Morning, everybody. Good to see
you again. If you would, Jonah chapter 1. Jonah chapter 1. Jonah's a little tiny book. It's
only got four chapters. But if you find Ezekiel and you just
start working forward, you'll eventually find it. Ezekiel,
Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, then you get to Jonah. Jonah
1. Once you get there, pick up in
verse one, we're gonna read the first three verses. Jonah one, verse one. Now 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 is come
up before me. But Jonah rose up to flee onto
Tarshish from the presence of the Lord and went down to Joppa
and he found a ship going to Tarshish. So he paid the fare
thereof and went down into it to go with them on Tarshish from
the presence of the Lord. Now Jonah was a legitimate prophet
of God. This is a man who the Lord had
raised up for a very short amount of time to speak for him. He
was a legitimate prophet. This is a man who was known of
God. He was loved by God. This is a man who was a believer.
He had been converted. This is a man who knew Christ.
He knew God. He believed on the Lord Jesus
Christ. All these things are true concerning him. And so it
makes the beginning of this book so puzzling. We have this man,
who the Lord raised up, who the Lord had saved, and the Lord
says, go and prophesy. And he says, no. And he hops
in a ship, and he flees from the presence of the Lord, which,
I mean, if we think about it, isn't that the stupidest thing
you've ever heard? You can't go anywhere he's not. Right?
This is silly. This is a believer. This is one
of the Lord's prophets, and he's acting in this manner. Now, if
you read, and most of you have, all these four chapters concerning
Jonah, he's spoken of a couple other times in the scripture,
but the majority is here in the book of Jonah. What you find
is this man was probably a pretty miserable man, if we're being
honest. He was probably tough to be around.
He probably struggled with interpersonal relationships and things like
that. You probably wouldn't want to spend a whole lot of time
around him. And you say, well, what would make him so humanly
miserable? It was really two things. You
read through the books, you find this about him. Number one, he
was a hothead. He was a very angry man, but
he's constantly angry at the Lord because of the Lord's province,
because of what the Lord is doing. He gets very angry, and then
he prays these very angry prayers at the Lord. So that's the first
thing that kind of leads to his misery. He is mad at the Lord
for his good province. And the second thing you see
about him when you read through this book is that he cares a
lot what men think about him, much more than what God thinks
about him. And I was thinking about this, if you want the perfect
recipe for misery, if you want to be absolutely miserable while
you're here, stay mad at the Lord for his good problems and
care a lot what men think. That's about the perfect recipe
for the whole thing. Now, I made some pretty coarse
statements against this man. I want to back it up with some
scriptures here. So we just read the first three verses there.
The Lord goes to Jonah, one of his prophets, and he says, you
go down to Nineveh, that great city, and you prophesy against
it. And he says, no, I'm not going to go. I'm not going to
do that. Why is that? Why won't he go to Nineveh to
prophesy against it? Well, it's very simple. It's
because he hated those people. Nineveh is this very large city.
It's the capital of Syria at the time. And the Syrians are
Gentiles. They're idolaters. They hate
the Jews, and the Jews hate the Gentiles. Jonah hates these people. And you think, though, with what
the Lord tells him to do, the Lord says, go and prophesy against
them. Prophesy their condemnation.
And you would think that Jonah would say, yeah, I'll do that.
I hate these folks. I'm going to go down there, and
the Lord's going to get you all. Right? This seems like a good idea.
But he won't go. Why is that? He eventually does
go, turn over to chapter 3, Jonah chapter 3. After the ordeal with
the whale's belly, he finally agrees to go. He goes to Nineveh
and he prophesies. He says what the Lord tells him
to say, and what he says is down in verse 4. Jonah 3 and verse
4, look at this. And Jonah began to enter into
the city a day's journey. That's how big the city is, takes
a day to travel through it. And he cried and said, yet 40
days in Nineveh shall be overthrown. Now notice there are no conditions
in that. It's not, y'all better get your act together, or in
40 days the Lord's going to overthrow this place. There's none of that.
There's no conditions here whatsoever. It's simply this. 40 days, Lord,
wipe this whole place out. And that's the end of it. And
you would think because he hated these people, Jonah would be
very happy to deliver this message. But once again, Jonah knows the
Lord. He knows him, and he knows what
to expect from him. And he knows this, that the Lord
does not send a prophet down to condemn men. Men don't need
a prophet to condemn them. Men condemn themselves just fine
on their own. He sends a prophet down if he
intends to show mercy. And this is what Jonah expects
from the Lord. You're going to send me down
there with this message, and you're going to bless these people,
and you're going to cause them to believe. and you're going
to show mercy. Look down at verse five. So the people of Nineveh
believe God. There's the message made effectual
and proclaim to fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest
of them, even to the least of them. Jonah expected this from
the Lord, that he was going to bless this message, that he was
going to make it effectual to these people, and he would cause
them to believe and repent. And that's exactly what happened,
exactly what Jonah expected the Lord to do. Now look at verse
10. And God saw their works, so they turned from their evil
way, and God repented of the evil that he had said that he
would do unto them, and he did it not. This is all the operation
of the Lord, everything Jonah expected. You're going to send
me down there with this message, this message of condemnation,
and you're going to use that to convert those people, and
you know what you're going to do? You're going to show mercy. That's exactly
what he expected the Lord to do, and that's exactly what he
did, because the Lord is completely and utterly predictable in what
he does. Now, how does Jonah feel about
this whole thing? Chapter four, verse one. But
it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry. He's very
upset about this. Now he's going to pray. Listen
to what 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?
