Blinded by Anger

Introduction:

When I'’'m Blinded by Anger... (Jonah 4):

1. I cannot see that God's plan is better than Mine . (Jonah 4:1-4)
2. I cannot see that My Comfort isn't the Point . (Jonah 4:5-9)
3. I cannot see any Needs of Anyone Else . (Jonah 4:10-11)

   Matthew 12:40-41 - For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here.

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:01

  Well, good morning.

  00:03-00:05

  What a blessing to be part of Baptism Sunday, amen?

  00:07-00:10

  Can we give another round of applause to everyone who got baptized today?

  00:17-00:17

  Wow.

  00:19-00:21

  Let's start by going to the Lord in prayer.

  00:23-00:28

  Lord, I thank you for everything that you have already done this morning, God.

  00:28-00:48

  incredible testimonies that we witnessed. And God, I just pray that as we dive into your word, God, that you would open our hearts to that as well, Lord. We thank you for what you're doing, and we give you all the glory. In Jesus' name, amen.

  00:50-01:25

  Well, for any of you who don't know me, my name is Justin. I'm married to the love of my life, Michelle. We actually celebrated 11 years this month. Thank you. But today, I'm going to take you back to just a few weeks before our wedding day. And as anyone who has gone through that knows, the last few weeks are exciting, but honestly, they can be stressful, especially for the bride-to-be, right?

  01:26-01:31

  Plans and the final details, and you just want everything to be just right.

  01:32-01:42

  Well, on this particular night, Michelle and I were at my parents' house, we were hanging out with my mom and dad, and we were about to have dinner.

  01:44-01:50

  And out of nowhere, Michelle started to insist that she needed to go to Walmart.

  01:51-02:00

  Now, I don't exactly remember what she needed, but I do remember thinking that it didn't sound urgent.

  02:01-02:03

  So I said, "Okay, that's fine.

  02:03-02:14

  Let's go after dinner." And she's like, "I really need to go now." Like I said, the last few weeks are pretty stressful.

  02:15-02:22

  So even though I was very confused, I may have been slightly frustrated on the inside.

  02:24-02:57

  By God's grace, I said, "Okay, let's go get what you need and let's come back." So we grabbed our coats, I opened the door, and this part is true, you can ask Michelle about it after service if you'd like. I took one step out onto the sidewalk and some guys jumped me from behind. They covered my eyes, grabbed my hands, took me off the ground, and started running away, but in that chaos I didn't fight back.

  02:59-03:27

  Right? Because we all assume that if I did fight back it would have been over right then in there, right? But I didn't, because of two reasons. Reason number one, Michelle didn't scream. That's a little curious. Reason number two, as I was being carried away, I heard my dad yell goodbye to my kidnappers. Wasn't exactly what I expected.

  03:30-03:43

  Anyway, on the way to the destination, my hands were tied, I was blindfolded, and at some point my shirt was removed, but the entire drive, everyone was totally silent.

  03:45-03:56

  Then the car stops, and I heard sliding doors, kind of like at the grocery store, as I was led into a building and then it was freezing.

  03:58-04:18

  They lifted me up and into something and I was thinking, "Am I shirtless in a trash can in the frozen food section right now?" And I was pretty close because when the blindfold came off, I was shirtless and I was in a trash can but I was in an ice rink.

  04:20-04:23

  And now you know the story of how my bachelor party began.

  04:25-04:37

  During the heist, they actually ran into the house and grabbed my skates and my hockey stick and my gear, and we spent the night playing hockey on the rink that they rented out.

  04:37-04:38

  It was awesome.

  04:40-04:47

  But what I'd like to call your attention to this morning is the part of that story when I couldn't see.

  04:47-04:52

  And you're like, "Well, yeah, you were literally blindfolded." And I was.

  04:52-04:57

  But do you know when I was even more blind than that?

  04:59-05:05

  When Michelle was not at all acting like Michelle, and I couldn't see, something was up.

  05:07-05:18

  I was confused, I was frustrated, I was concerned, and all of those emotions blinded me from seeing what was actually going on.

  05:19-05:24

  Now, of course, in that story, me not knowing what was going on was the entire goal.

  05:25-05:33

  But at different times, all of us have felt emotions take over in some way, haven't we?

  05:34-05:36

  Our emotions can blind us.

  05:37-05:40

  Like confusion or fear can blind you.

  05:41-05:44

  Even happiness, it can blind you.

  05:45-05:47

  I mean, really any emotion can.

  05:49-05:52

  But maybe the most common one is anger.

  05:53-05:55

  Anger blinds us.

  05:55-05:56

  True or false?

  05:57-05:57

  True.

  05:59-06:07

  And so if you'll please open your Bibles with me to the book of Jonah, chapter four, that's exactly what we're gonna see today.

  06:09-06:14

  While you're turning there, let's recap Jonah's journey up until this point.

  06:15-07:08

  Flee, fish, forgiveness. In Jonah chapter 1, God tells Jonah to go to the city of Nineveh and tell them to repent of the evil they're doing, but instead Jonah flees on a boat to escape. He ends up thrown into the water and famously, timely testimony, is swallowed by a fish. Chapter 2, from within the belly of that that fish. Jonah sees his mistake, prays to the Lord, and is saved as the fish spits him back out on the land. And in chapter 3, God again tells Jonah to go to Nineveh, and this time he does. And Nineveh hears his preaching, and the entire city repents of their sin. And in his mercy, God spares them. Forgiveness.

  07:08-07:24

  flee, fish, forgiveness. And while that's how the story of Jonah is most often remembered, that's not the end of the book. It's not the end of Jonah's story.

  07:25-07:41

  Now, after the entire city repented, you would expect chapter 4 to be a celebration, right? Let's look at Jonah chapter 4, verse 1. This is after Nineveh was spared.

  07:42-08:37

  It says, "But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry." Wait, wait, wait. Jonah was angry about what happened. Verse two, "And he prayed to the Lord and said, 'O Lord, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish, for I knew that you were a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster. Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live." Flee, fish, forgiveness, furious. Jonah is furious.

  08:39-08:54

  And as we dig into the scripture this morning, we have to ask ourselves, when I'm tempted to be furious, do I actually respond any differently? Or do I act just like Jonah?

  08:56-09:24

  Because reading that, our first reaction is probably, "I don't get angry like that!" Right? Are you sure? Because for some people, anger leads to yelling and screaming, but some people go completely silent. And some people rush into wild and crazy reactions, but others retreat and isolate and start to grow bitter.

  09:25-10:54

  And while there are things that should make us angry, some people think that their anger is always righteous anger. And I got to tell you, that's almost almost never the case. So it shows up in different ways, but any one of us can be blinded by anger. And in this passage, Jonah couldn't see anything. So, on your outline today, when I'm blinded by anger. Number one, I cannot see that God's plan is better than mine." So beyond reading about Jonah's hysteria, these verses also revealed why he initially ran away. Did you catch that? He said, "That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish. For I knew that you were a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster." And this is bananas, because Jonah ran away not because he was scared for his own safety and not because he thought Nineveh would ignore him. The prophet Jonah ran away because he knew if Nineveh repented at his preaching, God would forgive them. What is that about?

  10:57-11:20

  The short version is Jonah, honestly, didn't think that Nineveh deserved it. Israel was God's chosen people, and Nineveh was Israel's enemy. So Jonah wasn't just a little bit upset about this, he was losing his mind. Like, I knew it, God. I knew once they repented that you would forgive them.

  11:21-11:26

  I knew you would let him off the hook. Just take me now. I can't even handle this another second.

  11:29-11:30

  Sorry, that was matching Jonah's intensity.

  11:34-11:38

  How do you think God responded to that? Let's look at verse four.

  11:41-12:19

  And the Lord said, "Do you do well to be angry?" We serve a patient God. Amen? God is asking Jonah, "Does it benefit you to be angry?" This question could also be translated, "Do you have a right to be angry?" You know, if you somehow tracked all the anger that I've ever felt, I bet probably 75% of my lifetime anger happened while I was driving.

  12:20-12:21

  Does anybody else know what I'm talking about?

  12:23-12:36

  I remember one day years ago, we were driving home, and just before we got there, the driver in front of me, extremely dangerously, in my view, of course, cut me off.

  12:38-12:41

  And as Michelle and I walked into the house, I was still heated.

  12:43-12:49

  And, to my shame, I said, "You know what I wish?

  12:50-12:55

  I wish that every year, everyone got a free punch at anyone else.

  12:56-13:03

  You get one punch per year, no consequences." I'm not proud of that.

  13:05-13:18

  But after I said it, Michelle looked at me and paused and said, "Justin, the only problem with that plan is that multiple people would use their punch on you."

  13:18-13:19

  [laughter]

  13:23-13:28

  That happened almost 10 years ago, and I'm still thinking about it.

  13:28-13:32

  Not because I'm upset, but because she was so right.

  13:33-13:38

  Because my plan for judgment presumed that I was always innocent.

  13:40-13:44

  Now, OK, was I actually going to go start throwing haymakers around Route 19?

  13:44-13:45

  No.

  13:46-13:50

  But I hope you see that in my anger, I was Jonah.

  13:52-14:01

  Because just like I forgot that I'm neither a perfect person nor a perfect driver, Jonah forgot about his own rebellion.

  14:03-14:07

  And Jonah loved God's plan of mercy when he was inside the fish.

  14:07-14:49

  But when God's plan was to save people that Jonah didn't think deserved it, then he wasn't on board. Now maybe you're thinking, "Well, okay, Jonah was misguided, but I support God showing mercy to anyone." And I hope that's true. But even if that's true, there are always aspects of God's plan that are hard for us. Like Jonah, when something doesn't go the way that we want, it's hard for us to trust God's plan. But it is easy to get angry about it.

  14:51-15:34

  When we don't get the job we thought we would, when we don't get a spouse when we thought we would when we lose a loved one. We're like, "God, how can this be your plan?" Or when we're in the middle of a health issue and it's just not getting better, "God, how can this be your plan?" Or when we look around and see people who glorify sin thriving, we ask, "God, is this your plan?" Because we wonder if God is orchestrating things versus allowing things versus tolerating them.

  15:35-16:01

  And the honest truth most often is, we don't know. Now, please understand that God is sovereign and nothing is a surprise to him, but we are not God. And there's a bigger picture that we just can't see. So sometimes we can look back at what God was doing, but in the moment, how? Why?

  16:03-16:26

  And just like Jonah, in our anger we're tempted to think that our plan would be better, because we are Jonah. We forget. So I encourage you today to pray to the Lord to remember When you get frustrated by someone else's sin, first remember how God forgave your sin.

  16:27-17:02

  And when you're frustrated by a circumstance, remember another time that things looked bleak, and it was only later that you could see how God was working. Because that's going to shift your prayer from, "God, I can't possibly see how this is your plan," to, "God, I know that you were working for my best then. So even though I can't see it right now, I'm choosing to trust your plan because I know it's better than mine. Do you see that difference?

  17:04-17:10

  Unfortunately, Jonah didn't see that difference. And that leads us to point number two today.

  17:12-17:19

  When I'm blinded by anger, I cannot see that my comfort isn't the point.

  17:22-18:23

  So let's go back to the text. Jonah chapter 4, verse 5. It says, "Jonah went out of the city and sat to the east of the city and made a booth for himself there. He sat under it in the shade till he should see what would become of the city." Okay, so at this point Jonah has left Nineveh, and he built a little hut overlooking the city. Verse six, "Now the Lord God appointed a plant and made it come up over Jonah, that it might be a shade over his head to save him from his discomfort. So Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the plan. But when dawn came up the next day, God appointed a worm that attacked the plant so that it withered. When the sun rose, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on the head of Jonah so that he was faint.

  18:24-18:53

  And he asked that he might die and said, "It is better for me to die than to live." So Jonah goes to a very dark place again. And the Bible doesn't say exactly how Jonah's hut was built, but we can infer that he didn't have a great roof, right? Because he was absolutely thrilled to get some shade, but then thrown into despair when God took it away.

  18:54-19:25

  The sun was hot, the wind was scorching, and Jonah was melting. And how did God respond time. Let's look at verse 9. "But God said to Jonah, 'Do you do well to be angry for the plant?' And he said, 'Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die!'" Jonah was melting, and Jonah was melting down.

  19:27-19:32

  So what's going on? What was God's point in creating and destroying this plant?

  19:33-19:44

  We'll get there in just a minute because first I want us to see that whatever God's point was in this miraculous object lesson, Jonah completely missed it.

  19:46-19:47

  And why did he miss it?

  19:49-19:55

  Because Jonah was so angry about being uncomfortable, he couldn't even see the point.

  19:56-20:08

  Now, I'm not saying that everything that happens to us is an object lesson from God, and I'm not saying that God doesn't give us comfort, because he does, both now and eternally.

  20:09-20:17

  But what the text is saying is following the Lord is not always comfortable, just like trusting God's plan.

  20:18-20:20

  Sometimes it's hard.

  20:22-20:31

  And while comfort in itself isn't a sin, it can become an idol, something that we pursue ahead of God.

  20:32-20:34

  And I mean, that shows up all over the place.

  20:35-20:39

  Like one example, some people choose a church based on comfort.

  20:40-20:50

  They want minimal participation, they don't want to serve, they don't want any difficult or convicting passages, like this one, to be preached.

  20:51-20:57

  The priority is comfort instead of what God's Word says to do.

  20:58-21:14

  Or another example, as a parent, there are about 500 things today that are uncomfortable to talk about with your kids, but at the appropriate time, they need you to talk with them.

  21:15-21:17

  Are you willing to be uncomfortable then?

  21:19-21:28

  Or ask anyone here who's been on the mission field, locally or abroad, the first thing that you have to let go of is your own comfort.

  21:29-21:34

  So don't let comfort become an idol or you're going to miss the point.

  21:36-21:51

  You might be asking, "Well, Justin, do you have another story of your own failure that perfectly reflects Jonah's sinful attitude?" And to my shame, of course I do, because I am Jonah.

  21:53-22:09

  At the church I attended in college, we had an event every year where we gave away a bunch of donated furniture to incoming international students, who obviously have a much harder time bringing large items with them.

  22:10-22:15

  So it was a big outreach to serve a need and make connections.

  22:16-22:43

  And one year, a man, Mr. Bonetti, came up to me around that time and said, "Justin, are you coming to the student furniture thing on Saturday?" And I replied, "Oh, Mr. Bonetti, we already have furniture for our apartment." Church, I'm telling you, in that moment, he almost used his one punch for the year.

  22:45-22:59

  He said, "Not for you! So you can meet the students, so they know someone on campus, and you can invite them to church." I wasn't angry that time, but you see what happened.

  23:00-23:05

  I was so focused on my own comfort, I completely missed the point.

  23:07-23:09

  I wasn't even considering what other people might need.

  23:11-23:13

  And that's the heart of our third point for today.

  23:15-23:24

  When I'm blinded by anger, number three, I cannot see any needs of anyone else.

  23:28-23:31

  So let's see what God meant by the live-action parable.

  23:32-23:36

  He sent the plant that shaded Jonah, and then he took it away.

  23:37-23:39

  Let's rewind to verse 9.

  23:41-24:03

  "But God said to Jonah, 'Do you do well to be angry for the plant?' And he said, 'Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die.' And the Lord said, 'You pity the plant for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night.

  24:06-24:28

  And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?" So God laid it out for Jonah. That plant that shaded him, Jonah didn't put seeds in the ground.

  24:29-24:46

  Jonah didn't water it, and even if he did, Jonah can't actually make it grow. It was there for one day, and yet it was so important to him, he wanted to die over it being gone.

  24:48-25:12

  And God said, "If you're that concerned about a plant, should I not be concerned about a city full of people that I did create, that I did make grow, that have been there a lot longer than one day. A city full of people who are trapped in their sin and they don't even know how to escape.

  25:14-25:30

  That is our God, church. He is gracious and merciful. He is slow to anger and He is abounding in love. And as God suggested earlier in the passage, Jonah had no right to be angry.

  25:31-26:18

  The creation belongs to the Creator. And on top of that, Jonah had more compassion for a plant than he did for thousands of lives. And in our anger, we also miss what anyone else around us needs. We can't even see it, because the only thing we can see is whatever we're angry about at that time, because by nature, we are Jonah. But church, the glorious truth this morning is that our Savior, Jesus Christ, said He is Jonah.

  26:19-27:08

  Jesus said, you'll have to check this out, "For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here. See, like Jonah, Jesus descended and came back. And like Jonah, Jesus preached to a people in rebellion against God. But Jesus, the greater Jonah, didn't run from God's plan like Jonah did. He submitted to it.

  27:09-27:16

  And Jesus didn't idolize his own comfort. He sacrificed it.

  27:18-27:37

  And Jesus, the greater Jonah, didn't ignore the needs of his people. Through his death and resurrection, he fulfilled our every need. I mean, that's what we celebrated with baptisms today, right? We saw everyone identify with what Jesus accomplished through his death and resurrection.

  27:38-28:07

  They declared, "The old me is dead, and it's Jesus, the greater Jonah, who lives inside me." Through Jesus, we don't have to be blinded by anger, we don't have to be ruled by emotion, because we're rescued from that. Because Jesus brought salvation, and not just to the nation of Israel, not just to people who look or act or think like us, but to everyone who believes.

  28:08-28:39

  even Nineveh? Because as we prepare to close, that's the question that God leaves us with, isn't it? That last verse. "And should not I pity Nineveh?" One of the reasons the book of Jonah is fascinating is we don't know how Jonah answered that question. Instead, God poses that question to us.

  28:41-29:01

  Now, reading this chapter, reading this whole book, and knowing what Jesus has done, how could we answer anything but, "Yes, God should pity Nineveh." But when Nineveh is the ancient city from these verses, It's a lot easier to answer that way.

  29:03-29:09

  Who is your Nineveh today? Who blinds you with anger like Jonah?

  29:11-29:13

  Bad drivers? No, Justin, that's just you.

  29:15-29:22

  But seriously, is it terrorists? Is it criminals?

  29:23-29:29

  If they truly turned to the Lord, how would you feel about them being forgiven?

  29:31-29:56

  For some, it's a political party or maybe a political leader. You know, in some cases, I've heard they can make people upset. What about someone closer? A friend or a family member who deeply hurt you, have you ever thought, "I will never forgive that person"?

  29:59-30:05

  When that's Nineveh, do we answer the same way? Should God pity them?

  30:08-30:13

  Do we view ourselves as worthy of God's mercy while thinking they are not worthy of it?

  30:16-30:22

  Whoever we think our enemies are, do we pray for them to come to the salvation that we know?

  30:23-30:43

  Or in our anger, do we say, "You know what? I'm done with them." That's Jonah. And church, we can't be Jonah anymore, because as Jesus said, something greater than Jonah is here.

  30:45-30:55

  See, Jonah took the mercy for himself and wanted to give judgment to others, but Jesus took the judgment upon himself to give mercy to others.

  30:57-31:03

  And we all need his mercy, any and all of us.

  31:05-31:06

  So will you pray with me, please?

  31:11-31:15

  Lord God, we thank you so much for this morning, God.

  31:15-31:33

  We thank you for the work of your son Jesus that we celebrated with baptisms earlier, and that same work, God, that we celebrate now because through Jesus' death and resurrection, you have given us everything we need.

  31:34-32:21

  we need, you've given us the mercy that we all need, God. And so I pray that you would change our hearts to, instead of being blinded by anger, to have our eyes opened to see with your perspective, Lord God. May we reflect the character and the love that Jesus Christ demonstrated and that we celebrate. I pray that it would be real in our lives, God, this week and throughout the rest of our lives as we continue to serve you. We thank you and we give you the glory, Father. We pray this in Jesus' name, Amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read Jonah 4

1. What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
   

2. Have you ever found yourself frustrated by God’s plan? How would you encourage someone who’s going through that right now?
   

3. In what ways can the pursuit of comfort in the church today lead us to miss the point?
   

4. What are some areas where you need to be transformed from “Jonah” to “Greater Jonah” thinking?
   

5. Who is your Nineveh today? How is God calling you to view them with compassion?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

Even if you are angry with Him!

1. Getting angry with God is Common and Irrational (Jonah 4:1-9)

Is it ever okay to be angry with God?

I can get angry with God…

What do I need to know about coming to God?

1. When I forgot the Grace the Lord has shown me.


2. When the Lord doesn’t agree with my Judgments


3. When my personal Comfort becomes my focus..


2. God pursues the angry with a Proper Perspective (Jonah 4:10-11)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:04

  All right, Bible is our middle name. So do you have yours?

  00:05-00:36

  Harvest Bible Chapel you got yours. Do you have a cool one? That's actually on paper Or do you have one of those lame? It's on my iPod ones Grab your Bibles and turn Like I'm feeling so convicted right now Grab your Bibles and open up to Jonah chapter 4 What's that? You know what?

  00:40-00:45

  It's -- I know. I was hoping nobody would notice.

  00:47-00:50

  But am I speaking loud enough for you back there?

  00:55-00:55

  (audience laughing)

  00:59-01:00

  I was hoping nobody would notice.

  01:00-01:11

  They're like, "We need you to wear the microphone this morning." I'm like, "Why?" Because the microphone is going into the computer to record the sermon for the website.

  01:11-01:21

  So, anyways, if you don't hear me broadcasting through a speaker as normal, if you need me to speak up, just like pull on your ear or something, okay?

  01:23-01:28

  And by the way, I really don't think it's lame if your Bible is on your iPod, okay?

  01:30-01:32

  I have one on mine too, okay?

  01:33-01:35

  It's just hard to underline and highlight things on that.

  01:37-01:39

  Like "Oh, I have a program that does that." Okay.

  01:41-01:42

  No, it's cool, really.

  01:43-01:44

  Jonah chapter 4, are you there?

  01:46-01:47

  Let's pick up...

  01:47-01:50

  Actually, I want to go back to a quick review.

  01:50-03:13

  been going through the book of Jonah and the name of the series is God is out to get you, right? Isn't that good news? God is out to get you. And we saw in Jonah chapter 1, even when you're, bless you, even when you're on the run from God, God says, I'm still coming after you. And when we're broken before God, he's coming after us. And even people that don't know God. He's out to get them as well. And then we get to Jonah chapter four. Well you know the story Jonah had after some persuasion in chapters one and two Jonah decided he was going to go to Nineveh and preach and there was this mass revival and this is how we closed last week Jonah chapter 3 verse 10 it It says, "When God saw what they, what Nineveh, all the way from the king on down, when God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that He had said He would do to them, and He did not do it." And I've got to tell you, I'm glad Jonah did not end after chapter 1, aren't you?

  03:13-03:15

  You remember chapter one?

  03:15-03:17

  God says, I want you to go preach at Nineveh.

  03:17-03:19

  And Jonah was like, that's not happening.

  03:19-03:21

  I'm going as far away from you as possible.

  03:21-03:23

  And God says, yeah, we'll see.

  03:24-03:25

  And you know the story.

  03:25-03:30

  He got on the boat heading to Tarshish and God sent the storm.

  03:30-03:34

  And the sailors, the mariners were like, what's going on here?

  03:34-03:38

  Apparently somebody up there is mad at somebody down here.

  03:39-03:41

  And they were casting lots and they were crying out to their gods.

  03:41-03:46

  And they figured out that through the casting lots that Jonah was the problem.

  03:48-03:58

  And Jonah's like, "Well, just throw me overboard and the problem will stop." He preferred suicide over preaching to Nineveh.

