray that that would continue in greater measure every day.
[00:42:02] Lord, we love you and we praise you in Jesus name, Amen.