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." He praised the Lord. He said,
I knew you'd do this. I knew exactly what was going to happen.
I knew what was going to happen back there when I hopped on that
boat to Tarshish. You were going to send me down there with that
message, and you were going to show mercy to these people, and you were
going to bless them, and you were going to save them. I knew you'd do it. And look what he's
angry about. You're merciful, and you're gracious. and you're
slow to anger. All these things he's so upset
about, it's our hope. That's everything. Now, there's
two things that I noticed about Jonah here. The first one is
this. He struggles with the concept of grace. Now, this man is a
believer, right? So can a believer struggle with
the concept of grace? As much as there is a new man
inside this man, Jonah, as much as the spirit of God is dwelling
in this man, Just the same, he has that old, sinful, wicked
man. And that old, sinful, wicked
man, he doesn't get any better. He stays the exact same until
we die and we put him down. That old man, he hates grace.
Now, why would a man struggle with the concept of grace? There's
only one reason a man struggles or falls at grace. It's this. It's because he thinks God owes
him something. Now, the Ninevites are a perfect
example of grace. If you go back to chapter one,
what does it say? The Lord says the Ninevites, their wickedness
had come up before them. These were a wicked group of
people. They weren't searching for Jehovah.
They weren't trying to worship the true and living God. They
were idolaters. They were happy worshiping these idols, these
man-made gods. They weren't seeking Jehovah
in any way. They weren't crying out, saying, send me a preacher.
Send me a preacher. Send me a message. Do something
for me. These people had set, charted
a course, a path for themselves. And it led directly to hell.
And they were happy to walk that path. They weren't asking for
intervention. They weren't seeking anything
of God. But God, they had no interest
in the Lord whatsoever. The Lord had an interest in them.
They had a love for God. The Lord had love for them. And
what did he do? He sent them a prophet with a
message. And he made that message effectual
to their hearts. And what did they do? What happens
when the Lord makes a message effectual? They believe God.
That's exactly what it says. And they repented, and the Lord
had mercy on this group of people. That's the way grace works. It
has nothing to do with the operation of the recipient. It has everything
to do with the operation of the grace giver. That's salvation
by grace. Why would a man hate that? Why
would he get angry at that? The only reason a man would get
angry at that is if he thinks he's owed something by God. That's the only reason. Now I
want you to turn to a scripture. Turn over to Luke chapter 15
real quick. Y'all are familiar with the parable,
the sharedness, the parable, the prodigal. And if you remember
this, there are two sons. There's a son that leaves. And
there's a son that stays behind. The son that leaves, he goes
to his father. He says, give me my inheritance. Give it to
me early while you're still alive. And the father gives it to him.
And he goes to a faraway country. And that son, he spends all his
inheritance on righteous living, goes broke, famine in life. He
can't find corn husks to fill his belly. And he says, my father's
house, it has food. I'm going to return to my father's
house. And he works out a speech. Father, I'm no longer worthy
to be called your son. Be blessed if you just make me
a hired servant in your house. And so he goes back. And he goes
back, and he's going to make this speech. And his father sees
him afar off. And he runs, and he falls on
top of his neck, and he kisses him. And he tries to get his
speech out. He tries to get it out, and he can't even get it
out because his father is too busy hugging him and kissing
him. He says, take the best robe and put it on him. And take a
ring and put it on his finger, and put shoes on his feet. He
was dead, and now he lives. He's gone. He's found now. Bring
him in. Slay the fatted calf. We're going
to make him merry. We're going to have a feast. We're going
to have a party. My son is home. But there's another son. There's
another one. There's the one that stayed home.
