He said when I got home I had
to make my bed and clean the bathroom for him. I'll make the coffee too, that's
all right. If you will, let's turn to Jonah. Book of Jonah. You got Joel, Amos, Obadiah,
Jonah. If you get to Micah, you went
too far. Book of Jonah. The Lord told him, Those that trusted
in themselves. He said, you want a sign? You're
a wicked and adulterous generation. He said, the only sign you're
going to get is the sign of John. Everybody says, well, that guy
got swallowed by a whale. And they make little figurines
for children and make wallpaper out of it and coloring books.
And it's a big sign. If the Lord gives a sign, it's
a big sign. We ain't going exhausted. I was
talking to John right before we started, and there'll be a
time, he reminded us last night that our, David told us the number
of our days. That's all I've got left. I got
a couple days left. And it's very likely it could
be the last time I preach. And if I live another 80 years, that's
just a couple days. And if a man lives 120 years,
look what sin does to a body in 50 years. We ain't got a good
handle on what sin is, do we? It destroys in a vapor, that
fast. Comes forth brand spanking new,
just as sweet, smells good and soft, and it's gone. I thought
of Jonah. If I had to preach one more message,
and this is it, I want people to know what happened in that
garden, who we are, what happened on that cross, who Christ is,
what's done, and who that's for. It's for whosoever. Those rough
pearls, those sinners, the chief of sinners, not people, well,
I've sinned. The noun, sin, what we are, the worst of them, heathens. And then it's done. It's been
done so long, it's been written way before I was ever born. Before
I came on the scene, it's done. And I relate so much with Jonah,
I do. Despite myself, despite my willful
rebellion, the Lord's gracious to me. And he's gracious to his
people. The Lord is unbothered by the
ignorance or unwilfulness or anything else of his servants.
Moses came to him. We read a lot about Moses, don't
we? He wrote the first five books of the Bible. And he said, you're
going to go talk for me. And he said, Lord, I can't talk.
He said, who made the mouth? I'm sending you anyway. He didn't
hiccup. The Lord didn't have to take
a TV time out and find out what he's going to do. Y'all know
the story of Jonah. He said, go down to Nineveh and
preach to them. Jonah said, I'm going to go to
Tarshish. I don't want to go to Nineveh. We got a sign of what he meant
for evil, what he meant for self-service. And he said, well, there's a
ticket there for sale in Joppa. The Lord must have wanted me
to go. If he didn't want me to go, there wouldn't have been
a ticket for me. He's a fatalist, wasn't he? Despite all that, the Lord
used it, and we have this book here now. The Lord gave a sign
of Jonah. I just want to look at the first
chapter of this sign. I want to point out two Adams in it. We read in Romans 5, for as by
one man's disobedience. Many were made sinners, so by
the obedience of one shall many be made righteous. Just as much
as I fell in Adam, and that is my nature, and that is what I
am through my DNA inside and out, that's how much that other
Adam, the second Adam, as him as my head, and him as my representative,
and I'm a nation and a seed of him, his offspring, I'm made
just like him. As much as I fell in Adam, Lord's
people are made righteous in him. If so, I wasn't in that
garden. Well, I wasn't on that cross.
This body wasn't, but in him I was. And just like Adam, I
never met him. Act just like him. I don't encourage
anybody to go to another nation that hates America, but you could
go to another nation right now and say, I love you. You're my
favorite nation. I want to be like you. I'm going
to change my name. And they'll cut your head off,
because you ain't of that nation. You don't belong there. And that's
how we came into this world. And by one man's disobedience,
what happened in that garden? We died. Well, he kept breathing. Well, we ought to learn about
spiritual death. And just as graveyard dead as he was, that's
how everyone born of him is. Jonah was a real man. And boy,
this gets me. Sometimes the simple things,
really. And the evening, and the Lord said, let there be light.
