Jonah 3

Peter Thompson preaching from Jonah 3.

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SPEAKER_01 0:00

Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, Arrive, go to Nineveh second. And call up against the message that I tell you. So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three days' journey in breadth. And Jonah began to go into the city, going a day's journey, and he called out, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown. And the people of Nineveh believed God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth and from the from the greatest of them to the least of them. And the word reached the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, removed his robe, covered himself in sackcloth, and sat in ashes, in ashes. And he issued a proclamation and published through Nineveh, By the decree of the king and his nobles, let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything. Let them not feed or drink water, but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and let them call out mightily to the Lord, let every one turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands. Who knows? God may turn and relent, and turn from his fierce anger, so that we may not perish. When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it. The word of the Lord.

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You help me to see that this book, that the words in it are truly worth listening to and shaping my own life around. You encourage me. As you give a hearty amen to prayers in asking God to be working in our lives and in the world, you help me to believe that he can and will do it. I want you to know that I am affected by your participation in this service of worship. And I'm grateful to God for all of you. We're going to let God speak to us now in his word in Jonah chapter 3. So if you have that open there in front of you, that would be great. These last couple of years, everyone in Ireland, anybody who's been living here any length of time, will uh you'll know that we have this new task to do every week or so. It's to bring back your drinks, bottles, and your cans uh to receive the deposit back. In an effort to encourage recycling, the government's introduced this return scheme. It was introduced, uh I'm sure most of you know about it. As uh as a uh somebody who grew up in an Irish primary school, uh, it's just a natural thing to do to recycle. I don't know, it feels like it it's not even it's not even like it's a moral thing or whatever, but I'm like, I just feel it, you just that's where you put your plastic bottle, that's where you put the can in the recycling bin. So it's a bit jarring for me to be like, oh, I have to put it somewhere else now. Anyway, anyway, the merits of it, I'll let um the stats um actually say that we can have a look at the stats later. But anyway, in essence, you pay 15 or 25 cents for your uh for your drink, uh, whether it's a bottle or can. And when you bring that back, you get that voucher. As long as the yeah, as long as the machine's working and it's not full. But assuming you get to the machine that takes those bottles, it's working. You have your bag. I we bring it in a shopping bag, you have your bag there, and you go, you put your hand in, and there's nothing there. That hasn't happened us yet, that hasn't happened me yet. I'm sure when I pick the uh bag up, I'd notice. But I could get to the car park and realize, oh, I forgot them. Now it's not a big deal. You're gonna have to do it, do without that whatever, 150 or 2 euro uh that day. But I probably left them at home, probably lost them, and I'm only down a couple of euro. It's not a big deal. But when it comes to our lives before God, we can sometimes think we're not just bringing a bag of empty bottles and cans worth a few euro, but we think our hands are filled with everything we've done. We think we're laden with success and good works. But when we look properly at our hands, like my hands here, they're empty. We've nothing to bring. Nothing in my hands I bring simply to the cross, I cling. The Ninevehites here in Jonah chapter three would sing that line with as much conviction as any of us in the room. Nothing in my hands I bring simply to the cross, I cling. But chapter three starts off with the word of the Lord coming to Jonah again. God speaks to his wayward prophet again here at the start of chapter three. Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time. The first time God spoke to Jonah, the man ran away from God. The opposite direction of where he was supposed to go. It's at the start of chapter one we looked at a couple of weeks ago. I'm sure you're all used to what happens when you run away from God, kinds of things that happened to Jonah in chapters one and two. The ship he was on, it threatened to break up because God hurled a great wind upon the sea. Jonah ended up getting thrown overboard, a large fill fish swallowed him. He prayed, and after three days, it vomited him up on dry land. The usual. And so we get to where we are in our chapter today. And the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time. With everything that happened in those first two chapters, you'd expect God to be really angry with Jonah and to lose patience with him. You'd expect Jonah to be benched. Imagine someone who deliberately scores an own goal on their team. They'd be subbed off