  03:58-04:05

  Well they still tried to row to get the ship out of danger and they couldn't.

  04:07-04:09

  So they said, "All right, Jonah, you win.

  04:10-05:11

  you go?" And there was a revival on the boat, and as we said, they went on to plant Harvest Bible Chapel Tarshish. And I'm glad it didn't end there, right? Could you imagine if like that was it in your Bible? Like, okay, Jonah was thrown overboard, the end. But it didn't, because the Lord sent a fish to swallow Jonah, which was actually God's means of deliverance as Jonah was praying in chapter 2 he thought he was dead drowning and the Lord sent the fish to swallow him but I'm glad Jonah didn't end after chapter 1 but I'll be honest with you I I really wish Jonah would have ended at chapter 3 you know wouldn't that be great if that was like the end of the book when God saw what they did how they turned from their evil way God relented of the disaster he said he would do to them and he did not do it. I wish we could say that's amazing. Great story. Massive revival.

  05:11-05:17

  And they all lived happily ever after. But the story goes on in chapter four.

  05:18-05:24

  So let's look at that together. It says, but it displeased Jonah exceedingly.

  05:27-05:28

  And he was angry.

  05:31-05:33

  Is that is that in your Bible, too?

  05:34-06:36

  Like what? It displeased Jonah exceedingly and he was angry. Now, understand this, this is probably the greatest revival in history. The greatest revival event you could say in history. Would you agree with me on that? Can you think of a bigger one than this? Jonah going into the biggest city in the world at the time and everyone from the king on down and remember even the animals had sackcloth on, but fasting and repentance and crying out and there's this mass revival, biggest revival in history. What would you expect chapter 4 to say? And Jonah skipped all the way back to Israel and celebrated and they They had a party and they had this amazing worship service because of this revival.

  06:37-06:39

  But that's not what your Bible says.

  06:41-06:42

  And you know, I can.

  06:43-06:45

  This was a hard chapter for me.

  06:46-06:49

  Studying this week because when I go through the Bible, I can identify.

  06:51-06:54

  Can't you identify with a lot of failures of people in the Bible?

  06:54-06:55

  Can you do that?

  06:55-06:57

  Like, yeah, David.

  06:57-06:58

  Yeah, Samson.

  06:58-06:59

  Yeah, Peter.

  06:59-07:02

  You can identify with a lot of the failures of some people in the Bible.

  07:02-07:04

  This is one I just don't get.

  07:05-07:07

  A preacher rolls into town.

  07:10-07:12

  The whole city breaks out in revival.

  07:15-07:23

  And notice he wasn't just a little miffed, it says he was displeased exceedingly.

  07:25-07:25

  And he was angry.

  07:26-07:29

  Verse two says, and he prayed to the Lord and said, Oh, Lord.

  07:31-07:34

  Is not this what I said when I was yet in my country?

  07:37-07:40

  Now, understand, he wasn't he was angry, right?

  07:41-07:48

  This wasn't a now I lay me down to sleep kind of prayer, this was, I imagine, screaming at God.

  07:51-07:55

  That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish.

  07:56-08:05

  For I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and relenting from disaster.

  08:08-08:10

  Therefore, now, oh Lord, please.

  08:12-08:13

  Take my life for me.

  08:15-08:17

  For it is better for me to die.

  08:18-08:19

  Than to live.

  08:22-08:43

  So why was Jonas so mad? He told the Lord why he was mad. He said, "God, I told you so." He didn't want them to repent. And what you have going on here is sort of a national prejudice.

  08:44-08:47

  That's why he didn't want to go in the first place. He didn't want to go.

  08:47-08:50

  He wasn't afraid that they wouldn't believe him.

  08:52-08:53

  He was afraid that they would.

  08:55-08:58

  He wasn't afraid that they would mock God.

  09:00-09:03

  And the God would still send judgment and that the mission was a failure.

  09:04-09:07

  Jonah didn't want to go because he was afraid that the mission was going to be a success.

  09:07-09:10

  Did you catch that? Can you understand that?

  09:11-09:16

  I've been trying to wrap my brain around that all week, I just there's only one answer.

  09:19-09:28

  It's that Jonah's hatred for Nineveh must have been so deep that he would actually get mad at God for being so gracious.

  09:29-09:29

  Did you see that?

  09:33-09:34

  I'm mad at you, God, why?

  09:35-09:40

  Because you're gracious and because you're merciful, because you're slow to anger and you're abounding in steadfast love.

  09:41-09:44

  God, you would rather relent from disaster.

  09:45-09:49

  And that totally ticks me off right now is what Jonah is saying.

  09:51-09:52

  And how bad did it get?

  09:54-09:59

  Well, we saw in verse three, Jonah said, you know what, I just I just wish I was dead.

  09:59-10:00

  God, you know what? Why don't you just kill me now?

  10:01-10:04

  It is better for me to die than to live.

  10:05-10:06

  Really?

  10:10-10:13

  But look at this is this is grace right here.

  10:15-10:17

  Just write that in the margin of your Bible.

  10:19-10:31

  Or like type it on those really tiny keys on your iPod, and the Lord said, but this is just grace, you know, the Lord should have just said, OK, you know what, Jonah, you hate my grace and you wish you were dead.

  10:31-10:32

  Fine. Here you go.

  10:33-10:35

  dead. But this is grace.

  10:37-10:40

  And the Lord said. Do you do well to be angry?

  10:42-10:44

  Isn't that isn't that like a father?

  10:46-10:51

  It's not like a father taking this pouting, irrational kid.

  10:53-10:54

  Pulling him aside and saying.

  10:56-10:58

  Hey, think about what you're doing here, kid, are you?

  11:00-11:01

  Is it OK?

  11:02-11:04

  Are you doing the right thing?

  11:06-11:08

  Being so angry, do you do well to be angry?

  11:11-11:18

  Well, on your outline, God is out to get you even when you are angry with if you are angry with him.

  11:19-11:24

  Now. Number one, getting angry with God is.

  11:25-11:27

  This is all I could come up with.

  11:28-11:29

  First of all, it is common.

  11:29-11:30

  Write that down. It's common.

  11:31-11:32

  You hear a lot of people say that.

  11:32-11:39

  I'm angry at God, I'm mad at God right now. It's common, but listen, I'm not going to make excuses for it.

  11:40-11:43

  Because here's the other word, it's common and irrational.

  11:45-11:52

  Getting angry with God is common, and it is irrational.

  11:53-12:01

  So the question is, is it ever okay to be angry with God?

  12:04-12:06

  Is it ever okay to be angry with God?

  12:06-12:09

  Usually, when does somebody get angry with God?

  12:09-12:13

  Usually it's during a time of suffering.

  12:14-12:22

  Maybe a disease on you or worse yet, on someone in your family, right?

  12:22-12:24

  And you're angry with God.

  12:25-12:29

  Or maybe it's through a divorce or a death.

  12:31-12:34

  Some circumstances come into our lives and we're angry with God.

  12:36-12:38

  Now when we talk about being angry, understand this.

  12:40-12:49

  There's a difference between, this is so important, there's a difference between being angry at a thing and being angry at a person.

  12:50-12:58

  There is a difference between being angry at a thing and being angry at a person.

  12:59-13:09

  When we are angry at a thing, we express displeasure because of its effect.

  13:12-13:15

  For example, I'll give you a personal example.

  13:16-13:16

  Autism.

  13:17-13:20

  Take a guess how I feel about autism. Do you want to guess?

  13:21-13:23

  For those of you who are visiting, both of our boys are autistic.

  13:23-13:27

  You know, autism is a spectrum. We got one on this end of the spectrum, and we got one on this end of the spectrum.

  13:27-13:31

  Guess how I feel about autism. I'll tell you how I feel about autism.

  13:34-13:37

  I said, you know, God, just grant me this.

  13:39-13:43

  When everything is being thrown into the lake of fire, may autism be embodied somehow.

  13:44-14:09

  and somehow when autism is thrown into the lake of fire, might it like somehow catch itself on the edge and oh Lord grant me the grace to walk up and be the one to kick it in. That's how I feel about autism. All right it's something that's you know been an uphill battle in our family. Is it okay to be angry at a thing like that or insert disease of your choice? You know maybe it's cancer.

  14:10-14:12

  We're not saying you have to like those things, okay?

  14:13-14:25

  And it's okay when there's a displeasure in you over those things because this is not how things are meant to be and it's not how things are going to be long-term by the way.

  14:25-14:32

  Autism is going into the lake of fire as well as cancer and all means of death.

  14:33-14:38

  Right? There's going to come a day that The Lord is going to be done with all of that.

  14:39-14:41

  As well as everyone who has rejected him.

  14:43-14:47

  And the demons who have rebelled against him and Satan.

  14:49-14:51

  So it's OK if you're angry at a thing.

  14:53-14:59

  OK, I don't like the effect that this has, but here's the difference when we're angry at a person.

  14:59-15:21

  Understand this key difference when you're angry at a person You're expressing displeasure at a choice that they made and that's where it gets a little different When you're angry with someone for any reason here is the root of what you're saying I don't agree with what you did I don't like what you did. I think you made a wrong choice, right?

  15:22-15:24

  Isn't that what happens when we express displeasure?

  15:25-15:54

  anger at a person You made a wrong choice. You shouldn't have done that So, let me ask you have you ever been angry with God Because honestly at the very root of that that's what you're saying God you messed up Can we see how irrational that is Do we know some things about God all knowing all loving?

  15:55-15:58

  Sovereign, you know, God's never said whoops, not one time ever.

  15:59-16:01

  He's never he's never said it.

  16:01-16:02

  He has never said it.

  16:02-16:03

  God's never been like, whoa, whoa, whoa.

  16:04-16:05

  Where was I on that one?

  16:06-16:09

  He is sovereign over every single detail.

  16:11-16:19

  Of the universe, Jesus said, he knows how many hairs are on your head for some, that's more than others, but he knows how many hairs are on your head.

  16:19-16:28

  And if he cares about such an insignificant detail, how much more does he care about the things that are burdening you?

  16:28-16:31

  God's never said, whoops, he's never shown up a minute late.

  16:31-16:34

  There's times he's shown up early, but he's never shown up late.

  16:35-16:36

  His timing is always perfect.

  16:37-16:40

  Right. But when we're angry with God.

  16:42-16:49

  Honestly, it's just it's it's being irrational because now we're calling into question if he's sovereign.

  16:49-16:55

  if he's loving, if he's good, and if he's for me.

  16:57-16:58

  Is God on your side?

  17:00-17:06

  Well, we read this a couple of weeks ago, didn't we, Romans 8, if God is for us, who can be against us?

  17:06-17:07

  Is God on your side?

  17:08-17:10

  He sent his son to die for you.

  17:11-17:15

  That doesn't sound like somebody that has your worst interests in mind, right?

  17:22-17:32

  You know, I hear a friend of mine who's not a believer, a few weeks ago made a statement.

  17:32-17:54

  He said, "I'm just totally convinced that God hates me." And I said to him, "Well, the cross of Jesus Christ says otherwise, right?" I have another friend who was telling me how mad she was at God because her mother passed away.

  17:55-18:02

  And she said, "I used to stand at my mother's grave and just scream at God how angry I am at God.

  18:02-18:09

  I used to scream, 'God, I'm so mad at you!'" Really?

  18:13-18:16

  It's appointed for each of us to die, right?

  18:16-18:25

  And I'm not making light of that, and it is hard, but it's part of this life.

  18:29-18:33

  And actually for the believer, death is crossing over into glory.

  18:33-18:41

  So to be angry at God for a life to be gone, He's the giver of life in the first place, isn't He?

  18:43-18:53

  I'm not saying we don't mourn over a loss, but to blame God and to be angry with God, it's disapproval.

  18:54-18:55

  God, You did something You should not have done.

  18:56-19:07

  Genesis 18.25, "Shall not the judge of all the earth do what is just?" What's the answer? Yeah, God can't help it. He will always do the right thing.

  19:07-19:14

  Revelation 16.7, like Genesis, it said at the beginning, Revelation, it said at the end.

  19:15-19:32

  "Yes, O Lord God, the Almighty, true and righteous are your judgments." Understand, the eternity, for those of you who know Christ, the eternity that you spend with God, you are never going to say to him, "You know God, I really think that you dropped the ball on this one.

  19:32-19:44

  Looking back on my life, I really think you should have done this one different." The chorus you're going to echo is, "True and righteous are your judgments." God, you always do the right thing.

  19:46-19:49

  Well, people feel guilty about being angry, right?

  19:49-19:51

  And here's where the problem comes in.

  19:51-19:57

  I'm mad at God, then I feel guilty about being angry, And then I think that God is now angry with me.

  19:59-20:00

  Here's a quick remedy.

  20:02-20:06

  Christians. If you're angry with God.

  20:08-20:11

  I'm going to let you know a little secret, he already knows, OK?

  20:13-20:14

  Right. Do you think he knows he knows?

  20:15-20:18

  Just tell him, God, I'm struggling with anger right now.

  20:19-20:21

  I'm sorry. I know I shouldn't feel this way.

  20:22-20:24

  God, will you help me to deal with this?

  20:24-20:27

  I know that you're good, God, but I'm wrestling with this.

  20:27-20:29

  Can you just get honest with God?

  20:29-20:30

  That's what you see in the Psalms.

  20:30-20:32

  I'm just going to be honest with you, God.

  20:32-20:33

  It's OK to be honest with God.

  20:33-20:40

  Did you know that he knows what you're going to say before you say he knows what you think, even if you don't say it?

  20:44-20:50

  Well, most people are angry with God because they question his goodness, because they don't understand some things about him.

  20:50-20:53

  And here in Jonah, we're going to read through the rest of this text here.

  20:53-20:59

  Jonah was angry with God because of his goodness to people that Jonah hates.

  21:01-21:04

  Jonah was angry with God because he did understand some things about God.

  21:05-21:08

  And the Lord said, verse four, Do you do well to be angry?

  21:09-21:10

  What's the answer to that?

  21:13-21:15

  Being angry at God.

  21:16-21:17

  Good idea or bad idea?

  21:19-21:21

  Yeah, I'm with you on that bad idea.

  21:22-21:25

  Well, the Lord asked him, you know, you do well to be angry.

  21:25-21:28

  And what was Jonah's answer? He didn't say anything.

  21:28-21:36

  Look at verse five. Jonah went out of the city and sat to the east of the city and made a booth for himself there.

  21:38-21:39

  He sat under it in the shade.

  21:40-21:43

  Look at this. So he should see what would become of the city.

  21:44-21:45

  What's going on here?

  21:46-21:51

  Jonah was still hoping that God was going to bring the hammer down on Nineveh.

  21:51-21:52

  That's what was going on.

  21:53-21:54

  He's like, oh, you know what?

  21:54-21:55

  Maybe there's a chance.

  21:56-21:57

  Maybe there's a chance.

  21:59-22:01

  He was still hoping.

  22:03-22:04

  Verse six says, now the.

  22:06-22:08

  Now the pages in my Bible are stuck together.

  22:12-22:17

  Now, the Lord God appointed a plant and made it come up over Jonah.

  22:19-22:25

  that it might be a shade over his head to save him from his discomfort.

  22:27-22:30

  So Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the plant.

  22:32-22:36

  Circle the word glad in your Bible because that's the only time you're going to see Jonah was happy about anything.

  22:40-22:45

  Citywide revival! He's like, "Ugh, exceedingly displeased.

  22:46-22:49

  Plant? Woohoo!

  22:51-22:52

  Exceedingly glad.

  22:55-22:57

  But when dawn came up the next day.

  22:59-23:01

  OK, so check this out, God appointed the plant.

  23:02-23:03

  Keep that in the back of your mind.

  23:03-23:09

  But when dawn came up the next day, God appointed a worm that attacked the plant so that it withered.

  23:12-23:18

  When the sun rose, here it is again, God appointed a scorching east wind.

  23:18-23:26

  Notice. Great emphasis is being placed here that these weren't things that were happening accidentally.

  23:27-23:33

  God was like boom, plant, boom, worm, boom, scorching east wind.

  23:33-23:35

  He was doing all these things firsthand.

  23:36-23:43

  OK, when the sun rose, God appointed a scorching east wind and the sun beat down on the head of Jonah.

  23:44-23:45

  So that he was faint.

  23:47-23:49

  And he asked that he might die.

  23:51-24:11

  And said, "It is better for me to die than to live." But God said to Jonah, "Do you do well to be angry for the plant?" And he said, "Yes, I do well to be angry.

  24:14-24:15

  Angry enough to die.

  24:20-24:21

  Let's pause here for a second.

  24:24-24:27

  Because you know the big lessons coming, right?

  24:29-24:30

  Just jot these things down in your outline.

  24:32-24:33

  I can get angry with God.

  24:34-24:35

  That's bad wording.

  24:35-24:39

  I was like so anxious to get the outline to the bulletin.

  24:39-24:40

  I looked at that again.

  24:40-24:41

  I'm like, that's really bad wording.

  24:43-24:52

  it's not like, "Brace yourself, I'm about to give you permission to be angry with God." That's not what I mean. What I mean is, these are occasions in which I am tempted to get angry with God.

  24:52-24:57

  That's what I meant. That sounded very awkward too. Maybe I'm glad I went with this one.

  24:59-25:02

  Okay. These are occasions we can get angry with God.

  25:02-25:09

  Letter A. Just jot these down because this is going to happen to you if you're not on guard.

  25:11-25:14

  You'll be tempted to get angry with God, first of all, when I forget the grace that the Lord has shown me.

  25:19-25:25

  We are so much a "what have you done for me lately" culture, aren't we?

  25:26-25:27

  What have you done for me lately?

  25:31-25:39

  I heard James McDonald a couple weeks ago in one of those email video things that I know many of you get.

  25:40-25:41

  Did you see him talking about the one-strike Christians?

  25:43-25:52

  You know, that they're with you through a lot of things.

  25:53-26:14

  And then the one time something is said or happens that they don't agree with, they're like, "Okay, I'm done. I'm writing you off. On to the next church. One-strike Christians." A lot of Christians are like that with God sometimes, right? "What have you done for me lately?" Okay, you want to play a game? We played a game last week. Let's play a game this week.

  26:14-26:21

  You ready? We're going to play, "How long would it take me to forget I was thrown in an ocean and swallowed by a fish.

  26:23-26:23

  You ready?

  26:25-26:26

  We're gonna play.

  26:27-26:32

  How long would it take me to forget that I was thrown in an ocean and swallowed by a fish?

  26:33-26:38

  Okay, how many people think in 30 years you would forget that that happened to you?

  26:39-26:40

  All right, nobody.

  26:42-26:44

  This game is turning out a lot worse than I thought it would.

  26:45-26:55

  How many think that like in 60 years, By that point in your life, you might have forgotten at some point in your life you were thrown in an ocean and swallowed by a fish.

  26:55-26:56

  Anybody?

  26:56-26:57

  Sixty years maybe?

  26:57-26:57

  Okay.

  27:00-27:02

  Well, here's the thing with Jonah.

  27:02-27:03

  This looked like a matter of what?

  27:04-27:04

  A day?

  27:07-27:08

  A couple hours, right?

  27:08-27:11

  Like he's vomited on the shore and that fish was his deliverance, remember?

  27:12-27:17

  And he's just like, he totally wrote that thing off.

  27:18-27:19

  Totally wrote off.

  27:19-27:25

  He was at death's door and God delivered him in the most amazing way possible.

  27:27-27:29

  I wouldn't forget, I'll be honest with you.

  27:30-27:32

  I would be the most annoying person you've ever met.

  27:32-27:32

  I might be already.

  27:33-27:41

  But anybody that stood still for longer than three seconds, I'd tell them, "Did I ever tell you about the fish story?" Like, "Yes." I'm going to tell you again.

  27:42-27:46

  I was swallowed by a fish for three days.

  27:49-27:52

  While he forgot, we have terrible memories.

  27:53-27:54

  And, you know, kidding aside.

  27:57-28:09

  You see people so content to ignore the Lord while he's pouring on grace after grace, upon grace and provision upon provision.

  28:09-28:14

  But the minute any adversity comes, why, God?

  28:15-28:16

  Right. Don't you see that?

  28:18-28:24

  people that breathe God's grace every moment and the minute any little adversity comes.

  28:26-28:27

  Why, God?

  28:29-28:38

  The why might just be because we live in a fallen, decaying, cursed world that's going to eventually be burn up and replaced.

  28:40-28:45

  It might just be the effects of sin in the world, but we blame God.

  28:46-28:56

  Sometimes it's good to just make a list just to say, you know what, I'm just going to I'm just going to thank you for the things that you've done, start a list like that and call me in a couple of years when you're done with it.

  29:00-29:01

  OK, so let her be.

  29:03-29:05

  This was Jonah, when the Lord doesn't agree with my judgments.

  29:06-29:09

  You'll be tempted to get mad at God when he doesn't agree with you.

  29:09-29:11

  Oh, heaven forbid.

  29:12-29:14

  God doesn't agree with me, agree with my judgments.

  29:17-29:19

  I hope you smelled the sarcasm there.

  29:20-29:23

  We already saw that Jonah was a prophet before all of this started.

  29:26-29:28

  Good thing about Jonah, he loved Israel.

  29:30-29:38

  But the downside of that was, again, he had a great hatred for the Assyrian Empire, of which Nineveh was the capital, even after the revival.

  29:38-29:42

  And here's the foundation of the matter here.

  29:42-29:45

  was saying, they don't deserve to be saved.

  29:46-29:47

  Isn't that what he was essentially saying?

  29:48-29:49

  They don't deserve to be saved.

  29:50-29:56

  That's why I didn't want to preach, because I knew if they repented, you'd save them, relent from your disaster.

  29:56-29:58

  And quite frankly, I don't think they deserve it.

  30:00-30:01

  Isn't that what's going on here?

  30:04-30:05

  I think they should be judged.

  30:07-30:08

  And God says.

  30:10-30:15

  You know what, I'm on a little bit of a different track here, Joan, and by a little bit different, I mean completely the opposite.

  30:17-30:18

  Loving God means loving people.

  30:21-30:25

  Jesus taught us you can't separate the two. You just can't.

  30:25-30:26

  You just can't.

  30:27-30:36

  Actually, John says in 1 John 4, 20, "If anyone says, 'I love God and hate his brother,'" Oh, you read that, right?

  30:36-30:36

  He's a what?

  30:38-30:38

  A liar.

  30:41-30:43

  akin to the kind whose pants are actually on fire.

  30:44-30:46

  If you say, I love God.

  30:48-30:50

  But I hate my brother, you're a liar.

  30:51-30:56

  It says, for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God, whom he has not seen.

  30:56-30:58

  You're like, OK, well, that's like the brother thing.

  30:58-31:01

  I get that. Well, jot this one down.

  31:01-31:04

  Matthew five, verses forty three through forty eight.

  31:06-31:15

  Jesus said, "Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect." And obviously, none of us can attain that in the flesh.

  31:17-31:18

  He gives us that, right?

  31:18-31:22

  Grace is God, what, giving to us what He requires from us.

  31:25-31:29

  But in the context of that teaching, what Jesus is talking about is loving people.

  31:29-31:31

  Like, yeah, loving the people I like, right?

  31:31-31:35

  No, Jesus said even the pagans do that.

  31:37-31:41

  He said, "You know what your father is like? He sends the rain on the just and the unjust." Right?

  31:42-31:48

  God shows grace in equal measures, available to everyone.