And the evening and the morning was the first day. There never
was a day before that. There wasn't such thing as a
day. And then there was a day. And he said, never gonna come
a day, it'll be in the days. That's all we live in is days. This one John that's so rebellious,
it's God's prophet. The peevish prophet, the meekest
man that walked the earth was Moses, that was God's prophet.
Here's the harshest one. And it's God's prophet. And used
the greatest revival this world's ever seen. It's recorded. There's
120,000 that didn't know the left hand from the right hand.
That's little bitty fellas. They don't know the right from
their left. A million people with a king. That's what God
used. This is the means. Something
unfavorable and unprofitable and just something nobody else
used. It's foolish. Who would use that? Who would use Jonah?
God would. And it's his prophet. We read
that plain in 2 Kings 14, Matthew, the Lord records, His words recorded. I have no doubt this is a real
man. And in this book of Jonah, none of the pictures of the Lord's
church taught us where Jonah was going to go. Picture of hell,
damnation. That's a picture of separation
from God. I've read so many commentaries
on this, going to how many miles it was between Joppa and Tarsus.
It was a long way. That's how far it was. It was
as far as you could get from God. That's what it is. Physical
location doesn't matter. Jonah's a picture of several
things throughout this book. In the first four verses, he's
a picture of that first Adam. That's what we see here. Our
head. The one we're just like. The spirit and image as we're
coming to this earth. The spitting image of Adam. And
in chapter 1 verse 5 all the way to the beginning of chapter
3 is a picture of Christ. And throughout this whole book
he's a picture of the Lord's prophets, of his preachers, and us. Sinners
saved by grace. That's a sign I want to pay attention
to. That's a sign I want to look at. It says in verse 1 of the
Word of the Lord came unto Jonah The son of Amittai saying, Jonah's
name means dove. He's a dove. I thought of Noah's
Ark whenever floods came and the Lord said, send out the ravens. And the ravens went out and they
didn't come back. Why? They're flesh eaters. They feed
on death. And there's a floating bodies
all over the place. They didn't have to come back.
They could eat anything. They could feed on live stuff
and good things. They could feed on bad things.
But when they sent that dove out, it came back. There wasn't
no life out there for it. It has to feed on living things,
the living bread. And finally, whenever that dove
left, didn't come back, it found food, didn't it? Brought back
that olive branch to him. There's one where'd it go? It
was eating is what it was doing. That's this one. Sacrifice, a
dove was used for sacrifice because it was cheap. undesirable. If a family couldn't afford a
lamb, they could sacrifice a dove. And it symbolizes peace. Peace. This gospel we believe in is
a gospel of peace because of its peacemaker, the one that
that dove landed on. Our Lord was baptized. You were
baptized 2,000 years ago. side of God. And when he came
up out of that water, the heavens opened and the Lord spake. And
he said, this is my son, whom I am well pleased. And it was
like a dove. The Spirit of God landed on him like a dove landing
on his shoulders. What a thought. That father's name means truth.
I got tied up in what all the names meant. In the book of Hosea,
I thought it was wonderful. I studied so hard on that. And
each of the kings, it was just magnificent. And I got up and
I preached that, and I looked out, and it was like I was reading
tax code. I lost everybody. I won't get
tied up in the names. We'll keep going. Verse 2. Arise,
he's speaking to Jonah, go to Nineveh, that great city, and
cry against it, for their wickedness has come up before me. If Nineveh
is a picture of the saints of God, how are they wicked? How
wicked are they? They're just like everybody else.
They're born of Adam. They're sins of now. It's not
a verb. It's not just something we do.
It's what we are. The Lord looked down and saw the wickedness of
man was great and the earth and every imagination and the thought
of his heart was only evil continually. And unless the Lord is pleased
to send us his word through a messenger, we're going to perish just like
every other child, Adam. But God was pleased. God was
pleased. Just like that goodly pearl I
referenced just last night. I'll go backwards now. Just like
that pearl of great price. He said, that's a good pearl.
I love it. He said, that's a great city.
