JONAH: REJECTING GOD'S CALL
SERIES: As Ambassadors for Christ: Should we Not be Concerned?
by Doug Goins
As we begin studying the book of Jonah together, I want us to keep in mind
some of the principles we have been hearing in Ron Ritchie's recent series
in Paul's second letter to the Corinthians. We will discover that these
principles are keys to help us unlock the significance of the story of Jonah.
Firstly, in 2 Corinthians 5 Paul speaks powerfully about the practical,
daily implications of the resurrection. In verse 15 it says of Jesus that
"...he died for all, that those who live [i.e., are alive spiritually
through the resurrection] might live no longer for themselves but for him
who for their sake died and was raised." For those of us who are indwelt
by Christ and who have surrendered our lives to him, this passage means
that we don't live selfishly anymore. We aren't controlled by ego, fear,
or self-protectiveness, and we don't live need-centered lives as we did
before Christ came in. Rather, we are controlled by the love of Jesus Christ.
We are concerned about others and their needs, and how we can express the
love of Christ to them.
Secondly, as Paul states in verse 16, "From now on, therefore, we regard
no one from a human point of view...." That is, we don't look at people
from the perspective of prejudice or hostility; we don't evaluate them based
on our own sensitivities or cultural biases, whether racial, religious,
or political. We view people the way God does, from his heart of love.
Finally, Paul says in verse 18 that we gladly accept what he calls a ministry
of reconciliation. That is also an important implication of the resurrection
of Christ. If we believe the message of the resurrection, then we're compelled
to tell the world and the people we interact with; we can't keep quiet.
Because God is committed to reconciling the world to himself, as his representatives
we're committed to the same reconciliation. We are ambassadors for Christ
(verse 20).
Amy Marchetti, our deaconess to missionaries, told me Easter week of her
own adventure as a minister of reconciliation. She was invited by her first-grader
Laura's teacher to come into the classroom and tell the children about the
Christian symbols of Easter in a comparison of religious practices. Amy
told me that even though she had shared the Lord with many people in many
different settings, for some reason she was especially apprehensive about
this opportunity. She wasn't sure of the teacher's motives, and when she
arrived and began to talk to these thirty-five children, her heart was pounding.
She didn't feel like a very confident ambassador for Christ.
Amy told the children the whole story from Palm Sunday through Easter, explaining
the meanings of the palm branches, the cross, and the empty tomb. As it
turned out, the children were absolutely still, their eyes very wide. When
she opened it up for questions, one little boy asked, "Did they really
nail Jesus to a cross, or is that a story somebody made up?" Amy responded,
"History records that that event really happened." The little
boy said, "Well, then, how did he come back to life? That's impossible."
Amy had only a one-word answer for him: "God." Then a little girl
sitting in the front row turned around to the boy and explained knowingly,
"He's very powerful!"
It's fun to talk about the openness and innocence of children. Think about
the incredible possibility of each one of those little hearts opening up
to Christ, responding to his loving sacrifice, and letting him change them
from the inside out. The apostle Paul says that each one of those children
can be reconciled to God; they can become the righteousness of God. What
a beautiful idea this is---they are put in right relationship with their
Creator and Savior, then in right relationship with themselves in terms
of their own identity and worth and value, and finally all their other relationships
in life are put in place as well.
But the question I want to confront you with this morning is, how do you
respond when you're asked to be a minister of reconciliation and an ambassador
for Christ to individuals or groups whom you fear or find difficult to love---those
who don't have the innocence of children, or perhaps those with whom you
have radical disagreement?
Think specifically of individuals, types of people, or groups of people
of whom you're the most critical and judgmental. (They may very well deserve
your judgment and evaluation.) Think about the people whom you tend to dismiss,
those you hope to have very little contact with, and those for whom you
want no responsibility. They may be as close as a spouse or a child who
has deeply disappointed or hurt you. Or they may be as distant as the television
image of a terrorist who massacres innocent victims.