  31:49-31:55

  Available to everyone. Available to who? Everyone. Right?

  31:57-32:09

  But let me ask you, is there anyone that you think deserves hell and you can't wait until they get it?

  32:11-32:12

  I just want you to think about that.

  32:13-32:15

  Can you think of, can you be more specific? Sure.

  32:16-32:16

  What about a race?

  32:20-32:25

  Is there a quote-unquote race of people, and you know there really is only one race, but you know what I mean.

  32:26-32:28

  I too would say, I think they deserve hell.

  32:29-32:32

  What about a demographic, like Hollywood?

  32:33-32:42

  You know, those people parading and endorsing sin, someday they're going to get theirs, and I can't wait to see it.

  32:43-32:44

  Have you ever thought something like that?

  32:47-32:48

  What about nationalities?

  32:52-32:55

  You know, maybe it's a particular group in the Middle East.

  32:58-33:02

  You know, they've been doing nothing but causing problems, and I can't wait.

  33:03-33:03

  Maybe it's a religion.

  33:04-33:08

  You know, look at the effect Islam has had, and you know, all the jihads are being raised.

  33:08-33:12

  I can't wait until the Lord throws them in hell.

  33:15-33:22

  If you've ever had a thought like that, I've got to warn you, you're kind of walking down the path that Jonah's on here, right?

  33:25-33:25

  Bad choice.

  33:31-33:41

  Just, the thing now, church, keep this in the back of your mind, because we're seeing a big surging of the homosexual community.

  33:44-33:47

  Just bombarded with it lately, have you noticed?

  33:48-33:51

  You know, the big news last week, have you ever seen that show, The Big Bang Theory?

  33:51-33:52

  Have you ever seen that?

  33:53-34:00

  I watched it a couple times, but the big news on there was that the one actor had just come out of the closet.

  34:02-34:16

  And more and more, you're seeing that as being promoted and pushed and politicians changing their views about what they used to say about it and what they say about it now.

  34:16-36:39

  you're seeing more and more of it. To the point you're like well is there really a danger here? Well you know when I was a kid I loved comic books. I have like a ton of them in my closet. But I so it caught my attention they said a couple weeks ago that DC Comics has announced that one of its major characters that everybody thought was straight all the years is gonna be gay now I don't know if that's gonna be like Superman or you know but seriously no I'm not I'm not kidding and we might snicker at something like that but who are comic books mainly aimed for right let's teach children it's okay and I also saw you know there was a homosexual character in the other major comic company Marvel comics. They announced this past week that he proposed to his longtime boyfriend. So your kids can go down to the comic book store and buy a comic about a gay marriage. True. Sad. When I came back from a meeting out in Chicago concerning the elephant room last year, I was sitting next to a guy on a plane and just kind of sharing with him about our church and here's what I said in he was obviously coming back to Pittsburgh I knew you know there's a chance that he might live in the area I said hey you should come and check us out and he said I found that churches don't like people like me in them like I'm like why you seem like a nice guy and he said he was a homosexual but his mindset was, "The church hates people like me. I'm not welcome in churches." And somehow, just be on the lookout for this, but churches have a way of not knowing how to handle this kind of stuff, right? You have everyone from rubber stamping it to say, "Oh, it's okay." To the people that march in protests, you know, God's going to judge the homosexual, you know, sort of on the Jonah end of things.

  36:41-36:57

  We're gonna have to deal with this. But heaven forbid our response to that would be, "Let them burn in hell," which is what a lot of Christians say. Quote unquote Christians, that's Jonah thinking.

  36:59-37:00

  What's God's thinking?

  37:02-37:05

  I desire for them to be saved, too, right, right.

  37:08-37:12

  Just keep that in the back of your mind, it's coming bigger than ever.

  37:14-37:19

  How dare those who received grace judge others as not being worthy of it?

  37:21-37:24

  So like Jonah, we expect God to side with us, with our judgments.

  37:26-37:29

  And we're angry when he sides with grace, please let us not fall into that.

  37:31-37:41

  Let her see when my personal comfort becomes my focus on our getting all American here, we can get angry with God when my personal comfort becomes my focus.

  37:41-37:45

  As I said in verse six, the only time you'll see in the book of Jonah that he was happy about anything.

  37:46-37:47

  Why was he happy?

  37:49-37:50

  because he had personal relief.

  37:50-37:52

  Oh, we have a little shade now.

  37:53-37:54

  Life is great.

  37:54-38:03

  Life was horrible just a minute ago, but now that I have shade, ah, I can be happy about that because I'm comfortable.

  38:06-38:15

  Then verses 7 through 8, Jonah, he's like, he reminds me of Yosemite Sam, just like the slightest little thing sends him off into one of his tirades.

  38:16-38:19

  So the worm comes and the plant withers.

  38:22-38:27

  God sends some discomfort and he's back to the I wish I was dead sermon again.

  38:28-38:39

  But the only thing Jonah really seemed to genuinely care about was his own personal comforts. He must have been a real treat to hang out with, right?

  38:41-38:45

  He must have been a real treat, like party with the pastor, right, with Jonah.

  38:45-38:48

  Could you imagine that? Go to the party with the pastor with Jonah?

  38:49-38:50

  Oh, that must have been a blast.

  38:52-38:53

  I'd rather be dead than preach.

  38:56-38:58

  I'd rather be dead than see Gentiles converted.

  38:59-39:00

  I'd rather be dead than hot.

  39:05-39:06

  Would you like to join my church?

  39:11-39:15

  But this is the American way, personal comfort is my priority.

  39:15-39:17

  You'll see it real quick if I say, hey, you know what?

  39:17-39:19

  We're going to let's get some people up for a mission trip.

  39:19-39:20

  We're going to Africa.

  39:21-39:25

  I guarantee you there's going to be a line forming of people to say, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a second.

  39:25-39:26

  Is it going to be hot there?

  39:26-39:27

  Do they have bathrooms?

  39:27-39:29

  Is there going to be a McDonald's?

  39:29-39:33

  And am I going to be personally comfortable there?

  39:34-39:37

  We're raised in a culture that says that comfort is king.

  39:37-39:39

  As long as I'm happy, everything's great.

  39:42-40:02

  But when your focus is comfort and you that God owes it to you, brace yourself, you're going to be really upset. Maybe today, maybe tomorrow, but it's going to happen. If you think that my comfort is the end-all be-all of my existence, you're in the wrong place, planet Earth.

  40:03-40:08

  But let me ask you this, we're gonna play another game. This game is called "What What bothers you more?

  40:12-40:25

  I want you to think about the, I'm going to give you these scenarios in pairs, and I want you to think about these scenarios and ask yourself, which of these has caused you to have a stronger stirring of emotion?

  40:26-40:26

  Okay?

  40:28-40:29

  Pittsburghers who don't know Jesus?

  40:32-40:33

  Or when your Wi-Fi goes out?

  40:36-40:39

  Which one has really bothered you lately?

  40:40-40:43

  Thinking about the people in this city that don't know Jesus Christ?

  40:44-40:45

  Has that stirred you at all?

  40:46-40:55

  Or like your Wi-Fi goes out and you're like kicking the dog over it like, "Aww, life is miserable!" Okay, you ready for another one?

  40:56-40:59

  How about Christians being attacked and persecuted in the Middle East?

  41:00-41:02

  Or when you get bad cell phone reception?

  41:03-41:05

  Which has bothered you most recently?

  41:08-41:10

  Which one of those has bothered you most recently?

  41:13-41:22

  What about your co-workers don't know Christ or sitting in traffic because they're never going to fix 28 North?

  41:22-41:23

  They're never going to fix it.

  41:24-41:27

  They've been working on 28 North since 1847.

  41:28-41:29

  They're never going to fix it.

  41:30-41:38

  Okay, I just gave my answer. But in my defense, most of my co-workers were saved.

  41:42-42:02

  But which of those really bothers you? Well, there again, Jonah line of thinking, if I'm not personally comfortable, I'm angry. Meanwhile, God's big picture, God's big picture. Does anything stir in me at all about that? Last thing for today.

  42:03-43:21

  Number two, God pursues the angry with a proper perspective. And that's again, this is grace. Oh God is so patient. He is so patient because if I was God, Jonah would have been like three verses long. Seriously. Hey, hey, I want you to go preach to the Ninevites. I'm not. Next. You? That would have been my version of Jesus. He is so patient. Oh, with me? How about that? He's so patient with me. So the whole thing happens with the plant. God's like, "Do you do well to be angry for the plant?" He said, "Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die." Here it is. Here's the whole point of the book of Jonah. Don't tune out now, you're gonna miss like the whole thing. What was that book about? Here it is. The Lord said, "You pity the plant for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night.

  43:24-43:43

  And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle.

  43:47-43:49

  OK, so first of all, let's just get this on the table.

  43:49-43:52

  God does not need to explain himself ever to anyone ever.

  43:52-43:54

  This is grace again.

  43:55-43:57

  He doesn't need to explain himself.

  43:57-44:00

  He is the holy, omniscient sovereign.

  44:01-44:02

  He doesn't need to explain himself.

  44:02-44:05

  But in his grace, oftentimes he does.

  44:05-44:31

  reveal his heart. So there must be a powerful lesson here for God to be so patient, for God to keep this for us here today. And he says, "Jonah, you care about a plant which you had nothing to do with. It came, it went. Shouldn't I care about this massive city of human souls.

  44:35-44:40

  And then to just show this compassion on an even deeper level.

  44:41-44:46

  Notice that the Lord points out there are one hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know their right hand from their left.

  44:46-44:47

  Like, who are those people?

  44:49-44:50

  Who are those people?

  44:53-44:55

  Aaron Bloomingdale, do you know your right hand from your left?

  44:59-45:03

  Okay, so he wouldn't be talking about somebody like Aaron Bloomingdale.

  45:04-45:06

  Dr. Whitcomb, do you know your right hand from your left?

  45:06-45:09

  Okay, all right, where's Cade?

  45:12-45:20

  If Cade were here and we asked him, Cade's my six-year-old, his right hand from his left, he wouldn't be able to answer that.

  45:20-45:23

  I believe what he's talking about here is children, like Jonah.

  45:26-45:28

  This city has 120,000 children in it.

  45:30-45:31

  Shouldn't I care about that?

  45:32-45:45

  You'd be content to just wipe an entire city off the map, not even thinking about the most innocent in the city, children and even mentioning the animals.

  45:47-45:48

  So here's the lesson.

  45:48-45:49

  Are you ready to write this down?

  45:49-45:50

  Here's the whole lesson of Jonah.

  45:51-45:58

  This is the thing that the Lord went through all this thing with the plant and the worm and the scorching east wind.

  45:58-46:00

  And God says, "Here, Jared, I'm going to teach you a lesson now.

  46:01-46:01

  And here it is.

  46:01-46:02

  Write this down.

  46:04-46:07

  God loves." That's the lesson.

  46:09-46:09

  God loves.

  46:16-46:18

  God prefers mercy over judgment.

  46:19-46:20

  You know James 2.13 says that?

  46:21-46:22

  Mercy triumphs over judgment.

  46:25-46:27

  God, which one would you prefer?

  46:27-46:33

  God, if you had your choice, which obviously He does, but which would you prefer to dish out?

  46:33-46:35

  Mercy or judgment, what's God going to say?

  46:37-46:39

  Mercy every time.

  46:39-46:40

  Do you know that?

  46:41-46:41

  Every time.

  46:42-46:45

  He would prefer to give mercy.

  46:46-46:48

  He prefers grace over punishment.

  46:50-46:53

  He prefers pardon over condemnation.

  46:54-46:55

  And how do I know that?

  46:56-47:16

  Well Jonah tells me, but living in this period of history I know that because God came to this earth himself, taking the form of a man, and suffered the most brutal, humiliating, painful and shameful death that a human being could experience.

  47:17-47:20

  God did that in Jesus Christ.

  47:22-47:31

  So that whosoever would believe in him would not perish, but have everlasting life.

  47:31-47:32

  Whosoever.

  47:33-47:35

  Like, is that open to the Arabs?

  47:35-47:36

  Whosoever.

  47:37-47:38

  What about the homosexuals?

  47:39-47:40

  Whosoever.

  47:45-47:50

  God loves. This is the great thing that we've seen in Jonah.

  47:50-47:51

  He wants us to receive his grace.

  47:51-47:55

  You understand that God's not sitting up in heaven going.

  47:57-48:02

  Turner burn. Makes no difference to me.

  48:05-48:06

  Get right or get left, I don't care.

  48:08-48:09

  That is not God.

  48:10-48:23

  You know, before I was in pastoral ministry, I had a couple other jobs that, they weren't my favorite jobs in the world.

  48:23-48:26

  One, one much more tolerable than the other.

  48:26-48:38

  But when I worked at Walmart, and it pains me to even bring this up, but to be honest with you, when people would come in and shop at Walmart, we have people get mad because this fillet knife is 10 cents cheaper at Kmart.

  48:39-48:40

  You know what I would say?

  48:41-48:43

  Sounds like Kmart's a place to shop.

  48:44-48:48

  If you're in the market for a fillet knife, I guess that's where you go is Kmart.

  48:48-48:49

  I didn't care.

  48:51-48:56

  When I worked for Anderson Austin News, I stocked magazines for four different Walmarts and Kmarts.

  48:56-48:57

  I really liked that job.

  48:57-48:59

  I made commission on that job.

  49:00-49:02

  But I still totally didn't care.

  49:03-49:06

  Like, hey, you sold this many magazines this week.

  49:06-49:07

  I'm like, oh, whatever.

  49:08-49:12

  You didn't sell as many this week. OK, I honestly I just didn't care.

  49:12-49:16

  I was in Bible college. That was my job. And I did my job to my fullest.

  49:16-49:22

  I really did. But I wasn't like passionate about people buying magazines.

  49:24-49:28

  Just did that to pay the bills, but understand that God is not like that.

  49:28-49:31

  God's not saying I just don't care. I just don't care.

  49:33-49:41

  God's in pursuit. You see, God says, I have this gift for you And I am going to chase you down and offer you this gift.

  49:41-49:45

  He's not going to drag you to heaven, but he's going to chase you down and say.

  49:46-49:50

  This gift of eternal life in Jesus Christ, I want you to have it.

  49:52-49:53

  He purchased our salvation.

  49:55-49:57

  Chases us down to offer it to us.

  49:58-50:00

  So the glorious message of Jonah.

  50:04-50:07

  Even when you're in rebellion, guess what?

  50:09-50:10

  God is out to get you, right?

  50:12-50:18

  When you messed up, when you failed, and you're broken over your sin, guess what?

  50:20-50:45

  God's out to get you. And those people that don't know God, have not received Jesus Christ for eternal life, God's out to get them too. And here we see, Even when we have a stinking attitude and we have the audacity to get angry at the sovereign of the universe, guess what?

  50:47-50:50

  God is still out to get you.

Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Jonah 4

Breakout Questions:
Pray for one another.

Even if you don't know Him!

1. God promises to Judge Sin (Jonah 3:1-4)

What is sin?

Romans 3:23 - for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God
Romans 6:23 - For the wages of sin is death…
Hebrews 9:27 - And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment…

2. God pursues those who don’t know Him with Deliverance (Jonah 3:4-10)

What do I need to know about coming to God?

1. You must do it Now (Jonah 3:4)


2. You must take God at His Word (Jonah 3:5)


3. You are on the Invite List (Jonah 3:5-7)


4. You must cry out to God from the Heart (Jonah 3:8)

There are some wrong attitudes in approaching God:

• ”I don’t want to go to hell.”


• "This will help me be a better person.”


• ”I will get what I want if God is on my side.”


• ”Why not try it out?”


• ”I want to be saved in my sin, not from my sin.”


5. You must Repent (Jonah 3:8-9)


6. God Responds to what you do with the message (Jonah 3:10)

Romans 6:23 - …but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:02

  We're going to continue our series.

  00:03-00:05

  I got some more good news for you.

  00:06-00:08

  Did you know that God is out to get you?

  00:09-00:10

  Did you know that?

  00:10-00:11

  Isn't that great news?

  00:14-00:16

  It's fantastic news.

  00:17-00:27

  God is not indifferent, nor is God just waiting to unload judgment on the world, though we deserve it by nature.

  00:29-00:36

  The truth is, God is out to get you because He loves you.

  00:37-00:42

  And He is the one pursuing you back unto Himself.

  00:43-00:45

  We've been going through the book of Jonah.

  00:46-00:56

  I remember way back when we were in Jonah chapter 1, two weeks ago, we saw for the rebel, God's out to get you too.

  00:56-00:57

  Are you rebelling from God?

  00:57-01:06

  Is God calling you to something that you just flat out said, "Nope, I'm not going to do that." Well, the Bible says God is a loving heavenly father.

  01:06-01:10

  And just like fathers discipline their children, God disciplines us.

  01:10-01:16

  And then last week in Jonah chapter two, we saw that God is after the broken.

  01:18-01:24

  You know, the times in our lives that we realize that our choices have taken us somewhere that we don't wanna go.

  01:26-01:26

  Isn't it great news?

  01:27-01:31

  God is still after us in those times to say, I want to restore you.

  01:33-01:38

  And the truth is, as we saw last week in Jesus Christ, we're already restored.

  01:39-01:47

  It's not as if we have to be restored again, like we're on the outs with God, then we're on the ins with God, then we're on the outs with God, then we're on the ins with, that's not true.

  01:48-01:53

  If you are in Jesus Christ, restoration has been done once and for all.

  01:55-02:00

  And that's what we saw last week. You're one prayer away from experiencing that.

  02:00-02:06

  It's already happened. But as far as internalizing it and owning it, you're just one prayer away from that.

  02:08-02:10

  Well, there are some people that don't know the Lord.

  02:13-02:15

  And the question is, what about those people?

  02:16-02:17

  What about people that don't even know God?

  02:19-02:21

  Well, good news.

  02:23-02:26

  God's out to get you if you don't know.

  02:27-02:32

  In fact, isn't how this whole account of Jonah, isn't that how this all got started?

  02:32-02:37

  Well there were some people that didn't know the Lord and they were living in wicked sinfulness.

  02:37-02:38

  We're going to talk about that in a second.

  02:41-02:49

  And God said, I want to get them too, because their sin was in his face, so to speak.

  02:52-02:54

  So let's look at Jonah chapter three.

  02:56-03:01

  First of all, in your outline, we do have some bad news.

  03:02-03:03

  That's not all good news.

  03:04-03:09

  It always ends up being good news, but we got to share some bad news too.

  03:09-03:16

  And here's the truth from God's word, if you're taking notes, and I encourage you to always do that on the back of your bulletin thing.

  03:17-03:18

  God promises to judge sin.

  03:20-03:20

  Okay?

  03:20-03:22

  God promises to judge sin.

  03:25-03:32

  God is holy, and as a holy judge, he doesn't overlook sin.

  03:35-03:45

  God never overlooks sin to say, "Well, this guy's not as bad as this guy, so I'm just going to let it go." Or "You know what?

  03:45-03:52

  I'll let the best 10,000 people go to heaven and the rest." God doesn't overlook any sin.

  03:54-03:55

  And sin was the issue.

  03:55-03:57

  We saw that back in chapter one.

  03:57-04:00

  Again, I want to remind you, look at back in chapter one, verse two.

  04:01-04:16

  God originally said to Jonah, "Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against For their evil has come up before me." God says, "I'm going to judge their sin." Why didn't he just do it?

  04:17-04:18

  Why get Jonah involved?

  04:19-04:20

  Well, hang on.

  04:20-04:21

  You'll see.

  04:22-04:24

  Let's look at the first four verses in chapter three.

  04:26-04:27

  This is where we left off last week.

  04:27-04:33

  It says, "Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time." You know what happened the first time.

  04:34-04:47

  Jonah said, "No way, not me. I'm going to Tarshish." Well, then the whole storm thrown overboard, swallowed by a fish, near-death experience in the drowning.

  04:50-04:54

  Jonah repents. The fish vomits Jonah up on the dry land.

  04:55-05:01

  And it's like, "Okay, we're going to try this again." Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, "Arise!

  05:01-05:15

  "Go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you." So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh according to the word of the Lord.

  05:17-05:21

  And you're like, "Uh, yeah. Yeah, I think so." Right?

  05:24-05:28

  Now, Nineveh was an exceedingly great city.

  05:29-05:32

  Three days journey in breadth.

  05:35-05:46

  What that meant was, if you were going to start on the east side of Nineveh and walk all the way through the city to the west side, it would take you three days.

  05:46-05:50

  And different scholars and commentators have different views.

  05:50-05:59

  Some people say, "Well, you know, they based that on walking 20 miles a day, so what's that? 20 times 3 is -- what's that?" It was 60 miles wide.

  05:59-06:06

  I saw somebody else said, "Well, that's 40 miles." I'm like, "Who's walking 40 miles in a day?" I mean, come on.

  06:06-06:10

  We're not like marathon people here, most of us.

  06:11-06:13

  But that would be, what's 40 times three?

  06:15-06:17

  120, okay, thank you.

  06:17-06:20

  I didn't do the math on this, but I appreciate the help.

  06:22-06:24

  Okay, Nineveh was a big city.

  06:24-06:26

  Okay, that's what I got from this.

  06:26-06:27

  None of it was big.

  06:28-06:35

  Okay, this wasn't like, you know, going to preach in Zillian Opal or going to preach in Shakora where I'm from.

  06:35-06:38

  This was a major metropolitan area.

  06:39-06:40

  Okay, a huge city.

  06:41-06:50

  As we saw back in chapter one, scholars estimate there were somewhere between 600,000 to over a million people in this city.

  06:51-06:53

  Okay, so this was a huge city.

  06:53-07:29

  And the reason I'm pointing that out is understand the mission that Jonah's called to here. You know, it wasn't like, "Hey Jonah, there's a little bus stop with four people there. Will you go share the gospel, maybe hand them a track?" This was sort of the equivalent of, "Jonah, I want you to walk down Broadway in New York and tell everybody the city's about to be ruined by God." So could you imagine just walking into enemy territory, by the maybe Philadelphia would be a better city to use for the analogy.

  07:30-07:45

  Sorry, Amanda, but go right into enemy territory, people that don't know the Lord, this huge metropolitan city, probably the biggest city in the day, and just say this message I'm going to tell you.

  07:45-07:46

  This was a major undertaking.

  07:48-07:48

  Big job.

  07:50-07:51

  It's a big city.

  07:51-07:56

  So it says Jonah began to go into the city, going a day's journey.

  07:57-07:59

  Okay, so he's about like a third of the way through.

  07:59-08:08

  And understand Nineveh wouldn't have been as densely populated as some of the cities in our day, but there were still a lot of people in the city.

  08:10-08:27

  So Jonah began to go into the city going a day's journey, and he called out, "Yet 40 days!" and Nineveh shall be overthrown." Let's pause there.

  08:27-08:28

  That was the message.

  08:30-08:35

  God was saying, "Jonah, I want you to go tell this city the time is set.

  08:38-08:51

  And because of Nineveh's sin, I'm going to bring judgment." Now, the Ninevites would have, And we're going to see this as we go through the text.

  08:51-08:56

  They would have understood this didn't mean from an invading army or something was how this was going to be quick.

  08:56-08:58

  Forty days, a little over a month.

  08:59-09:01

  OK, something huge was going to happen.

  09:02-09:06

  Was it going to be like Sodom and Gomorrah, maybe, you know, like fire from heaven?

