Jonah's that famous old kid story,
isn't it? Known by everyone. And yet there's so much more
to Jonah that we don't realize. And it takes the Holy Spirit,
obviously, to convince us of these things. There's so many
golden threads running through the book of Jonah and all the
scriptures. All those threads lead to Christ. Him crucified in the salvation
of His people. And there are parallels between
the Old Testament and the New Testament, aren't they? Last
week, Angus spoke from John 6, and there was a sea, and there
were men in a boat, and there was a storm that was sent of
God. There was a trial of the faith of those in the boat, and
there was a resulting union between the Lord and His people. Jonah's story is similar. There's
a boat, there's men in a boat. There's a storm that's sent by
the Lord Jesus. There's a trial of men's faith
and there's a resulting union between the Lord again and his
people. Jonah rebelled against God. You can read chapter one at your
own leisure, but he rebelled against the Lord. And all of
us, in all we do, in some way, rebel against the Lord. Jonah's
no different to any of us. That's why we desperately need
a savior. There's consequences to our sin
in this world. And for the Lord's people, our
God uses the consequences of those, of our sins, of that rebellion. to bring us to himself, to strengthen
us in faith, to bring an intimate or more intimate experience of
his presence, to bring forth true praise from our lips in
a gospel declaration. See chapter one, and as I said,
you can read it for yourself later on, but it starts with
God sending Jonah to proclaim the gospel. To proclaim the gospel, People don't realize it, but
Jonah was of nation Israel, and it was hated by the Assyrians
at the time. They were a superpower. It was
no easy task that the Lord sent Jonah on, and it makes many of
our own failings seem minuscule. But Jonah, like the rest of us,
rebelled against God. And it ends with Jonah being
lifted up and thrown into the raging sea, and that raging sea
ceasing. It ends with the Lord having
prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly
of that fish for three days. And these three days symbolize
death. They symbolize spiritual death,
not just physical. but they also symbolize the three
days that our Lord Jesus spent in the tomb as he represented
his people. And then we come to chapter two,
and it's a detailed description of the saving experience of every
one of God's children. Now, the circumstances might
be different from case to case, But what's revealed to the sinner
in this saving experience forms the foundation of their relationship
with God. Now, there's many in this world
that would teach that salvation is a pretty simple process. It
relies on the free will of men. It relies on us praying a prayer,
or making a choice, or walking an aisle, or writing a name in
a Bible. But as we'll see in this chapter,
Salvation is a mighty work of God, a work in which he embeds
precious truths deep into our souls and the truths which stay
with his people for the rest of their lives. So just briefly, let's look at
chapter two. Verse one, then, then Jonah prayed
unto the Lord his God out of the fish's belly. So it was after,
after this life-threatening experience, both physically and spiritually,
then true prayer to his Lord. See, we need to be completely
consumed by the circumstances of our rebellion. And we need to be emptied of
every worldly prop. Verse two, Jonah said, I cried by reason
of my affliction unto the Lord. And he heard me out of the belly
of hell. Oh, sorry. Out of the belly of
hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice. See, there's a conviction of
sin that's necessary for us to truly cry to our Father in heaven. And this is a work of the Holy
Spirit and him alone in the salvation of God's people. It's the first
work in a sense. And it causes us to look beyond
our own abilities, beyond our own wisdom, and it causes us
to cry out to God for salvation. And what is it to be heard of
God? Now, God doesn't change. So if we're heard of God, we
have favor with God, and if we have favor with God, we've always
had favor, favor with God, which means the circumstances of our
lives have been ordered by a loving Father for the good of His children. Look at verse three, for thou
hast cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas, and the
floods compassed me about, all thy billows and thy waves passed
over me. See, it's here in this state,
a state that God can only bring to us, that we acknowledge the
righteousness of God in disciplining us for our sin. It's here that
we acknowledge his sovereignty over all things. Verse four,
then, after this process takes place, then, I said, I am cast
out of thy sight, get old, look again toward thy holy temple. See, it's now that we truly begin
to care about what we are before a holy God. And this is where
we begin to cry out to him with a very serious regard, not just
for the physical, but for our eternal souls. Verse five, the
waters compass me about, even to the soul. The depth closed