That's my city. It's great. Well, they're nothing but wicked.
Yeah, go tell them. He's going to warn them. Fail not to warn
them. Just as he's pleased to send
his preacher in this day to his children and say, all flesh is
grass. Anything you thought was good
is bad. Anything you thought was bad is probably good. Behold
your God. That's it. He sends them saying,
arise and go to Nineveh. Go to my people. You get up and
go. You don't write him an email,
you don't make a voice recording and mail it to him. He said,
get up and go, just like I told Phillip. He said, that eunuch's
down there, now get up and go. He took off running. Just like
Anna and I, I said, Paul's down there, go to him. He hesitated.
He said, I heard about this fella. I said, Lord, you sure? And he
said, behold, he prayeth. He never had prayed before. I
told our folks there, I said, I don't know somebody's heart.
You don't know my heart, I don't know anybody else's heart. The
Lord knows the heart. But I know what comes out the
mouth. And on a long enough timeline, you're going to get a tenor of
life, ain't you? If you praise him or curse him, one of the
two. And he told Ananias, he said, you go down there. He said,
Paul's praying to me. You'll hear it. I remember the first
time I came to this congregation. My brother back there got up
and prayed. And I said, that's my brother. I know it right then. I heard what come out of his
mouth. He said, you get up, arise, and go to Nineveh. Verse 3, here's
a picture of that first Adam. But Jonah rose up to flee unto
Tarsus from the presence of the Lord. And he went down to Joppa,
and he found a ship going to Tarsus. So he paid the fare thereof
and went down into it to go with him to Tarsus from the presence
of the Lord. Jonah was a rebellious child. The Lord gave him one command,
one command, And he did the exact opposite. Now Eve was in that
garden. She ate that fruit of the tree
and her eyes didn't see nakedness. Nothing happened. She was deceived.
She went to her husband and he listened to his wife instead
of the Lord. He sinned willfully. Adam did. It was willful. He
willfully sinned. Jonah willfully sinned. He went
down to Tarsus. And I tell you what, he paid
for that ticket. I need to learn that. Willful disobedience comes
at a cost. Sin, there's a price to be paid
in this body. Pain and suffering or shame or
something in us. And sadness and guilt over what
we know. To willfully do that to sin against
God. Not to, you all have seen it. Some of y'all, years ago,
I won't say how many. I was a teenager, I did some
dumb things. John Vickie's witness to it. You saw it, that's against
God. Against thee and thee only have
I sinned. done this evil in your sight." That's what Jonah did.
That's what Adam did in the garden. Same thing. Jonah tried to flee
from the Lord. What did Adam do? After he ate,
he fled from the Lord. He went and hid from Him and
tried to cover himself and hide himself, cover his nakedness
with those fig leaves. I'll tell you, tell Jonah, tell
me. You can't run from God. We don't use that word much.
It was used widely in the 80s. He's potentate. The only authority. He's the only power. He's the
only one that receives honor and glory and majesty. Only.
Omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent God of heaven and earth. We can't
run from him. How could Jonah or Adam even
think they could ignore God and run from him? Same way I can. Same way you do, just like us.
Those are like passions, no different than us. John tells us later
in chapter 4, he said, the reason I ran is I knew he was going
to save that city. I knew he was going to be gracious to them.
I knew you were merciful. I knew you were slow to anger.
And I was mad. It's a Gentile city and I told
them it was going to get destroyed. Now I look like a false prophet.
My ministry is tarnished because of them. And the army had a phrase called
with them, as an acronym. What's in it for me? That's all
they were worried about. Verse four, but the Lord sent
out a great wind into the sea, and there was a mighty tempest
in the sea, so that the ship was like to be broken. He was
about to tear that thing all to pieces. And they knew it.