And he's very, very upset about this party that the father is
showing for this son that returned. Look at what he says. Look at
verse 29. Look at the thing. This is the son that stayed home,
he said, and he answering said to his father, lo, these many
years do I serve thee. And what he means is, it's been
rough labor. I've been serving you a long
time. I haven't liked it a bit. These many hard years I serve
you. Neither transgressed I at any
time thy commandment, and yet thou never gavest me a kid that
I might make merry with my friends. But as soon as this thy son was
come, which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast
killed for him the fatted calf." He said, these many years I've
served you, I haven't enjoyed it one bit. And I've never transgressed
against you, I've never done you wrong in any way, shape,
or form. And my brother here, he left,
he spent all his money on harlots and on drinks and stuff like
that, but secretly I wanted to do the same thing. He never slew
the fatted calf for me so I could make merry with my friends. I
want to go out and party. I want to do all those things,
too. I just didn't. The heart was the same. The actions
different. He's mad. What is he mad about?
I owe this. I stayed behind. I did what I
was supposed to do. I've earned this. He hasn't.
It's a man who's mad at grace. Because what is the reality of
the situation? The reality of the situation
is this. There is absolutely no difference between men whatsoever. You take the most moral man you
can find, the man who is most outwardly upright, and you take
the most immoral man you can find, that is outwardly the lowest
that you can possibly find. There is no difference. You believe that? There is no
difference because the heart is the same. The nature is the
same. Desperately wicked, who can know
it? The only reason the man who is
outwardly upright and moral is simply the restraining grace
of God. It is not because of some sort
of moral fiber that is in him. It is the Lord's restraining
grace. That's it. The man who does not act morally outright,
he just hasn't been shown restraining grace. That's it. The heart It
is absolutely the same. So when the Lord looks at every
man, he sees the exact same thing. Wickedness. Sinfulness. That's
it. That means I'm not owed anything.
Who loves grace? A sinner. A sinner loves grace. Why? Because a sinner can't earn
anything. I don't have anything to bring before the Lord. I don't
have one work. I don't have one thought. I don't have one action.
I have absolutely nothing to bring before him. And you know
this, if you're a believer, you know this to be true. If he were
to save everybody on this planet except you, what's his name?
His name is right, just, and fair. That's the case. That's the reality of the situation. And a man who's in that case,
in that situation where he has no rights before God, he's send
away his rights. His only hope is grace. that
God would find the reason to be merciful to him, to show him
favor outside of him. He would find it in Christ. That's his only hope. And you
know what? For everyone, if that's your only hope, you have the
very grace of God. It presides on you right now. Now, this man struggled. Jonah,
he struggled with grace. And there's another thing that
we find out about him. He expected the Lord to show
mercy. So Jonah goes along. He flees
from the Lord. Why? Because he expected him
to be merciful to these Ninevites. I knew what you would do. You
would send me down there with this message. You would make
an effectual of these people. And you were going to show mercy
to them. He expected him to show mercy. Now, this word expect,
I have expectations for my children, right? What I mean by that is
this, these are the rules, this is the bar, you have to meet
it, right? That's not the expecting we do on the Lord, it's what
you can count on. What can we expect from the Lord?
What can we count on? What can we rely on from him?
Micah chapter 7 verse 18 says this, who is a God like unto
thee that pardoneth iniquity and pacify the transgression
of the remnant of his heritage He retaineth not his anger forever,
because he delighteth in mercy. What can we expect from the Lord
Jesus Christ? You can fully expect, you can
write this down, you can pursue this with confidence, that if
you come to him seeking mercy, you will have it. That's a promise from God. I'm
gonna give you some scriptures here. These are very simple scriptures,
scriptures you've heard many times. Matthew 11, 28, the Lord
says, come unto me. All ye who labor and are heavy
laden, and I, anybody remember the next word? Will give you
rest. See, yes, that is, We're told
to do that, that's command, absolutely. More than anything, folks, that
is a promise. Christ says this, come unto me. How do you come to Christ? You
believe on him, you trust him, you rely upon him for everything
in your salvation. Come unto me, who? Those who
are labored and heavy laden, sinners where there's nowhere
else to turn. And here is the promise, I will
give you rest. That's a promise from God. This
is the one who cannot lie. He cannot go back on this. You
understand that? If he were to go back on this,
he would cease to be God. This is a promise from God. You
come to him. You believe upon him, sinner.
You'll be received. You will have mercy. Let me give
you another one here. This is Hebrews 4.16. He says,
let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace that
we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. Now, pay attention to where we
are directed. Come boldly, not sheepishly,
come boldly with full confidence to the throne of grace, not the
throne of worse. What sits on the throne of worse? No savior sits on the throne
of worse. There is one that sits on the throne of worse, it's
the law. And if you go to the throne of worse, the only thing
you will hear is this, unacceptable, guilty. fall short of the glory
of God. Don't go to that throne. That's
what you will hear every single time. We're directed to the throne
of grace, where there is power. Throne speaks of power, ultimate
sovereign power. Who sits on that throne of grace? Jesus Christ. God's son sits
on that throne of grace, and he sits 100% accessible to any
sinner who is in need of mercy. Come boldly now. Don't hold yourself
off, not for any reason. Don't wait. Come boldly. Come
to Christ today, and here's what you'll find. You will obtain
mercy. You'll have it. You'll obtain
mercy, and you'll find grace to help in time of need. That's a promise from God. And
the whole thing is summed up with this. This is John 6, 37.