right away, they'd be put on the bench, there'd be no tolerance for that. If it was me, I'd be saying to Jonah, look, God has been so patient with you. It's probably time to hang up those prophets and enjoy a quiet existence at home, keeping your head down as best you can to avoid the judging looks of those who know you tried to run away from God. And that's actually probably what Jonah wanted to do. Um, but regardless, if I were God, I'd be I'd be putting Jonah to one side and saying, no more, buddy, you've had your chance. Yet consistent with how God has been through chapters one and two and the whole Bible, God is unbelievably patient. He's patient He's patient with this prophet in his failings. He speaks to him again and again and gives him a mission and a purpose. And God's patient with you too. He will speak with you again. And he'll give you purpose. Even when you turn away from him, or if you can't hear him, he will speak again. Perhaps you're like Jonah. Perhaps you've run from God. God is so patient with those who run from him. And he speaks again. Well, you might say to me, Peter, look, we're all at church here. We're all uh we're all coming to God. What why are you wasting your time? You're talking to a group of people who are at church. The purpose of us being here is to meet God. We're coming towards him. But if you think about it just for a second, Jonah is one of God's people. He's a prophet. If he runs from God, then who are we to say that we're immune? But God is patient with Jonah. He's patient with us. And so we can come back to him again and again. Think about two different dads. Sean is as patient as they come. Terry struggles to keep us cool. He can't tolerate somebody messing up and making a mistake. Think about their kids. Think about their sons, Sean Jr. and Terry Jr. Terry Jr.'s gonna be afraid. He's gonna be afraid to come back to his father when he's made mistakes. He's gonna he's gonna struggle to admit it. Especially Terry, the dad, his modus operanda is a silent treatment when his son messes up. Sean over here, though, he patiently gives his son the task again. He's patient with him. He welcomes him back and he gives him the task again. So often we can view God as this impatient dad over here. We think he's giving us the silent treatment. You know, I run away from God so frequently. I do the opposite of what he says. I'm not running to Tarshish. But when I do the opposite of what he says, I'm running away from him. I'm disobeying him. And I deserve to be put to one side. I deserve to be benched, I deserve to be given the silent treatment, maybe. Yet, like Jonah, God speaks again to me. He patiently waits as I constantly roam. God is so, so patient. And his patience is so great that we can bring our empty hands. And it's not just even our empty hands, it's our failings. We can bring our empty hands, even our failings, again and again and receive him. Now, this word that God gives to his wayward prophet, it's a powerful one. He gives Jonah this task of sharing this news with the Ninevites. God gives Jonah this purpose, this direction. Again, Jonah had been aiming at something over there, something else away from God's presence. But now the Lord restores him to the path he should have been on all along. And what is that path? What does it lead to? The path leads to Jonah proclaiming the good news to the Ninevehites. Now, it doesn't seem like good news to begin with, but this is the gospel. This is still part of the gospel we proclaim. This is God commissioning Jonah, again, the second time. He's commissioning Jonah, he's sending him to the nations to point them to God. And he's pointing them to a God who is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and who relents from disaster. But who will by no means clear the guilty. That's what Jonah's doing. That's where that's the message Jonah's bringing. That's who he's pointing to. And Jesus commissions us to do the same. At the end of Matthew, especially, he says, Go and make disciples of all nations. Jonah's being commissioned here. And the message Jonah delivers is powerful because it's God's message, it's his word. Jonah isn't powerful in and of himself. He's not the one who makes this happen. In fact, as we've seen so far, Jonah pretty much tries to sabotage everything. But even here in chapter 3, it seems like he might be trying to sabotage the delivery. How would Jonah think it's effective to give a sermon like this? Yet 40 days, this is the end of verse 4, yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. Which in Hebrew, in the original language, is just five words. It's basically like doom and gloom for you. First, that's not a very encouraging message. Secondly, it doesn't seem like he's putting much effort in those five words. And thirdly, as we've seen, his track record is pretty bad. Yet it's through this message that God shows his power and might by saving everyone in this exceedingly great city from the greatest to the least. And Jonah only gets into the first day of his three-day trip before his news spreads like wildfire. Whether it's the geographical size of Nineveh or the customs in a city like that, the plan was for Jonah to be there three days. Yet the message he brings is so powerful that it spreads ahead quicker than Jonah can get through his plans. You can imagine that the first people to hear it were so profoundly affected by it