These professional seafarers knew it. First, the Lord sends
a storm. And it's right. And it's just
for him to send this storm. What Jonah did was wrong, it
was wicked. And it was willing, it was willfully against the
Lord. And he willfully disobeyed the Lord. And he meant it for
evil, but the Lord meant it for good. That doesn't excuse his
sin, doesn't excuse ours. It doesn't make light of our
disobedience. Should we sin that grace may bound? God forbid,
God forbid. But the sinner does not hinder
the Lord. Man does not affect Almighty God. That's what so
many people think. We'll get together and we'll
pray through this. That's a mutiny. We'll make a big old prayer list
and we'll all get together and we'll hold hands until God does
something we want him to do. That's mutiny. You're ganging
up on God. Prayer doesn't change God. His
acts are known from the beginning. He knew what he was going to
do. It changes us. You've done that, ain't you?
You start to pray for something. You say, oh Lord, would you?
You're on your throne. We start to praise, don't we?
You're holy. You're right. Everything you
do is right. And everything's in your control. Never mind. Go to ask for something. Oh,
that's right. Just praise him, thank him. It
stifles a lot of our petitions, doesn't it? John washed his hands
of what the Lord told him to do and he bought a one-way ticket
to Tarsus, trying to leave everything behind but the Lord. But God, He had some of His elect
children on that ship to Tarsus that must be saved. And He had
some elect children in the whole city of Nineveh that must be
saved. And we're given a beautiful picture here of what the Lord
Jesus Christ does in this book right here. The same way He saved
sinners then, the same way He saves sinners now. The same trouble
there was in back then, and the same thoughts, and the same nature
Adam and Eve had, ain't no different. We can just do it faster now.
We have man's devices. I left mine over on the pew.
We literally have devices, don't we? Sin's the same, we're just
more efficient at it. That's all there is to it. But
God. In this point of the chapter,
remember Jonah's the type of that first Adam. Because of his
disobedience, because of his sin, those in that same boat
as him were in the same storm as him. And it was about to be
ripped apart. That's why they didn't disobey
God. They hadn't even talked to God.
Well, that's what Paul told us in Romans 2. Nevertheless, death
reigned. There was no law to offend between
Adam and Moses. People still died. Why? We didn't believe God. We didn't
believe God. Adam didn't believe God. We didn't
believe God. We thought it was our way. We had opinions. You
know what opinions literally translated as? Heresy. Heresy. Why? I ought not think." What
does God say? What does He say? They were in
that boat after the similitude of Jonah. Nevertheless, death
is about to reign. They were dying. They were willfully
and gainfully employed on that ship. That was their place of
business to go to hell, to go to Tarsus. That's how I make
a living. That's what we're doing. Those
in the same boat, they see that judgment of the Lord is coming.
They became physically afraid. they became physically afraid.
When sinners are in the same boat of Adam, and the Lord starts
revealing this, this judgment for sin, people get physically
scared. My dad told me that whenever
children are young, they physically fear their father, because they're
going to get spanked. They're going to get the rod. And then
as you grow, you don't get... There was a time I got my last
spanking. I didn't get spanked anymore.
But I still feared my father, but I wasn't afraid he was going
to hit me. I honored him. That's the difference. That's
the difference. These people, they start out, they're scared
to death. What's both gonna say? We're in trouble. We're gonna
die. Now we see a picture of that
second Adam, verse five. Then the mariners were afraid.
and cried every man unto his God. They weren't crying to God,
they was crying to the gods of their imagination. And cast forth
the wares that were the ship were into the sea to lighten
it of them. They started working real hard. What can we do to
get rid of things? Let's cut this out and cut that out. And
I'm gonna quit drinking and I'm gonna quit smoking and I'm gonna quit
whatever. That's what they're doing. We're in trouble. Jettison,
get it out of here. But Jonah, See throwing things
overboard? He was going down to the sides
of the ship. And he lay and was fast asleep. This sign come to
fruition. All these signs, there's a thousand
of them. I'm just cherry picking the pearls out. This happened
on Mark 4. There's a great storm of wind
came. It was beating on that ship. And they were mariners.