  09:06-09:08

  Was it going to be another one of those types of things?

  09:09-09:16

  Not sure what exactly they thought it was going to be, but we're going to see they knew that this was something from the Lord God.

  09:18-09:20

  So God promises to judge sin.

  09:21-09:22

  I want to pause here.

  09:27-09:29

  I want to examine what is what is sin?

  09:31-09:40

  What is sin, if you're taking notes, here's the most elementary definition of sin, there are many, many definitions, there's different words in the Bible for sin.

  09:41-09:44

  I'm just boiling it down to the very base root of it.

  09:46-09:48

  Sin is doing something that God forbids.

  09:50-09:58

  Or it's not doing something that God commands, those things are sin, but you see, sin is actually deeper than that.

  09:59-10:04

  Like I said, that's sort of an elementary thing, that's something that I would teach the kids.

  10:06-10:13

  But to say it goes a little deeper than that, because sin isn't just what you do, actually, the action is the fruit.

  10:14-10:17

  But where does sin start? It starts in here.

  10:19-10:21

  We're sinful at the roots, by nature.

  10:22-10:32

  And the Bible tells us that Adam's sin, we talked about this back when we were in Genesis 3, Adam's sin brought sin and death into the world.

  10:32-10:37

  And the Bible would say that we're actually born with a sinful, rebellious nature.

  10:39-10:40

  Now, how many people here have children?

  10:42-10:44

  Okay, so I don't have to do a lot of explaining here, right?

  10:47-10:49

  Were your children born with a sinful, rebellious nature?

  10:51-10:57

  Those darling, precious, adorable children, yes, in fact, were born with a nature to do what they want to do.

  10:59-11:02

  Self-centeredness. Nobody tells me what to do.

  11:02-11:05

  That's the sin nature that we're all born with. Okay?

  11:06-11:12

  On your outline, I have a couple of verses I want you to take into consideration as we talk about sin.

  11:12-11:25

  Romans 3.23 says, "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." So according to God's Word, what's the percentage of people by nature that are sinners?

  11:27-11:31

  100. That's our nature in Adam.

  11:32-11:33

  Okay?

  11:34-11:36

  But it was the purpose of the law.

  11:36-11:45

  God gave us his Old Testament law to show us that we're sinners.

  11:45-11:48

  So we're going to play a game. I know we're going to play games at the party with the pastor.

  11:48-11:50

  So we're going to play a game right now, and I want everybody to stand up.

  11:53-12:04

  We're going to play a game. Just in case you're not convinced that you've ever had a sin problem, I'm just going to go through some of the Ten Commandments.

  12:04-12:07

  And if you violated one of these, I want you to sit down.

  12:07-12:09

  That means you're guilty, okay?

  12:10-12:12

  I didn't even go through them yet.

  12:12-12:18

  Bob Arnold's like, "Forget it, come on, stand up." Yeah, party poopers, come on.

  12:19-12:27

  Okay, I'm just gonna give you, I'm trying to be careful which ones I say first, 'cause I know if I say certain ones, like there goes 95% of us, right?

  12:28-12:32

  Okay, so this is called the guilty game.

  12:32-12:33

  Like, what'd you do at church today?

  12:33-12:34

  We played the guilty game.

  12:36-12:36

  Okay.

  12:37-12:40

  The fifth commandment is honor your father and mother.

  12:40-12:45

  If you've ever dishonored your parents in any way, have a seat.

  12:48-12:49

  Well, that was quick.

  12:52-12:56

  I was thinking don't start with number nine, which is lying.

  12:56-12:59

  I was thinking don't start with number one, which is no other gods.

  13:00-13:00

  Wow. Okay.

  13:01-13:04

  So, guilty, right?

  13:06-13:07

  And go through the list.

  13:10-13:12

  Not let's play, you don't have to stand back up.

  13:12-13:15

  But how many of them have you been guilty of multiple times?

  13:15-13:18

  The first commandment is you shall have no other gods before me.

  13:18-13:23

  Has the Lord God always been the most important thing in your life every moment of every day?

  13:23-13:26

  Has there ever been something in your life that's taken his place?

  13:26-13:29

  Well, that gets us into the second commandment, no idols.

  13:29-13:31

  Don't make for yourself any graven images.

  13:31-13:38

  So if you've ever had anything in your life that's been more important than the Lord at any point, then you've really broken the first two commandments.

  13:39-13:42

  Third commandment is don't use the Lord God's name in vain.

  13:42-13:45

  The fourth commandment is remember the Sabbath and keep it holy.

  13:45-13:46

  How are we doing?

  13:46-13:52

  The fifth commandment is honor your father and mother, which obviously disqualified you all.

  13:52-13:54

  The sixth commandment is do not kill.

  13:54-13:58

  And a lot of times when I share this with people, they say, "Well, I've never killed anybody." Really?

  13:58-14:03

  Jesus said, if you've ever hated someone, you've murdered them in here.

  14:05-14:08

  So by that definition, how many people here are guilty of murder?

  14:08-14:09

  I am.

  14:11-14:13

  The seventh commandment is do not commit adultery.

  14:17-14:22

  Again, I'm sure a lot of people here would say, well, you know, the only person I've ever been with is my wife.

  14:22-14:25

  Jesus said, if you look at a woman lustfully, you've committed adultery in your heart.

  14:25-14:28

  So by that definition, how many of us have committed adultery?

  14:31-14:33

  All right, the Eighth Commandments do not steal.

  14:33-14:35

  Have you ever taken something that doesn't belong to you?

  14:35-14:36

  I have. Guilty.

  14:37-14:40

  The Ninth Commandment, do not bear false witness.

  14:40-14:44

  Have you ever known the truth and willingly and knowingly withheld the truth?

  14:45-14:47

  Lying. You ever done that?

  14:49-14:51

  Well, you're like being so convicted over there.

  14:51-14:52

  I just see his hand keep going up.

  14:53-14:55

  Hey, you hang in there because there's good news coming.

  14:55-14:55

  All right.

  14:57-15:00

  And the 10th commandment is do not covet what's coveting.

  15:01-15:05

  That's when you look at what God provided somebody else and you wish that you had that.

  15:05-15:12

  You think, you know, my life would be so much better if I had what he had or I had what this family had.

  15:12-15:18

  Or, you know, you start instead of being thankful for what God gave you, you start looking around at what God gave other people.

  15:19-15:20

  That's coveting.

  15:20-15:20

  Okay.

  15:21-15:21

  How are we doing?

  15:22-15:23

  Guilty?

  15:24-15:29

  Under the law, we all stand condemned.

  15:31-15:31

  Okay?

  15:32-15:33

  But it gets worse.

  15:34-15:35

  Believe it or not.

  15:37-15:38

  Do you know what James 2.10 says?

  15:38-15:46

  It says, "For whoever keeps the whole law "but fails in one point "has become accountable for all of it." I want you to think about that statement.

  15:48-16:06

  Imagine if you showed up in the Allegheny County Courts, or the Butler County Courts, depending which way you're coming from, and you stand before the judge, and the judge pulls out your rap sheet, and he says, "Oh, I see here that you are guilty "of breaking every law of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

  16:09-16:10

  "What are your chances of getting off?

  16:11-16:17

  "What are your chances?" You're like, "But your honor, I won't do it again." But you're still guilty.

  16:18-16:22

  But I didn't mean to, but you've broken every single law.

  16:24-16:25

  Yeah, it was a bad day.

  16:25-16:28

  You've broken every single law.

  16:29-16:36

  And I think James's point here is, you know, breaking the law in essence is rejecting the law giver.

  16:37-16:39

  So rebellion is rebellion across the board.

  16:39-16:41

  It's just breaking the entire law.

  16:43-16:43

  Guilty.

  16:45-16:45

  But it gets worse.

  16:48-16:56

  I have on your outline, Romans 6, 23 says, "The wages of sin is death." What's a wage?

  16:58-17:00

  A wage is something that you earn, right?

  17:01-17:02

  A wage is a paycheck.

  17:02-17:03

  You earn it.

  17:03-17:11

  And I don't imagine those of you who have a job and get a paycheck, I don't imagine when you get your paycheck, you go storming into your boss's office and go, "Oh, thank you.

  17:11-17:12

  Thank you for this.

  17:13-17:14

  This was so gracious.

  17:14-17:15

  This was so generous.

  17:15-17:17

  "Oh, thank you so much.

  17:18-17:21

  Your boss is gonna look at you like you just fell out of a tree.

  17:21-17:23

  Like, what are you talking about?

  17:25-17:28

  You earned that." Duh.

  17:30-17:31

  Well, that's what a wage is.

  17:33-17:44

  And because by nature in Adam, we are born sinners by nature and we become sinners by choice also, both, not in either or, sinners by nature and by choice.

  17:46-17:50

  What we've earned by that is death.

  17:52-17:54

  And death really is separation.

  17:56-18:02

  Back in the Garden of Eden when God told Adam if he sinned, you would die.

  18:02-18:10

  Literally in the Hebrew, he said, "Dying you will die." Meaning, it's going to start a process that's going to go somewhere.

  18:10-18:16

  Meaning, basically this, from the minute you're born, you start to die.

  18:17-18:21

  That's why some of us, not some of us, all of us are wearing out.

  18:21-18:25

  What I meant to say was some of us just look more worn out than others.

  18:28-18:31

  But those that don't look as worn out are going to be catching up with you, right?

  18:32-18:32

  We're all wearing out.

  18:36-18:40

  And ultimately, it's spiritual death, it's separation from God.

  18:41-18:44

  We are separated from God because of our sin.

  18:46-18:56

  OK. And Hebrews 9, 27, also in your outline, says just as it is appointed for man to die once and after that comes judgment.

  18:57-19:02

  You have an appointment, according to Hebrews, now you have an appointment with death.

  19:02-19:07

  and then after death comes judgment.

  19:09-19:13

  And I'd like to remind you this morning that that's an appointment that you can't skip.

  19:16-19:17

  I've had dental appointments that I've missed.

  19:18-19:21

  I've had eye doctor appointments that I've missed, chiropractor appointments that I've missed.

  19:21-19:23

  I've had a lot of appointments that I've missed.

  19:25-19:27

  You're not gonna miss this appointment.

  19:28-19:30

  Someday you are going to leave the earth.

  19:32-19:41

  And then what? Well, Hebrews 9, 27, "And after that comes judgment." And my question is, what's your plan?

  19:46-19:56

  What's your plan when you stand before a holy God, and by your own admission this morning, by nature, we're guilty.

  19:57-19:59

  We're guilty of violating the holy law.

  20:00-20:07

  We're sinners by nature that we don't have a way out.

  20:07-20:08

  We can't buy our way out of it.

  20:09-20:15

  We can't say from this point forward I'm going to do the best I can because the truth is you're still going to fail at some point.

  20:17-20:22

  And you have all this past sin that you're already guilty of.

  20:25-20:25

  So what's your plan?

  20:28-20:31

  Well, you ready for some good news?

  20:34-20:40

  The very reason that this church exists is really the same reason that God sent Jonah to Nineveh.

  20:42-20:48

  And just as God gave warning and offered grace through Jonah, that's what He called the church to do.

  20:48-20:51

  Okay, so on your outline number two, here's the good news.

  20:53-20:56

  pursues those who don't know him with.

  20:57-20:59

  And I wrote on my outline deliverance.

  21:01-21:03

  Deliverance, you could write salvation.

  21:07-21:08

  You could write restoration.

  21:09-21:17

  I like the word deliverance that's used in scripture, it's the idea literally of being rescued. You know, you're heading for.

  21:20-21:21

  Did somebody get locked out?

  21:23-21:26

  Thanks, Michelle. You're heading for danger.

  21:30-21:32

  And the Lord steps in and rescues you.

  21:35-21:39

  OK, I just thought maybe there was like a mob of people out there like, oh, I got to get in and hear this.

  21:44-21:50

  So God pursues those who don't know him with deliverance, with salvation, with restoration.

  21:51-22:03

  See, here's the thing, just as God is holy and just, the Bible also says that God is loving and merciful too.

  22:05-22:11

  So that creates what we would say, that creates quite a dilemma for a holy judge, doesn't it?

  22:12-23:24

  be just and be loving at the same time. We're gonna see how God answered that. It wasn't a dilemma for him. Actually, he had a plan even before the problem. So we chose sin and death. God is offering you forgiveness in life. Now we're going through the rest of Jonah chapter 3. The question is, what do I need to know about coming to God. The reason I'm sharing this with this message, it's just all from the text. It's just all right there. What does it look like when somebody comes to God? It's just all laid out right here. And this is a great text to share because, spoiler alert, plug your ears if you don't want to know how this ends until we get to the end. But we know the deliverance was made by the end of this chapter. So we could say in essence, well, what they did worked. And I want to look at what happened there. What does it look like coming to God? You ready?

  23:25-23:40

  It includes these ingredients. I'm going to go through these rather quickly. It's Verse four again. First ingredient you need to know about coming to God, you must do it now.

  23:41-23:57

  You must do it now. Jonah began to go into the city going a day's journey, and he called out, "Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown." That was Jonah's whole sermon.

  24:00-24:05

  And I know many of you are thinking, "Man, I wish I lived in those times." That was the whole sermon.

  24:06-24:07

  Like, how many words is that?

  24:09-24:11

  Come on, math people, how many words is that?

  24:12-24:14

  In my Bible, it's like six, seven, eight words.

  24:16-24:19

  You're like, "Dude, I wish you preached like Jonah." Eight words.

  24:21-24:25

  It's like time to evaluate your sermon, Jonah, where you didn't really have a catching intro.

  24:28-24:31

  Your illustrations were kind of weak because they weren't there.

  24:33-24:36

  Well, let's evaluate the sermon seriously.

  24:37-24:39

  Seriously, let's evaluate what was he saying.

  24:40-24:47

  In essence, he was saying, "Nineveh, time's almost up." That was his sermon.

  24:48-24:55

  He's like, "Nineveh, you got 40 days." And then he just keeps walking.

  24:55-24:59

  Nineveh, by the way, 40 days. That was his sermon.

  25:03-25:05

  So why didn't God just bring the hammer down?

  25:06-25:11

  Like, sins coming up to God, we saw that was the issue.

  25:11-25:13

  Why 40 days?

  25:15-25:17

  Why did God give them 40 days?

  25:18-25:20

  Their sin was so bad and He's a just God.

  25:20-25:27

  Why didn't He just, "I've had enough." Why did he give him 40 days?

  25:27-25:36

  Well, the reason is the same reason that God didn't obliterate us the first time that we sinned.

  25:38-25:42

  God was giving time for repentance to take place.

  25:43-25:46

  That's how God works. He's patient and he's merciful.

  25:46-25:51

  And if you're sitting here this morning and you're not a believer in Jesus Christ, you don't know God.

  25:52-25:55

  Let me tell you why you woke up this morning and took a breath this morning.

  25:55-25:59

  It's because God's giving you another opportunity to come back to him.

  26:00-26:03

  That's the only reason you're still breathing, man or woman.

  26:05-26:08

  It's because God is delaying your judgment.

  26:11-26:20

  And if you're sitting here this morning and you haven't received the salvation that God's offering, I'll tell you the same thing Jonah told Nineveh, your time is going to be up.

  26:20-26:24

  Now, there's a difference between you and Nineveh. They had a timeline.

  26:26-26:27

  Here's your thing, you don't.

  26:30-26:36

  You could pull out of this school after service and get broadsided by a car and kill just like that.

  26:39-26:40

  That stuff happens, doesn't it?

  26:40-26:45

  I could keep you here for the rest of the week telling you stories of friends of mine and people that I went to high school with.

  26:46-27:11

  sudden, tragic deaths, some of them in the most unbelievable ways and just fluky things that we would say, "You don't know how much time you have. But I'll tell you what you do is you have now. OK, and just by virtue of the fact that you're still alive means that God is still pursuing you with his grace.

  27:12-27:14

  OK, but you must do it now.

  27:16-27:25

  Your time may be up in 2015 or next month or this afternoon, but listen, judgment delayed does not mean judgment canceled.

  27:27-27:29

  And the reason you have to do it now.

  27:32-27:37

  Because the longer you put off coming to Christ, the harder it is.

  27:39-27:40

  Why is that?

  27:42-28:14

  The Hebrew writer warns us over and over and over again in the book of Hebrews, today if you hear his voice, "Do not harden your heart." And when you know what God is calling you to, when you know that God is calling you to come into relationship with himself through Jesus Christ, and you keep saying no, and you keep putting it off, and maybe next month, or maybe when the kids graduate, or maybe this, or maybe...

  28:14-28:17

  What you're doing that whole time is hardening your heart.

  28:20-28:23

  And it's going to get to the point that you're going to become so calloused.

  28:25-28:27

  It's not God's fault. He's still calling.

  28:27-28:31

  The problem is you've calloused yourself so much that you won't be able to hear him.

  28:34-28:35

  Do not harden your heart.

  28:38-28:41

  If you're sitting here today and you don't know the Lord and you feel like, you know what?

  28:41-28:43

  You know what? God's right.

  28:43-28:44

  I need to do this today.

  28:45-28:46

  You know, I need to do this today.

  28:46-28:49

  And that's great news.

  28:49-28:56

  Don't put that off, because the next time you feel that it's going to be so much easier to say no the next time around.

  28:57-28:59

  Okay, don't put it off.

  29:01-29:02

  The worst thing you can do is put it off.

  29:02-29:08

  Let me ask you, if you if you're sitting here and you have not received the salvation that God's offering, let me ask you, what's the delay?

  29:10-29:10

  What are you waiting on?

  29:13-29:15

  Let me hear some good reasons why we should wait.

  29:16-29:17

  Can you think of any?

  29:19-29:22

  Can you think of any reason why God extending?

  29:24-29:25

  His offer of grace to us.

  29:25-29:28

  Can you think of any reason why we should wait on that?

  29:30-29:35

  I can't think of any, but I can give you a list of reasons why it's a bad idea to put it off.

  29:37-29:40

  Your eternity is on the line, man, you can't put this off.

  29:43-29:44

  So you must do it now.

  29:46-29:48

  Secondly, you must take God at his word.

  29:50-29:51

  You must take God at his word.

  29:51-29:58

  Look at verse 5. It says, "And the people of Nineveh believed God.

  30:00-30:11

  They called for a fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest of them to the least of them." Here I want you to underline this, highlight it in your Bible, circle it, whatever.

  30:12-30:19

  Verse five, where it says, believe God, underline that the people of Nineveh believed God.

  30:21-30:27

  So secondly, this morning, if you're sitting here, you don't know the Lord, you're like, what's it look like to come to come to the Lord?

  30:27-30:29

  You must take God at his word.

  30:31-30:33

  It includes believing God's messenger.

  30:35-30:41

  So long as the messenger does his job, understand this is this is what my job is, basically.

  30:41-30:46

  You're like, "We're paying you for this?" I'm a megaphone.

  30:46-30:47

  That's really all I am.

  30:49-30:53

  I don't sit at home and try to make up something to tell people.

  30:54-30:55

  I go home, that'll be interesting.

  30:58-31:01

  You know what my job really is at the very base of what I do?

  31:01-31:02

  I'm a megaphone.

  31:02-31:03

  I don't make up the message.

  31:04-31:13

  My job is to get up here and strap this annoyingly irritating thing on my ears and just broadcast the message saying this is what God said.

  31:13-31:15

  And you're like, well, why are you doing that?

  31:15-31:17

  Because this is how God has chosen to work.

  31:17-31:18

  You can study your Bibles.

  31:18-31:22

  God has chosen to speak through people.

  31:23-31:28

  I'll never understand that because I am fallible and I am weak and I am.

  31:30-31:37

  You know, so unworthy, but God has chosen to use people to well, then you look at Jonah, he had problems, too, right?

  31:37-31:39

  But God speaks through people.

  31:39-31:40

  That's his way.

  31:40-31:41

  That's how he chose to work.

  31:41-31:45

  Could God part the heavens and just scream his message down from heaven?

  31:46-31:47

  He could.

  31:48-31:49

  Could he write it in the clouds?

  31:49-31:50

  He could.

  31:50-31:54

  Could he send a letter to your house, handwritten by himself?

  31:54-31:54

  He could.

  31:55-31:57

  He has not chosen to work that way.

  31:57-31:58

  He has chosen to work through people.

  32:01-32:06

  So my job is the megaphone is to just broadcast what this what this book says.

  32:07-32:13

  And what this book says, the next thing we see in our sermon, you have to take God at his word.

  32:13-32:15

  Nineveh believed God.

  32:18-32:20

  Nineveh believed God.

  32:22-32:28

  And when it comes to God's word, anything I say, you just what you need to do, go home and look at the Bible and say, is that what it says?

  32:28-32:29

  That's the evaluation.

  32:30-32:31

  Not did I like it?

  32:34-32:38

  But is that actually what the Bible says?

  32:38-32:40

  That's how you need to evaluate a sermon, by the way.

  32:44-32:52

  And in any sermon based on the Bible, more specifically, let's take the text of the Bible.

  32:53-32:57

  You have two choices. Two choices.

  33:00-33:02

  Either it's true or it's not true.

  33:03-33:06

  OK, those are really the only two choices you have.

  33:07-33:10

  You believe it or you don't believe it.

  33:12-33:17

  Does that make sense? You can't kind of believe it like, oh, that's what the Bible says.

  33:17-33:21

  I like 60 percent believe that you either believe it or you don't believe it.

  33:23-33:24

  OK, I'm going to read some verses to you.

  33:24-33:25

  I want you to listen.

  33:28-33:31

  I need you to ask yourself, do you believe these verses or not?

  33:31-33:32

  Okay, I'm just gonna read these.

  33:33-33:40

  There were like lists of like dozens and dozens and dozens, but I just chose five out of the gospel of John because you're gonna see a theme here.

  33:40-33:42

  This is all through the New Testament, by the way.

  33:44-34:01

  John 1:12 says, "But to all who did receive him, "who believed in his name, "he gave the right to become children of God." Do you believe that by receiving Jesus Christ, God adopts you as a child?

  34:01-34:04

  Do you believe that? That's what God said.

  34:06-34:10

  It's black and white. Actually, my Bible, I think some of it's red.

  34:12-34:15

  But believing in Jesus means you're adopted as a child.

  34:15-34:17

  Do you believe that? It's true.

  34:19-34:26

  John 3.36 says, "Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life." Do you know eternal life isn't something you get?

  34:27-34:31

  Eternal life is something that you have when you receive Christ.

  34:32-34:35

  I grew up thinking that someday when I die, I'm going to get eternal life.

  34:36-34:38

  In Christ, we have it now. We just carry on through eternity.

  34:39-34:39

  We're going to see that in a second.

  34:41-34:43

  "Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life.

  34:43-34:50

  Whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him." Do you believe that?

  34:52-34:54

  Having Jesus means having life.

  34:57-35:02

  Not having Jesus, it doesn't mean that you're going to get God's wrath.

  35:03-35:06

  God's wrath is already on you. Okay?

  35:09-35:10

  Do you know what you have to do to go to hell?

  35:11-35:15

  The answer is nothing, because by nature you're already heading there.

  35:17-35:23

  It's the heart of God to extend this invitation to you.

  35:25-35:27

  He loves you and wants you to receive His grace.

  35:28-35:36

  John 5, 24 says, "Truly, truly, these are the words of Jesus, truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears My word and believes Him who sent Me has eternal life.