me around about, the weeds were wrapped around my head. I went
down to the bottoms of the mountains. The earth with the bars was about
me forever, yet hast thou brought my life up from corruption, O
Lord my God." Do you see now, this isn't just about worldly
things, is it? not about the circumstances of
our lives, this has become a matter of overwhelming concern for our
spiritual wellbeing. And the trial, having achieved
what God sent it for, causes us to know experimentally and
intimately that salvation must be a powerful work of God in
grace toward his chosen children. Verse seven, when my soul fainted
within me, I remembered the Lord and my prayer came in unto thee
into thine holy temple. See, we're also in this trial
brought to pray and genuinely pray to the Lord. We're brought
to see that He's the only hope that we have for salvation. And
we're brought to see that these prayers really do reach the ears
of God, that they actually do enter His holy temple. And how do they enter that? It's
by the advocacy of a gracious substitute, the advocacy of the
Lord Jesus Christ before him. You can read about it in Romans
8. See, as I said, there's many golden threads running through
this book, through all the scriptures, and all of them cry, Christ and
him crucified. But one of the pictures, if you
do read chapter one later on by yourself, you'll see that
Jonah was thrown into the raging ocean. And that one man was sacrificed,
and the rest of the men in that ship were saved because of that
sacrifice. See, first and foremost, what
we're reading here is an experience of our Saviour on our behalf,
suffering the wrath of His Father for the sake of our sins. Verse eight. They that observe
lying vanities forsake their own mercy. Throughout this process,
as I said, we're taught many things or a number of things
that are foundational. Prior to this process, we rested
in our own wisdom and we rested in our own strength and we looked
to men. The word vanity means emptiness.
It means no substance. If you want to enter the presence
of a holy God, you must have his perfect righteousness. And the activities of men, the
wisdom of men, the works of men, never produce the goods to enter
a perfect holy presence. And they're lying vanities, aren't
they? It's a great description of the false religion that I
spoke to you about at the start. They proclaim a salvation that
is not salvation. They declare that salvation rests
in the abilities of men. And it's a lie because it's the
same lie we received in the garden from Satan. Wisdom and works. And salvation cannot come through
the activities of men. It must be an activity of God,
and it must be applied by the activities of God to each of
His saved individuals. See, we turn from that in this
process, don't we? Look at verse nine, but, but
I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving. I
will pay that that I have bowed. Salvation is of the Lord. See,
but it's now that we turn away from our carnal, inadequate offerings
to God. Our sacrifice is now simply thanking
God for his salvation. And what is it to pay our vows?
It's simply declaring the true and only way of salvation. It's declaring the gospel. That's
how we praise our God. That's how we pay our vows. That's
how we sacrifice to our Father in Heaven. We declare salvation
is of the Lord. And what happens when we reach
that point, when this trial has reached its end? Verse 10, and
the Lord spoke to the fish in sovereignty and it vomited Jonah
upon the dry land. And if you want to continue reading
in Jonah, you'll see that Jonah was spoken to again by the Lord
and sent again by the Lord. And what did Jonah do? He faithfully
proclaimed the gospel. He was faithful to the Lord,
his God, and he was faithful to men's souls. So what a great
contrast we have here in this chapter between false religion
and what we see in the scriptures. My hope is that God will teach
every one of us his precious truths personally, as painful
as it might be. My hope is that he'd continue
to grow our faith through the trials of this world, which he
sovereignly controls. And my hope is that he'd continue
to use us to proclaim the gospel in this desperate and fallen
world. Let's just pray. Heavenly Father,
these are things that only you can do, and we're convinced of
that, but we need convincing. We need continual convincing.
We're weak and fallen and frail, and so apt to go back to our
natural ways. Father, as painful as they are,
please continue to do what's necessary to bring us into greater
union with you, to bring us closer, to draw us nearer. and to make
known to us more and more the wonders of our great King and
Saviour in His activities on our behalf and in our lives.
We thank you again for the opportunity to worship you together and we
pray that throughout our time together, Heavenly Father, you
would fulfil that promise to walk amongst us and apply your
word to our hearts. Thank you again for the grace
that we live by and live in, and Lord willing, we'll live
for eternity. We pray in the name of our great
King and Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ.