All right, let's turn back in
our Bibles to the book of Jonah, chapter four. Jonah, chapter four. Now what
I want to do in finishing up the book of Jonah, I want to
take two messages in this chapter four with the same title, part
one and part two, and tonight what I want to do is lay the
foundation of what I believe is the main message and lesson
of the whole book of Jonah as far as Jonah himself is concerned. Now, you know the theme of the
book of Jonah is salvation is of the Lord. And even in Jonah's
experience as a prophet, as a preacher, And in his preaching to such
a wicked people as the Ninevites, we see a great and grand testimony
and display of the sovereign mercy and grace of God, and that
any sinner who is saved is saved by God's grace. Every sinner
who is saved is saved by God's grace. Sovereign mercy. and not by our works, not by
works of righteousness which we have done or will ever do
or try to do. And so that's the main message
here. The title of these two messages
is this, An Angry Prophet and a Lesson in Grace. An Angry Prophet
and a Lesson in Grace. Let's look at a couple of things
here. First of all, let's read the
first three verses of Jonah, chapter 4, and then I want to
turn to Romans 9 just for a moment. But let's look at it now. Jonah
is reacting here to God's great work of bringing the Ninevites
to repentance. And it says, but it displeased
Jonah. God bringing these people to
repentance displeased Jonah. Now, immediately you might ask
the question, was this God's man? He sure is God's man. You know how I know that? Because
God said he's God's man. That's why I know it. But it
displeased Jonah exceedingly. Not just, this was no light matter.
He said, and he was very angry. Now, who do you suppose he's
angry with? He can't be angry at the Ninevites.
He's angry at God for saving these people, for bringing them
to repentance. Have you ever been angry at God
for anything like that? You might immediately say, no.
Well, hold on. Hold on. But look at verse 2, he says,
and he prayed unto the Lord and said, I pray thee, O Lord, was
not this my saying when I was yet in my country? Referring
back when he first got the command to go preach to Nineveh. Therefore
I fled before unto Tarshish, for I knew that thou art a gracious
God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest
thee of the evil. Now what a thing to get angry
over. He's angry because he knew God was a gracious God, a merciful
God, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentance thee
of the evil. Therefore now, O Lord, take, I beseech thee, my life
from me. You know, that's an amazing thing
to me when I read this. He says, for it is better for
me to die than to live. What a spirit of evangelism.
What a motivation. Jonah went and preached the gospel,
and God brought sinners to repentance. The Bible says Christ Jesus came
into the world to save sinners. And here God saved some sinners.
And Jonah, the prophet from Israel, is so angry and distraught that
he said, just kill me. Just kill me, Lord. It's better
for me to die than to live. Now certainly you'll say, turn
over to Romans chapter 9 with me. Certainly you'll say, and
I'll say this too, and I'm just trying to, again, as I said,
lay a foundation here for the necessary lesson of God's grace
that God's prophet needs. And certainly you'll say, well,
that behavior is inconsistent. You see, that's one reason I
had Brother Stan read the portion of Scripture that he read in
Luke 15. Compare Jonah's anger to this. Let me just read it to you. You
stay at Romans 9. Compare Jonah's anger to this in Luke 15, 6.
Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost. Compare
that to... contrast that, rather. He said,
I say unto you that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one
sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons
which need no repentance. There's joy in heaven when one
sinner repents, let alone a whole city of Ninevites. Jonah's angry over a whole city
of Ninevites that were brought to Christ says there's joy in
heaven over just one. Isn't that amazing? So, I mean, it doesn't take a
genius to figure out that Jonah's behavior and attitude is inconsistent
with the way of God, with the way of God's grace, with the
gospel. Look at Romans chapter 9. I want you to see something
here. Now, this is a summary, I believe, of the lesson that
Jonah needs to be taught, and he's going to be taught through
these elements of the gourd. You probably read about the gourd.
That's not a gourd like we think of, like one of those things
you hollow out and pour water out of. It's a palm leaf, or
palm crisp, they called it. Some even say it's a castor oil
leaf. I don't know what that is. I know what castor oil is,
but it's a big leaf that gave him shade. That's what that was.
And then, when it speaks of the worm that ate that up, and then
the the very severe summer hot wind that burned him. I'm going
to deal with them in the next message, but here's the lessons.