It says, all that the Father giveth me shall come to me, and
him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. Now if you understand that verse,
start from the back and work the front of it. Now on this,
those who come unto me, I will in no wise cast out. A promise
from God. You come, a guilty sinner, looking
for mercy, trusting Christ, you will not be cast out. God promised.
Who's going to come? All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me. I'm not worried about any of
God's people not coming to Christ. Every one of the elect are going
to come to the Lord Jesus Christ. They're all going to believe
upon him because they're called, they're made to come. Not worried
about that in the least. But here's your command. Are
you a sinner? That's a good question. Are you a sinner? No claims on
God. Send away all my rights. This
is your command right now. You come and you will be received. And if you do, when you do, it
is the very evidence the Father gave you to Christ before the
world ever began. That's how you understand election.
That's how it's understood. Now, the last thing about this
man, Jonah, we'll look at chapter one briefly. Go back to Jonah
four and look at verse three. Look how he reacts to this whole
thing. Jonah says, therefore now, O Lord, take, I beseech
thee, my life from me, for it is better for me to die than
to live. Now, why would he say that? The
Lord had shown mercy to all these Ninevites. He sent them down
there with this message, and he'd watched this great, miraculous
thing the Lord had done, and he sits back and he says, Lord,
just kill me. Better that I was dead than to live. Why would
he say that? Because now he esteems himself
a false prophet. See, he made this proclamation, 40 days and
Nineveh is going to be destroyed. And the Lord repented of it.
And he didn't destroy Nineveh. Woe is me. No one's ever going
to believe me again. No one's going to trust me as
a prophet. I'm going to have a terrible reputation from now on. Lord,
you might as well just kill me because my reputation is shot. The Lord knew the truth. He was
incredibly concerned, Jonah was, with what other men thought.
If the Lord knows the truth, And every man for the rest of
his life mocked him everywhere he went. Had he lost anything? Did it matter in the least? It
absolutely didn't. Now, I want to say this right.
I want to have a good reputation around those people who know
me. At work, here with you all, everyone who spends time around
me, I want to make sure, try to keep myself in check, right? But at that same time, folks,
At the end of the day, if everyone in this world turns thumbs down
on us and mocks us everywhere we go, and we have the very love
of God and we have Christ for us, have we lost anything? Absolutely
nothing. Now, General was a highly flawed
man, exceptionally flawed, but he represents one. He's the type
of one who is flawless. He's a type of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Now I want you to go back to chapter 1 and we're going
to briefly just look at what's said here in chapter 1. The entire
gospel is revealed in this first chapter of Jonah. Pick up in verse 4. 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. Now Jonah had boarded
this ship to Tarshish with a bunch of other men, a finite amount
of men in this ship with Jonah. And each one of these men, if
you think about it, they all have a purpose for themselves, right? They're
all boarding this ship and they have a purpose. And maybe one
man, he found a job in Tarshish, so he's going to go take the
ship over there and he's going to start a new job. And maybe
somebody else, they've got family over in Tartus. So his purpose
is to get on that boat, go visit family, and stuff like that.
Every one of those men had a purpose for himself, a purpose he had
planned out. And all of a sudden, in the midst
of all that purpose, and trying to execute that purpose, the
Lord sent a storm. Don't miss that. The Lord sent
the winds, the Lord sent the waves, and put these men in terror
of their lives. Now, what does that sound like
to you? To me it sounds like when the Lord begins dealing
with man. Now we're born, and all of us roughly pursue the
exact same thing. The Lord can get married, the
Lord can have a family, the Lord can get a job, move here, move
there, go through the acts of life. And then the natural man
comes along, he may subscribe to some sort of religion, right?
But he doesn't really care. He may listen to someone talk
about God, and they have different opinions. He said, who could
possibly know? What does it really matter, right? I've got a family
to feed. I've got a job to take care of. And all of a sudden,
here's what the Lord does. He puts that man in terror of
his soul. And here's a good scripture that
kind of sums up what's being said here. This is Proverbs 9,
10. It said, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
What type of fear is that? And the knowledge of the holy
is understanding. This is how the Lord puts this
man in fear. He gives him some knowledge of
his own personal holiness. This is what we see. We see something
of the holiness of God. Who is God? He's holy. That means
he's perfectly just. That means he can't accept sin
in any way, shape, or form. He's sovereign. He's in control.
He has the power to punish, and he must punish where there is
sin. We get a glimpse of the holiness of God, and then you
get a glimpse of yourself standing in the light of His holiness.
I'm a sinner in His hands, in the holiness of God, a condemned
man before a just God. This is where the Scripture makes
sense. This is the beginning of wisdom. This is the beginning
of understanding. When a man sits, in the hands
of a sovereign and a holy God, a condemned sinner before him.
Then he's teachable. He's teachable then. He wasn't
teachable before. He was just going through the motions of
life. But when the Lord sends this storm, he becomes teachable. Now, look down here at verse
5. Then the mariners were afraid,
and cried every man unto his God, and cast forth the wares
that were in the ship into the sea, to lighten it of them. But
Jonah was gone down to the sides of the ship, and he lay and was
fast asleep. Now, there's tons of humor in
the scripture. The Lord constantly mocks man's
religion in the scripture. And this is one of those times
where he's mocking man's religion. I'll paint the picture for you
here. These men are put in terror for their lives. What do they
immediately do? Every man turned to his idol,
his man-made God, and he asked for help. Save us. Do something
for us. Directly after that, what did
they do? They went about to help their
idol out. They prayed to their idol. Then they went through
the boat. They found the heaviest stuff, and they start chucking it overboard.
Let's make this ship more buoyant. Help us. Now I'm going to try
to help myself. Maybe between his help and my
help, we'll get the job done, right? These are two things you
can't separate. Anytime you have an idol, you
have work to do. That's just the case. What's
an idol? It's simply a man-made god. He's not real. Man has conjured
him in his imagination. The man has assigned him attributes.
But when the man assigns him attributes, he always gives him
this attribute. He can't save on his own. He
can't get the job done. There's something you need to
do to help your God out. Every single time, man assigns,
of all the idols in every generation, always assigned him this attribute.
He can't get the job done. He needs your help. That way,
man gets some glory in salvation. I think it's comical here. Help
us. Now let's go to work. Let's start helping our God out
so he can help us. Between him and us, hopefully
we can get the job done. Verse six. So the shipmaster came to him
and said unto him, what meanest thou, sleeper? Arise, call upon
thy God, if so be that God will think upon us that we perish
not. Now this shipmaster unintentionally
makes a wonderful statement. If so be that God will think
upon us. Here's the character in scripture
I thought of. Remember the thief on the cross?
I love the thief on the cross. I love to think about him. Because
as far as we know, that man knew about as little about Christ
as you could possibly know to be a believer. That man had been
converted in a matter of hours, minutes, whatever it might have
been. Here's all he knew. He knew that this man who was
dying next to him on this cross was God. He was the Lord. He was in absolute sovereign
control. That he was the spotless lamb.
And he knew this. This is what he said to the Lord
right before he died. He said, remember me. when you come into your kingdom. Think upon me. Now, think about
the gravity of that statement. If you think about that thief
on the cross, if you were to ask him the deep things of the
gospel, deep doctrine, hey, can you explain to me imputation?
I'm sure he couldn't do it, right? Explain to me union. Explain
to me federal headship. Could you walk me through all
the ins and outs of that? No, I don't think he could have.
This is the only thing he knew. That's God. He's in control.
And all he has to do is think upon me. All he has to do is
will my salvation. Now, whatever it takes, he's
going to do it. And I'm not sure exactly what
it's going to take. I don't know the operations on that. I don't know all the
ins and outs. But I know this. He can't fail, and he can do
it. All he has to do is will my salvation, and I'll be with
him. I'll tell you what, folks, that's
a great faith right there. That is child-like faith. You think of a child, a toddler,
when it comes up to his parents. If that toddler's hungry, does
it say, uh, how much money do we have in the bank? Because,
you know, I like a certain kind of food, and, you know, I want
to get a grocery. Do we have this in the pantry? They don't
ask any of those questions. It comes up to its mother and
it says, I'm hungry. You're the one who feeds me. I'm hungry.
And they just wait to be fed. If they're scared, they don't
go up to their dad and say, you know what, we're out. Can you
defend us? They just crawl in their dad's
arms. He defends me. That's it. That's childlike faith. If he would just think upon us,
what a great statement. But I want you to hear this.
How does the Lord think upon us? Right now, if you're a believer,
what are his thoughts toward you? This is them. This is Jeremiah
29, 11. For I know the thoughts that
I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace and not
of evil, to give you an expected end. Right now, if all your hope
is in Christ, this is God's thoughts toward you. Peace. You have peace
with God because Christ has made your complete peace with God.
And that is an unchangeable peace. And there's no thoughts of evil.