They were professionals. This is what they're used to. And
they were scared. And the master was on a pillow
in the back of the ship. And that's where it's kicking
the most, sleeping. And I said, what's wrong? Don't
you care that we're going to die? First thing he did before
he talked to them, he rebuked the wind and the sea and said,
peace, be still. Smooth as a mill pond in Maine.
And then he turned to me and said, why are you so fearful?
What's wrong with you? How is it that you have no faith? And they marveled and they said
one to another, what manner of man is this that even the wind
and the sea obey him? We can't, this guy, he ain't
like us. This God ain't like us. Physically,
as John was about to tell us, Christ has power over the sea,
but spiritually, Christ is the only one that can calm that sea
of judgment, that sea of pain and anguish that we rightfully
earned our wage that we deserve from the hand of a just and holy
God that we spit in His face. We was at war with. While we
were sinners, while we were in that war, He's the only one that
can stop it. And he says, peace. Peace to
him. How does he give life? He looks
on a valley of dry bones and says, live. And they got life.
Don't take much, does it? Verse six. So the ship master
came to him. They went down there to wake
him up. And said, what man is that old sleeper? What's wrong
with you? Why are you sleeping? Arise and
call upon by God. We're having a prayer meeting,
everybody get together. You pray to your God, I pray to my God, and we all
get together and somebody's gonna be right. We're betting on odds
and evens. We'll bet on it all. Somebody
will be right. You get up and do it. If so be
that God will think upon us that we perish not. And they said
everyone to his fellow, come let us cast lots. Praying ain't
working. Let us cast lots that we may
know for whose cause this evil is upon us. Somebody done somebody
wrong. And I'm the one that was wronged.
You ever thought of that? Something bad happened. You've
seen that happen. Trials come. They're going to ask it twice.
Who did wrong? Who brought this evil? It wasn't
me. Yes, it was me. I haven't revealed that to them
yet. It's my fault. If somebody's wrong, it's me.
I promise you that right now. my fault. The Lord has to teach
us that. So they cast lots and a lot fell upon Jonah. What brought
their attention to Jonah? Well, the lot fell on him. Just
so happened. Now, the Lord of hosts. The lot
is cast to the left, but the whole disposing thereof is of
the Lord. The Lord purposed this. Verse 7, they said, every one
of his fellow come, let us cast lots that we may know for whose
cause this evil is upon us. So they cast lots, and the lot
fell upon Jonah. And they said to him, tell us,
we pray thee, for whose cause this evil is upon us. The lot
laid on you, now you tell us. That's somebody asked me that
recently. Who made this evil come upon, who made this trial
come upon us? You don't even know how to answer.
God did, and it's your fault. If it happened, the Lord did
it. Is He not on His throne? That's what, speaking of providing
for pastors and stuff, and you reap what you sow is what Paul's
saying. He said, God's not mocked. And that's so. If we sow corn,
we don't expect tomatoes to come up. And if I sow three grains
of corn, I'm not going to get two acres of harvest. That's
just so. But that word, God's not mocked,
it's translated, He's not frustrated. He's not surprised. You get frustrated,
I get frustrated. The Lord, he ain't caught off
guard. Marisha, go eat a ham sandwich. I say that to other
people all the time. Get her this shade treat. Eat your sandwich.
You'll be fine. Calm down. The Lord's on his
throne. He is. They said, for whose cause is
this evil upon us? They weren't sinners yet. That's
the problem. And if that's offensive to somebody,
I hope you offend them now instead of offending them that day of
judgment. We're the sinners. or the sinners. I know that because
I am. But here they're asking, for whose cause is this evil
upon us? What is thine occupation? And which comest thou? And what's
thy country? And what people art thou? You can read in chapter
4, John didn't want to go to Nineveh. That's Assyrians. That's
close to Mosul, Iraq. I'll tell you from personal experience,
it's an undesirable place. He didn't want to go there, but
he's a Jew. And the Lord was going to have him go down and
preach to Gentiles. And he said, I don't want to. is get some
Gentiles, they ain't as good as me, and I don't need, my time
could be used somewhere else that's better. But they want
to know what country he's from, where his people was, whence
comest thou, those are kind of all the same, isn't it? And what's
your occupation? They want to know that. They
want to know if this is a conspiracy. What's superstition? That means
overly religious. They thought man could control
the weather. Did anything change? Who did
this? Is this another country's fault?