These are people who have become our enemies because of what they believe,
say, or do. If these individuals or groups have declared themselves to be
God's enemies then we feel all the more justified in passing judgment on
them, writing them off, and distancing ourselves from them. That is exactly
what happened to the Old Testament prophet Jonah.
Jonah was called by God to be an ambassador and to extend a ministry of
reconciliation to the city of Nineveh, which was one of the capital cities
of the Assyrian empire. We're going to spend four weeks examining Jonah's
personal account of his struggle with God to respond in obedience to this
calling. He disagrees with God from the very beginning. Even though God
says he loves Nineveh, Jonah wants nothing to do with this city. He disobeys
God's direct command, and we're going to see in this story a growing self-centeredness,
an egotism, in him as he tries harder and harder to resist what God wants
for his life, even while he clearly understands that God is open-hearted
and merciful and loving to the despised residents of Nineveh.
Let's turn to the book of Jonah and look at God's heart for this great city.
In chapter 4 verse 11, the very last verse of the book, God makes a final
explanation of his plan by asking a rhetorical question of Jonah: "And
should I not pity [or show merciful concern for] Nineveh, that great city,
in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do
not know their right hand from their left....?" They are just flailing
around in the dark, and God is saying, "Don't I have a right to show
mercy to this city?" The apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 5:19 says, "...God
was in Christ reconciling the world to himself...." From the beginning
God has always had a love relationship with his creation, the human race.
He has tried in every way possible to communicate that love.
This story is power-packed with theological truth and with practical implications
for us today as we try to live out our identity as ministers of reconciliation
and ambassadors of Christ. As we follow this story we're going to find that
an examination of Jonah's life is like a look in the mirror, and we may
not like what we see. There are aspects of this very reluctant prophet in
each of us, and in our contemporary church as a whole.
Before we begin looking at the text, let me refer you to 2 Kings 14, which
you may want to read on your own to get the historical context for Jonah's
life and work. In 2 Kings 14:25 Jonah is identified as the son of Amittai,
as he is in the book of Jonah as well. This is important information because
it puts him in a human lineage. If he had a real father, then he was a real
person who lived on earth and ministered.
Jonah is introduced to us as a prophet of God who served the Lord faithfully
during the reign of Jeroboam II in the middle of the eighth century BC.
He ministered to Israel in the north in the time of the divided kingdoms,
before any of the invasions and deportations that would affect both kingdoms.
King Jeroboam was an idolatrous and immoral king who brought nothing but
evil to the land. And yet God in mercy and grace had Jonah prophesy to the
nation that the territorial boundaries were going to be expanded. God was
going to give back to Israel territory that had been taken several generations
earlier by the Syrians. God hoped that the nation would respond to his mercy
in repentance. And Jonah's ministry was fulfilled; he preached expansion
and it happened. He had great public success in the economic and military
glory days of the northern kingdom.
Now let's turn back to the book of Jonah and look at his call in the first
three verses. God invites Jonah to participate with him in a mission to
Nineveh. The first two verses define God's agenda, and the third verse defines
Jonah's agenda. Verses 1-2:
Now the word of the LORD came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying,
"Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry against it; for their
wickedness has come up before me."
What God wants from Jonah is obedient response to this assignment for ministry.
These opening words of the book of Jonah (which is an autobiographical narrative)
are very similar to the opening words of other books of minor prophets.
God's word comes to Jonah as it has before, and it stirs in him, at least
initially, awe and wonder because it is much more than just words. It is
a profound experience of God's presence and power. Jonah's call to be a
prophet is being reaffirmed and validated. His faithfulness to God and his
loyalty to the nation are being confirmed.
When we get to verse 2, however, before Jonah can revel in his new encounter
with God, shock waves begin exploding in his mind, and his heart sinks when
he hears the statement, "Go to Nineveh." From the very beginning
his strong will starts to stiffen and resist as he says to himself, "He
can't mean Nineveh," the capital city of Israel's avowed enemy!
Assyria at this time is one of the most feared nations of the ancient Near
East, known for its cruelty and violence. It is a world-class city both
in size and political importance. But Jonah has no desire to leave Israel,
because he sees himself as a prophet of Israel (up to that time the prophets
of God didn't itinerate). As we read on we will find a clear sense that
in Jonah's heart he is saying, "I am a prophet of Israel, a prophet
of territorial expansion and good news for my nation. I don't do windows
and I don't go overland to Assyria." Part of it is because Jonah thinks
that Israel is the favored nation of God anyway; why would God care about
Assyria? He will agree with God that they are quite wicked. The fact that
God wants him to have anything to do with them leaves him cold.
There is a deeper reason, though, that Jonah balks at God's call. At the
end of the book he is very candid with God about what was going on in his
mind at the moment that he received the call. In chapter 4, verse 2, he
admits this to God:
"I pray thee, 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 thou art a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding
in steadfast love, and repentest of evil [calamity]."
This verse shows two things Jonah knows. He knows his Bible, the Pentateuch,
very well, because this statement that he makes is a word-for-word quotation
from Exodus 34, where God is talking to Moses about his own character and
his concern for the people. And he knows God's character. He is afraid that
if he goes to Nineveh and preaches judgment and there is genuine repentance
of sin, then God will forgive them. The bottom line is that he hates the
Assyrians with a passion. The last thing he wants to do is become an agent
of salvation for his avowed enemies. That is really the deepest source of
his resistance. Look at his response in chapter 1, verse 3:
But Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the
LORD. He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish; so he paid
the fare, and went on board, to go with them to Tarshish, away from the
presence of the LORD.
God tells Jonah to go five hundred miles east, a three-month journey by
caravan, to preach judgment to Nineveh. Jonah turns and goes the opposite
direction down to the seaport city of Joppa on the Mediterranean, and probably
rushes up to the ticket window saying, "Give me a ticket to whatever
ship I can get on that is going the farthest distance away from here!"
Tarshish is a little fishing village on the Atlantic coast of Spain, and
just to get there by ship will be a year-and-a-half journey through the
straits of Gibraltar. But he has all the time in the world anyway. A sea
voyage will probably do him good; it will put God's desires out of his mind.
That is what he means when he says twice in this verse that he wants to
get away from the presence of the Lord. What Jonah is doing is abandoning
his obligation of ministry to Nineveh, and it is an act of sinful rebellion.
Jonah is a strong-willed man, and for four chapters he is going to be involved
in a massive power struggle with God. If you think about his prior history
recorded in 2 Kings 14, Jonah was a faithful prophet as long as God wanted
what Jonah wanted. But when God's command goes contrary to what Jonah wants,
Jonah is going to do what he very well pleases.
In Lesley Allen's commentary on Jonah he calls us to empathy for the prophet
before we get too carried away with harshness toward him. He writes, "A
Jonah lurks in every Christian heart, whimpering his insidious message of
smug prejudice, empty traditionalism and exclusive solidarity." One
of the things I pray for our weeks together in this book is that we will
face our own struggles with God: the command that we find most difficult
to hear, the instruction from God that sends us into a panic, the thing
that prompts us to say, "Anything but that, Lord!" Remember, I
asked you earlier to think specifically of some individuals, groups, or
types of people of whom you're most critical. What assignment would cause
you to not only dig your heels in but even run the other direction?
A few weeks ago, just before Charlie Tucker and I left for Germany, Ron
Ritchie and I had lunch with a dear Christian from West Germany who is a
doctor. He confessed to us his difficulty in accepting a recently converted
East German businessman as a brother in Christ. Since the wall had come
down and the nation had been reunified, they were members of the same country.
The problem in accepting this man was that he had served in the East German
army and as a Communist party official; and further, he was suspected of
being a member of the Stazi, the DDR secret police, before the reunification
of Germany. Our friend confessed his embarrassment at how difficult it was
to set aside all that history and prejudice.