Even when it sounds like or looks like that evil is knocking at
your door, it's not. It's just goodness and mercy
disguised in some other form. There's no evil. And I love how
he says this. He goes, and I've always thought
of it that way. To give you an expected end. Your end state. I've been thinking about that
from the beginning of eternity. I've had it playing out from
the beginning of eternity. You're going to be just like
Christ. perfectly conformed to his image. I had that planned
out from the very foundations of the world. If you don't feel
special, if you're a believer, you've been on the heart and
mind of God himself from the eternities. You remember that
story in Luke 16? The rich man and Lazarus. Most
of you probably read it. That rich man, he fared sumptuously. Lazarus was a beggar. The dogs
licked his sores. They both died. The rich man,
he ended up in hell. And Lazarus was carried by the angels into
Abraham's bosom. And I don't understand all the
ins and outs of that story. But here's what I notice. In that
story, Lazarus has a name. He is referred to as Lazarus.
In that story, that rich man is never named. Lazarus had a
name before God. God knew him. He knew Lazarus's
name. On the cross, Lord had Lazarus
on his heart, Lazarus on his mind. That rich man, he didn't
know him. Yes, he was his creator. Yes, he knew him in that sense,
but he didn't know him in that loving and that saving way. But
he knew Lazarus, and Lazarus had a name before God. You think
about it, dear believer, you have a name before God. You've
always had a name, a person, a personality, and always have
been loved by him from the foundations of the world. Now look at verse
7. And they said everyone to his
fellow, come and let us cast lots that we may know for whose
cause this evil is upon us. So they cast lots and a lot fell
upon Jonah. What does that represent? He's
been standing around and said, we're all in trouble, but somebody
did something. All of us are suffering here.
All of us are in danger of our lives, but it's because one of
us did something. What's that talking about? Romans
5, 12, wherefore, as by one man, sin entered into the world, and
death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for that all have
sinned. Talking about our fallen Adam.
What happened in the garden? And these are things, the more
I talk about these things like federal headship, the more foolish
I feel. Who could possibly understand these things? We can simply give
what the scripture says about it, but who could possibly enter
into these things? In that garden, Adam had all of humanity stored
up inside of him. Every one that would ever be.
God made all men at once. He made them in Adam. The whole
posterity was in him, and Adam disobeyed God. And when he did,
we all died spiritually. Adam did this, but when Adam
did that, I did that. And we can't separate those two
things. It's not victimized in Adam. Well, Adam sinned and now
I just have to suffer the consequences. I'm born with this sinful and
evil nature. That's not what it says. Romans
5.12 says at the end, for that all have sinned. That was me. I did that. I disobeyed God. This sinful nature I'm born with,
I'm no victim of this. I've gotten exactly what I deserved. That's what happened. But if
I can be condemned in a man, here's the good news of it. I
can be saved in a man. And just as every man was sorted
up in Adam, every member of the elect are in Christ. So much
so, I sinned in Adam, I did it. When Christ did righteousness,
I did righteousness. It's real. I did righteousness
in Christ. It really is mine. When he went
to the cross bearing my sins, I died in Christ. I suffered
in Christ. I really did suffer and die.
Raised again without sin. I really don't have any sin in
Christ. Both those things are reality.
Reality is I sinned in Adam. Reality is I'm justified in Christ. Isn't that wonderful? That's
the reality of the situation. This is truth. It's not what
we see, but this is the reality of the situation. Verse 18. I'm sorry, verse 8. Then said they unto him, Tell
us, we pray thee, for whose cause this evil is upon us. What is
thy occupation, and whence comest thou? What is thy country, and
of what people art thou? Now I think this is funny. This
is scriptures being slightly comical. A man walks through
life, and he says, who is God? Can we possibly know? This is
what this guy thinks. This is what this guy thinks.
Who knows, right? Could we even possibly know?
Is there a God? And then all of a sudden, he's
in trouble of his soul, and he finds out that he's a sinner
in the hands of a holy God. And all of a sudden, he's asking
questions that he never would have asked before. Who is God? What's he like? What does he
expect from me? What will He accept? Those are
good questions, but until the Lord puts you in His fear of
your soul, you're never going to answer those questions. What's
He like? He's holy, and He's sovereign, and He's righteous,
and He's separate from sinners, and He's completely and utterly
just. That's God. That's what He's like. What does
He expect from me? To believe on His Son, Jesus
Christ. To abandon any hope of myself,
saving myself in any way, and flee to Christ. That's what He
expects. That is the call, that is the command to every sinner.
Go. That's who he is. That's what
he expects. They start asking these questions.
Now, look down at verse 9. And he said unto them, I am in
Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, which hath
made the sea and the dry land. Now, I find this interesting.
Jonah appeals to them based on what they can see. He says, the
God I worship, his name's Jehovah. This is Lord right there, Jehovah.