Here's a summary of the lessons that Jonah had to learn. Look
at Romans chapter 9 and verse 14. Verse 14. Here's lesson number
1 for Jonah and for us. What shall we say then? Now you
know what he's talking about here. He's talking about God's
electing grace, God's justifying grace, God's mercy, sovereign
mercy in Christ to save sinners. And here's the first lesson Jonah
had to learn. Here's the lesson we have to
learn. What shall we then say? Is there unrighteousness with
God? God forbid. God was not unjust. or unfaithful when he saved those
Ninevites. He's not unjust or unfaithful
when he saves any sinner. Do you know that? God never does
anything wrong. He always does that which is
right. You say, well, that's not the
one I would choose. Well, the one you'd choose would
be wrong. But God's never wrong. He's never...
Listen, when God saves a sinner, He's just in doing so. That's
why Christ came into the world to save sinners. By His obedience
unto death, His shed blood, His righteousness imputed. Because
when God saves, it's a just salvation. We were reading back in the study
Brother Ron read in Psalm 27 how the Lord hath forgiven our
iniquity And then right after that it says, He has covered
our sin. And that covering is the atonement. You see, God forgives
sin, but He's always just in doing so. And He's just based
upon the blood of Christ. We're washed in the blood. We
stand before God accepted in a just way based upon the righteousness
of Christ freely imputed to us, which we receive by God-given
faith. And so when God saves, He's always just. Is there unrighteousness,
unfairness with God? God forbid. Whatever God does
is right. And listen to me, when God damns
a sinner, He's just. He's just in doing so. If God
were to damn every one of us, He would be just in doing so.
I know that so. And whomever he saved, he's just
in doing so. So that's lesson number one.
Here's lesson number two. Look at verse 15 of Romans 9. He says, For he saith to Moses,
I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion
on whom I will have compassion. God's sovereign in this. Whoever
God determines to have mercy upon, that's God's business.
He's the one who does the... He's the one who shows mercy.
He's the one who shows compassion. If God withholds His mercy, that's
God's business. If He withholds His compassion.
You know, the reason that people think that God is... The God
of the Old Testament, for example, is a mean, unfair God. You know
why people think that? I'll tell you exactly why. It's
because we, by nature, think we deserve God's mercy and grace,
and we don't. We do not. God had mercy on the
Ninevites. You know why? Because He willed
to do so. Really, the only scriptural answer
that you can give to that question is really found in Matthew 11,
when Christ in upbraiding the cities of Bethsaida
and Chorazin and Tyre and Sidon, he said, and Capernaum, and he
said, he said, I thank thee, O father, that thou hast hid
this from the wise and the prudent and revealed it unto babes. And
then he said, for so, father, it seemed good in thy sight. Now that's lesson number two
of the book of Jonah. Why did God save those terrible,
sinful, idolatrous Ninevites? He said to Moses long before
Jonah, I'll have mercy on whom I will, I'll have compassion
on whom I will. But now here's the question of questions that
you need to consider and that I need to consider. Why did God
have mercy on a sinner like me? And that's not just talk now. You know what Jonah needed to
learn is what I need to learn, what you need to learn, that
if God saved me by His grace, I ought never resent or be angry
over the fact that God would save any sinner, whether they're
a Ninevite or whatever. God has mercy and compassion.
Jonah needed to learn that. Here's lesson number three. Look
at verse 16 of Romans 9. He says, so then it's not of
him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that
showeth mercy. It's not of man's will, it's
not of man's works, it's totally of God that shows mercy. Did
those Ninevites deserve God's mercy? No. You can't deserve
mercy. Once you begin deserving it,
it's not mercy anymore. Isn't that right? Did those Ninevites earn God's
grace? No, they didn't. Didn't earn
it at all. Once you begin to earn it, it's not grace. That's
the nature of God's mercy and God's grace. Well, let me tell
you something. Neither did I. I didn't earn
it and I didn't deserve it. Neither did you. So if God has
mercy and grace upon undeserving sinners who deserve nothing but
His wrath, why in the world would we get angry or even resentful
or even have a bad attitude. Why aren't we rejoicing like
they are in heaven? Over one sinner that God brings
to repentance. Now, I know this. You see, you
read passages like Romans 9, and I know what people do with
them. They take them out of context, and then they subject them to
the reasoning of man, and then they come out with all their
objections, and Paul anticipates those objections all the way
down through Romans 9. You can read that on your own. I'm not
going to read all that. But let me tell you something.
I'll put it to you this way. God is merciful to any and every
sinner who wants His mercy. That's right. ask and you shall
receive, knock and it shall be opened unto you." That's so. The problem is man by nature
won't ask for God's mercy. He wants what he thinks he deserves,
what he thinks he's earned in some form or another, to some
degree or another. But a sinner who comes to God
seeking mercy and grace. Now go back here to Jonah Now,
back up in verse 10 of chapter 3, we looked at that last, but
here's the first consideration. Consider Nineveh's repentance. He said, and God saw their works,
Jonah 3 and verse 10, and they turned from their evil way. And
that's the way it is with repentance. Every sinner who comes to repentance
turns from their evil way because they turn to the one and only
way, which is Christ and Him crucified and risen again. They
turn to the way of grace, the way of mercy, the way of forgiveness
by His blood, the way of righteousness by His obedience unto death,
submitting to His righteousness and not trying to establish one
of their own. That's the way it is. And it
says, And God repented of the evil that He had said that He
would do unto them, and He did it not. So there's Nineveh's
repentance. Now consider that now. Their
works refers to their repentance and their attitude and their
actions that flowed from that repentance which God granted
them in a powerful way, brought them to faith and repentance. As I preached in the last message
on this, that gospel repentance unto salvation, whatever the
nature of this repentance in Nineveh, I'm going to tell you
something, it was not of their works or their will or their
goodness, it was of God's grace and power and mercy in and by
the Lord Jesus Christ. Mark it down. Always remember,
as the psalmist put it in Psalm 51 and verse 17, the sacrifices
of God are a broken spirit. Who breaks that spirit? Not man's
will. Man's will has to be broken,
just like his spirit. And I'll tell you who it takes
to break the will and the spirit. It takes an act of God. It takes
the power of God to break the old stiff-necked sinner. And it says, in a broken and
a contrite heart. Who breaks that heart? Who makes
it contrite, penitent? God does. That's the work of
God. And he says, O God, thou wilt not despise. Gospel repentance. And it always leaves the sinner
with Christ and Him crucified and risen. Second, consider again
Jonah's reaction. Look at it again, chapter 4.
But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry. Jonah's
anger at God, his anger at God for His mercy upon Nineveh. Why
is that? Well, it's because of his prejudice
and his rejection of Gentiles. You see, that's part of the old
grave clothes that God has to strip off after He brings His
people to repentance. It took Peter a long time to
learn that message, didn't it? You know, when God told him to
go down and preach to a Gentile named Cornelius, Peter was reluctant
to do so. He said, I'm not... I haven't
even had that dream. He said, I've not eaten anything
unclean. I'm not going to consort with anything unclean. What was
the problem over there in Luke chapter 15? He said that this
man receiveth sinners and eateth with them. That's not right. You see, you can hear it today
in religion. Publicans and sinners. You're going to consort with
people like that?" That's the way Jonah was feeling. Also,
he was angry because these Ninevites were great sinners and brutal
enemies of Israel. And Jonah was displeased and
even angry at God for bringing them to repentance. Now, Jonah
understood the gracious character and mercy of God. That's what
he said. Verse 2, he prayed unto the Lord and said, O Lord, was
not this my saying when I was yet in my country? I fled before
Tarshish, for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful,
slow to anger, and of great kindness, repentant of the evil." It's
almost like saying, now God, I know you're a gracious God,
but please don't be gracious to that one, or that one over
there, or that group. That's an awful way to reason,
isn't it? Let me read you a passage out
of the book of Micah. This is Micah, you know, he was
a contemporary of Isaiah. This is Micah 7, verse 18. When you talk about the gracious
character of God, listen to this. Micah writes, the prophet Micah,
he says, Who is a god like unto thee that pardoneth iniquity? and passeth by the transgression
of the remnant of his heritage, that's his chosen people, in
Christ. He retaineth not his anger forever,
because he delighteth in mercy. You know where God's wrath and
anger was poured out for his people? On the cross of Calvary,
based upon our sins, charged, imputed, accounted to Christ.
And it says, he will turn again, he will have compassion on us,
he will subdue our iniquities, and thou will cast all their
sin into the depths of the sea. That means God won't charge us
with our sins. Who will lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? Who can condemn us? Thou will
perform the truth to Jacob and thy mercy to Abraham, which thou
hast sworn unto our fathers from the days of old. Now, according
to Jonah's attitude, he would have to, if he ever read that,
now Jonah was before Micah, but he knew this same thing. That's
basically the same thing Jonah said, but if he'd read that,
he'd have to put a little codicil at the end of it, except Nineveh. Just not them, Lord. They're
not my kind of people. They don't like the same things
I do and they don't have the same interests that I have. Well,
what does the Scripture say? Turn to Ezekiel chapter 33 with
me. Look at Ezekiel chapter 33. You see, this is where you've
got to see, this is why Jonah's attitude, I mean, we know it's
wrong, but why? I mean, why is it so wrong? Look
at Ezekiel 33, look at verse 1. To the prophet Ezekiel, again,
the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, speak
to the children of thy people, and say unto them, When I bring
the sword upon a land, if the people of the land take a man
of their coast, and set him for their watchman. Now, he's talking
about the watchman here. You see that? You've got to be
watchful. He says, if when he seeth the
sword come upon the land, he blow the trumpet and warn the
people, warning that danger's coming, wrath is coming. Now
that's essentially what Jonah did when he went into Nineveh.
He said in 40, what was it? I think, let me get the exact
number here. When he come in, he said, yet
40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. Now he was being
a watchman. He did what the Lord told him. Now granted, It took
a great fish to get him there. He didn't have his evangelistic
team going in first, you know, and surveying the land, you know.
It's just a great fish vomited him up on dry land. But he's
being a watchman. And it says in verse 4 of Ezekiel
33, it says, "...then whosoever heareth the sound of the trumpet,
and taketh not warning, If the sword come and take him away,
his blood shall be upon his own head." In other words, it's kind
of like this, it's a situation, what he's describing here is
if I tell you that without Christ you'll perish, if I tell you
that and you reject it, then who's responsible, who's accountable?
Your blood's on your own head, that's what he's saying. But
he goes on, he says in verse 5, he heard the sound of the
trumpet, took not warning, his blood shall be upon him. That's,
you know, Paul in Romans 9, you know, when they asked him, well,
how can God hold people accountable? Well, I'll tell you exactly how. Right here, he tells you how.
When they've heard the message, they don't want it anyway. and
they reject it. And so he says, but he that taketh
warning shall deliver his soul. Verse 6, he says, but if the
watchman see the sword come and blow not the trumpet, and the
people be not warned, if the sword come and take any person
from among them, he's taken away in his iniquity, but his blood
will I require at the watchman's hand. Now, see that's for the
prophet of God, that's for the preacher of the gospel. When
God lays that message of the only way of salvation upon that
man's heart and he fails to tell people their need of Christ,
their sinfulness and deservedness of damnation, their need of a
righteousness they cannot produce, but not only that, but I can
tell you where you can find the only righteousness God will accept. but if I fail to tell you that
and warn you, you know, there are people who'll tell me sometimes,
they say, you know, why don't you just preach the gospel and
not say this or not say that? Well, you don't understand what
the preaching of the gospel is. One preacher told me one time,
he said, well, I said, or he said, he said, I don't want to
preach anything negative, I just want to preach all positive.
Reminds me of that fellow down in Houston, you know, he's got
that I pan a glean smile, you know. And I told him, I said,
well, you do realize now half, 50% of the Great Commission is
negative. He that believeth not shall be
damned. That's half the Great Commission. Now, I don't want
to be a negative person, but let me tell you something. We
need to warn sinners of the danger to come. And if I don't, as a
preacher of the gospel, what does it say here in Ezekiel 33
verse 6? It says, "...their blood will I require at the watchman's
hand." So he says in verse 7 of Ezekiel
33, "...so thou, O son of man, I have set thee a watchman under
the house of Israel. Therefore thou shalt hear the
word at my mouth and warn them from me." This is God's Word,
that's what he said. Jonah would have been responsible
for the blood of these people that God sent him to if he hadn't
gone. Well, God meant to get him there.
God put him there. But look there at Ezekiel 33.
Look at verse 11. Look down there. He says, For
thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I, even I, will both search my
sheep and seek them out. As a shepherd seeketh out his
flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered,
so will I seek out my sheep and will deliver them out of all
places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day. And
I will bring them out from the people and gather them from the
countries and will bring them to their own land and feed them
upon the mountains of Israel by the rivers and in all the
inhabited places of the country." And he goes on, I will feed them
in a good pasture and upon high mountains. What's he talking
about? He's talking about calling his sheep. Yes, even out of Nineveh,
even out of Ashland, Ironton, Huntington, wherever. God has
a people out of every tribe, kindred, tongue and nation. And
He chose them in Christ, He redeemed them by the blood of Christ,
He justifies them in the righteousness of Christ, and He calls them
by the power of Christ through the preaching of the gospel by
the Spirit. You know, there are four things
that we as believers should always be passionate about. Passionate. Paul spoke of passions over in
Romans 7 one time. He said, when we were in the
flesh, the motions of sin, in verse 4 there, that word motions
there is passions. We were passionate about something.