When I got to East Germany and met with this dear man who is now strong
in the Lord, he said that in fact that there are even deeper issues than
just the immediate history and political differences. The mistrust goes
back centuries to the Middle Ages, and it is based in tribal animosity.
This businessman is Pomeranian, born in the Baltic northeast of the country,
and the doctor is Bavarian, from the Black Forest. Those tribal animosities
after all these generations still run very deep. He talked about how embarrassingly
difficult it is to initiate friendship and accept unity in Christ across
those lines.
That is the kind of struggle that Jonah is having and what gets him on the
ship to Tarshish. When he steps on that ship, he thinks he is finished with
God. But God isn't finished with him, no matter how hard he tries to defect.
This rebellious missionary bets his life on the false idea that he can run
away from God's presence and that God will let him get away with it; and
he loses, because God loves him too much. As this book unfolds we're going
to see an incredible struggle that speaks to the strength of God's commitment
to us and his love for us. Look at verses 4-5a, another "but"
statement:
But the LORD hurled a great wind upon the sea, and there was
a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship threatened to break up. Then
the mariners were afraid [terrified], and each cried to his god; and they
threw the wares [cargo] that were in the ship into the sea, to lighten it
for them.
There is going to be a lot of hurling in this story---they hurl cargo, God
hurls the wind, and they are going to hurl Jonah overboard.
It is amusing that in verse 4, to make the story more graphic it says the
ship itself is saying that it is afraid it is going to be broken up; it
has never been in a storm this violent. This is the only place in the Bible
that an inanimate object speaks.
The terror of these seasoned veterans of the ocean, who have been all around
the Mediterranean and know storms and winds, shows that they realize immediately
that this storm is supernatural in origin. They have never been in anything
like this in their lives. They cry out to all their different gods---it
is probably a multinational crew, all the members of which have their own
pantheons. The irony is that the one person on board the ship who could
have cried out to the real God isn't anywhere in sight. Look at verses 5b-10:
But Jonah had gone down into the inner part of the ship and
had lain down, and was fast asleep. So the captain came and said to him,
"What do you mean, you sleeper? Arise, call upon your god! Perhaps
the god will give a thought to us, that we do 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 upon Jonah. Then they said to him, "Tell us, on whose account
this evil has come upon us. What is your occupation? And whence do you come?
What is your country? And of what people are you?" And he said to them,
"I am a Hebrew; and I fear the LORD, the God of heaven, who made the
sea and the dry land." Then the men were exceedingly [even more] afraid,
and said to him, "What is this that you have done!" For the men
knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the LORD, because he had told
them.
Through the whole story the storm intensifies, and Jonah's recalcitrance
and self-absorption are going to intensify.
The word that is used to describe Jonah's sleep could mean drugged or deep
sleep. It is the sleep of exhaustion and depression. He is going to sleep
off this calling that he has rejected. He is emotionally exhausted. Think
about how when you are depressed, you welcome sleep and escape from all
that is swirling around you. In that same way Jonah is escaping into sleep.
The sailors eject all the cargo, but it doesn't help. They pray to every
god they can think of, and that doesn't help either. Then the captain remembers
that there is one more passenger who got on at Joppa. He goes down into
the hold and looks for him, finds him sound asleep, and says, "How
can you sleep in a storm like this? Get up quickly! You must have a god---pray
to him, none of ours have worked!"
It's interesting, in verse 6, that when the captain says, "Arise, call
upon your god!" it is an identical construction to God's calling to
Jonah in verse 2: "Arise...and cry against [Nineveh]...." The
words that wake him from his sleep must mock him a bit as they echo what
he is trying to get away from.
So Jonah comes up on the deck, but as verse 7 shows, he doesn't say a word.
In spite of the captain's impassioned plea, Jonah doesn't pray. All you
hear in verse 7 is the desperate voices of the sailors. One thing that struck
me is that at least up to this point Jonah is very consistent---he is willing
to let both Nineveh and these pagan sailors die in ignorance of the God
of the universe. He stands by in silence and watches things breaking up
all around him. He is dragging innocent people into his own sinful rebellion.
That is an important spiritual principle. To the degree that we allow rebellion
and disobedience in our lives, we will establish a downward spiral like
a whirlpool or funnel that seizes us and others and pulls us down, harder
and harder. That picture of being pulled downward because of sin is very
clear in this text. On the other hand, God says in verse 2, "Arise,
go to Nineveh...and cry against it...." As the story unfolds there
is a sense an upward direction in following God. (Paul even talks in Philippians
about the upward call of God that we have in Jesus Christ.) But the language
Jonah uses as he tells the story in verse 3 is,
"He went down to Joppa." And in verse 5, "...Jonah
had gone down into the inner part of the ship...."
(He has a lot farther down to go, by the way. In chapter 2 verse 6 Jonah
says in effect that he went down to the bowels of the earth, literally "the
belly of hell." He must go to the belly of the ocean.) And he pulls
innocent people down with him. We don't sin alone. The wages of sin is death,
the Scriptures say clearly, and we drag other people into our death by resisting
God, rebelling against him, or running from him. It's a scary warning for
us as we examine our own hearts.
In verse 7 the sailors are casting lots, doing divination to try to figure
out who the guilty person is. Obviously, from their superstitious perspective,
some god or gods are angry with somebody, and they are all suffering because
of what this person has done. The lot falls to Jonah, and he is finally
forced to go public. Yet in verse 8, even though the divination points to
Jonah as the culprit, the sailors still question him. It's almost as if
they are really concerned to give him the benefit of the doubt; maybe the
lots aren't accurate. They say, "Tell us who you are, where you come
from, what's going on in your life, why you are here. Is there anything
that could possibly have caused this?" They care more about Jonah and
being fair to him in this interrogation than he cares about them. They are
concerned about doing the right thing. But they have to drag out of him
who he is and what he stands for.
In Jonah's response in verse 9, he answers only one of the questions they
ask. He doesn't respond at all to the questions about his vocation, his
town, or his country. And he is not about to talk about his being a prophet
of God. You can put yourself in his shoes; in his mind he has disqualified
himself from the occupation of a prophet. Jonah simply tells the crew that
he is a Hebrew. They can't make too big a deal out of that; it is a common
designation of the Jewish people among all the Gentile nations. And even
his statement that he fears or worships God is really not much more than
a suggestion of religious affiliation. It's like somebody's saying in our
day that they are a Christian and meaning only that they are not a Moslem,
Hindu, or Buddhist.
But Jonah does draw on his spiritual heritage when he describes God at the
end of verse 9: "...the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry
land...." There's a note of pathos in the words that he chooses to
describe God. It's almost as if, as he speaks of the attributes of his God,
he feels that he really can't claim them for himself in this crisis because
of his disobedience. This declaration of God's absolute sovereignty as Creator
over all the sea and dry land contradicts his own assumption that somehow
he can escape from God's attention and concern.
When the sailors hear what they have dragged out of Jonah in verse 10, they
immediately respond with more fear. It terrorizes them. They latch on to
his declaration about his God, and although it isn't recorded here, they
must be begging him, "If your God is in charge of all this and he is
the one who made the storm, then pray to him! Get him off our backs, get
him to calm things down!" But Jonah doesn't ever pray in this first
chapter. Then we see the comment they make in verse 10 to Jonah: "What
is this that you have done!" You could paraphrase it, "Jonah,
if this is the God you believe in, how in the world could you act like this?
What kind of an idiot are you to presume on this kind of a God?"
Don't you hate it when nonbelievers ask you a question like that? I've had
the question asked of me. My wife Candy helped me remember this week some
of the times that I've been asked similar questions. In all candor, some
of the experiences are too painful to share. But I remember the one that
may be the least embarrassing. I was in my first year in food service management
in Idaho, a newlywed and a Christian. My district manager was a nonbeliever,
but he cared about me and invested himself in me. One day he took me into
his office and shut the door. My face flushed and my heart started pounding
when he confronted me with the fact that he noticed that profanity was increasingly
creeping into my language as I interacted with people. I remember his words
to me: "You leave that kind of language to us pagans. You shouldn't
talk that way." It felt like a knife as this nonbeliever said in effect,
"How could you act that way?"
I also remember a few years ago, when I was a pastor here at PBC, the pain
of a phone call from the president of a company here in the valley. He told
me that a young man who was very much involved in the ministry of our church
was guilty of embezzlement from their company. The president asked me the
same kind of question: "As a Christian, why would he do that?"
Now as the storm increases in intensity, Jonah's stubbornness gets harder
and harder. Let's follow the story as it continues in verse 11:
Then they said to him, "What shall we do to you, that the
sea may quiet down for us?" For the sea grew more and more tempestuous.
He said to them, "Take me up and throw me into the sea; then the sea
will quiet down for you; for I know it is because of me that this great
tempest has come upon you." Nevertheless the men rowed hard to bring
the ship back to land, but they could not, for the sea grew more and more
tempestuous against them. Therefore they cried to the LORD, "We beseech
thee, O LORD, let us not perish for this man's life, and lay not on us innocent
blood; for thou, O LORD, hast done as it pleased thee." So they took
up Jonah and threw him into the sea....
What an incredible evangelism opportunity Jonah missed! As I was studying
this week I speculated about what might have happened if Jonah had, on the
spot, repented of his rebellion against God and his defection from his calling
and had called on God to save him and the crew. As the story unfolds we
know that that is really what God wanted; he wanted a prophet who was right
with him and who would go preach the message. I think God would have responded
to that prayer to calm the storm, and everyone on the ship would have embraced
the God of Israel. The grateful sailors would have put Jonah ashore somewhere,
and he would have turned around and headed east toward Nineveh. But that
is exactly what Jonah did not want to do. He knew that for him to call on
God for help would surely mean that God would reissue the call he had vehemently
turned down days before.
It is tragic for each one of us when we refuse to obey God's clear command,
because the result is that it puts us out of commission spiritually. It
takes away our credibility and it robs us of opportunity. And when Christians
fail and violate the call to be ministers of reconciliation and ambassadors
of Christ, it is amazing how often the secular world responds with sadness.
In the newspaper a few weeks ago there was a quote from a non-Christian
man in southern California who was responding to the media's exposing sinful
immorality in the life of a Christian radio preacher. This man said, "I
was starting to listen to what that guy said. It's really disappointing
to see that he couldn't live it out in his own life."
As we look at verse 12 where Jonah finally gives directions to the sailors
about what to do with him, we are probably tempted to interpret it rather
heroically: "I will save the day! Throw me overboard, then the storm
will be calmed!" I read some interpretations that try to make this
out to be tragic heroism on the part of Jonah. But what he does here in
verse 12 is not a spiritually courageous act. His disobedience to God disqualifies
him from that. If Jonah knows that the storm is God's judgment on him, why
doesn't he either set things right with God or take responsibility for getting
himself off the ship? Instead what he does is make the sailors responsible
for his actions. Look at all the first-person-singular pronouns: "Take
me up and throw me into the sea...for I know it is
because of me that this great tempest has come upon you." What
we will see in this story is that as he becomes more self-absorbed, he also
becomes more narcissistic. He is at the center of everything. When we spend
our lives thinking about ourselves and how we can't get what we want, it's
common to manipulate people to fulfill our sinful desires. Jonah would rather
die than preach in Nineveh, so he has the sailors help him die in disobedience
of God. All he needs to do is ask God to forgive him, and he can live. But
his stubbornness is greater than his fear of death.