that they said it to the first people they met and to their loved ones. And then from there, the message goes across the whole city in just one day. The message is powerful, not the messenger. And the gospel we've received is even greater, both because of its content and the one who brings it. The one who brings it, that's the one who Jonah represents. He represents Jesus here, but he represents them really badly, but he still represents Jesus. He's a foreshadowing of Jesus. You see, Jesus brings this powerful message. The same message that Jonah brings, but even better. The gospel message that Jesus brings is that there is disaster coming for us. But that God is merciful to his enemies when they turn to him. And not only does the word of the Lord come to Jesus as it does to Jonah, he is the word made flesh who comes to us. The people of Nineveh will look at anyone who rejects the good news of Jesus Christ and say, How could you? We only had Jonah and we turned. And we're called to make disciples. We've been given the mission of proclaiming the gospel, which the book of Jonah is really about and points forward to. And this gospel that we proclaim, it's powerful. Like, I mean, try not to do the kind of job that Jonah did in running away and then preaching like as if you don't want people to turn. You don't want them to believe what you say. But even if you do, the gospel is unstoppable. Think of people around you who are like the Ninevites. Your enemies. You could be scared of them. Or like Jonah, you could think that they don't deserve God's mercy. Think of those people even now. And pray for them. Pray that they would hear the gospel. Pray that they would respond in repentance and that the Lord would have mercy on them. Maybe this is terrible advice, but perhaps God is calling you to share the gospel with someone you've grown to hate. Maybe even a nation you've grown to hate. Pray that his will would be done in your life, in and through you. You see, this message we see here in Jonah chapter 3, this message is like a hurricane or a riptide. They're unstoppable forces that affect everyone in their path. It doesn't matter who you are. The gospel will have its transforming life to the full, giving effect in all those he chooses. The gospel message we receive is so powerful that we bring those empty hands to him and he still uses us. Bring your empty hands, even hands that have failed, and receive his mission. The king here in verse 6, the king of Nineveh humbles himself. He recognizes the evil he has done and what he has led his people into, and he turns from it. We have just a quick line in verse 5 that the greatest to the least believed God, and then verse 6 focuses on the greatest of the great, the king. And that's significant. The king, as the ruler and one with authority, and who is leading his people towards evil, is highlighted. He's at the center, he's at the pinnacle of this exceedingly great city. He's directing how society runs, he's controlling everything. It's crucial that what's at the center, what's controlling everything, is truly affected. This king, like the whole of the city and the Ninevite kingdom, you would have thought that he could do whatever he wanted, that he could decide what was good for him. He chose to do evil and to carry out violence. He did this so he could get what he wanted. To build this great city, to have the life he envisaged for himself. Yet this message of judgment, it comes to him. It's what's at the heart of Nineveh that's humbled. And the gospel must make its way to the center of who you are. We must let the gospel speak to whatever is ruling our lives, whatever is at the center of our hearts. It's not okay just to let it affect things at the gates of our lives, those things out on the edge in the suburbs. The epicenter of our will, of our intellect, of our reason and emotions must be changed. That we say, I'm no longer calling the shots ultimately. I'm stepping down from the throne, taking off my robe of authority, and I'm humbling myself before God. It's like those weeds that are growing up at the moment. Spring has sprung, and so it's beautiful out there, but there's the weeds are coming up, and I see them in the gaps in the pavement of the front of our house. I can pull the flower, I can pull the stem, I can pull the leaves off the dandelion, but if I don't get to the root, it'll just come back. Or maybe for our programming friends, it's more like trying to patch a program rather than doing a complete rewrite. There's something at the most fundamental and basic level that needs to be completely changed. That's where the gospel needs to have its way with us. It needs to humble us. It needs to cause us to turn from our evil. It needs to show us that we have empty hands. Humble the king of your heart. Turn from your evil by bringing your empty hands to him. And the sincerity we see through the passage, the sincerity of their repentance is staggering. It's a complete 180. Nothing is spared. The king himself, he comes down from his throne, he removes his robes, and he puts on sackcloth instead. And he sits in ashes. It's no half-hearted thing, which is in stark contrast to God's prophet Jonah. And it doesn't stop there. It goes to every man and even every animal. They don't drink, they don't eat. They're so moved by the words spoken to them that they make these drastic changes. It's clear that their hearts