There are people that you know and I know who are passionate
about some of the most ungodly things you can think of. They're
passionate, they're people passionate about drugs, alcohol, Partying,
whatever you call it. There are people who are passionate
about sports. I mean, that's how you identify
them almost. They're passionate about it. I mean, they're on
fire for it. And then there are people who
are passionate about religion. Works religion. Working their
way into God's favor. That's what Paul's talking about
in Romans 7. He was passionate. Saul of Tarsus, he was passionate.
But when God saves sinners like Ninevites and Jonah and us, and
brings us to faith in Christ and repentance, and brings us
to submission to Christ and His righteousness, there are four
things which we should always be passionate about. And they
all go together. You can never separate these
four things. Number one is the glory of God. That's the essence of worship.
I want to glorify God in my worship. I want to glorify God in my life.
We need to be passionate about glorifying God, honoring God.
And in order to do that, you have to have the second thing,
and that is the preeminence of Christ. You can't glorify and
worship God without Christ. First of all, it takes Christ
for our acceptance. God said in the Old Covenant,
above the mercy seat covered with the blood, there I will
meet with thee and commune with thee and accept thee. That's
where the prayer is done, that's where communion, that's where
worship is done. Under the blood of Christ, clothed in the righteousness
of Christ. If we're passionate for the glory
of God, which is the essence of worship, we're also passionate
about the preeminence of Christ, which is the essence of faith
and repentance and love. And thirdly, and this is where
it really applies to Jonah in this specific instance, the third
thing we're to be passionate about is the salvation of sinners.
And that's the essence of evangelism. We want to see sinners saved. Not just certain sinners, but any and every sinner whom
God chooses to save. That's the essence of evangelism.
And you can't be passionate about that in a real way, in a truthful
way, without glorifying God and being concerned and passionate
about the preeminence of Christ. What is the message of evangelism? Christ and Him crucified. It's
the gospel, which is Romans 1, 16 and 17. Paul said, I'm not
ashamed of the gospel of Christ. It's the power of God unto salvation
to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first, and to the Greek
also, the Gentile also, for therein is the righteousness of God revealed
from faith to faith. As it is written, the just shall
live by faith. When you read Jonah chapter 4 in verse 1, 2,
3, you don't see a very passionate man in evangelism, do you? The
fourth thing, and it goes together with these other three, is the
edification of the church, the building up of the church, the
growth of the church. And I'm not just talking about
adding numbers to the congregation so that we can post it up here
on the wall and brag about it. I'm talking about in evangelism,
when God brings people into the church, to be an encouragement
to each other, to be a friend to each other, to fellowship
with each other. See, this is the essence of fellowship. And all of that goes together.
And that proves this. Now, Jonah, where he really went
wrong is not just his view of the Ninevites as great sinners.
They were great sinners. Where he went wrong is failing
to see himself as a great sinner. He lost sight of that. And when
we lose sight of that, we'll lose sight of these four things
that we're to be passionate about. Glorifying God. The preeminence
of Christ. What John the Baptist... And
I'll tell you what, I'm the first one to tell you, and I'll admit
this. Alan, you know it. It's always... Preachers are
the worst. We're the worst. Because preachers
are the worst kinds of people to get full of themselves. That's
why I tell people, I said, if you want to go to the best preacher
school you can find, go to John the Baptist School for Preachers.
And you know how John the Baptist, you can follow his ministry.
He said, I'm not the Messiah. I'm not the light. There's one,
I can't save you. I can baptize you with water.
Now, I can do that, but I can't baptize you with the power of
the Spirit. I can't birth you again. I can't justify you. You're not saved or justified
before God based upon my righteousness or anything I do. It's based
upon Christ. John said, I'm not even worthy
to untie his shoelaces. And his last words were something
like this, I must decrease, Christ must increase. That's what Jonah
forgot. And it killed his evangelism.
