Alright, it's good to see everybody.
Let's turn to Jonah chapter 2. Jonah chapter 2. I just want to read one verse here.
Jonah chapter 2 verse 9. This is Jonah speaking. Jonah 2 verse 9. He says, will sacrifice unto
thee with the voice of thanksgiving." I will sacrifice, not with anything
but this, with the voice of thanksgiving. I will pay that I have vowed. Salvation is of the Lord. Salvation. We need salvation
from our sins, from the curse of the law, from our sin nature,
from our hourly choices, from this present evil world, from
death, and from hell. Salvation. Salvation is of the
Lord. God the Father chose His Son. He's the first choice of God. He chose His Son. And He chose
a people in His Son. And He sent forth His Son to
work out a salvation for His people and entered covenant with
His Son to raise Him when the work was finished and give Him
all preeminence in His church. And He's done so. God the Son. Christ Jesus came here, made
flesh, made of a woman, made sin, made a curse, made higher
than the heavens. and is sat down at the right
hand of the Father and accomplished the work God the Father sent
Him to do for His people. And right now, He's sending the
Gospel forth and He's calling out His sheep one by one. And He's not going to lose one.
He's going to bring them all to glory with Him. Salvations
of God the Holy Spirit. We must be born again. We must
be regenerated. We must be brought to faith in
Christ. We must be given repentance from
our self, our wisdom, our ways, our sins, We must be kept by
His grace. We must be guided in all truth
by Him. We must be preserved all the
days of our life by Him. And at last, raised from the
dead and brought into His presence by God the Holy Spirit. Salvation
is of the Lord. From the first day of grace until
the last day of grace, salvation is of the Lord. And every step
we take in His life, Every obstacle we face, every joy and every
sorrow, every good thing and every evil thing is to teach
us the one message. The one message. And this is
the one message. Salvation is of the Lord. What I have to do in it? Sin. And that's all. That's it. You
sin. That's it. That's it. Well, the Lord shows us here
how that he taught Jonah this lesson once again. Now, he's
teaching Jonah this as a believer. He's teaching this lesson again. But this is the one message that
he must teach us in the beginning. And this is the same way he taught
Jonah this message again as how he teaches us in the beginning.
Alright, here's the first thing. There is a command given. There's
a command given. Look at Jonah 1. The Word of
the Lord came unto Jonah. The Word of the Lord came unto
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. Now, just like Jonah, every single sinner in this earth
is given a command from God. And we have one responsibility
to obey God in reverence to God. You don't have whatever it is
you've got on your day planner for tomorrow. That's not your
responsibility. That's not nearly as important
as this one responsibility right here. Ecclesiastes 12, 13 says,
let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. Fear God and
keep His commandments For this is the whole duty of man." The
whole duty of man. This was the whole duty of Adam
who represented the whole human race. And Adam failed. Adam sinned against God. He didn't
reverence God. He sinned against God. He didn't
keep that one commandment in the garden, and he plunged the
entire human race into sin. So that when we come forth from
our mother's womb, we're already sinners before we ever do anything.
And what we're going to do when we come forth is break God's
law. We're lawbreakers. We're lawless. That's what we are in our flesh.
Here we have a believer. This is Jonah. This was his one
responsibility. And here we have Nineveh mentioned.
This is a city full of wicked people. This was their one responsibility. Let us hear the conclusion of
the whole matter. Fear God and keep His commandments. This is
the whole duty of man. Now, for believers, for those
of you and I who have been called, the commandment The commandments
of God are not the old covenant law. Not the old covenant law,
because we're under the new covenant of grace. The Ten Commandments
are holy, they're just, and they're good. They're given, I told you
this morning, they're given to show us the offense. To show
us the offense in that garden. They're given to shut our mouths
in guilt before God. They're given to drive us to
Christ. And when we've come to Christ that we might be justified
through faith, we're no more under the law. Now, the commandment
God has given to the believer is just one commandment. It's
got two branches in it, but it's just one commandment. You can
find it in 1 John chapter 3. And this is it. 1 John 3, 23.
This is His commandment. You see, it's just one. This
is His commandment. Believe. on the name of His Son,
Jesus Christ. Believe on the name of His Son,
Jesus Christ, and love one another as He gave us commandment. Believers
are not trying to establish the righteousness of the Ten Commandments.