  35:38-35:42

  He does not come into judgment but has passed from death to life." Do you believe that?

  35:45-35:56

  For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in Him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day." John 6, 40.

  35:58-36:00

  Do you believe that? That's God's will.

  36:01-36:03

  It is that Jesus Christ is lifted high.

  36:06-36:13

  And when people look upon Him, they'll have eternal life.

  36:15-36:19

  John 11, 25, Jesus said, "I am the resurrection and the life.

  36:20-36:27

  Whoever believes in Me, though he die, yet he shall live." Do you believe that?

  36:30-36:32

  This is what was happening in Nineveh.

  36:32-36:40

  Jonah proclaimed the Word and they said, "You know what? I believe that." How are you doing with that this morning?

  36:41-36:46

  I like to challenge people. When we say "believe," that means a whole myriad of things.

  36:49-36:56

  And actually, people want to take the word "belief" at its very base, I guess you could say.

  36:57-37:00

  But there's really three levels of belief. I'll jot these down.

  37:00-37:02

  There's three levels of belief.

  37:04-37:08

  And the first one is knowing the facts.

  37:14-37:18

  The second one is agreeing with the facts.

  37:24-37:33

  And the third one is trusting, or you could say, resting your life on the facts.

  37:34-37:36

  Those are the three levels of belief.

  37:36-37:41

  And a lot of times when people say, "Well, I believe in God," they're only at level one.

  37:42-37:47

  Like, "Yeah, I've heard that there's a God out there, and maybe they're kind of tiptoeing into level two.

  37:47-37:58

  I guess I kind of agree that there might be somebody out there." But biblical faith isn't until you get to level three, that you're actually trusting and internalizing the message.

  38:00-38:01

  That's receiving.

  38:02-38:05

  I like to describe it to people this way, if I had a chair up here, and I don't.

  38:06-38:21

  But if I had a chair up here and I said to you, "This chair will hold an adult man if he sits on it." Now the first level of belief is you'd sit here and you're like, "Okay, I've learned something today.

  38:21-38:26

  I've learned that Jeff thinks that this chair will hold an adult man." That's the first level.

  38:28-38:31

  The second level is agreeing to say, "You know what? I think he's right.

  38:31-38:41

  That thing looks like it could hold somebody." But the third level of belief, or what I would say where biblical faith comes in, is what?

  38:43-38:46

  Is actually sitting down on the chair. Does that make sense?

  38:47-38:57

  You can know it and you can agree with it, but until you rest in it and trust it, that's the ultimate level of belief.

  38:57-38:59

  And again, that's biblical faith. Does that make sense?

  39:01-39:03

  Jesus isn't calling you to just agree with Him.

  39:05-39:10

  He's calling you to rest in Him, to receive Him.

  39:12-39:16

  So let her see, you know, first of all, you must do it now.

  39:16-39:17

  You must take on it as word.

  39:17-39:19

  Let's look at verses five through seven.

  39:19-39:20

  Here's good news.

  39:20-39:22

  You are on the invite list.

  39:23-39:25

  Look at verses five through seven again.

  39:26-39:27

  We'll pick up at the end of verse five.

  39:27-39:29

  They called for a fast and put on sackcloth.

  39:29-39:30

  Here it is.

  39:30-39:32

  From the greatest of them to the least of them.

  39:35-39:37

  Well, how great is did it go?

  39:38-39:46

  Well, the word reached the king of Nineveh and he arose from his throne, and removed his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes.

  39:47-39:59

  And he issued a proclamation and published through Nineveh, "By the decree of the king and his nobles, let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything.

  40:01-40:07

  Let them not feed or drink water." Let's pause there.

  40:07-40:11

  greatest to the least. That went all the way up to the king.

  40:15-40:19

  Do you know that God is sovereign even over politics? Did you know that?

  40:22-40:31

  I know a lot of Christians are concerned about the doings in Washington and the White House and God is still sovereign.

  40:32-40:37

  All right. Word got to this wicked king of a wicked city.

  40:42-40:44

  Who's to say that it couldn't happen in our day?

  40:46-40:47

  All things are possible with God.

  40:47-40:47

  Amen.

  40:49-40:49

  All right.

  40:50-40:51

  That's my political speech for the year.

  40:53-40:53

  Okay.

  40:53-40:54

  For the year.

  40:57-41:00

  No matter who you are or what you've done, you're on the invite list.

  41:02-41:03

  Notice it doesn't say.

  41:05-41:10

  Well they put on sackcloth just the ones who really didn't sin that much.

  41:10-41:20

  Or the liars and the people that didn't honor their parents repented, but the sodomites and the homosexuals, they were not able to repent.

  41:21-41:22

  It doesn't say that.

  41:23-41:24

  It was top to bottom.

  41:26-41:27

  It was from the greatest to least.

  41:28-41:30

  God's Word is just saying it was just everybody.

  41:31-41:38

  no matter who they were, how much money they had or didn't have, what they did, what they didn't do, how popular they were or weren't.

  41:40-41:44

  There's some people here that might say, "You know, I hear what you're saying, but I've done some bad things in my life, man.

  41:45-41:46

  I've done some bad things in my life.

  41:47-41:48

  I've hurt some people.

  41:48-41:49

  I've betrayed some people.

  41:50-42:05

  I've done some wicked, rotten things in my life, man is somehow more powerful than the grace of God.

  42:06-42:07

  I've got to hear this.

  42:07-42:15

  I've got to hear what sin there is out there that God is like, "Whoa, I'm not even powerful enough to handle that one." Really?

  42:16-42:23

  God came to the earth Himself and died on a cross, and there's some sin that's greater than that kind of a sacrifice? Really?

  42:24-42:25

  I've got to hear it.

  42:27-42:28

  Obviously not.

  42:29-42:37

  You are shortchanging the grace of God when you have the audacity to think that you have a sin that can't be forgiven.

  42:39-42:41

  You better change that thinking.

  42:43-42:48

  God's grace is so much greater than anything any of us have ever done.

  42:50-42:51

  So guess what? You're on the invite list.

  42:52-42:54

  Letter D, you must cry out to God from the heart.

  42:55-42:56

  from the heart.

  42:57-42:58

  Look at verse 8.

  42:59-43:06

  The king says, "But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and let them call out mightily to God.

  43:11-43:23

  Let everyone turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands." I tried to find a satisfactory answer this week, and I just couldn't, to be honest with you.

  43:23-43:24

  Like, what's up with the animals?

  43:25-43:51

  Like all the people fast and the animals and the cows are like, oh man Everybody put on sackcloth and make sure your goats have sackcloth on - like I'll be honest with you guys. I tried to find a satisfactory answer and I heard Different scholars and people a lot smarter than me like, you know Was it a matter of ignorance?

  43:51-43:53

  Was a matter of pervasiveness?

  43:53-43:56

  Was a matter of what the people are fasting?

  43:56-43:57

  That means they're not eating animals.

  43:57-43:59

  I've heard a lot of different theories.

  43:59-44:08

  I'm just saying I think it's kind of funny that the king was like, everybody's fasting, everybody, even the herd.

  44:12-44:13

  I'll tell you what I think it is.

  44:13-44:22

  This is Riley. I think the king was so concerned over the proclamation of judgment.

  44:22-44:23

  I think he just wanted to be thorough.

  44:24-44:24

  That's what I think.

  44:24-44:27

  He was just like, we're just going to, OK, soup to nuts.

  44:28-44:29

  Everybody, you know, thorough.

  44:29-44:31

  No, but you know, get the animals, too.

  44:31-44:35

  We're going to do this mass repentance thing.

  44:35-44:39

  I think he was just being thorough, right, wrong or indifferent.

  44:46-44:48

  But letter D, you must cry out to God from the heart.

  44:50-44:57

  There's an emotional element to this verse eight, he says, call out mightily to God.

  44:58-44:59

  That's the emotional element to this.

  44:59-45:01

  This has to be done with the right attitude.

  45:01-45:03

  It has to be the right attitude.

  45:03-45:06

  It can't be half hearted like, oh, you know what?

  45:06-45:08

  You're right, God, I'm sorry.

  45:12-45:15

  It can't be half hearted, it can't be obligatory either.

  45:16-45:19

  Like, well, if that's what I'm supposed to do, then I guess I will.

  45:20-45:21

  What are the words that I should say?

  45:22-45:26

  No, call out mightily to God when you realize.

  45:28-45:41

  How wicked we are and how holy God is and how awesome his grace is, call out mightily, just call out mightily, just let it out, man, but it has to be from the heart.

  45:44-45:47

  You know, that's that's one of the dangers in leading people in the sinner's prayer.

  45:47-45:50

  And I'm not not throwing that whole thing under the bus.

  45:50-45:52

  It's great leading people to Christ.

  45:52-45:53

  Any opportunity you get.

  45:54-45:54

  But you understand what I mean?

  45:55-46:01

  That's one thing that kind of concerns me about that is sometimes it's just like repeat this little poem thing after me.

  46:01-46:12

  And. It can't be obligatory or half hearted, it has to be call out from from your heart, call out mightily to God, it has to be real.

  46:14-46:15

  It has to be real.

  46:17-46:19

  Here's some wrong attitudes in approaching God.

  46:19-46:21

  I want to go through these quickly, but these are wrong attitudes.

  46:21-46:23

  I think this whole thing is about attitude.

  46:23-46:24

  Here's some wrong attitudes.

  46:28-46:29

  These cannot be primary motives.

  46:30-46:32

  The first one is, well, I don't want to go to hell.

  46:34-46:35

  That's my primary motive.

  46:35-46:37

  I just, yeah, I'll, okay.

  46:37-46:38

  What am I going to say so I don't go to hell?

  46:40-46:45

  Listen, the living sovereign of the universe is not fire insurance, okay?

  46:47-46:50

  You're like, "I don't want to go to hell." Good. You shouldn't.

  46:51-46:59

  But if you're looking at God as some sort of a ticket for fire insurance, forget it. You're missing the whole point.

  47:00-47:02

  The Bible does warn of judgment. Why?

  47:04-47:04

  Because it's real.

  47:06-47:13

  And it should be something like in Nineveh that shakes us to our senses to say, I'm going to get serious about God here.

  47:14-47:20

  But if you're just looking to cash in on, oh, yeah, I'll say whatever I need to say just so I don't go to hell.

  47:21-47:22

  Something's coming over here.

  47:22-47:23

  Do I need to stop?

  47:24-47:25

  No, I didn't do it.

  47:27-47:30

  When I was a kid, I did the Methodist church I was going to.

  47:31-47:32

  That was what they did with us.

  47:32-47:34

  They took us into the auditorium one by one.

  47:34-47:48

  the preacher did, he took us into the auditorium, and I'll never forget this, we sat down and he said, "Jeff, you don't want to go to hell, do you?" And I was like 12.

  47:48-48:02

  I was like, "No? Like, you mean like we're getting up a group to go now? Like we're not going to Kennywood? What? Youth retreats canceled? We're going to hell?

  48:02-48:07

  Well, like what? No, I don't want to go to hell. He goes and you want to receive Jesus, right?

  48:09-48:37

  And I was like Okay And then like every time I saw him after that he's like I remember the day You gave your life to Jesus and I was like Yeah That was a good day. I Had no idea what was going on I just knew that I didn't want to go to hell and like okay, whatever you say boss Like if I agree with this guy Well, that should get us to our senses, but that can't be your primary motive.

  48:38-48:40

  Here's another thing that can't be your primary motive.

  48:40-48:41

  Well, this will help me be a better person.

  48:46-48:50

  Well, first of all, in God's eyes, by nature, we're not good in the first place.

  48:50-48:52

  It's not like he'll pad your resume.

  48:53-48:57

  Jesus Christ didn't come into the world to turn bad people into good people.

  48:57-49:00

  He came into the world to turn dead people into alive people.

  49:00-49:03

  Okay, so scrap that one.

  49:05-49:06

  Here's one.

  49:06-49:08

  I did prison ministry for 10 years.

  49:08-49:09

  I heard this one a lot.

  49:09-49:11

  I will get what I want if God is on my side.

  49:12-49:17

  I have a lot of people come to Bible study on Friday because they had a court date the following Monday.

  49:17-49:45

  And they would come and they're like, you know, hands raising, praising, praying, you know, trying as hard as they can to wear that brand new Bible I just gave them, trying to all worn out because they thought, "Well, I'll get serious about God and when I go to trial on Monday, through some miracle in the legal system, I'll just get out." And I've seen so many people like, "Well, God didn't cash in for me?

  49:47-49:51

  Lame." Well, if that's your motive, like you're trying... God is not a genie, okay?

  49:53-50:06

  He's not your vending machine. He's a person, and you're not gonna trick Him into doing something for you through some presumptuous false motive prayer thing. Forget that.

  50:08-51:25

  Now here's one. Why not try it out? Yeah, I'll try it out. I've had people tell me, "I'll try it out." Yeah, I was thinking about giving that a try. God is not ultimate Frisbee either. Okay? It's not something you try. He is a person that has promised judgment, has provided grace, and has called all men everywhere to repent. You don't try God. Okay? You know, he's not Ponderosa. Well, I'm not sure if I'm gonna of like this so I'll just take a bite and he hasn't called you to try him okay and one more I want to be saved in my sin not from my sin if that's your motive you're not even gonna get out of the starting gate if you want to be saved but still want to live the kind of life you want to live that's not saving faith because God won't let you live the kind of life that you used to live when you truly come to him. You're going to want to. He changes your heart. He puts a heart in you.

  51:25-51:42

  He gives you new appetites. But the people that think, well, give me the magic formula to say so I can go back to my adulterous lifestyle. But still go to heaven. God will not be mocked, OK? He won't be.

  51:44-51:49

  It's my recognition of my sin and God's holiness and mercy.

  51:49-51:51

  There's the king called for sackcloth.

  51:51-51:53

  You're like, what's a sackcloth about?

  51:53-51:55

  Well, that was the outward display of the heart.

  51:56-52:00

  You know, in Old Testament times, you see, they talk about sackcloth and ashes.

  52:01-52:03

  Basically, it was like putting on a burlap bag.

  52:05-52:13

  And sitting down in the garbage, basically, was you were you were outwardly demonstrating. I'm broken.

  52:14-52:15

  I'm mourning.

  52:17-52:19

  And here it's mourning over your sinfulness.

  52:23-52:25

  So you must cry out to God from the heart.

  52:26-52:28

  I can do it with you, but I can't do it for you.

  52:28-52:30

  OK, two more.

  52:31-52:35

  You must repent. Verses eight, nine again.

  52:36-52:39

  Let everyone turn from his evil ways and from the violence that is in his hands.

  52:39-52:47

  Who knows, God may turn and relent and turn from his fierce anger that we may not perish.

  52:50-52:53

  There's no offer of salvation in scripture without repentance.

  52:53-52:55

  Nowhere. Nowhere.

  52:56-53:00

  You'll never find any place in scripture where God offers salvation without repentance.

  53:01-53:03

  It just it doesn't come up at all.

  53:05-53:06

  What is repentance?

  53:06-53:08

  Repentance literally means to change your mind.

  53:10-53:15

  I used to love my sin and I'd try to avoid God or the things of God.

  53:16-53:19

  And I thought my sin was pleasurable and I enjoyed it.

  53:19-53:22

  And it's changing your mind about those things.

  53:22-53:24

  That's what repentance is. I don't like this.

  53:24-53:28

  This has brought me nothing but destruction and heartache and it's hurt other people.

  53:29-53:40

  Change your mind. Change your mind about your sin, about God, about who he is, about who I am, about who he says I am, about who he promises to make me.

  53:41-53:49

  Change your mind. The change of action follows, but it's always from the inside out, never from the outside in.

  53:50-53:52

  OK, one more.

  53:55-53:58

  This is the crux of the matter here, verse 10.

  54:00-54:03

  God responds to what you do with the message.

  54:04-54:08

  God responds to what you do with the message.

  54:11-54:31

  Verse 10 says, "When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it." You have a choice.

  54:34-54:43

  And the Bible says that God responds to the choice you make in response to Him.

  54:47-54:48

  You already stand condemned.

  54:50-54:52

  You already stand judged for your sin.

  54:52-54:58

  But if you receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, listen, everything changes.

  54:58-55:03

  You pass from death to life. You pass from guilty to forgiven.

  55:04-55:08

  You pass from God's enemy to God's child.

  55:08-55:18

  But there's one big difference between what the king of Nineveh knew and what you know.

  55:21-55:41

  Look at verse 9 again. He says, "Who knows? God may turn and relent, and turn from His fierce anger, so that we may not perish." There's a big difference here.

  55:42-55:43

  I want you to catch this.

  55:47-55:49

  He didn't know.

  55:50-55:51

  He wasn't fully convinced.

  55:54-55:55

  He said, "Who knows?

  55:56-56:05

  "We'll try this and hope for the best." But we have assurance.

  56:05-56:07

  You remember those verses out of John I read earlier?

  56:08-56:09

  We have assurance.

  56:14-56:26

  A hundred percent of the people that sincerely turn to Christ by faith and receive Him are saved.

  56:27-56:28

  A hundred percent.

  56:30-56:38

  There has not ever been anyone that has come to Christ honestly by faith with a sincere heart that he has turned away.

  56:39-56:43

  He promised that he would never turn somebody away.

  56:44-56:47

  So that's the difference between you and the Ninevite king.

  56:49-56:54

  He wasn't sure what would happen or what could happen.

  56:57-56:58

  But you can be sure.

  56:59-57:00

  Did you know that?

  57:02-57:05

  And it's no guarantee that I make as if I'm promising something.

  57:07-57:08

  God has promised.

  57:08-57:12

  And understand that your salvation is based on his integrity.

  57:14-57:17

  Your salvation is based on God keeping his word.

  57:21-57:23

  So we can have assurance.

  57:25-57:32

  Earlier I read Romans 6.23, it says, "The wages of sin is," what?

  57:34-57:39

  "Death." You've earned death because of your sin.

  57:40-57:41

  Well, you know that's only half the verse.

  57:42-57:46

  The other half of the verse is... do we have it, Ashley?

  57:47-57:49

  Oh, there it is. I knew she had it.

  57:51-58:00

  But the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord.

  58:03-58:07

  As I close, it's a free gift.

  58:10-58:11

  It's not a wage.

  58:12-58:13

  It's a free gift.

  58:15-58:16

  What do you do with a gift?

  58:19-58:21

  Well, let's pretend it's my birthday.

  58:21-58:23

  It's not, my birthday's September 23rd.

  58:25-58:38

  You won't insult me with cash or gift cards, but let's pretend it's my birthday and you show up at my house with a present.

  58:40-58:43

  I want you to know that there are four ways that I can respond to that.

  58:45-58:49

  Okay, so you ring the doorbell, I open the door.

  58:51-58:53

  Happy birthday, Pastor Jeff, you have a gift for me.

  58:54-58:55

  There's four ways I can respond to that.

  58:56-58:59

  One way is I could just slam the door.

  59:00-59:01

  Say, I don't want your stupid gift.

  59:05-59:12

  Another way is I could say, wow, thank you.

  59:12-59:12

  You know what?

  59:13-59:13

  Let me get my wallet.

  59:14-59:15

  How much was it?

  59:16-59:17

  How much was it?

  59:17-59:19

  I'd like to pay you for it.

  59:20-59:22

  How would you feel about that?

  59:23-59:24

  Insulted?

  59:28-59:36

  Or happy birthday Pastor Jeff, the third thing I could do is I could take it and be like wow you know what, this looks great.

  59:38-59:44

  That looks really great and I'll get right back to that one of these days.

  59:45-01:00:13

  you come back to my house like Christmas time and it's still sitting in the exact same place but now it has an inch of dust on it. It looked like I took it but I didn't do anything with it, right? Or the fourth way I could respond to the gift, which is the most likely, is I could reach out and take it and say thank you and receive it.

  01:00:16-01:00:22

  And I want you to know that those are four ways that you can respond to the invitation that God's given you through Jesus Christ.

  01:00:22-01:00:29

  For those of you who have not taken that step, in just a few moments we're going to have some people come up here that you can pray with.

  01:00:30-01:00:36

  If you've not taken that step, understand you can leave here today making one of those four choices.

  01:00:37-01:00:43

  For some, God has offered his gift of eternal life through Jesus Christ and you just slam the door in his face.

  01:00:43-01:00:44

  I don't need Jesus.

  01:00:46-01:00:47

  I'll get to heaven on my own.

  01:00:47-01:00:50

  Don't tell me I need your Jesus or your Bible, your religion.

  01:00:51-01:00:52

  Bad move.

  01:00:53-01:00:55

  Some people slam the door in God's face.

  01:00:55-01:00:56

  That's a choice that you can make.

  01:00:58-01:01:03

  Some people, proverbially speaking, pull out their wallet.

  01:01:05-01:01:06

  I guess metaphorically speaking, I should say.

  01:01:06-01:01:09

  and they try to earn it.

  01:01:10-01:01:11

  Gee, you mean Jesus died for me?

  01:01:12-01:01:13

  Wow, you know what?

  01:01:13-01:01:23

  From now on, I'm gonna get involved in teaching children and I'm gonna start doing this and I'm gonna help Dave Grimm get this stuff set up and I'm gonna help this and I'm gonna start doing this.

  01:01:23-01:01:29

  And you think if I just start doing a bunch of stuff, I can sort of pay God for what he's done for me.

  01:01:31-01:01:35

  You'd be insulted if somebody tried to pay you for a gift.

  01:01:37-01:01:42

  Do you think God is insulted when He's offered you a free gift and you think you have to buy it from Him?

  01:01:44-01:01:45

  You can't buy it from Him.

  01:01:48-01:01:54

  The third way you could respond, and I think a lot of people do this in church, they come and they see the gift.

  01:01:57-01:01:58

  You know what?

  01:01:58-01:01:59

  That looks good.

  01:02:00-01:02:00

  It looks good.

  01:02:02-01:02:03

  And then they set it aside.

  01:02:05-01:02:07

  I'm going to get back to that one of these days.

  01:02:11-01:02:12

  And they never really do.

  01:02:15-01:02:24

  What I'm hoping is what God's hoping for you is that you would take his gift and receive it.

  01:02:27-01:02:31

  By faith. His gift of eternal life.

  01:02:33-01:02:34

  in Jesus Christ.

Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Jonah 3

Breakout Questions:
Pray for one another.

Even if you are Broken

1. Brokenness is coming to the realization that "I Am Wrong"



You've hit a "Broken Point" when:

1. Your circumstances are Out of your control (Jonah 2:2-3)


2. You got what you wanted, then find out You don't really want it (Jonah 2:4)


3. Crying out to God becomes Your only option (Jonah 2:5-7)


4. You Learn the lesson God was trying to teach you (Jonah 2:8)


5. Your Passion for God returns (Jonah 2:9)


2. God pursues His broken children with Restoration (Jonah 2:10-3:3)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:11

  Open up your Bibles to Jonah. Chapter 2, we're continuing our series, "God is out to get you." And last week we saw that God is out to get you even if you rebel.

  00:12-00:15

  Today, God is out to get you even if you are broken.

  00:16-00:29

  Quick recap from Jonah chapter 1. It's a familiar story to a lot of us, but just to give us an on-ramp for where we're heading today, you remember the story. Jonah is called to preach to Nineveh, the capital of Assyria.

  00:31-00:34

  Jonah flees on a boat and God hurls a storm in him.