Who's making this climate change? I tell you right now, I believe
in global warming. It's going to get real hot. All
the fervent heat and all the elements are going to melt too.
I don't know how long. Days to a thousand years. It may happen
tonight. It may happen in two millennia. I don't know. Ain't
none of my business. But they thought this was some man's fault
that the seas were corrupted and the weather was changed.
Verse 9. John was going to answer him. And he said until he answers
him backwards. But he answers him. I'm in Hebrew. I fear the Lord, the God of heaven,
which hath made the sea and the dry land. You're about to see
the dry land. God made it. But he's answering their questions
in reverse. They're asking, where are you coming from? What's your
country? What's your people? Who are you? Where are you from?
And he says, I'm in Hebrew. I'm a child of God. And they
said, what's your occupation? And he replied, I fear the Lord.
That's his job. Honor God. Believe God. Look to God. Point your face
towards Him. You know that's every child of
God's occupation. Don't put that on a resume. You won't get hired.
What are your past experiences? I believe God. What about Him? Everything He says. You understand
at all? No, but if He said it, we'll
figure it out someday if we need to. He'll teach us. I'll tell
you what I do know, that's what Peter and John told that lame
man in front of the temple. That guy sat in front of the
temple for forty-some years. He wouldn't go inside, but he sat outside. And he said, give me some alms.
He said, I ain't got nothing to give you. I ain't got no money. I'll
give you everything I got though. I'll tell you about the Lord.
He said, that's my occupation. I fear the Lord. Why is this
evil upon us, Jonah? He's going to preach to these
marriages. Tells them who God is. He said, the living God sends
judgment as he wills. And if it's without warning,
that's just fine. That's right. And He sends peace as He wills. That's right. He's merciful to
whom He will, and He'll show grace to whom He will. Lord,
show us Your glory. I used to stand on that when
I was a teenager. My doctrine was as straight as
a gun barrel and just as empty. I was right. I said I was apologetic
because I wasn't apologizing to nobody. And you need to be
right. The Lord's merciful to who he'll
be merciful. He's gracious to whom he'll be gracious. He's
sovereign. And then he showed Moses his glory. I'm going to
put you in the Christ. I'm going to put you in the cleft
of the rock. That's my glory. It's my son and me putting you
in him who didn't deserve to be in there. Jonah preaches to him and tells
him who God is. Verse 10. Then were the men exceedingly
afraid and said unto him, Why hast thou done this? For the
men knew that he fled from the presence of the Lord because
he told them. He told them the truth. My pastor
helped me out with this. At the end of this book, John
was just horrored the whole way through. The Lord says, how is
it working out for you? fighting me and they said it's
working out all the way to death, you just go ahead and kill me.
Oh man, what that's just stubbornness and disobedience. I see that
in myself. But the Lord kept asking him some questions and
at the very last punctuation in this whole book is a question
mark. I called Clay, I said, why does it end in a question
mark? And he said, yeah it ends in a question mark. What's the
answer? The book of Jonah. The Lord asked him a question
and he wrote it down just like Onesimus. Wrote that letter to
Philemon. He said, by the hand of Onesimus,
in Rome. He's the one that penned all
that out. I'm unprofitable. That's right. That's right, Paul,
I am. And he wrote it down, didn't he? We'll confess. We'll tell
the truth when the Lord deals with us. These men didn't want to face
judgment, but they asked Him. Now they saw something, heard
of the Lord, and they were exceedingly afraid. And they asked the question
and then taught in their hearts something about who God was.