We're not trying to do that. By God's grace and power working
in our hearts, by the Holy Spirit, we believe unto righteousness. That's what the Scripture says,
with the heart man believeth unto righteousness. I love that. I just love how that, you know,
when you think of doing right, you think of doing, you think
of working, you think of striving to do right. Believing unto righteousness. Believing. And it's just like
Robert said, when he gives you this heart to know him and he
knows you, a believer cannot not believe him. You just can't
not believe Him. You believe Him. And you're righteous
by what He's accomplished. What is it to believe unto righteousness?
It's to establish the law of God through faith in Christ Jesus
who established the law of God for us. Romans 3. I get so tickled
at that, I shouldn't get tickled. It's sad. It's sad. The whole
context of Romans 3 is telling us the law was given to shut
our mouths. The whole context of Romans 3
is to say the righteousness of God is manifest not by our faith,
not by the law, but by the faith of Christ, by Christ himself
in his faithfulness in everything he did in his whole person. There
you see the righteousness of God. And it says, and God sent
him forth to justify his people freely through faith because
Christ is the propitiation for his people. Christ came forth
and took the sin of His people upon Himself and went to Calvary's
tree and paid the debt we owe, and now by His grace working
in our hearts, by Him giving us faith, we've been made the
righteousness of God in Him." And he concludes that statement,
and he says, now then, where's boasting? How's it excluded? By the principle of law-keeping
or the principle of faith? And then he says, Do we then
make void the law through faith? No! We establish the law through
faith. And I can't tell you how many
men I've heard get to that verse and break from the whole context
of the chapter and say, see there? We're under the law. We keep
the law. No, you don't. No, I don't either. Except for
one way. Through faith in Christ who did.
That's the only way. The only way we're going to establish
the law is through faith in Him. He hath made Him sin for us who
knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God
in Him. And that's what He makes His people. And so Christ is
the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believes. Now
believer, I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, that
sounds good to me. Because you've been shown something
of your inability to keep God's law. And so you know what a blessing
it is to believe unto righteousness, to see Christ and know Him and
know He has satisfied the law for you and established it fully
for you. And I told you this morning,
no charge can ever be laid against us ever again. Not one for whom
Christ died. Man, that's a big statement,
isn't it though? And aren't you glad God makes
it? Who's going to lay anything to the charge of God's elect?
It's God that justifies. You want to lay a charge to somebody
for whom Christ died, you've got to take it up with God. That's
right. You've got to take it up with
God. And if you can't get to God our Father, you've got to
come through Christ, because He ever lives to make intercession
for us. That's right. We are as righteous as God. Did
you know that is what 2 Corinthians 5 says, that we might be made
the righteousness of God? We are made the righteousness
of God. We are seated with Christ at God's right hand, accepted
of God, never again to be separated from His love ever again. Never. The more the child of God hears
that message, you know what that message does for him? It makes
him That's the food, that's the strength, that's the power that
makes us keep that commandment God gave us, to believe on His
Son. That's the message that makes
us believe unto righteousness. You can preach the law to them.
You can get men jumping through every hoop you want to look like
they're on that show, you know, where they run and they get knocked
off with all the obstacle course, you know. You can make them do
all that crazy stuff, all you want to. And they just look like
they're just as moral and as straight and as just upright
on the outside. And inside, they're just dirty,
dumb, filled with nothing but rottenness. And Christ's people,
sometimes you look at them and they look like Jonah. Sometimes
you look at them and they look like David with Bathsheba. Sometimes
you look at them and they look like Moses, passed out. But you
know what they are in Christ? the righteousness of God, and
it will never change. It will never change. And they
know what they are. We know what we are. So when
we hear this message, it makes us believe Christ. It makes us
rejoice. And it makes us do this other
thing, too. The second branch of that law is love one another. It makes us love one another.
Because when I see my brethren, I see somebody Christ died for.
I see somebody God chose from the foundation of the world.
I see somebody He laid down His life for. I see somebody that
He turned the world upside down to bring the gospel to, to create
anew and give them faith in Christ. I love them for Christ's sake.