  00:36-00:45

  Well, the mariners on the boat find out that Jonah is the problem, and he tells them to just throw him overboard and the storm will stop.

  00:46-00:50

  They do, and it does the end.

  00:50-00:51

  Well, not hardly.

  00:53-00:57

  But what we saw was that God is a loving Father who disciplines rebellious children.

  00:59-01:14

  And that was our lesson last week. When God is clearly calling you to something, and you say no, He loves you enough to pursue you. But the question is, what happens when He catches you?

  01:16-01:19

  Well, let's pick up in the text. We ended with chapter 1, verse 17.

  01:21-01:25

  Let's pick up there again. Jonah is thrown overboard, as we said last week.

  01:25-01:30

  the men on the boat, they went and planted, harvested Bible chapel, Tarshish.

  01:31-01:39

  And it says, "And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah.

  01:42-01:48

  And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights." Now, do you believe that?

  01:49-01:52

  Do you believe that Jonah was actually in the belly of a fish for three days and three nights?

  01:53-01:54

  Why in the world would you believe that?

  01:56-01:57

  What's that? Say it loud.

  01:58-02:01

  Because the Bible said so. Great. That works for me.

  02:02-02:09

  And as we saw last week, Jesus talked about Jonah as being a real person in a real place that these events really happened to.

  02:09-02:13

  Jesus didn't talk about Jonah as being a parable or an allegory.

  02:13-02:15

  He talked about him as being real.

  02:15-02:20

  And if Jesus says this is how it happened, then I'll go with that, right?

  02:24-02:26

  So the Lord appointed a great fish.

  02:26-02:28

  It's funny, the people that struggle with that.

  02:29-02:33

  We don't have any problem with, God spoke the world into existence.

  02:34-02:41

  We don't have any problem with raising the dead, but really somebody swallowed by a fish for three days.

  02:42-02:45

  Come on, it's true.

  02:47-03:10

  Well, look at chapter 2. It says, "Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the belly of the fish." Interestingly, when the mariners were having the potluck prayer meeting, Jonah wasn't interested. Remember that? Like, "Hey, we're just like all crying out to our gods.

  03:10-03:48

  You get a god. Who's got a god? Anybody got a god? You get a god. We're all praying to our God. So you want to pray to yours?" And he wasn't interested at the time and swallowed by a fish. It says, "Then Jonah prayed." Jot down in your notes, "God will get your attention. God will get your attention." Okay, if the storm didn't do it, if the panic of the mariners didn't do it, if throwing all the cargo overboard and the casting lots, if that didn't do, God will get your attention." And clearly he had to Jonah.

  03:49-03:51

  But here's something interesting.

  03:54-04:03

  For some reason in the back of my mind, most of my life, I had this idea that Jonah was in despair because he was in the belly of a fish.

  04:04-04:06

  And maybe I thought that because that kind of seems natural, right?

  04:07-04:11

  I mean, if a fish swallows you, like how many people here would totally panic?

  04:12-04:15

  Yeah, like, what's next, right?

  04:15-04:27

  Well, I had this idea that that's why Jonah was kind of freaking out, like, "Holy smokes, I was swallowed by a fish." But actually, what we see in chapter 2, that wasn't what he was concerned over.

  04:28-04:30

  And I want to show you what I mean by that.

  04:30-04:32

  Look at verse 6. We're going to go down through and read these.

  04:32-04:35

  But at verse 6, this is what he's praying inside the fish.

  04:36-04:42

  He says, "Yet you brought up my life from the pit." You know, it's a prayer of deliverance.

  04:42-04:44

  He talks about salvation belongs to the Lord.

  04:45-04:46

  We're going to talk about that in verse 9.

  04:47-04:59

  But that prayer took place in the belly of the fish, verse 1, and before the fish vomited Jonah out on dry land.

  05:00-05:03

  So understand that Jonah wasn't panicking about the fish.

  05:03-05:05

  Well, what was going on here?

  05:05-05:06

  It was over nearly drowning.

  05:08-05:10

  We're gonna see that very clearly in the text.

  05:12-05:21

  So first of all, in your outline, number one, brokenness, that's what we're gonna see here in this prayer.

  05:21-05:27

  Brokenness is coming to the realization that, and I want you to write down the three hardest words to say.

  05:28-05:29

  Like I love you, no?

  05:31-05:33

  There are actually three words that are a lot harder to say than that.

  05:34-05:35

  Any takers on that?

  05:37-05:37

  I was wrong.

  05:39-05:40

  That's hard to say, isn't it?

  05:42-05:42

  No?

  05:43-05:44

  Really?

  05:47-05:49

  No, I mean you saying it, not me saying it.

  05:50-05:53

  It's hard to get to that point where you say, I was wrong.

  05:53-05:56

  I can tell my wife I love her all the time.

  05:56-05:58

  I love you, I'll tell you right now, I love you.

  05:58-06:02

  But to go and say, I was wrong, that's a lot harder.

  06:03-06:05

  And that's where brokenness starts.

  06:07-06:08

  It's in the head and it's in the hearts.

  06:09-06:12

  Now, last week we saw that rebellion is a choice to disobey.

  06:14-06:18

  Brokenness is the acknowledgement of what a bad choice that is.

  06:18-06:24

  And understand that this brokenness is meant to draw you to God, not away from God.

  06:25-06:27

  To get you to the point that you say, I'm done running.

  06:29-06:29

  I'm done.

  06:30-06:39

  I've been thinking that I can flee from God and I've been trying to avoid God and the things of God and I'm done with that.

  06:40-06:40

  I'm done with that.

  06:40-06:42

  I'm running to God.

  06:44-06:51

  So many times people ask me to pray that God would break someone.

  06:52-06:53

  Like, just pray.

  06:53-06:56

  I have a prodigal child right now.

  06:56-06:59

  Just pray that God would break him down.

  07:01-07:05

  What kind of a prayer is that? We're going to see as we go through this text.

  07:05-07:14

  Or, you know, my spouse has been so unrepentant over this particular area, and I need you to pray that God would get his attention.

  07:14-07:15

  Just pray that God would break him down.

  07:16-07:20

  I've been asked to pray that so many times.

  07:21-07:24

  But here's the question we're going to answer today.

  07:25-07:27

  How do you know when someone is really broken?

  07:29-07:30

  That's what we're going to see here.

  07:30-07:32

  Those are the ingredients that are in this text.

  07:32-07:33

  But how do you know?

  07:35-07:37

  How do you know when somebody is really broken?

  07:41-07:43

  Because it's easy to get jaded, isn't it?

  07:44-07:45

  Have you ever been jaded with someone?

  07:46-07:49

  They're sorry, they're sorry, I'm so sorry.

  07:51-07:52

  No change.

  07:53-07:54

  Do it again.

  07:54-07:58

  I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, and they do it again.

  07:58-08:00

  And we become jaded.

  08:02-08:04

  That was an obstacle for me to overcome.

  08:05-08:08

  I did prison ministry for 10 years, every week.

  08:09-08:21

  Do you know how many people would come in and, "Yeah, I'm really sorry about what I've done." And I think they eventually, maybe Dale can help us, he's a CEO, but did they put that revolving door in the front because we had a lot of people that were sorry.

  08:23-08:29

  that no sooner made it to the sidewalk that they were doing the very thing that they were so sorry for.

  08:30-08:31

  Yeah, please stop saying that.

  08:31-08:36

  Okay, but you get jaded.

  08:37-08:40

  So the question is, how do you know when someone is really broken?

  08:41-08:42

  How do you know?

  08:44-08:47

  Well, some of you may still be on the run.

  08:48-08:50

  I just want to encourage you, that can stop today.

  08:51-08:52

  Okay, that can stop today.

  08:52-09:00

  There might be some people sitting here that have been like on the boat to Tarshish and trying to avoid something that God's wanting to work on you.

  09:01-09:02

  That can end right now.

  09:03-09:04

  Isn't that great news?

  09:05-09:06

  That can end today.

  09:07-09:08

  And by God's grace it will.

  09:12-09:13

  You're heading for your broken point.

  09:14-09:16

  And things are going to get harder before they get easier.

  09:16-09:17

  Just ask Jonah.

  09:18-09:19

  So how do we know?

  09:20-09:26

  Well, jot these down. I'm going to go through these five ways that you know you've hit your broken point.

  09:28-09:32

  First of all, letter A, your circumstances are out of your control.

  09:34-09:38

  Your circumstances are out of your control, and you realize that.

  09:39-09:44

  Okay? Your circumstances are out of your control, and you realize that.

  09:44-09:47

  Let's get to the text here. This is Jonah's prayer.

  09:47-09:53

  "I called out to the Lord out of my distress, "and He answered me.

  09:55-10:03

  "Out of the belly of Sheol, I cried, "and you heard my voice." What is Sheol?

  10:04-10:13

  Well, understand the period of history where we live, we have the completed written revelation of the Word of God.

  10:14-10:21

  And in Old Testament times, there was still a bit of mystery concerning what happened beyond the grave.

  10:22-10:26

  It was thought of as being a dark, gloomy, mysterious place.

  10:27-10:30

  And oftentimes your Bible will just call that Sheol.

  10:31-10:35

  And it's our way of saying at the grave, okay?

  10:35-10:37

  Kind of a gloomy concept.

  10:39-10:40

  The mysterious realm of the dead.

  10:41-10:42

  It's the grave.

  10:44-10:44

  Okay?

  10:45-10:52

  And then verse three, he says, "For you cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the floods surrounded me.

  10:53-11:01

  All your waves and your billows passed over me." We'll pause here.

  11:02-11:06

  You've hit broken point when you realize your circumstances are out of your control.

  11:06-11:08

  It has to get to this.

  11:08-11:09

  It has to get to this.

  11:09-11:11

  I don't have any human way out.

  11:11-11:12

  I have nowhere to run.

  11:13-11:14

  I have nothing to buy.

  11:14-11:17

  There's no way that I can get out of this situation on my own.

  11:19-11:22

  It's like financial collapse and there's no more credit.

  11:26-11:30

  It's like a health crisis, but there's no cure.

  11:34-11:35

  Every bridge is burned.

  11:36-11:38

  Every option is exhausted.

  11:40-11:55

  You don't have to raise your hands, but how many people here this morning would say, I feel like I'm in a hopeless situation." Well, sometimes in God's discipline, that's what He's trying to drive you to, and we're going to see why here in just a second.

  11:56-11:58

  That was certainly Jonah's case.

  12:01-12:03

  He said, "I was knocking on death's door.

  12:05-12:28

  I was in the heart of the sea." And you can imagine, I don't know if anybody here has ever had a near-death experience with flooding, but you can imagine how scary that is to be out in the middle of a hurricane in the middle of the sea, where the waves keep crashing and you don't know which end is up and you can't catch your breath.

  12:31-12:34

  But you've hit broken point when your circumstances are out of your control.

  12:35-12:51

  "Secondly, letter B, you've hit broken point "when you got what you wanted, "then find out you don't really want it." I've thought a lot about this.

  12:52-12:56

  This is a phenomenon that you're like, I'm not too sure about this one.

  12:57-12:58

  Well, walk through this with me.

  12:59-13:02

  You got what you wanted, then find out you don't really want it.

  13:04-13:09

  This plays out in my life quite often, especially in the summer.

  13:11-13:13

  We're playing outside with the kids.

  13:14-13:16

  Just happened the other day, Erin came home.

  13:17-13:27

  She's like, "Hey, you wanna go get ice cream?" I'm like, "Ice cream, ice cream, yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, let's go get ice cream." I thought that's what I really wanted.

  13:29-13:32

  But then right after I eat the ice cream, it is throbbing headache.

  13:33-13:36

  My stomach feels like somebody's wringing out a dish rag.

  13:37-13:40

  It is asthma problems, it is allergy problems.

  13:40-13:42

  I'm congested, I'm wheezing.

  13:42-13:50

  And every time I'm just like, "Aaron, don't let me eat any more ice cream." But then it'll happen in a couple of weeks.

  13:50-14:00

  "Oh, ice cream sounds good." You get exactly what you want, and then you realize that's not what I want at all.

  14:01-14:02

  What do I mean by that?

  14:02-14:13

  Well, back in chapter one, three times, we saw twice in verse three, Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord at the end of the verse.

  14:13-14:19

  Away from the presence of the Lord, verse 10, the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord.

  14:20-14:24

  So like, if Jonah was trying to make a point, Jonah was trying to get what?

  14:26-14:28

  Away from the presence of the Lord, right?

  14:29-14:29

  Isn't that clear?

  14:29-14:30

  Well, look at verse four.

  14:32-14:44

  He said, "Then I said, 'I am driven away from your sight, yet I shall look upon your holy temple.'" Like, wait a minute, Jonah, isn't that what you wanted?

  14:45-14:49

  Didn't you want to be driven away from the sight of God? Isn't that what you wanted?

  14:50-14:55

  And then he realized as soon as he got it that maybe this isn't what I want.

  14:57-15:11

  And sometimes God in His grace allows us in our rebellion to have the thing that we think we need, so we can experience the truth that it is not going to satisfy us.

  15:15-15:17

  I'm going to say that again. I'm going to try to.

  15:19-15:23

  Bear with me this morning. I was up all night. I got a crazy fever.

  15:24-15:30

  So I told Lippin if I collapse, I'm like, my sermon's in here, just pick it up where I left off.

  15:32-15:37

  So that's why I'm not being too sociable today. I'm not gonna, you know, give many hugs or anything today.

  15:37-15:41

  Don't take offense. I just don't want you to have the flu for Mother's Day, okay?

  15:43-15:44

  What was I talking about?

  15:45-16:11

  Oh yeah, sometimes when we persist in "I want this, I want this, I want this," So many times God says, "Okay, you can have it. You can have it." And then we realize as soon as we get it, "That's not what I wanted at all." You're like, "Can you back that up biblically?" Actually, I can.

  16:12-16:13

  Numbers chapter 11.

  16:14-16:27

  Remember the story of the whining nomads heading from Egypt to the promised land as Moses was leading the Israelites and the Egyptians who ended up coming with them.

  16:28-16:33

  But in Numbers chapter 11, remember the account?

  16:34-16:37

  "Oh, we wish we were back in Egypt because back in Egypt we had meat.

  16:38-16:50

  And now we don't have anything but manna." "Oh, I just wish we had meat." Man, it was the perfect food that God provided, ultimately picturing Jesus Christ, the bread of life.

  16:54-16:59

  But instead of being thankful for God's provision, they were crying they wanted meat.

  17:00-17:02

  And God said, literally, "You want meat?

  17:02-17:03

  "Consecrate yourselves.

  17:04-17:08

  "I will give you meat until it comes out of your noses." That's what your Bible says.

  17:11-17:13

  And he drove in quail.

  17:13-17:19

  And the Bible says that while the meat was still between their teeth before they consumed it, God struck them dead.

  17:22-17:28

  And the rest of the Israelites said, you know, man is sounding awfully good about now, right?

  17:30-17:34

  Sometimes we get what we want and we find out it isn't really what we want.

  17:35-17:36

  How about 2 Samuel 13?

  17:39-17:50

  Such a sad and sick story, but David's son, Amnon, wanted a sexual relationship with his sister, Tamar.

  17:52-17:56

  And he did this little, you know, I'm so sick, can you bring me food?

  17:56-18:00

  And then he tried to get her to sleep with him.

  18:00-18:04

  And she said, you can't do this.

  18:05-18:07

  Well, she wouldn't do it willingly, so he raped her.

  18:08-18:17

  And interestingly, verse 15, the very next verse, it says, "Then he hated her." He got exactly what he thought he wanted.

  18:19-18:23

  He realized, "That's not what I want." Sad.

  18:24-18:26

  Luke 15, the prodigal son, what did he want?

  18:26-18:33

  "I want independence. Nobody tells me what to do." Okay. Let me know how that works out for you.

  18:35-18:40

  He had his independence, he lived like a pig, and then he ended up rooming with them.

  18:42-18:46

  And while he was with the pigs, he thought, you know, this isn't really what I wanted.

  18:47-18:49

  Didn't turn out exactly how I thought it was going to.

  18:52-18:53

  But just make a mental note.

  18:54-18:58

  Some of you might be sitting here this morning going, yeah, that was me, that's totally me.

  18:59-19:04

  But if it hasn't happened to you yet, or somebody that you know, make a note of that.

  19:04-19:09

  So many times we want something, and then when we get it, we don't want it at all.

  19:11-19:14

  I wanted that divorce, and now that I got it, why am I so miserable?

  19:18-19:23

  I spend lavishly on something I don't need, and now I hate to even look at it.

  19:25-19:26

  You know, I wanted that affair.

  19:26-19:33

  I just wanted that sexual relationship with that woman, and now she just drives me insane.

  19:34-19:35

  I can't stand to be around her.

  19:36-19:38

  I wanted to be a stay-at-home mom.

  19:40-19:43

  Now I just wanna go back to work and let grandma raise the kids.

  19:44-19:46

  And I wanted that promotion at work.

  19:47-19:50

  And I worked so hard, that's all I thought about was the promotion and more money.

  19:51-19:54

  And now I just wish I had my old job back.

  19:54-19:56

  You'll see that over and over and over.

  19:57-19:58

  The thing that we think we have to have.

  20:01-20:03

  We realize that that does not satisfy.

  20:04-20:08

  Actually, there's a saying that goes right along with this.

  20:08-20:10

  It's something like, "Careful what you..." What?

  20:11-20:18

  "Wish for," right? "Careful what you wish for, because you just might get it." And over and over and over, that's repeated.

  20:18-20:22

  And if Jonah were here today, he would tell you the same thing.

  20:22-20:28

  You know, "All I wanted was to be out of God's presence, and then when I felt like that had happened, panic button.

  20:31-20:34

  Brokenness brings a disgust over the focal point of rebellion.

  20:36-20:37

  How do you know somebody's broken?

  20:39-20:44

  When the thing that they had to have in their rebellion now just completely disgusts them.

  20:45-20:46

  I wanted that?

  20:48-20:50

  I was daydreaming about that.

  20:50-20:58

  I spent so much time and effort and energy thought into that, you'll know someone's broken when that disgusts them. Okay?

  20:58-21:26

  Letter C. How do you know when someone's broken? Crying out to God becomes your only option. Look at verses 5 through 7. He continues talking about this near-death experience. Some people believe that Jonah actually did die. I'm not there. But I think he's talking about a near-death experience.

  21:27-21:31

  He says, "The waters closed in over me to take my life.

  21:31-21:33

  The deep surrounded me.

  21:33-21:38

  Weeds were wrapped around my head at the roots of the mountains.

  21:39-21:43

  I went down to the land whose bars are closed upon me forever.

  21:45-21:49

  Yet you brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God.

  21:51-22:09

  "When my life was fainting away, I remembered the Lord, and my prayer came to you in your holy temple." So you know someone's broken, you know maybe you're at the broken point, when not only your circumstance is impossible, but it leads you to your only option, which is crying out to God.

  22:11-22:22

  Again, he sort of keeps circling back to this feeling of distress, and then it says, "He remembered the Lord." And I don't think that means that Jonah was like, "Is there anybody else that I can call?

  22:23-22:33

  Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, the Lord, I'll try Him." I think what that saying is, sort of like when that prodigal son remembered some things about his dad.

  22:36-22:38

  I think that's what was going on with Jonah here.

  22:38-22:42

  You know, I remember some things about God's character.

  22:43-22:45

  I remember that God hears prayers.

  22:46-22:52

  I remember that I can cry out to Him and He's going to hear me.

  22:55-22:58

  And you need to get to that place where crying out is your only option.

  23:00-23:16

  You know, I heard a preacher say one time, "Jesus Christ is all you need, but you'll never know it until He's all you got." And then when he's all that you got, you realize he's all that you need.

  23:19-23:26

  By God's grace, he brings us to that place initially.

  23:28-23:33

  By God's grace, he'll bring us back to that place when it's just Jesus.

  23:33-23:34

  I just need Jesus.

  23:34-23:35

  There's no plan B.

  23:35-23:45

  There's no other option here. I'm not going to settle for anything else than the Lord Jesus Christ.

  23:47-23:49

  So that's a clue that somebody's at broken point.

  23:49-23:53

  Two more. Letter D, you learned a lesson that God was trying to teach you.

  23:55-23:57

  You learned a lesson that God was trying to teach you.

  23:57-24:04

  Look at verse 8. This could be the key verse in all of Jonah, where he says, This is what he's talking about.

  24:04-24:10

  I went through this near-death experience, and I cried out to God, and here was his epiphany.

  24:11-24:17

  Those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love.

  24:17-24:23

  Those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love.

  24:24-24:26

  This is Jonah saying, "I get it now.

  24:28-24:33

  I get it now." God's lessons are never FYI. Did you know that?

  24:35-24:37

  When God teaches us lessons, it's never...

  24:37-24:39

  Here's some interesting factoids for you.

  24:39-24:42

  Just file this away. This might come in useful someday.

  24:42-24:45

  When God's teaching us a lesson, it's meant to change us.

  24:47-24:52

  It's not just if I'm on Jeopardy and New Testament is one of the categories, I'm so going to nail it.

  24:52-24:57

  It's this is taking root in my life and it's changing me, this lesson that God's teaching me.

  24:59-25:03

  So what was the lesson? Here's a paraphrase.

  25:03-25:07

  "People who refuse to come to God won't know the love of God." That's what he's saying.

  25:08-25:12

  If you refuse to come to God, you're not going to know God's love. That's pretty simple, isn't it?

  25:14-25:16

  People who refuse to come to God won't know the love of God.

  25:17-25:22

  Well, that's what Jonah learned, and that was the message he was supposed to take to Nineveh.

  25:24-25:30

  And see, in our ministries, our ministries need to be the overflow of what God is doing in us.

  25:33-25:43

  You know, Jonah here was saying, "I was lost, I was hopeless, I was helpless, I was doomed." But crying out to God turned everything around in an instant.

  25:48-25:52

  And then he thought, "You know what? That's exactly what Nineveh is facing.

  25:52-25:55

  They're lost, they're hopeless, they're doomed.

  25:57-26:03

  But you know, if they would cry out to God, their situation too could turn around in an instant.

  26:05-26:07

  Jonah had to learn the sermon so he could go preach it.

  26:10-26:12

  You have to let the lesson sink in.

  26:13-26:20

  Not just head acknowledgement, not just lip service, but you have to let God's lesson sink in when He's trying to teach you something.

  26:20-26:30

  And that's what we see here with Jonah. He's like, "I get it now." Aaron and I were thinking of an example of that in our own lives.

  26:31-26:40

  You know, what was the time where we heard a lesson and we were like, "Yeah, I knew that." See, Jonah knew this lesson before. It wasn't like he learned that in the fish.

  26:40-26:42

  It was in here. It just wasn't in here.

  26:43-26:46

  So Aaron and I were talking, you know, was there a time that the Lord's done that in us?

  26:47-27:00

  And the best example that we could think of, especially in watching our video about Harvest Bible Chapels, you know, when we were in the training center, over and over people would say this, "You know what? God provides what you need. God provides what you need.

  27:00-27:08

  And you start with your core group and you're praying and you're meeting, God's going to provide what you need." We heard that so many times.