And they said, why wouldn't you obey God? Why wouldn't you do
it? They hadn't walked in faith long
enough to see their failures just yet. They were excited and
motivated. Why wouldn't you obey God? Verse
11. And said they unto him, what shall we do unto thee that the
sea might be calm to us? For the sea is wrought and tempestuous. We don't want to face this judgment
because we can't live through it. What must we do to be saved? What must we do to be saved? John was going to show them.
It ain't your doing. As a picture of Christ it is.
This is the Lord's doing. Verse 12. And he said unto them,
take me up and cast me forth into the sea, so the sea shall
be calm unto you. For I know that for my sake this
great tempest is upon you. There's the gospel, isn't there? If Christ our substitute is cast
into that divine judgment on our behalf, Judgment's over. And it's all for His namesake. It's for His sake. It's for His
glory. And I tell you what, the Maryknolls
will confess with me. They'll witness with me. It's
for our good. It's for our good. This was a good thing. He warned
us. He showed us what we are. And in spite of ourselves, the
Lord blessed us anyway. And the whole time, all that's
taken place, it ever bit glorifies the Son. For His sake. Verse 13, nevertheless the men
rode hard to bring it to the land, but they could not for
the sea was wrought and tempestuous against them. Physically, earthly,
they didn't want to kill Jonah, did they? And they gave it all
they had to do something other than watching him die. The thought
of it was just unbearable. And to think that God, His Son
not sparing, sent him to die, I scarce can take it in. If we
get along, go read Matthew 27 on that, when the Lord went to
that cross and what they did to it. Chris Cunningham asked
me, he said, go read that. He said, how do you feel after
you read that? It rips your heart out, doesn't it? Oh, if there's
any other way. Those that cried, I thought of that too. The very
ones that cried. We're about to go through Stephen
there in Acts 7. And as they stoned him, he said,
Lord, forgive them. They don't know what to do. That's
exactly what the Lord cried out on the cross with them. But as those
cried, they said, give us Barabbas. And they told Pilate, they said,
let his blood be on us. They did. That's what old Sapphora
told Moses. She said, you're a bloody husband
to me. And then she repeated it. They said twice. And everyone
that cried out that the Lord saved, let this blood be on us.
Boy, it wasn't long after they heard the gospel, they said,
let his blood be on us. Give us in that blood. Lord,
it must be. And so she cried out, she said,
you're a bloody husband to me. And then she cried out, you're
a bloody husband to me. Verse 14. Therefore they cried
unto the Lord. They weren't crying to their
little G-gods no more, are they? Something happened. By the foolishness
of preaching, the Lord saved some of his people in that boat.
Therefore they cried unto the Lord and said, we beseech thee,
O Lord, we beseech thee. We're not commanding. I demand
that you do this, if you're willing. We beseech thee, let us not perish
for this man's life and lay not upon us innocent blood. For thou,
O Lord, hast done as it has pleased thee. Oh, what a thing. Thou art the Lord, has done what
it please thee. They knew there's a sovereign
Lord. They knew their sin and wrath for that sin was well deserved. It was right. And they knew something
of obedience to the Lord. They knew to cry out for him.
Verse 15, so they took up Jonah. They said, Lord, we'll do it
your way. We'll do as your prophet said. We tried, we rode as hard
as we could until our hands bled and that ain't working. You're
right. You're right. And they took up
Jonah, cast him forth into the sea, and the sea ceased from
her raging. When Christ died for the elect
chosen people in him before time was, the wrath of God was ceased
from raging. It stopped right there. To say
that Jonah was cast into that sea and that all storms for everybody
without exception throughout time has ceased is not true. That's not so. Now for His people,
for those in that boat, for those on that ark, for those on that
ship that they had fellow ship with, fellows in the same ship,
that's true. That's just done. Storm's over.