Is there something lovable in them? Not always. Not always
things lovable in me. But we love them for Christ's
sake. We love them for Christ's sake. Now look at Galatians 5.4. Before I leave this, I want to
show you this. Faith which works by love. That's
the rule of the believer's life. Faith which works by love. Galatians
5.4, Paul says there, Christ, Galatians 5.4, Christ is become of no effect
unto you, whosoever you are justified by the law, you're fallen from
grace. You've gone down from grace when
you start trying to be justified by law. And that justification
by law means if you're trying to use the law to justify before
a man that you're holy and sanctified by your law keeping, or you're
trying to justify before a man that you're righteous by your
doing before the law, or if you're trying to use the law to justify
before God that you're holy and righteous, however you're using
it, you've gone way down from grace. You've fallen way down.
You're down in the dirt. Why? Here's our rule of life. We, through the Spirit, wait
for the hope of righteousness by faith. For in Jesus Christ,
neither circumcision availeth anything nor uncircumcision.
Circumcision stands for the law. Whether you were born under the
law or you were born as a Gentile and never were under the law
of Moses, it doesn't matter. Here's what matters. Faith which
worketh by love. Faith which worketh by love.
And he says here, you ran well. Who did hinder you that you should
not obey the truth? That's the truth. Faith which
works by love is the truth. That's the rule we're under.
Faith which works by love. 2 Corinthians 5.14 says, The
love of Christ constraineth us, because we thus judge. It's not law, it's the love of
Christ. Because we thus judge that if
Christ died for all, And He did. He died for all His people. He
died for everybody that He justified, everybody that He redeemed, everybody
He purged us of our sin. He died for all of them, and
they were all dead. Everyone of them were dead. And
that He died for all, that they which live should not henceforth
live unto themselves, but unto Him which died for them and rose
again. This message is the only message
That will make us do that. Make us love our brethren and
love Christ and live for Him and them. This is the only message
that will do that. And under that one commandment
of faith, which works for love, we are given several exhortations
all through the Scripture. I'll give you some examples.
This is just from Hebrews. Hebrews is a letter that is written
to turn professing believers They were turning back to the
Law, and He was turning them from the Law back to Christ.
Now listen to this. I took all of these from Hebrews.
If you want to look at the Scripture, you can go online and get my
notes, and you can look them all up. But let me just go through
these quickly. Number one, hear only the Gospel of Christ. That's
the first thing. And I have the Scripture references
here. Number two, hear Christ in the Gospel. Number three,
guard against the heart of unbelief. And you do that primarily by
resting in Christ. Number four, go to Christ at
the throne of grace for help constantly. Number five, love
your brethren chiefly by assembling yourselves together around the
hearing of faith, around the hearing of the gospel. Support
the gospel. Exhort one another. Support one
another around this gospel. Number six, lay aside every weight
and the sin that so easily besets us, and run this race set before
us, looking to Christ. And number seven, let your only
motive be the grace and love of God in Christ Jesus. That falls under this heading
of this one commandment. Faith, believe on Christ, and
love one another. Alright, the chief purpose for
this, this is the chief purpose, our obedience in this world,
And everything Christ is teaching us is for the furtherance of
His gospel. He puts us together to work as
one man, as one body, as one single unit to spread the gospel
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Because through this message,
He's going to teach His needy, lost, elect, redeemed sinners
that salvation is of the Lord. That's what He's going to teach
them. Jonah was given one message, one thing to do. Go to Nineveh
and preach. Go to Nineveh and preach the
gospel. That's all he was given to do. And that's all we're given
to do. But here's the amazing wisdom
of God. He's left us in these bodies of death for a reason. He's left us plagued by this
sin for a reason. Because every step of the way,
He's teaching us all over again, salvations of the Lord. If he
didn't, we would start thinking we can do this work. We would
start thinking we've got the strength to do it. And he's constantly
showing us he's the one doing the work. Salvation is of the
Lord. Now let's see that in Jonah. We see here in Jonah an example
of me and you who believe. This is an example of us who
believe right here. We need God to keep us every hour. And thankfully
He does. I love that we sang that song.
He leads His dear children along. He leads them through the flood.
Anybody going to lead them all through the blood? We're going
to see that too when we get to the 2nd chapter. Look here now.
Here's the response to that command. Here's the 2nd thing, verse 3.
Jonah rose up to flee unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.
And he went down to Joppa, and he found a ship going to Tarshish.
So he paid the fare thereof, and he went down into it to go
with them unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. This
was just rebellion. That's all it is. There's nothing
to it. Jonah fled from God's way. He went to Tarshish instead
of Nineveh. Jonah fled from the presence
of the Lord. It means where God's visible
presence was. He knew he couldn't get out from
under the eye of God, but it means from where God's visible
presence was, like an established church. He paid the fare to flee
from God. Rebellion is always costly. And
he entered fellowship with unbelievers. That's what he did. And doing
so, he took two steps down. He went down, he went down. But
he's not nearly as down as he's going to be. He's going to be
a whole lot further down before it's over. Jonah could see how
God would be glorified and how he could be spared injury by
going to Nineveh as God commanded and preaching the gospel. He
just couldn't see it. And so what he did was, he looked
to his wisdom, his understanding, and his way, and did what he
wanted to do instead of believing God and doing what God told him
to do. What inspired this message? I
was asked a question recently. Somebody said, why does God permit
his people to be so far away from the gospel, from a church
where the gospel is preached, and where God's people gather?
Why does God permit his people to be so far away from the gospel,
from a church where the gospel is preached and where God's people
gather. There are some cases of this. Folks are called later
in their life and they've already got a lot of roots down and a
lot of responsibilities and a lot of ties to where they live, and
they just can't simply uproot and go to where a gospel church
is. That is the case sometimes. Usually, God either gives His
child a heart to move to where the gospel is. And when God does
that, it's as easy as packing up a box. And when He does it,
you can't do otherwise. I mean, it's as right as rain. You've got to do it. That's usually
what He does. Or, if God has more than one
child in a place, He'll send a preacher to that place and
establish a gospel work there. That's what He did here. That's
what He did here. But to leave a child separated
from the gospel is not the normal way God operates. It's not the
normal way God operates. Now, here's what we need to understand
preeminently. God never excuses rebellion. Never. And He's never working
us to rebel. Never. Never. Now, as we see
in Jonah, most of the time, Most of the time, when believers are
separated from the gospel, when we're separated from Christ's
people, it's usually due to our own selfish motives. That's usually
the case. That's usually the case. But
remember this. Remember this, brethren. We must never judge
character by a man's circumstances. You never judge a man's character
by his circumstances. A child of God may very well
be in a similar condition as Jonah was in, and be loved of
God, and be redeemed of Christ, and be protected of God, and
kept of God. The best of men can make very
poor choices and can find ourselves in very poor circumstances sometimes. But thankfully, God won't allow
His child to be separated from His love in Christ. He won't
allow His child to be separated from the gospel, separated from
His people. He's going to bring us back to
ourselves to see Christ and to see our need of His gospel. Thirdly, let's look at God's
chastening hand. First of all, we see God's chastening hand
in the great wind. Verse 4 says, 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. Now, child
of God, when you're in the midst of your own trouble, now listen
carefully to this, Because we face trouble. You who believe,
when you're in the midst of trouble, in the midst of trouble, trace
your trouble, trace the effects to the cause. Now look here,
it says, "...the ship was almost broken because of the tempest,
and the tempest was caused by the wind, and the wind was sent
from the Lord, and the wind was sent because of Jonah's rebellion."
Trace it back to the cause. Now, let me quickly say these
two things. First of all, a child of God's
suffering is not always due to rebelling. It's not always due
to rebelling. Sometimes it is, sometimes it's
not. And then secondly, this is very important too. It's only
for me to judge if my suffering is from the hand of God when
I'm the one suffering it. And it's never for me to judge
if it's because of rebellion when you're the one suffering
it. That's not my call. It's not my place to say, well,
that's happening to you because you're rebelling. Job's friends
were miserable confidants, and that's what they did. They came
to Job saying, you did something. This is your fault. This is your
fault. We can be certain of this, a conscience that is made tender
by the Lord, Eventually, the Lord is going to bring that man
to see what the Lord would have him to do in His Word. He is
going to bring him to see his sin. He is going to bring him
to see his rebellion. He is going to bring him to see his need of Christ.
And we can be sure of this too. If we are found judging that
man, we will be found most of the time to be like David who
judged that rich man who took the poor man's one little ewe
lamb, and he was the one being judged and condemned the whole
time. And that's what we'll usually find out when we're the one that's
become the judge and jury all of a sudden in our self-righteousness.
Now we see, then let's look at the shipmaster. Verse 5 says,
Jonah was gone down in the sides of the ship. He lay and he was
fast asleep. And the shipmaster came to him
and said unto him, What meanest thou, O sleeper? Arise, call
upon thy God, if so be that God will think upon us that we perish
not. Rebellion is a sleeping stupor. And only God can wake
us up from it. We've got to have God's chastening
hand to wake us up. You just think about it. When
Joel went down in that ship and fell asleep, just think what
he must have been thinking. He's thinking, this is the Lord's
will. This is the Lord's approving
of this. I can tell by providence that He's worked here for me.
I needed a ship to go to Tarsus. There was one available. I needed
the fare to pay the price, and I had it. I needed some fellas
to sail with, and there were some sailors. They're all going
to Tarsus. Well, it was their duty to go to Tarsus. They were
sailors. It wasn't Jonah's, because the Lord told him to go somewhere
else. What's right for somebody might not be right for me. It
might not be right for you. Well, I needed a place to sleep.
I was so restless, and I got on this ship, and I got down
here, and it was just this nice place to go to sleep, and I'd
be able to sleep so good. The Lord's in there. The Lord's
working in there. It's the Lord's providence, and I'm where I'm
at. Spurgeon said this, he said, ìItís very easy to make up a
providence when you want to do so. If you sit down and you try
to find an excuse for the wrong which you mean to commit, the
crafty devil and your deceitful heart together will soon conjure
up a plea for providence.î All endeavours are under the
control of Godís sovereign hand. Thereís no doubt about that.
Thereís not a bird that falls without His consent. But what
was the one way Jonah could have known for sure? The one way Jonah
could have known for sure whether this was God's approving providence
or not? The Word of the Lord. Verse 1
said, "...the Word of the Lord came to Jonah." You know what
you've got? You've got the Word of the Lord. We've got the Word
of the Lord right here. This is the Word of the Lord.
You want to find out if what you're doing is in God's approval,
look in this Word. Look in this book right here.
Those seven things I gave you from Hebrews would be a good
place to start. That would be a real good place to start. But when Jonah was awakened by
that shipmaster and he saw those sailors running all over that
ship and throwing all the wares overboard, and that ship just
about to be broken, and he looked up and he saw this great tempest
and the winds howling and the tackle banging against the ship
and everything just crazy and chaotic on that ship, I bet you
he didn't think it was God's providence then for him to go
to Tarsus. And I guarantee you this, that
tempest that was in that sea wasn't anything like the one
going on in his conscience. God's got him woke up now. Now
let's see his chastened hand in the lot. Look at verse 7.
Look down at the last part of verse 7. I have to go fast to
get through this, but verse 7. Jonah 1, 7. It says, So they
cast lots, and the lot fell upon Jonah. It fell upon Jonah. They took a vote, so to speak,
to see who's this tempest on us for? Who's the evil to come
on us for? And it fell on Jonah. They cast the lots, but God made
it fall on Jonah. He's chasing his child. He's
protecting his child. He's keeping his child. The lot's
cast into the lap. The whole disposing thereof is
of the Lord. And then we see God's chastening hand in the
mariners. Let's look down at verse 9. The mariners asked Jonah
who he is. In verse 9, he said unto them,
I am a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, which
hath made the sea and the dry land. And then were the men exceedingly
afraid. And they 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. Art, it is easy for God to use
everything at His disposal, the wind, the sea, the dry land,
whatever it is, heathen idolaters, mariners, lights, whatever it
is, it is easy for God to use all these things at His disposal
to correct His rebelling child as it is for me and you when
Will or Joshua try to run out of the room and disobey us, and
we get up and go correct them. It's just that easy for God to
do with us. It don't matter where we try
to go, where we try to run, where we try to hide, God can correct
His child. He can correct His child. So
therefore, you and I can do this. When we see somebody rebelling,
when we see somebody going away from the gospel, when we see
somebody leaving the gospel, we can tell them how how we need
this gospel. We can tell them how we need
Christ. We can remind them we need Christ. We've got to have
Him. But we don't have to act ugly
when they insist on rebellion. We don't have to try to force
them to do something. We don't have to try to constrain
them to do something. Because if they're God's child,
God's not going to let them go. He's not going to let them go.
And I'm trying to tell you the difference between really believing
God Really trusting God. Really believing God is able
to save to the uttermost. And putting your hand to the
work, and you try to do it. If we had stopped Jonah at this
point right here, and we forced him to come, and we forced him
to go to Nineveh, well, he'd be in Nineveh. But he's fixing
to miss everything God's fixing to teach him. And this is where
he's fixing to learn the lesson. This is where he's fixing to
get the lesson. God's leaving His children alone, and He's
going to lead some through the flood. He's going to lead them
through the flood. And in leading them through that
flood, He's going to lead them through the blood, because He's
reminding us of the blood. And that's what we have here.
That's what we have here. Here's the fourth thing. Here's
the need. We must be brought by God to die to ourselves, to
die to our old man, and cast all our care into his hands.
And God is the only one that can melt our heart of stone,
put down our old man of flesh, and strengthen the inward new
man, and show us Christ our salvation, and plant us squarely at his
feet and in his hands. He is the only one that can do
this. Now watch, verse 11. Then said they unto him, What
shall we do unto thee that the sea may be calm to us? For the
sea wrought and was tempestuous. Now, these men are speaking,
but it's God speaking through these men. Now, he's brought
Jonah down. He brought him down to the point
of his rebellion, and he says to him, now, what should we do
to make this sea stop rebelling against these people? And Jonah
says this, verse 12, "...take me up, and cast me forth into
the sea, so shall the sea be calm unto you. For I know that
for my sake this great tempest is upon you." Verse 15 says,
ìSo they took up Jonah, and they cast him forth into the sea,
and the sea ceased from a-raging.î It proved that indeed this is
why the tempest was upon him, most because of Jonah. ìAnd the
sea ceased from a-raging.î Verse 17 says, ìNow the Lord had prepared
a great fish to swallow up Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of
the fish three days and three nights.î This was not death for
Jonah. Not the real Jonah. This was
death for the old Jonah. It was death for the old Jonah.
It was not death for the new Jonah. It was death for the old
Jonah. It was salvation to turn Jonah to Christ, our salvation,
Christ his surety. The Lord Jesus told us that what
Jonah endured is a sign of the Savior's substitutionary work
for his people on the cross. They were wanting a sign, and
he said, there's no sign that's going to be given to you but
the sign of Jonah's. He said, as Jonah was three days and three
nights in the whale's belly, so shall the Son of Man be three
days and three nights in the heart of the earth. He's saying
this is a picture, this is a sign, this is an illustration of what
Christ did, what Christ bore for His people. And the only
reason Jonah is not being cut off, the only reason Jonah is
being dealt with in love, in mercy, in grace, is because And
way back before the foundation of the world, God put Jonah in
Christ, and Christ became his surety, and Christ is standing
between God and Jonah, and this is what Christ will do for Jonah.
And the only reason you and I weren't cast out and dealt with in the
fierceness of God's wrath is because Christ has borne that
for us, brethren, and now God is dealing with His child in
mercy and grace to show us what Christ has done for us. Bring
us back to see what Christ has done for us. But God will bring
our old man to nothing. He will do that. Now, I want
you to notice, the old man of Jonah was put off by God's chastening
hand. But faith remained by God's grace. The new man was renewed and faith
remained. Now, watch this. Watch this now.
We read verse Jonah 2-1. Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord
his God out of the fish's bellies. He didn't pray while the sun
was shining, and he was sailing away from the port on that ship
headed to Tarsus. He wasn't praying then. But now
he's praying. Now he's praying. He's in the
deep. All the strength has been taken away by God's hand. Then
Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God. And God always hears the
cry that he puts on the lips. Verse 2 says, "...and he heard
me." He heard me. "'Out of the belly of hell,'
cried I, and he heard my voice." You know the belly of hell has
to be a low place, don't it? The belly of hell. Not just hell,
the belly of hell. Now God didn't cast Jonah into
hell. He cast him into a place that Jonah said, this is like
being in the belly of hell. Now Christ Jesus on the cross,
what he bore for his people, separation from God, cut off
from God, cut off from his brethren, giving the the full vent to Satan
and all the wickedness that there is to lash upon him in however
manner it would. That is the belly of hell. And
Christ bore that. And He drank the cup dry and
put an end to it for His people. Now, what John is suffering,
it's bad. And what you and I go through sometimes when we suffer,
it feels like the belly of hell. But it's nothing, nothing in
comparison to what Christ Jesus paid for His people. It's nothing
compared to what He suffered. Now, what did God do to Jonah
to produce this cry of faith? What did He do? Look at verse
3. Jonah tells us. I just sat and looked at this,
and it just began to come clear. The Lord just started to open
this up. And I hope He does that to you
too. I want us to get this. Watch
this now. Verse 3. Jonah is telling us
how He did this. Jonah is telling us how God did
this. Verse 3. Thou hast cast me into the deep,
in the midst of the seas, and the floods compassed me about,
and thy billows and thy waves passed over me. Then I said,
I am cast out of thy sight, yet I will look again toward thy
holy temple." The deep and the floods and the billows and the
waves that God gave to Jonah are a glimpse. He gave Jonah
a glimpse of the justice that Jonah deserved. He gave him a
glimpse of the justice that ought to be his, if he was outside
of Christ. And God brought him to think
he was cast out by this. He brought him to think that
he was out of God's saving hand, out of his protecting hand, out
of his electing, saving, redeeming hand, that he was just cast out,
that he was a phony. That's what he made him think.
And God made it so Jonah could no more look to self and to his
own strength. Do you remember Jacob? Remember when Jacob wrestled
with the angel of the Lord? You hear that priest totally
wrong too. Jacob was not prevailing when
he was trying to wrestle with the Lord. He wasn't prevailing
when he was trying in his strength to wrestle with the Lord. Do
you know how he prevailed with the Lord? The Lord touched the
hollow of his thigh and pinned his little scrawny butt to the
ground and made it so he didn't have any strength in himself
whatsoever, so that all he could do was cry to the Lord and say,
Please have mercy on me! Bless me! Please bless me! And
that's how you prevail with God. And that's how you prevail with
the Lord. And that's what's happening to Jonah right here. He's not
destroying him. He's bringing in a look again
toward God's holy temple. "...When through fiery trials
thy pathway shall lie, by grace how sufficient shall be thy supply.
The flame shall not hurt thee, I only design your dross to consume
and your gold to refine." Let's see that. How did God bring this
about within Jonah? Notice these words, down and
up right here. Watch this in verse 6. I went
down to the bottoms of the mountains, and the earth with her bars were
about me forever. Yet, watch this now, yet hast
thou brought up my life from corruption, O Lord my God." God
brought Jonah down, down, down. Something, you're here today
because I was just telling Melinda yesterday, when I was in Montana,
I was looking at the mountains. I was staring and looking at
the mountains. And they're so massive and just so high and
just so majestic. And I was reading this scripture
yesterday and I thought, there are mountains that large in the
sea. And Jonah was brought down, down,
down, down. to the bottoms of the mountains,
he said. Now listen to this. Yet, in doing so, while he was
in the bottom of the mountain, while he was at the bottom of
the ocean, while as yet he was down there at the bottom of the
ocean, thou brought up my life from corruption. Oh, Lord, my
God. I'm not talking about when he
was sped out on the ground yet. I'm talking about while he's
still down there in the ocean. What does this mean? What's this life
in Jonah that God brought up from corruption? Verse 7, he
says, "...when my soul fainted within me, I remembered the Lord."
I remembered the Lord then. And my prayer came in unto thee
into thine holy temple." You see, by bringing us down, our
old man of flesh, our old corruption, our old dead, dying nothingness
that we are, that man that says, don't listen to God, go your
way. How in the world are you going
to achieve what you want in this life if you listen to God and
serve God and obey God and follow God? You've got to follow what
men tell you you've got to have. That man's got to be killed.
And God destroys that corruption by bringing us down, down, down. And while He's doing that for
the believer inside of us, He brings us to see the Lord Jesus
Christ, our life, exalted high in all His highways. And in doing
so, He brings up our life from that old man. The old man of
corruption was way up here, and our life, our inward man, was
way down here. And He brings that new man up
here and that old man down to the bottom so he can't rule anymore. And we remember the Lord who
is our life. Who is our life. And notice this, by God making
Jonah's soul to faint within him, God made his prayer come
in unto God. He made his soul faint within
him, and that made his prayer come in unto God. He was made
to look away from himself to God. I've experienced what Jonah
experienced. I've thought long and hard about
making that statement, but I have a couple of times. And I say
a couple because it's a rare thing to experience this. It's
only every now and then that God makes us to faint in our
flesh to the point that all we can do is look to Christ. It's
just every now and then. One time I was looking to me.
I do this all the time, but this was on a couple of occasions.
I recall I was looking to me. I was looking at my wisdom. I
was looking at my way. And I didn't know I was doing
that. I didn't know I was doing it. I was blaming God. I said,
this is God's will. It's God's providence bringing
this to pass. But God brought me down. And when I thought I
couldn't go any further down, He brought me down. And I thought,
boy, this is it. This is the belly of hell right
here. Oh, no. I went down further.