  27:10-28:16

  And when we started to build the core group, people said, "Well, where's this stuff going to come from?" intellectually, we could say, "God's gonna provide what we need." There was a sense in which we knew that. But then when we got to launch and God provided every single thing that we needed, most of it in the span of a couple of days, we learned that lesson in a whole nother level. Does that make sense? So now, talking to people that are in the process of planting a Harvest Bible Chapel, I can tell them God's going to provide what you need in a much different way than I could have told them before the Lord took me through the lesson. You know, sometimes He does that with us. I'm gonna teach you something It's going to become embedded into your heart, and your ministry is going to be the overflow of that.

  28:18-28:21

  One more, how do you know you've reached a broken point?

  28:22-28:24

  Your passion for God returns.

  28:26-28:36

  Look at verse 9, Jonah says, "But I, with the voice of thanksgiving, will sacrifice to you what I have vowed I will pay.

  28:37-28:40

  Salvation belongs to the Lord. He like breaks into praise service here.

  28:42-28:44

  Your passion for God returns.

  28:44-28:59

  Remember, this wasn't Joe Schlub that was just sitting on the curb, that God was like, "Eeny, meeny, miny, do you want to go preach?" This was a prophet. This was someone whose life's calling was to proclaim the Word of God.

  29:03-29:06

  Jonah was called, he loved the Lord, his whole life was about the Lord.

  29:08-29:11

  And we get to this point, we see how far he got away from that.

  29:13-29:15

  And now he snapped back to his senses.

  29:16-29:23

  Like, "What am I doing? What am I doing?" What does it look like when someone has snapped back to their senses?

  29:23-29:24

  Well, it's right there in the text.

  29:24-29:33

  He says, first of all, "But I, with the voice of thanksgiving, will sacrifice to you." It's thankfulness. It's thankfulness.

  29:33-29:35

  Thankfulness should be as natural to a Christian as breathing.

  29:37-29:42

  I should never have to get up and preach a sermon, "Here's why you should be thankful.

  29:42-29:47

  You should try really hard to be thankful. You either get it or you don't.

  29:48-29:57

  You either understand what God's done for you in your life as a testimony of thanksgiving, or you didn't get it and you're not thankful.

  29:58-30:07

  That's a sign when somebody's snapped back to their senses, "You know what, I have so much to be thankful for." Secondly, commitment.

  30:08-30:15

  He says, "What I have vowed, I will pay." What's he talking about there? Is he talking about the ministry?

  30:18-30:21

  I'm not sure, but it was a commitment.

  30:25-30:26

  And then the reminder.

  30:27-30:35

  This was the reminder, "Salvation belongs to the Lord." There are some people here that need that reminder.

  30:39-30:42

  I want you to bow your heads. We're not going to pray yet. We're going to wrap this up.

  30:42-30:45

  But I just want you to bow your heads and close your eyes, because I'm going to read something to you.

  30:46-30:52

  Jonah needed this reminder, and I just really feel that there's some people in here that need this reminder.

  30:52-31:00

  I want to read out of the New Testament a reminder that salvation belongs to the Lord.

  31:04-31:10

  Because there are some people here who have, at least in their minds, maybe gotten away from that.

  31:11-31:13

  And you've forgotten who you are in Jesus Christ.

  31:13-31:18

  I want you to listen to this, Romans chapter 8, five unanswerable questions.

  31:18-31:19

  I just want to read them.

  31:21-31:23

  "What then shall we say to these things?

  31:27-31:31

  If God is for us, who can be against us?" There's no answer to that question.

  31:34-31:35

  This is your reminder.

  31:37-31:57

  You're like, "Well, how do I know God's for me?" Well, verse 32, "He who did not spare his own son, but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?" If you're a born-again believer in Jesus Christ, God is on your side.

  32:00-32:07

  Don't let any stinking thinking influence you into starting to believe that God is opposed to you.

  32:09-32:13

  God is on your side. You need that reminder.

  32:16-32:29

  He says, "Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies." Sometimes the person that brings a charge against God's elect, sometimes it's ourselves.

  32:30-32:37

  Self-condemning. Well, you're in that category too. You can't even bring a charge against yourself.

  32:39-32:42

  Why? Because you've been pronounced not guilty.

  32:44-32:45

  You can argue with God on that one.

  32:46-32:47

  Who is to condemn?

  32:50-32:56

  Christ Jesus is the one who died, more than that, was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us.

  33:02-33:04

  Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

  33:05-33:16

  "Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?" As it is written, "For your sake we are being killed all the day long.

  33:16-33:21

  We are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered." Suffering was nothing new to the people of God.

  33:22-33:26

  He says, "No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.

  33:26-33:42

  For I am sure that neither death nor life nor angels nor rulers nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus, our Lord.

  33:45-33:46

  You can look up here.

  33:47-33:48

  That's the end of Romans chapter eight.

  33:49-33:49

  That's your reminder.

  33:53-33:57

  That's your salvation belongs to the Lord moment, okay?

  34:00-34:01

  We need to get back to that.

  34:03-34:04

  Who am I in Christ?

  34:04-34:06

  That's what's going to restore our passion for God.

  34:11-34:15

  And as I close, God pursues his broken children with restoration.

  34:18-34:20

  God pursues his broken children with restoration.

  34:23-34:24

  So Jonah gets it.

  34:24-34:31

  He's like, I learned the lesson, Thanksgiving commitment, salvation belongs to the Lord.

  34:31-34:32

  I get it now.

  34:34-34:46

  And the Lord spoke to the fish and it vomited Jonah out upon the dry land, which teaches us, write this down, you can't keep a good man down.

  34:49-34:55

  Actually, we were planning the worship set last Tuesday and we're talking about what songs to sing.

  34:55-35:05

  And Laura said, "We should sing from the inside out." I thought it was a great idea.

  35:10-35:13

  God pursues his broken children with restoration.

  35:15-35:19

  I look at chapter three, verses one and two, and you're going to see it's very familiar sounding.

  35:20-35:35

  Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, "Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you." That's almost word for word what was said in chapter one, verses one and two.

  35:37-35:38

  Exact same concepts.

  35:38-35:41

  Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, call out against it for the evil scoundrel before me.

  35:44-35:46

  Slight difference, but overall same message.

  35:48-35:51

  Jonah arose and went to Nineveh according to the word of the Lord.

  35:52-35:52

  Oh, that's different.

  35:53-35:58

  Now, Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three days journey in breadth.

  35:59-36:00

  I love this.

  36:01-36:02

  God didn't put Jonah on probation.

  36:03-36:05

  He didn't suspend him.

  36:10-36:12

  He didn't continue to discipline him.

  36:13-36:14

  What did he do?

  36:14-36:17

  He simply gave him a clean, fresh start.

  36:19-36:20

  God's like, "Okay, you know what?

  36:20-36:22

  "We're gonna try this again, all right?

  36:22-36:30

  I want you to go to Nineveh and I want you to preach." Okay, on it, on it.

  36:32-36:34

  He gave them a clean slate and a fresh start.

  36:36-36:48

  And as we bow our heads to pray, again, there are some people here that not only needed that reminder, but there are some people here that needed that fresh start, that restoration.

  36:50-37:01

  There's people in here saying, "You know, I need restoration while I got good news for you." Christ has already provided that. Do you understand that?

  37:03-37:21

  If you've been one who's been rebelling, who's been on the run, and you've come to this point this morning where you're saying, "You know, I need restoration." He already provided that. It's already done.

  37:22-37:26

  You are restored, even if you don't feel like it.

  37:28-37:35

  And you know, you're one prayer away, I would say, from feeling like it.

  37:36-37:38

  It's already done. The work is done. The work was done in Christ.

  37:43-37:50

  Today can be the day that you say, "You know, I'm done running. I get it now.

  37:52-37:55

  I've learned the lessons that He's taught me."

Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Jonah 2

Breakout Questions:
Pray for one another.

Even if you Rebel

2 Kings 14:25 - He restored the border of Israel from Lebo-hamath as far as the Sea of the Arabah, according to the word of the LORD, the God of Israel, which he spoke by his servant Jonah the son of Amittai, the prophet, who was from Gath-hepher. 

Matthew 12:38-41 - Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him, saying, "Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you." But he answered them, "An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here. (Matthew 16:4, Luke 11:29-32) 

1. Rebellion is a Choice to disobey God (Jonah 1:1-3)


1. Rebellion makes use want to Avoid God (Jonah 1:3-5)


2. Rebellion saps our Boldness to Witness (Jonah 1:6-10)


3. Rebellion drives us to more and more Desperate Choices (Jonah 1:11-16)


2. God pursues His rebellious children with Discipline


1. What is discipline?


2. Why is discipline a good thing?


3. How does God discipline us?

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:12

  Have you ever had somebody say to you, "You know, I think God's out to get me." Did you ever hear somebody say that? "I think God's out to get me." Like a good newsreader. He is.

  00:14-00:20

  And that's basically our sermon for the next four weeks as we're going through the book of Jonah.

  00:21-00:22

  God is out to get you.

  00:23-00:25

  Okay, turn in your Bibles. Let's get right to it.

  00:25-00:39

  The book of Jonah. The title of today's message is "God is out to get you even if you rebel." While you're turning to the book of Jonah, turn nice and loud so I know that you're getting there, okay?

  00:41-00:43

  Make sure your pages make lots of noises.

  00:45-00:50

  If you have one of those electronic Bibles, make sure you program it so it makes little beeps or something.

  00:52-00:56

  But this is actually not Jonah's first appearance in scripture. I have on your outline.

  00:57-01:05

  Jonah comes up in 2 Kings 14.25 where it says, "He restored the border of Israel." He is referring to Jeroboam II.

  01:06-01:54

  "Restored the border of Israel from Laban-hamath as far as the Sea of Araba, according to the word of the LORD, the God of Israel, which he spoke by his servant Jonah, the son of Emetai, the prophet, who was from Ga-hefer, which is actually a place three miles northeast of Nazareth. Okay, so Jonah, as we see in 2 Kings 14.25, prophesied during the reign of Jeroboam the second. So, as we get into this book, we kind of place it, place the date rather, We're looking about 793 to about 758 BC, roughly, is when Jonah would have been doing his ministry.

  01:55-02:02

  Sometime after Elisha and starting a little before Amos, actually, is where you find Jonah.

  02:03-02:06

  And he's unique for two reasons.

  02:06-02:14

  One reason is, he's the only prophet in the Old Testament that was actually sent to another nation.

  02:15-02:24

  You know, a lot of times you see the Old Testament prophets pronouncing judgment on another nation, but Jonah was the only one that was actually sent.

  02:26-02:29

  But Jonah has another distinction that you've probably heard of.

  02:29-02:33

  He was the only prophet who refused his ministry.

  02:34-02:48

  that God says, "Here's what I'm calling you to do." And Jonah said, "Nah." He's the only prophet in Scripture that we know of that just flat out refused His ministry.

  02:49-02:51

  Why did he refuse His ministry?

  02:51-02:58

  Well, in chapter 3, verse 10, to chapter 4, verse 2, Jonah tells us why he refused the ministry.

  03:00-03:02

  We're going to be getting to that in a couple of weeks.

  03:02-03:04

  So what is the book of Jonah about?

  03:07-03:09

  When I say Jonah, what's the first thing you think of?

  03:11-03:12

  The whale, right?

  03:12-03:25

  Actually, the Bible says it's a fish, and there's different scholars get into, "Was it a fish? Was it a whale?" Sometimes that word is used different ways in the Old Testament, but a lot of times we think of Jonah getting swallowed by the fish.

  03:25-03:27

  So Jonah's like the ultimate fish story, right?

  03:28-03:33

  Actually, no. The fish is only mentioned four times in the book of Jonah.

  03:34-03:36

  So, what is the book of Jonah about?

  03:36-03:38

  Well, oh, it's about Nineveh, right?

  03:38-03:40

  No, Nineveh is only mentioned nine times.

  03:41-03:46

  Well, Jonah, surely it's about Jonah, right? It's got names on it.

  03:47-03:49

  Actually, Jonah is mentioned 18 times.

  03:51-03:53

  Jonah is actually a book about God.

  03:54-04:01

  There are 48 total verses in the book of Jonah and the Lord is mentioned in 38 of those.

  04:01-04:04

  So really Jonah is a book about God.

  04:06-04:07

  And what about God?

  04:08-04:10

  Well here it is, this is going to be our next four weeks.

  04:14-04:16

  He is a God who is in pursuit.

  04:19-04:20

  He is out to get you.

  04:21-04:21

  Okay?

  04:22-04:24

  So mark that down.

  04:25-04:26

  It's like right on the top of my outline.

  04:27-04:27

  Circle it.

  04:29-04:31

  God is out to get you.

  04:34-04:36

  Alright, well let's deal with another elephant in the room.

  04:37-04:41

  The book of Jonah comes under a lot of attack.

  04:42-04:56

  Right? Maybe you've heard some scholars say, "Well, maybe Jonah's just a parable." terrible. Or maybe it's just a kind of a story with a message and it didn't really happen.

  04:57-05:19

  How can you be sure that Jonah happened? Well, you can read this stuff. It's funny because I read some things this week, right? When I study for these things, I get on and I read what different scholars and commentators have said. Some people have said, "Well, you know, We have accounts of people that have actually been swallowed by fish and survived.

  05:21-05:22

  So Jonah could be true.

  05:24-05:28

  And there are different instances in history where that's cited.

  05:30-05:32

  That stuff doesn't mean a thing to me.

  05:32-05:39

  I'll give you one good reason why you can believe that the book of Jonah is literally true.

  05:39-05:41

  And really it's the only reason you need.

  05:43-06:17

  Jesus believe right doesn't that settle for you that settles it for me I've never like tossed and turned like I do I really believe Jesus believed it yeah that works if Jesus says it's true are you gonna come alongside God in the flesh and say well I don't really think so well I have this in your outline to Matthew 12 just look at this quickly this is what Jesus said about Jonah he He spoke of Jonah as being a real person, a real part of the history of the nation of Israel.

  06:19-06:36

  And some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him, answered Jesus, saying, "Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you." But he answered them, "An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.

  06:37-06:46

  For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

  06:49-07:05

  The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here." Again, Matthew 16, Luke 11, Jesus references Jonah some more.

  07:06-07:20

  Jesus said that Nineveh was this real place where people really repented because this real prophet really went there and preached after this real prophet was really swallowed by a real fish.

  07:20-07:23

  So that settles it for me.

  07:26-07:27

  So let's look at Jonah chapter 1.

  07:27-07:28

  Is everybody there?

  07:30-07:33

  God is out to get you even if you rebel.

  07:33-07:39

  If you're taking notes on your outline, today we're going to be talking about rebellion.

  07:41-07:43

  So mark this down first.

  07:46-07:50

  Rebellion is a choice to disobey God.

  07:51-08:01

  You're like, "Wow, that's profound." Listen, the key word here is "choice." Rebellion is a choice to disobey God.

  08:01-08:27

  Let's look at the first three verses. It says, "Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah, the son of Amittai, saying, 'Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it, for their evil has come up before me.' But Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.

  08:28-08:31

  He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish.

  08:32-08:41

  So he paid the fare and went on board to go with them to Tarshish, away from the presence of the Lord.

  08:43-08:47

  Now here we see in the first couple of verses Jonah's call was crystal clear.

  08:48-08:52

  We see the how, the rise and go. Where? To Nineveh.

  08:53-09:16

  What? Call out against it. Why? God says their sin is so out of control. He says literally, "Their evil has come up before me." Kind of like we say, "I'm fed up to here." God says, "Their evil has risen up before me. I want you to go call out against it." Pretty clear call, right?

  09:18-09:55

  I admit there are a few passages of the Bible that are hard to understand. This is not one of them. I don't think Jonah was sitting there going, "Wait, wait, wait, back up, back up, what, what, what?" Little thing about Nineveh, first of all, it's the capital of Assyria. Originally it was founded by Nimrod, which was Noah's great-grandson, Genesis chapter 10, and depending on which scholar you read, Nineveh at this time would have had a population of somewhere between 600,000 to over a million people.

  09:55-09:57

  A huge city back in this day.

  09:59-10:11

  And Nineveh was known, get this down, this is important, Nineveh was known for its cruelty and it was known for its animosity towards Israel.

  10:14-10:26

  For an Israelite to hear Nineveh, or to think about the city of Nineveh, would be like us Yinsers thinking about, what?

  10:28-10:28

  Cleveland!

  10:29-10:29

  Amen!

  10:31-10:32

  Who said that?

  10:35-10:37

  Oh, look at Jay now, we're just throwing Taylor right under the bus.

  10:39-10:42

  I was thinking Philadelphia or Baltimore, but Cleveland works.

  10:45-10:46

  Israel hated Nineveh.

  10:49-10:51

  So Jonah receives a clear call.

  10:52-10:53

  Also get this down.

  10:53-10:55

  This is really important as we go forward too.

  10:56-10:59

  Jonah is a prophet of Israel.

  11:02-11:16

  Jonah is someone that God spoke directly to, that God gave direct revelation to, This is someone that God had used, someone that God had spoken through, a real deal preacher who was faithful.

  11:17-11:21

  Jonah is somebody who knew better because he knew God.

  11:21-11:33

  I think it's important to get that down because sometimes we can kind of skim through Jonah and be like, you know, thinking that God just picked this random guy and like this guy's like, "No, I don't want to go preach here," and then the story ensues.

  11:34-11:36

  This is a real deal preacher.

  11:37-11:44

  Okay, this would be like the Lord calling like John MacArthur to a ministry and he's like, no, I am out of here.

  11:45-11:46

  That's sort of what's going on here in Jonah.

  11:48-11:50

  He knew better because he knew God.

  11:52-11:54

  Now, also getting the geography down here.

  11:55-11:57

  We're going to do this stuff when we start a book, right?

  11:57-11:59

  Important Bible students.

  11:59-12:03

  Nineveh was about 500 miles northeast of Israel.

  12:04-12:06

  But it says that Jonah went to Joppa.

  12:06-12:11

  Where's that at? Well, that's actually on the Mediterranean coast, somewhere between Judah and Samaria.

  12:13-12:15

  And where does your Bible say Jonah was heading?

  12:16-12:17

  Shout it out.

  12:17-12:18

  Tarshish.

  12:18-12:20

  Tarshish. What's it say, like three times in there?

  12:21-12:26

  He's like, "I'm going to Tarshish." "I'm going to Tarshish." Not because it's fun to say.

  12:27-13:01

  Go ahead. See? But why Tarshish? Well God told Jonah, "I want you to go 500 miles northeast." And Jonah says, "I'm going..." Tarshish was actually 2,000 to 2,500 about miles west. So do you see what's going on here? Actually in Jonah's day, most scholars believe that Tarshish would have been the furthest edge of civilization.

  13:02-13:30

  Like, "How far away can I get?" was basically what Jonah was saying. "How far away can I get?" Well, Tarshish is like the end of the world, so to speak. "Okay, I'll take one ticket to Tarshish." All right? You're like, "Well, okay, can you put it in perspective for me?" Well, let's pretend that Jonah is right here from the So to put it into perspective, it would be as if God called Jonah to go preach in Boston.

  13:31-13:34

  Go to Boston and preach.

  13:35-13:40

  Because Boston is about 483 miles northeast.

  13:41-13:43

  So go to Boston and preach.

  13:44-13:54

  And Jonah goes to the Pittsburgh International Airport and catches the first flight to Bogota, Columbia, which is 2,491 miles south.

  13:55-13:56

  OK, that's what's going on here.

  13:57-14:00

  Basically, I want you to take a little road trip here.

  14:00-14:04

  And he goes, no, I'm going to the end of the world, the other direction.

  14:04-14:05

  You see that?

  14:07-14:11

  So rebellion is a choice to disobey God.

  14:11-14:13

  Look at verse 3 again.

  14:13-14:14

  Is it a choice?

  14:15-14:19

  Seven words in verse 3 all indicate that this was a choice.

  14:20-14:27

  Okay, he rose to flee, he went, he found, he paid, he went to go.

  14:27-14:30

  Seven words, they're all choice words, they're all action words.

  14:30-14:32

  This is a deliberate choice.

  14:35-14:38

  That's what rebellion is, it's a deliberate choice to disobey God.

  14:39-14:40

  Rebellion is not ignorance.

  14:41-14:46

  Like, "Oh, I didn't know he wanted me to do that." Not knowing, that's ignorance. Rebellion is not ignorance.

  14:48-14:59

  Nor is rebellion discouragement, as if I really want to do the right thing, but I'm just really struggling, I need some help, I need some people to come alongside and kind of give me a boost.

  15:00-15:01

  That's not rebellion either.

  15:03-15:05

  Rebellion is a choice to disobey God.

  15:06-15:09

  So let's pause here and let me ask you, are you running from God in a certain area?

  15:13-15:15

  Are you running from God in a certain area?

  15:19-15:24

  I guarantee you right now, many people in this room, as soon as I said that, and hit you know.

  15:25-15:28

  You know that you've made some choices.

  15:31-15:34

  For it to be very clear what God has called you to.

  15:36-15:39

  But you've made the choice, I'm not going to.

  15:41-15:57

  Or maybe someone here, it's God saying, "You know what? You need to forgive that person." And you've said, "I'm not gonna." Or God has said, "You know, I gave you a Holy Spirit." God gave you a gift to be used in ministry.

  15:58-16:15

  God says, "I've given you a gift to use in ministry. Use it." And you say, "I'm not gonna." Or maybe there's someone here that you know the Lord has been pressing on you, you know, you need to honor me with your finances. You say I'm not gonna.

  16:16-16:36

  You've made deliberate choices to not obey a clear area that God is calling you to. Now our obedience is yielding to God's will out of love. That's what the New Testament describes as walking in the Spirit, it's yielding to His will.

  16:38-16:44

  But when you refuse to yield, you're going to find yourself in a state of rebellion, like Jonah.

  16:48-16:55

  And you're like, "Well, how bad can that be?" And all the people that have read Jonah before are like, "Yeah, it gets bad, right?

  16:56-16:57

  You read Jonah?

  16:57-17:02

  It gets bad." Well what does it look like when I rebel?

  17:03-17:05

  Well just jot these things down. First of all, letter A.

  17:08-17:10

  Maybe somebody here is convinced I'm not really rebelling.

  17:11-17:15

  Okay. Letter A. Rebellion makes us want to avoid God.

  17:16-17:19

  Just flat out simple. You want to avoid God.

  17:19-17:21

  Look at verses 3 through 5 again.

  17:24-18:38

  verse 3 Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish what's the next phrase your Bible has say it out loud we'll try again verse 3 Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord okay good so he went to Joplin found a ship according to Tarshish, paid fare, went on board to go with you ready here we go we're gonna do it again to go with them to Tarshish away from the presence of the Lord then we get down to the verse 10 you see that same phrase again from the presence of the Lord verse 4 it says but the Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea and there is a mighty tempest in the sea so that the ship threatened to break up. Then the mariners were afraid and each cried out to his God and they hurled the cargo that was in the ship into the sea to lighten it for them. But Jonah had gone down into the inner part of the ship and had lain down and was fast asleep." So rebellion makes us want to avoid God, make no mistake why he fled.

  18:39-20:04

  Jonah wasn't like, "You know what? I have some vacation time saved up. I'll get to a Nineveh thing when I get back or you know I guess I got a sister in Tarshish that I you know she just had a baby I don't want to go see it a little taget. It's very clear why he went there right? Why did he go there? He was trying to get away from the presence of the Lord. Is that crazy or what? You know maybe he was thinking you know back in this day, the unique presence of the Lord was in the temple. Maybe he was thinking, "If I just get out of Jerusalem, God's fear of influence seems to decrease." Well, Psalm 139, verses 7 through 8 say, "Where shall I go from your spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there. If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there." Now you know Jonah, I know that he knew that song. This is a prophet of the Lord. He probably preached from this song. He knew that there was nowhere he could go to get out of God's presence, but that's something about rebellion, is once it starts, the crazy thoughts start too.