Storm's over. To say that Christ died for everyone
throughout time is not true. Jonah died for those that's in
the ship. Christ our ark died for those that were in him and
sealed in him. Pitched within and pitched without.
That God put in there and God shut the door on. He closed them
in. Verse 16. That's what I had to say. Christ died for everybody is
just a lie. It's wrong. But to say that That storm ceased and
all rage is consumed and judgment was satisfied, and then to say
that there's something else that has to be done for that storm
to stop is wrong. It's wrong. When the seas have
ceased, there's therefore now no condemnation. We gotta get
these waves to stop. What waves? He calmed the sea. There's nothing else to be done.
What are we going to do? Thank Him. Sing to Him. Sing to Him. Praise Him. Verse
16, And the men feared the Lord exceedingly, and offered a sacrifice
unto the Lord, and they made vows. They made vows. Now they're
young believers. Let's not pick on him for making
vows. Paul said this, I've committed everything to him against that
day. Well, we do too. We turn ourselves over lock,
stock, and barrel. It's in his power and his time. And Lord,
those wedding vows, I'm yours. I am my beloved's and he's mine. He's mine. But that's his doing.
We understand that, don't we? But they made vows. Now the Lord
had prepared. He'd ordained a great fish to
swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of
the fish three days and three nights. That's exactly what happened. Our Lord spoke of in Matthew
12. He said, those scribes and Pharisees answered, saying, Master,
I wonder what kind of inflection they had on that term. You know,
somebody else tells me, there's some people on this earth, they
can call me a hillbilly. That don't bother me at all. There's
other people, I've had people say, you hillbilly. Well, buddy, we
got a problem now. It's not necessarily how it's
said, but how it's said, isn't it? I heard my pastor for years
said, the master came. And others, they go, master?
They said, master, we would see a sign from thee. Give us a sign.
And he said, an evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign.
There shall no sign be given to it but the sign of the prophet
Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in that
whale's belly, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three
nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh shall rise
up in judgment with this generation, shall condemn it, because they
repented at the preaching of Jonah. And behold, a greater
than Jonah is here. That's just a picture, the real
one standing before you. What a sign, isn't it? Well,
I said last night about the Lord said, if he that has ears to
hear this parable, let him hear. And they said, Lord, what's that
mean? Right after. And he said, sit down. I'll tell
you about it. I'll explain it to you. He told them, he said,
you show us a sign. We ain't going to believe. He
said, you're a wicked and adulterous generation. You get away from
me. Go read it. Go see what that means. And Thomas
said, unless I touch his side and I touch his hands, I ain't
going to believe. And he showed up and said, come here, Thomas.
Put your hand right here, buddy. That's just plain sonship, isn't
it? Just between being a child of God and not, that's his doing.
He said three nights, three days and three nights. There's a lot
of explanation to it, but it's the timing of that. I read that
one time, and I was like, that don't really look like three
days and three nights. But if the Lord said it's three days and three
nights, and it took three minutes, that means it's three days and three
nights. Donny Bell said that. He said, do you believe that
he was really swallowed by a whale? He said, the Lord said so, yeah.
He said, if the Lord said that Jonah swallowed that whale, I'd
believe that. That's just right, he said so. We believe him. I believe that Jonah was a real
man, and that was buried for three days and three nights.
I believe that's miraculous. And I don't know how it happened,
but I know it's so, and I know he spit out on dry land. Just
as I believe that Christ was in that earth for three days
and three nights. That's miraculous. He satisfied the wrath of God
on behalf of his people. That storm ceased. There's nothing
for me to do and nothing to add to it. And I don't know exactly
how that happened. I don't. But for his Nineveh,
it's done. I know that. I hope Lord bless
that to our hearts. Thank you for having me. I'm
off work now. Clay told me, he said, you're
going to preach Friday night and you're going to preach Saturday morning. I
said, all I heard was I was off Sunday. I was just going to sit
and listen, so thank you.