You know, here's something to consider. Let me just give you
a few scriptures. Turn to Genesis 12 here. Sometimes
when we read the Old Testament, especially in the time that covers
the history of the Old Covenant, We have a tendency to just look
at Israel as an entity in and of itself and not even consider
the Gentile nations because there were very few Gentiles that were
saved. I don't know how many. I know
one day in Nineveh there was a bunch. Because I read the book
of Jonah and I believe God's Word. But here's the thing. Israel, as the covenant people
of God under that Mosaic covenant, the Law of Moses, Do you know
that they were to be a missionary nation? They were to be a nation
that brought the truth, not just to keep it in themselves and
in their own walls, but to bring it to the world. Do you know
that's what they were put together for? And it's all grounded upon
God's purpose in the very beginning to save sinners through the Lord
Jesus Christ. Look at Genesis chapter 12. This
is God's first dealings with Abraham, which is the foundation
and the root of his dealing with the Jewish nation later on. He
says in verse 1, Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee
out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's
house, unto a land that I will show thee. I will make of thee
a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great.
And thou shalt be a blessing, and I will bless them that bless
thee, and curse them that curseth thee. And now the way that applies
today has to do with a person's attitude and reaction to the
gospel of Christ, which brings together the church of the Lord
Jesus Christ, spiritual Israel. And he says, and in thee shall
all families of the earth be blessed. Not just one nation,
but all families. That includes the Gentiles. You
see that? Let me show you one more. Look
over at Isaiah chapter 49. This is jumping way ahead of
Abraham. Now this is a prophecy of the
coming of Christ into the world to save His nation. And His nation is made up of
God's elect out of every tribe, kindred, tongue, and nation.
And he says here in Isaiah chapter 49, look at verse 1, he said,
listen O Isles, that's the islands. You go over there to Palestine,
you're not going to see any islands. So in other words, what he's
saying here goes beyond just that geographical land. He says,
listen O Isles unto me, hearken ye people from far. Not just
one nation. The Lord hath called me from
the womb and from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention
of my name. This is talking about Christ
now. He says, And he hath made my
mouth like a sharp sword in the shadow of his hand, hath he hid
me, and made me a polished shaft in his quiver, hath he hid me,
and said unto me, Thou art my servant, O Israel, in whom I
will be glorified. Then I said, I have labored in
vain, I have spent my strength for naught, and in vain, yet
surely my judgment is with the Lord, and my work with my God. and now saith the Lord that formed
me from the womb to be his servant to bring Jacob again to him though
Israel be not gathered yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of
the Lord and my God shall be my strength and listen to this
he said and he said it is a light thing it is a light thing that
thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob
and to restore the preserved of Israel I will also give thee
for a light to the Gentiles that thou mayest be my salvation unto
the end of the earth." Remember when Simeon took the Christ child
up in his arms and he said, I'm ready to depart for mine eyes
have seen thy salvation. And then he said, and a light
to lighten the Gentiles. Paul wrote it in Galatians chapter
three concerning this when he talked about the blessing of
Abraham coming upon the Gentiles. Now look back at Jonah, and I'll
close. Jonah chapter 4. You know, we read that passage in Luke
15 about there's more joy in heaven over one sinner that repented. You know what the issue there
is. The problem is, the problem is self-love and self-righteousness. That's the problem with Jonah.
That's our problem. That's why we have to fight it all the days
of our lives. You know the hardest thing for us to do as believers
and followers of the Lord Jesus Christ is to love our enemies? That was Jonah's problem. If
we really understand what it means to love our enemies. Somebody
said you can't pick and choose your neighbors. Christ said love
your neighbor as yourself. He said you can't pick and choose
your neighbors. Well, you can't. You can't even
pick and choose your enemies. They're there too. Christ said,
pray for those who despitefully use us. Is that difficult for
you? It is for me. You don't have to pretend. I
don't have to pretend. That's why I need God's grace.
That's why I need his mercy. That's why I need the righteousness
of Christ. That's why I preach the righteousness of Christ so
much. Because I'm a sinner. Saved by the grace of God. It's
a struggle with me. It's a warfare within. One that
we cannot win in our own strength and our own goodness, but only
in and by Christ. And sometimes we get to thinking
that, well, if that love is not our first inclination, or because
we have to make ourselves do it, then we're being hypocritical
or disingenuous, but we're not. We're not. Think about it this
way. Here's Jonah being angry, and
here's what God's going to teach him, and that's this. Bill, Ron,
whoever. In the salvation of sinners,
God is glorified. Christ is exalted. Sinners are
saved from sin. And the church of Christ is built
up and it will never be defeated. Now, how can we be angry with
that? How can we be angry with that?
Well, the Lord is going to teach Jonah that and hopefully he'll
teach me that too. Teach you too.