  20:07-20:11

  You And you get down to verse 5.

  20:11-20:14

  Okay, so the Lord hurls a great wind.

  20:14-20:15

  We're going to talk about that in a second.

  20:15-20:17

  And you know, you can see the scene.

  20:17-20:24

  The waves, the ship breaking up, and then all the sailors are like, "Let's unload the cargo." I mean, this had to have been pretty serious.

  20:25-20:36

  You know, imagine if you were driving down Route 79, and you see a Mack truck pulled over, an ATV puller pulled over, and they're unloading all of this stuff.

  20:36-20:38

  just throwing their stuff along the side of the road.

  20:39-20:45

  You're like, "Aren't you supposed to deliver that?" "Yeah, but we can't carry it." That's what was going on here.

  20:47-20:54

  It was, "Forget our jobs, our lives are on the line." And what's Jonah doing during all this?

  20:55-20:56

  It says he was sleeping.

  20:57-20:58

  Well, is it that nice?

  21:00-21:04

  Everyone else is fearing for their lives, and Jonah is sleeping.

  21:04-21:05

  Why was Jonah sleeping?

  21:06-21:08

  Tired from the trip to Joppa.

  21:09-21:10

  Well, here's what I think.

  21:13-21:15

  I think it's an escape from reality.

  21:16-21:18

  That's what depressed people do, right?

  21:20-21:23

  Anybody testify that you've been in a funk and all you want to do is sleep?

  21:24-21:26

  Anybody else? That's me.

  21:26-21:33

  If there's an area where I'm depressed or what we're talking about today, an area of rebellion, let's be honest.

  21:34-21:38

  Sometimes sleeping is easier than wrestling with God.

  21:40-21:47

  Sometimes sleeping is easier than facing up to our guilt of our rebellion.

  21:49-21:57

  Sleeping is easier than wrestling with our conscience, than thinking about our sin, than admitting we were wrong.

  21:58-22:00

  That's what I think was going on there.

  22:01-22:03

  We just embrace sleep.

  22:03-22:06

  Like, I'll just get into a place of unconsciousness.

  22:08-22:09

  So I don't have to think about what I'm doing.

  22:11-22:17

  Well, from the Garden of Eden to today, that guilty feeling we have makes us want to escape.

  22:18-22:20

  But you know, it was foolish when Adam and Eve hid in the bushes.

  22:21-22:26

  And it was foolish for Jonah to think that he could hide from God in the belly of the ship.

  22:26-22:32

  It's foolish, but again, it's insanity is what it is.

  22:34-22:36

  But you know what's even more foolish?

  22:37-22:45

  Or I would say most foolish, is for you, who are born again, to think that you can flee from the presence of God.

  22:46-22:48

  Why? Because where is He?

  22:50-22:51

  He's in you, right?

  22:52-23:01

  If you're here this morning and you're a born-again believer in Jesus Christ, the Bible says that God fills you with His Holy Spirit.

  23:01-23:04

  The Bible says that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit.

  23:05-23:07

  You know, in the Old Testament, the temple was the building.

  23:08-23:08

  Right?

  23:08-23:12

  It was actually a building where God's unique presence dwelt.

  23:12-23:23

  John 1:14, "When Jesus came on the scene, the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us." God's unique presence, so to speak, was found exclusively in the person of Jesus Christ.

  23:24-23:28

  And Jesus said when he leaves, he was going to send another helper, another comforter.

  23:29-23:32

  So now in our day, where's the temple?

  23:33-23:34

  The temple's right here, right?

  23:35-23:36

  Where does God live?

  23:37-23:38

  God lives in the heart of every believer.

  23:39-23:44

  So how foolish is it for you to think that you can escape from the presence of God, because he's right there?

  23:45-24:02

  for a second think that when you're in rebellion he leaves you. That's not the case at all. He promised to never leave us or forsake us. There's no sin that you can commit even as a believer where God says okay that's it we're breaking fellowship. You can't.

  24:04-24:24

  You are sealed in the Holy Spirit. You're an heir of the promise. You are born again. Eternal life. Nothing can undo that. How foolish us to think that we can get out of God's presence. But we try, don't we? How do we do that?

  24:26-24:42

  You might not jump on a ship. It's harshish, but here's what I see believers doing when they want to escape from the presence of the Lord. Drop these things down and stop going That's one thing, you just, I don't want to go to church.

  24:46-24:47

  I just, I don't want to go to church.

  24:48-24:48

  Why?

  24:48-24:50

  Because, who do they talk about at church?

  24:51-24:52

  Usually God.

  24:55-25:00

  I don't, I'm not there, I'm in a place of rebellion right now, I've made some choices.

  25:01-25:04

  Or, here's another one, you stop going to your small group.

  25:06-25:07

  Stop going to your small group.

  25:08-25:23

  Somebody's gonna ask me how I am and you know we're gonna be you know having our prayer time together and I just don't want to deal with it man. You stop talking to your Christian friends at all. I don't want to answer the phone. I'm screening my calls.

  25:23-25:34

  I'm not replying to emails. Here's another one. When you see a drought in and your prayer life and your time in the Word.

  25:34-25:38

  That's a sign when you see a drought.

  25:39-25:43

  That's a sign that maybe your heart's in a place where you're trying to avoid God.

  25:45-25:45

  Rebellion does that.

  25:47-25:47

  Did it to Jonah.

  25:49-25:50

  Passed asleep.

  25:52-25:56

  Secondly, rebellion sacks our boldness to witness.

  26:00-26:01

  Look at verses 6-10.

  26:02-26:10

  Okay, so you have to see the storm's coming, they're throwing all their cargo overboard, and they're fearing for their lives, Jonah's sleeping, alright?

  26:10-26:15

  So we get to verse 6, "So the captain came and said to him, 'What do you mean, you sleeper?

  26:18-26:34

  Arise, call out to your God. Perhaps the God will give a thought to us that we may not perish.' And they said to one another, "Come, let us cast lots, that we may know on whose account this evil has come upon us." So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah.

  26:36-26:42

  Then they said to him, "Tell us on whose account this evil has come upon us.

  26:43-26:44

  What is your occupation?

  26:44-26:45

  Where do you come from?

  26:45-26:46

  What is your country?

  26:48-27:12

  And of what people are you?" And after the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land, 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.

  27:15-27:19

  Rebellion snaps our boldness to witness. Look at verse 6 again.

  27:21-27:23

  It says that they cast lots.

  27:24-27:26

  I'm sorry, that's verse 7. Back up to verse 6.

  27:26-27:31

  What do you mean? I was like, "But call out to your God. Call out to your God." They were just like...

  27:33-27:35

  Like, Hail Mary prayers.

  27:35-27:39

  There might be a God somewhere out there. Let's just address all of them.

  27:39-27:41

  And that's what they were doing, and it wasn't working.

  27:41-27:45

  But like, maybe the guy that's sleeping, maybe he's got a God that we haven't tried.

  27:46-27:48

  Get on it. Get on it!

  27:48-27:54

  Like what are you doing? We're like having this prayer thing going on up here. Did you try praying to your God?

  27:54-27:55

  Why are you just down here sleeping?

  27:58-28:07

  You know when I read that this week, I was thinking, you know, that's like I'm like come on preacher That's like the ultimate witnessing opportunity, isn't it? You know, call out to your God. Maybe the God will save you.

  28:09-28:45

  Ultimate witnessing opportunity. Jonah should have stood up and said let me tell you There's only one God and there's no one like him and he is the awesome Sovereign of the universe who has compassion on and he could have just like perfect perfect preaching opportunity, right Well, look at the end of verse 6 beginning of verse 7 what was Jonah's reply he didn't say anything Why do you think he didn't say anything Because when you're in rebellion, not only do you think you want to leave from God's presence, but you're not very effective talk about it. Right?

  28:47-30:09

  Well look it says let's cast lots. What's that? Well that was something that God used in the Old Testament. Sort of like rolling dice or drawing straws. There's been different debates on what exactly casting lots looked like. Some people thought it was a couple of stones that depending on how you rolled it one way meant yes, the other way meant no. The last time it was used is actually Acts chapter 1 before the Holy Spirit came. Pentecost Acts chapter 2. But you saw the barrage of questions in verse 10. You know, they're like, "Dude, you gotta talk. What do you do? Where do you come from? What is your country? What people are you?" They're like, "We know there's something going on with you so spit it out spit it out come on tell us everything come on come on come on come on tell us the marriage had to force the preacher to speak isn't that crazy forcing a preacher to speak well Jonah said okay don't miss this this would have been such a kapow moment in scripture. Jenna's like, "Alright, I'm Hebrew." What?

  30:10-30:41

  And I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land. They would have heard of the Lord, right? But what do you think they would have heard of the Lord? You mean the one that took the nation out of Egypt and the plagues and the Red Sea and that one, the one that flooded the earth in judgment and the one who created all this by speech, they would have known some things.

  30:42-30:55

  And it's obvious when you get to verse 10 because when Jonah said that, it says, "Then the men were exceedingly afraid." Look again at what they said.

  30:55-30:57

  What is this you have done?

  30:59-31:03

  Jonah's like, "Yeah, you know the Almighty Sovereign?

  31:04-31:08

  I'm kind of running from Him." And they're like, "What?!

  31:08-31:13

  You're running from Him?! Are you nuts?!

  31:13-31:18

  We know who you're talking about, and that is the God you're running from?!

  31:18-31:27

  Like, what is the matter with you?!" Well, again, when you're running from God, you're not very likely to talk about it.

  31:29-31:33

  If there's someone here who's rebelling, I'd just like to ask why.

  31:35-31:40

  Have you made some choices to rebel?

  31:42-31:45

  I'd like to ask you why. Did God provoke you?

  31:49-31:50

  Have you experienced God to be harsh?

  31:51-31:52

  Is that why you're rebelling?

  31:55-31:56

  Are you tired of Him?

  32:00-32:01

  Has He disappointed you?

  32:04-32:12

  You know, stand up, give me the convincing reasons that you would have to rebel and to continue in rebellion against God.

  32:12-32:13

  Give me your convincing reasons.

  32:16-32:18

  Come on, stand up, we'll take you one at a time.

  32:18-32:24

  Give me the reasons why you would persist in rebelling against such a sovereign and loving God.

  32:28-32:30

  Then letter C, one more thing about rebellion.

  32:31-32:34

  Rebellion drives us to more and more desperate choices.

  32:37-32:39

  Rebellion drives us to more and more desperate choices.

  32:41-32:54

  Then they said to him, oh by the way I love the end of verse 10, It says, "For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them." I just love verses like that in the Bible.

  32:55-32:57

  Right? Because you can imagine how that conversation went.

  32:58-33:03

  Like, you can imagine these guys are like, "What's with this Jonah fella?" I imagine that's how they talk.

  33:04-33:17

  "What's with this Jonah fella?" And the guy's like, "He's fleeing from the presence of the Lord." He's like, "How do you know?" And he goes, "Because he told me." Isn't that what it says?

  33:20-33:22

  At least that's what I got out of it.

  33:24-33:27

  Rebellion drives us to more and more desperate choices, verses 11 through 16.

  33:27-33:31

  Then they said to him, OK, obviously you're the problem.

  33:32-33:36

  So they said to him, "What shall we do to you that the sea may quiet down for us?

  33:37-33:45

  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.

  33:46-33:56

  For I know it is because of me that this great tempest has come upon you." Nevertheless, the men rode hard to get back to dry land, but they could not.

  33:58-34:00

  For the sea grew more and more tempestuous against them.

  34:02-34:06

  Therefore, they called out to the Lord-- ah, a little different here, right?

  34:07-34:27

  They called out to the Lord, "O Lord, let us not perish through this man's life, and lay not on us innocent blood, for you, O Lord, have done as it pleased you." So they picked up Jonah and hurled him into the sea, and the sea ceased from its raging.

  34:31-34:38

  Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord, and made vows.

  34:43-34:47

  That's great hope for me. Jonah basically did everything wrong and a revival broke out.

  34:49-34:50

  That gives hope.

  34:52-34:55

  But notice here, rebellion drives us to more and more desperate choices.

  34:58-35:08

  Jonah's like, "Okay, here's the problem. I'm the problem." Jonah would have known of the goodness and mercy of God.

  35:08-35:12

  At this point Jonah should have said, "I'm the problem, "and here's what I know about God.

  35:12-35:21

  "He is a God who is gracious and compassionate, "and he loves to pour his mercy and grace.

  35:21-35:22

  "He's a God who restores.

  35:23-35:25

  "He's a God who calls us to repentance.

  35:26-35:33

  "Even when we blew it, he's a God that says, "Hey, hey, I'm not done with you." Jonah knew that.

  35:34-35:39

  But you see, the more and more desperate choices-- basically, what Jonah was asking for was assisted suicide, right?

  35:41-35:43

  This wasn't like a plan he didn't think through.

  35:44-35:48

  Throw me in the water, and the storms will stop.

  35:48-35:50

  Well, Jonah, then you'll probably drown.

  35:51-35:51

  Oh, yeah, yeah, back up.

  35:51-35:52

  Let's not do that.

  35:53-35:55

  He knew exactly what he was asking for.

  35:55-35:57

  He knew exactly what it was.

  36:01-36:04

  He didn't say, it's my fault, I need to repent.

  36:04-36:06

  He said, it's my fault, just kill me.

  36:09-36:13

  While verse 13, a sailor still trunks, nevertheless the men rode hard to get back to dry land.

  36:14-36:20

  It's interesting here that these men cared more for one foreigner than Jonah did for 600,000.

  36:22-36:28

  So Jonah was thrown overboard while the men planted Harvest Bible Chapel in Tarshish.

  36:28-36:32

  (audience laughing) The end.

  36:34-36:34

  Right?

  36:37-36:37

  No.

  36:39-36:40

  Actually, that's not the end.

  36:44-36:47

  Just be careful in your rebellion.

  36:47-36:48

  Not even be careful.

  36:51-36:51

  Scratch that.

  36:52-36:56

  You're going to make more and more desperate choices the more you persist in it.

  36:58-37:00

  God just cranks up the response.

  37:01-37:02

  Look at verse 17.

  37:03-37:06

  And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah.

  37:07-37:10

  And Jonah was at the belly of the fish three days and three nights.

  37:12-37:13

  So it's not the end.

  37:16-37:17

  So that's a little bit about rebellion.

  37:18-37:22

  As we close, this is really about God.

  37:24-37:29

  I wanna give you a few things about discipline.

  37:29-37:30

  Jot this down.

  37:30-37:34

  Number two, God pursues his rebellious children with discipline.

  37:35-37:40

  God pursues his rebellious children with discipline.

  37:43-37:45

  Jonah leaves town, God didn't just say, "You know what?

  37:48-37:52

  I got like a thousand creatures, I'll just grab another one." Not at all.

  37:53-38:18

  verse 4 it says the Lord hurled a great wind understand that it wasn't like God was like I gotta get Jonah's attention and all of a sudden coincidentally a storm breaks out and God's like oh no literally your Bible says he hurled what do you think that looked like? God was like oh look he's running and he throws a storm at them.

  38:22-38:32

  And then as we saw on the ship as it grew you know more and more the vocabulary word of the day tempestuous.

  38:35-38:37

  What God was doing was backing Jonah into a corner.

  38:38-38:39

  You don't want to deal with me?

  38:39-38:40

  You're going to deal with me.

  38:41-38:44

  I'm coming to get you Jonah. I'm coming to get you.

  38:47-38:49

  So, three quick things about discipline.

  38:50-38:52

  What is discipline first of all? I'll jot these things down.

  38:54-39:04

  Discipline is God's direct intervention in the lives of believers to correct an area of rebellion.

  39:06-39:13

  It's God's direct intervention in the lives of believers to correct an area of rebellion.

  39:15-39:18

  I also put this in my notes, it's never a pleasant experience.

  39:19-39:26

  God can calm the storms of life in his submissive children, or he can bring the storms of life onto his rebellious children.

  39:29-39:31

  But discipline isn't a pleasant experience, right?

  39:33-39:35

  At least it wasn't at our house growing up.

  39:37-39:38

  But it was discipline time, that wasn't pleasant.

  39:41-39:48

  I would just hope and pray that Mom would be so worn out disciplining Darren that she'd be too tired to take care of me.

  39:50-39:51

  It works sometimes.

  39:54-39:55

  But it's not a pleasant experience.

  39:56-39:58

  It's not meant to be soft and easy.

  40:01-40:04

  And the more we rebel, as Jonah learned, the more God fires up the discipline.

  40:06-40:08

  What's he doing? He's trying to get our attention.

  40:11-40:23

  See, the Lord wants us in that place where we realize every moment, every second, every breath of every day is complete and utter and total dependence upon Him for everything.

  40:25-40:26

  That's where He wants us.

  40:31-40:34

  Where we realize it's not us, He's living in us and through us.

  40:35-40:36

  He's going to get us to that point.

  40:37-40:49

  When we start making these choices to do our own thing, God says, "Okay, I'm going to bring my children back in line." Letter B, why is discipline a good thing?

  40:52-40:54

  Why is it a good thing?

  40:55-41:12

  Proverbs 3, Hebrews 12, verse 6 says, "Those whom the Lord loves, He disciplines." That's the best news about discipline. If God's disciplining you, that means He loves you.

  41:14-41:58

  That means He cares about you. That means even the rebellious choices we make, God says, "That doesn't affect how I love you." that just affects how I'm gonna bring you back on course. But write this down discipline is not punishment. Drop that down because that's so important. People think that when we mess up God's going to punish us. God's not going to punish you if you're a believer in Jesus Christ. If you're here today and you're not a believer in Jesus Christ, if you're not born again, all you have to look forward to is God's punishment. Because He's going to pour out His wrath on your sin, on you.

  41:59-42:09

  But if you're here this morning and you've received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, understand that God is not going to punish you. Because all of the punishment went on His Son.

  42:09-42:13

  Do you understand that? That's why the Bible uses this word a couple of times.

  42:13-42:16

  It's the word "perpetuation" talking about the death of Christ.

  42:17-42:19

  What that means literally is God was satisfied.

  42:21-42:32

  When God punished Jesus, when God the Father punished God the Son when He was on the cross, He says, "I'm satisfied. My wrath has been appeased." So discipline is not punishment.

  42:35-42:42

  But discipline is a good thing because parents, loving parents, discipline their children.

  42:44-42:44

  You ever been to Walmart?

  42:47-42:48

  You know where I'm going with this.

  42:48-42:51

  You're like, "Yeah, I've been to Walmart." No, no, no, that wasn't like the end.

  42:53-42:54

  And somebody's kid's acting up?

  42:56-43:02

  You're like, "Yeah, that was yours, actually." We've all been there.

  43:02-43:04

  You're going to Walmart and you hear the kid acting up, right?

  43:05-43:10

  And you think to yourself, "That kid needs discipline." Right?

  43:13-43:15

  sure hope to heaven that none of you have ever done that.

  43:15-43:17

  Like, I'll step in and do it, right?

  43:20-43:21

  Well, why don't you?

  43:21-43:22

  That kid needs discipline.

  43:22-43:24

  Why don't you step in and do it?

  43:25-43:26

  Because it's not your kid.

  43:27-43:28

  And laws and stuff.

  43:28-43:29

  But it's not your kid.

  43:30-43:31

  [LAUGHTER]

  43:32-43:34

  Well, it's the same way with the Lord.

  43:35-43:36

  God says, do you know why I discipline you?

  43:38-43:39

  Because you're my son.

  43:40-43:46

  Do you know why I'm out to get you and discipline you, rebellious daughter?

  43:46-43:47

  Because you're my daughter.

  43:50-43:53

  That's the awesome thing about discipline. It's not like God's mad.

  43:56-44:03

  God says, "My children need some correction." And I love them so much. I'm not going to let them destroy themselves.

  44:03-44:05

  I'm not going to let them hurt their testimony.

  44:06-44:08

  I'm not going to let them affect other people.

  44:08-44:12

  I'm going to bring discipline in their lives to correct them because I love them.

  44:13-44:16

  That's discipline. That's exactly what God was doing for Jonah.

  44:19-44:20

  He's out to get you.

  44:21-44:23

  Last thing, how does God discipline us?

  44:24-44:30

  Well, the Bible doesn't say, you know, "Here are the six most common ways God disciplines us." It doesn't say that.

  44:32-44:38

  I am not going to attribute every single hardship we face in life as being directly caused by the Lord.

  44:38-44:40

  Understand that. We live in a fallen and cursed world.

  44:43-44:47

  And it is true that God is sovereign and He uses everything. That's true.

  44:48-44:51

  He uses everything in our lives.

  44:52-45:00

  But, as we see in Jonah's case, sometimes the discipline is directly from the hand of God.

  45:02-45:08

  The Lord hurled the wind, the lot fell on Jonah, the Lord appointed a great fish.

  45:09-45:17

  Those were all God stepping in, directly acting, personally involved statements of terminology.

  45:22-45:24

  So you might not get swallowed by a fish.

  45:25-45:31

  Here's something you will find. God's discipline is tailor-made for each person.

  45:34-45:37

  Now parents of multiple children, have you noticed?

  45:38-45:42

  This is what I'm learning, my kids are still pretty young, 7 and 6.

  45:42-45:51

  I'm about to pray for us, but have you noticed that discipline isn't a one size fits all thing? Have you noticed that?

  45:51-45:54

  You can't discipline all your children exactly the same.

  45:58-46:04

  You know, as a parent you learn, in order to get her attention, I need to do this.

  46:04-46:06

  But in order to get his attention, I need to do this.

  46:06-46:09

  If I tried that with her, it wouldn't have any effect.

  46:09-46:10

  She totally would miss it.

  46:10-46:14

  And if I tried that on him, he wouldn't understand the lesson I'm trying to teach him.

  46:15-46:21

  Well, just as parents know how to discipline each child, often very differently, so does God.

  46:24-46:31

  But like Jonah, you know when you're in rebellion.

  46:34-46:42

  And when you're in rebellion, you're going to know how God's trying to discipline you.

  46:44-46:45

  Maybe not right away.

  46:48-46:49

  But it's going to catch up to you.

  46:52-46:54

  God's been trying to get my attention.

  46:56-46:57

  I've been wrong.

  46:59-47:01

  God's trying to teach me something.

  47:04-47:06

  It may be a trial that comes upon you.

  47:07-47:09

  It may be a natural consequence of sin.

  47:09-47:14

  Just because you're a child of God doesn't mean that you're exempt from the natural consequences of sin.

  47:15-47:34

  You know, if I drink a gallon of whiskey three times a day, every day, and I get liver failure, I'm like, "Well, wait a minute, that's a natural consequence." Alright? I'm not exempt from that. Sometimes God's discipline may come through the law.

  47:36-47:41

  I'm not exempt from the law which has been ordained by God, right, when I was 13.

  47:42-47:51

  Hebrews 12 teaches that God's discipline can even include death.

  47:54-48:12

  Sometimes God, the most loving thing He can do for one of His children is say, "You know what, it's just time to go." God loves you too much to let you go.

  48:14-48:18

  So when you rebel, God is out to get you.

Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Jonah 1

Breakout Questions:
Pray for one another.