He's the one who made the sea and then the dry land. Men don't
need a Bible and they don't need a preacher to know that there's
a God. The very light of creation declares
it. Everybody's born with that understanding. Somebody made
that out there. Somebody made that tree and then
nobody made him. The question is, who is he? And
he says, he's the God of Hebrews. His name's Jehovah. That's who
I worship. That's the true and the living
God. Now look at 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. Notice,
capital L-O-R-D, because he had told them. All of a sudden now,
they're referring to God as Jehovah. Capital L-O-R-D, Lord. They're convinced. Yep. Yep,
that's it, Jehovah. He's the Lord. He's God. He's
in control. Verse 11. Then said they unto
him, what shall we do unto thee? That the sea may be calm unto
us, for the sea wrought and was tempestuous. And he said unto
them, 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. What a beautiful picture of the
cross. Here Jonah stands up and he says this, there's one way. This whole storm is going to
get us all. We're condemned in this storm. It's going to come
right on top of the show. It's going to kill everybody.
There's one way, boys. You take me. You throw me overboard
in a certain death. In these waves, in these winds,
and the seas will be calm for you. All of you will live, but
I have to die. That's Christ. That's the cross.
And there's two things I noticed here. Number one, this was Jonah's
plan. This is not the ship master's
plan. He didn't come up with this. This was not the mariner's
plan or any other man on the ship. One man came up with this
plan. There's only one way you can
live. Take me and throw me overboard. This was the plan of God from
the eternities. The sacrifice of the Lord Jesus
Christ for his people. This is how his people could
be and would be and are saved through the sacrifice of Christ.
This is always the purpose of God. And everything that's going
on, folks, led up to that purpose and follows that purpose. Everything.
The fall of man. Say, why did that happen? because
God purposed it, that the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ would
come to be. This whole place right here,
this earth right here, the fact that dirt exists, it exists for
one reason. So some 2,000 years ago, a Roman
soldier could dig a hole into it, drop a pole in that dirt,
with our Lord suspended on that pole, dying between heaven and
earth. It's the whole reason this place was built. For that
one thing, that he might save his people through that one action.
That he may achieve his chief glory. That's what all this is
about. And everything that happened
after that? Just the ripple effects. That's it. That's what this is
all about. This was Jonah's plan. It had always been Jonah's plan.
Number two is this. Jonah was the willing sacrifice.
Now, I read a lot of military books and stuff like that. And
over the years, I've met some very brave men. And here's a
conclusion I've come to, that most acts of great courage are
a mixture of both true bravery and impulsiveness. The man who's the hero in the
story, he's truly courageous, right? Something happens, he
has to react immediately to save lives, to defeat an enemy, whatever
it may be. And so there's an air of impulsiveness to this.
He just reacts. He just acts, and it's an act of great courage.
But if he had time to think about it later on, if there was time
there where he could really weigh the consequences and see the
danger, he may not have actually done it, right? The fact that
it happened so fast is part of the reason he did it. He didn't
have time to think about it. The Lord Jesus Christ had all
of eternity to contemplate what he would go through. There was
no impulsiveness in him whatsoever. This is a holy man who had all
of eternity to contemplate being made sin. Had all of eternity
to contemplate his father turning his back on him, suffering under
the wrath of God. Whatever hell is like for an
eternity, times 10,000, and 10,000, and 1,000, and 1,000. He experienced
that in a matter of hours on that cross. He had all of eternity
passed to contemplate this surety ship, this thing that he would
undertake. And yet, when the time came, he didn't flinch. He didn't bat an eye. Didn't
back down for a second. I want to say this reverently,
but what a hero. Why would he do that? Looking unto Jesus,
the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was
set before him endured the cross. The joy. What joy was in this? Salvation of his people. He wouldn't
be without you. He wouldn't be without his bride. That is the
joy. Despising the shame and is set
down at the right hand of the throne of God. That's salvation
story in just one verse right there. Now look at verse 13. Nevertheless, the men rode hard
to bring it to land, but they could not, for the sea wrought
and was tempestuous against them. Wherefore they cried unto the
Lord, unto Jehovah, and said, We beseech thee, O Lord, we beseech
thee, let us not perish for this man's life, and lay not upon
us innocent blood, for thou, Lord, hast done as it pleased
thee. These men on this ship are now
calling on the name of Jehovah. The Lord has saved these men
and what is likely a matter of minutes. And this is what they
know about him already. You do as it pleases you. They knew God was sovereign.
And this is the dividing point with all men, folks, either love
this or you hate it. And there's no middle ground
on it. He is in absolute sovereign control of all things and all
men and all events at all times. He is the first cause behind
everything. And you either love that, and
you find all your hope in that, or you hate that. There's no
middle ground on this. You know who loves the sovereignty
of God? A man who can only be saved by
a sovereign God. That's who loves the sovereignty
of God. What do I mean by that? It takes a sovereign God to save
a real sinner. Because a real sinner flees from
God. A real sinner hates God as he is. A real sinner says
no to grace, no to Christ, no to his glory. I will not bow.