Again, the concern of the sailors is clear in verse 13. They don't throw
him overboard right away; they row hard. They don't want to kill him. He
is indifferent to life and death, and the sailors have more concern for
him than he has for himself or for them or anybody else. They demonstrate
an amazing compassion for human life.
Then in verse 14 we see the first prayer, and again it comes from pagans,
not from Jonah. The sailors pray to the one true God to whom Jonah has introduced
them. And it is an amazing prayer of contrition before the Lord. They are
struggling with a tragic moral dilemma. They finally throw themselves on
God's mercy and say, "We are going to do this, and we will trust that
it is from you." Then in verse 15 after this prayer of faith, they
throw Jonah overboard. Verses 15a-16:
...and the sea ceased from its raging. Then the men feared the
Lord exceedingly, and they offered a sacrifice to the LORD and made vows.
Instantly the sound and fury of the storm, and the yelling and crying and
praying and screaming cease. The sea is quiet. And these sailors believe
with all their heart that God is indeed the Creator and Sovereign over land
and sea as Jonah has told them. They shudder with awe and wonder, and they
make thank offerings to the Lord. They promise to live lives of gratitude
for his saving grace. It's a very strange twist, if you think about it.
Jonah wouldn't go to Nineveh to prophesy to the Gentiles there, but through
his own choices, when he tries to escape, he is put into a situation where
Gentile sailors believe in the one true God because of his weak, brief,
and halfhearted witness given under duress.
We are going to see that God is totally committed to turning this prophet
around and using him. There is going to be no escape for Jonah. We are going
to stop here this morning as Jonah is spiraling downward into the depths
of the sea, where he is going to survive three days and three nights before
we can get back to him. It is a powerful symbol of his slide into selfish
rebellion against God.
There is a tragic contrast between Jonah and our sister Amy Marchetti. To
this point he is not experiencing any of the adventure that Amy enjoyed
Easter week in sharing with those children. He certainly doesn't understand
God as the apostle Paul knew him, a God who is reconciling the world to
himself (as we saw in 2 Corinthians 5). Jonah is still controlled by his
own selfish ego and by fear. He is not controlled by the love of God. He
doesn't understand it, he doesn't like it, and he doesn't agree with it.
He is not willing to offer his life unconditionally for other people. He
doesn't understand that God pities even his enemies and has merciful compassion
for them. He is incredibly culture-bound---prejudiced and hostile toward
people whom God loves and wants to save more than anything else. Jonah is
unwilling to be an ambassador of God's saving grace or a minister of reconciliation
to Gentiles.
Let me ask you to do two things in preparation for the remainder of this
series. Read Jonah through several times and ask God to help you find yourself
in the mirror of this book. It has been powerfully convicting for me to
do that in recent weeks. And then ask God specifically for two things: Firstly,
ask him to remind you of who the Ninevites are in your life---the individuals,
family members, racial groups, political action groups, groups whose behavior
you find deviant and depraved, groups with whom you disagree Biblically.
Who are the people you are afraid of and want nothing to do with? It may
take awhile, but God will do it if you ask him to. Secondly, ask him to
help you examine any patterns of escape in your life. What is the Tarshish
that you are running away to? What are you doing to evade God's clear command
in your life? Finally, perhaps the place to start is really to pray that
God would make us willing to allow him to exercise the same tough love in
our lives that he did in Jonah's. Storms are frightening and life-threatening,
but God loved Jonah enough that he was willing to threaten his life. Are
we willing to let him threaten ours?
Paul concludes his challenge to an Easter lifestyle---his call to be ministers
of reconciliation and ambassadors for Christ with this concluding invitation.
It calls us to respond this morning,
"...we entreat you not to accept the grace of God in vain....
Behold now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation."
(2 Corinthians 6:1-2)
Catalog No. 4342
Jonah 1:1-16
First Message
Doug Goins
April 18, 1993
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