Oh, this is it. Nope. Went down further. And
while I was in the depths of the deep, My soul fainted within
me. No strength in me whatsoever.
Finally, to the point where I could not have any other recourse but
just say, Lord, help me. You know what you do with a simple
prayer like that? When it's worked by God in the
heart, you confess what you are and you confess who God is. And
that's when you'll get help from God. I found myself feeling like I
was cast out of God's sight forever. And that's when God made me see
Christ. That's how it happened the first
time. And every time I've ever seen Him since, that's how it's
happened. Because truthfully, unless God does that, you know,
we go through the motions. And we're just cold. We're just
lifeless. And every now and then, He gives
us a glimpse. You've got to go through the
belly of hell to see it. But every now and then, He gives
us a glimpse. And I found myself confessing myself, and I found
myself confessing Christ. Here's what it is. Jonah does
it. Here's what it is. Here's what it is to confess
yourself. What you are, what you've been doing by looking
to yourself. Verse 8. They that observe lying vanities forsake
their own mercy." That's what it is to confess yourself. Lord,
all I've been doing is looking to lying vanities by looking
to myself, looking to my wisdom, looking to my way, looking to
my law keeping, looking to my righteousness, checking my sin. All I've been doing is looking
to lying, not vanities, lying vanities. It's full of entities. And here's what it is to confess
the Lord. Verse 9, I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving. Thank you, Lord, for not letting
me go. Thank you, Lord, for saving my
soul. I'll pay that I have vowed. Salvation
is of the Lord. I'm going to tell you something,
if salvation is of the Lord, it is not of me or you, in any
shape, form or fashion, at any hour, at any minute, at any second,
at any time. It's all of God. And when He
brings us to these places like this, when He makes us see ourselves
and see His power and grace in the face of Christ Jesus and
all His glory, that's when He makes us see that this is so.
This is so salvation is of the Lord. And then comes the peaceable
fruit of righteousness. The Lord said in Hebrews 12,
when He chastens one of His children that He loves, it always yields
the peaceable fruit of righteousness. Here it is. Jonah 2.10, And the
Lord spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the
dry land. Oh, what it is to be nothing
but fish vomit. That's a good thing. That's a
good thing. When God's brought us to repent
from ourselves once again and He's turned us back to Christ,
He delivers us to the dry land, to Christ the solid rock, to
our salvation, and He plants us there firmly. And He makes
us see no matter how greatly we suffer under God's chastening
hand, the reason He saved us is for His sake. Have you ever
thought God saved you for your sake? We might have thought that. But God's turned us to see that,
no, He didn't save us for our sake. He saved us for Christ's
sake. Isaac White says, He raised me from the depths of sin, the
gates of gaping hell, and He fixed my standing more secure
than it was before I fell. And that's how you feel. That's
exactly how you feel. You can walk on tippy-toes then
when He brought you right there. Take with you words and turn
to the Lord. Say unto him, take away all iniquity
and receive us graciously, so will we render the calves of
our lips." God is not interested in our sacrifices. Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving. David said, Lord,
open my lips and my mouth shall show forth thy praise. And he
has got to open our lips and make our mouth show forth his
praise. For thou desirest not sacrifice, else would I give
it. Thou delightest not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God
are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart, O God,
thou wilt not despise." How many of us loved it? Which one, let
me ask you this, which one would you rather have? Which one would
you rather have? Some of you think you can enter
into this with me. A pimply-faced, puberty-stricken teenager, rebelling,
and turn his back on you all the time, so strong he can do
everything by himself and don't need you at all. Or that little
baby, it smells so good and it's all swaddled and it's so dependent
on you that it can't even, it can't do anything without you.
Honestly, I'd rather hold the baby. You know which one God
likes to hold? That little baby. That one has
got a broken and a contrite spirit that just needs Him for everything. We're babies. Babies. Well, here's
the last thing. God always puts us right where
God would have us to be. John 3 says, And the word of
the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, saying, Arise, go
unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching
that I bid thee. So Jonah arose, and went unto
Nineveh according to the word of the Lord. You know what we're trying to
do by rebellion? We're trying to run away from heaven. We're trying to run away from
God and salvation. Anytime we disobey God, you know
where we're going to end up? In glory with God. Just like
the Lord said we would. Amen.