I won't have anything to do with that. I'd rather go to hell than
be with you. That's a real sinner. And a real
sinner like that, it takes a sovereign savior to override his will.
A savior that reaches out and says, no, you're coming with
me. And he does it in a way to where
he takes you, kicking and screaming, and makes you willing along the
way. To where you want to be saved by him, and you want to
bow the knee, and you wouldn't have anything else but him. A
sovereign savior who says, I'm going to save these people, has
the power to execute that, and has the power to ensure that
what he executed actually worked. He cannot fail. Christ cannot
fail. I need a Savior just like that,
a sovereign Savior. That same one where we put our
feet on the floor every morning when we get out of bed and we
do it without fear. Everything that's going to happen
between now and the end of this day is for His glory and for
my good. That's His promise. It may not
feel good, may not enjoy it, but it is for my good. This is
a waiting room. This is a pilgrimage. We're not
here for very long. Sometimes it's tough, sometimes
it's hard. But he's always bringing us to what? That expected end
that he gives us. It's all good. All good. Look
down here at verse 15. So they took up Jonah and cast
him forth in the sea, and the sea ceased from her raging. You want a commentary on that?
Romans 5, 1. Therefore, being justified by faith, by the faithfulness
of Christ, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. They threw Jonah in, and what
happened? It was just like Jonah said.
The seas were calm. Christ died. The Father put him
to death, and when he did, all the sins of all God's people
were put away, and there is peace with God through our Lord Jesus
Christ. It is finished. Verse 16. Then the men feared the Lord
exceedingly, and offered a sacrifice unto the Lord, and made vows.
And this is the operation of the Holy Spirit. When that blood
is applied to you personally, you make a sacrifice. Here's
what it looks like. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a
broken and a contrived heart, O Lord, that will not despise. You become a broken person. I got a broken heart. It's no
good. It's a bad, evil heart, which means everything I do is
bad and evil, and everything I think is bad and evil, and
everything I say is bad and evil. I'm broken and I'm contrite.
Lord, do something for me. Give me a new heart. Make me
clean. Wash me in the blood of Christ.
Do something for me. That's the sacrifice. I'm nothing. Lord, sacrifice yourself for
me. Do something for me. And he says there, and they feared
God. What does it mean to fear the
Lord? It means you're afraid to look anywhere but Christ alone. And when the Holy Spirit makes
us effectual to you, when you're saved and you're experienced,
you're a broken man. My only hope is in Christ and
Him crucified. I don't have anything else. That's
it. Now finally, verse 17. Now 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.
Now, I'm sure everybody knows the story. Three days, three
nights go by, and that fish spits Jonah out onto dry land. Matthew
tells us what that is all about, and here's where I want to close.
Turn to Matthew chapter 12. Matthew chapter 12, and look
at verse 38. Then certain of the scribes and
the Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we would see a sign from
thee. But he answered and said unto
them, an evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign,
and 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 the
whale's belly, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three
nights in the heart of the earth. An evil and adulterous generation
seeketh after a sign. I have read that probably hundreds
of times, and every time I read it, here's what I walk away with.
Yes, I do. I'm an evil and adulterous generation.
Yes, I seek a sign. I want some sign that God loves
me. Some sign that Jesus Christ died for me personally. Some
sign that I actually am draped in the robe of righteousness,
Jesus Christ's righteousness, that righteousness that stands
before God. Some sign, something personal
that I would know. And in an evil and adulterous
generation wants to say, yes, I do. I do. I want a sign. He says, you get one. The sign
of Jonah. That's it. Three days and three
nights in the whale's belly and then out. The whale spits him
out. The Lord Jesus Christ went on
that grave three days and three nights. And after three days
and three nights, his father raised him from the dead. Why? Because full satisfaction had
been made. Everybody that Christ died for,
he made their peace with God. He put away all the sins of all
his people, they are gone, and now there is nothing but love
and favor from the Father to the elect. That's it. He says,
this is your one sign, but when does that sign become personal?
Because that seems very generic. How can I know if that sign is
for me, if that is my sign? Very simple. If what led to that
sign is your only hope of salvation, that sign is for you. My only hope that I will stand
before God in peace is that Jesus Christ shed his precious blood
for me. That's it. That is all I have. It's as simple as I can possibly
make it. Either that man, that God man died for me, and he may
be acceptable with God, or I'm gonna go to hell. And there's
no middle ground between those two. That's it. This is all I
have. The night of the Passover was
the one thing the Lord was looking for. The blood over the door. You were either in the house
with the blood over the door, or you were not. It was it. That
was it. One thing. Blood. This is all I have. This
is my only hope. If that's your only hope of salvation,
this is your sign. Your sin has been put away. This
was done for you. You have peace with God through
our Lord Jesus Christ. Here's your sign. I'm going to
leave you all there.