are completely undone and they turn to God in utter honesty with nothing. Not being willing to enjoy food or even to quench their thirst. They're so clearly serious about the change that they see the need that they need to make in turning from their evil, of stopping their violence, that everything in the city stops. It comes to a standstill. Everyone puts on sackcloth. The sense of remorse that they feel is far greater than any sense of shame that they would feel for wearing sackcloth and sitting in ashes. And this makes a difference, doesn't it? It's clear they're not doing this out of religious piety. They're not trying to fool Jonah or God into thinking that they're serious about turning from their evil. It's obvious to see that they're sincere. And again, that makes a difference, doesn't it? We think it's important. In a courtroom, even today, if the defendant pleads guilty, if they show remorse and apologizes, and you can see the sincerity, and the judge sees the sincerity, that's taken into account. It doesn't make everything right again, but it's important to us that when somebody sincerely says sorry and shows it, we can we can see that it's it's actually happening. This change is actually happening. It's sincere. And what what does your turning to God look like? It all comes from and has to come from a heart that's been changed, but it reveals itself in our thoughts, in our words and actions. Is it as sincere as the Nineveh's here? Or is it just something you'll say you'll do like Jonah in the previous chapter in verse 9? Are you staying at that promise stage and yet continuing to live in our evil and violence towards God and towards others? Let that gospel penetrate down into the places of your heart that need to be transformed and sincerely give that to God. Sincerely turn to Him. And the king doesn't presume upon God's mercy. He doesn't assume he and the city will or should be saved. So he calls out for mercy. Verse 8 Let man and beast call out mightily to God. Who knows? God may turn and relent and turn from his fierce anger, so that we may not perish. This again is in stark contrast to Jonah in the previous chapter. Like Jonah's confession isn't all bad, but it's certainly a bit inconsistent. Not so in chapter 3 with this pagan king. Jonah comes before God and says, I remembered you, and my prayer came to you when you cast me into the sea. There's a lot of Jonah in Jonah's prayer. And just a few verses later, in our passage today, the king here knows he brings nothing but his empty hands and he calls out for mercy. Some of you here are in the possession of the Nineveh. You're an enemy of God. Now the story of Jonah is one of great hope for those enemies who call out to God for mercy. But for those who remain enemies of God, wrath is coming. A day of judgment is coming. That short sermon of Jonah's is still true for each of us unless God is merciful to us. It may not be 40 days from now. It may only be a matter of hours. But perhaps it won't be for 40 years or maybe even longer. But God's wrath is coming. His enemies will face the consequences of their evil. If that is you, I urge you to come humbly before God, sincerely turn to him and cry out to him for mercy. Come broken, come empty and seek his mercy. And for those of us who have been saved by him, who know the sweetness of receiving his mercy, see afresh his grace and his mercy in the way that he treats his enemies. We were his enemies. But now, because of his great mercy, we are his people. Praise God. And so when we look at how he responds to the Ninevehites when they turn from their evil, when they acknowledge their emptiness and brokenness, we're assured, we're assured yet again that we can cry out to him for mercy and help, and he will indeed be merciful and help us in our time of need. So ask God to be merciful to you. Look at your empty hands. Even see the stain of violence on them and call out mightily to God to be merciful to you. Turn from your evil and receive his mercy. How would you answer the question? What's the greatest miracle in the book of Jonah? What's the thing that seems most unbelievable? I think, hands down, it has to be the last verse of chapter 3, verse 10. God saves his enemies. God has mercy on them, and he relents from disaster. God does not destroy them, he's merciful to them. They deserve to be destroyed, but God saves them from the just end they had coming for them. God relents from disaster. And this is the God we come to. This is the God who is speaking to us now. As you bring your empty hands to Him, as you bring your failings, as you turn humbly from your evil, as you're sincere in that, as you cry out for mercy, what you find is you find a God who relents from disaster, who doesn't judge you as your sins deserve. It can be hard to trust, though, can't it? We sometimes think God is punishing us, that he's bringing disaster upon us. We can think, why would why would he stop this terrible thing that I see coming down the tracks? Why wouldn't he let me be destroyed? I don't bring anything, I don't deserve to have good and to be saved. I deserve actually to have it all taken away. But in Jonah chapter 3, we encounter the God who is gracious and compassionate, who's slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and who does indeed relent from disaster. As you turn to him, encounter the God who relents from disaster. But then you might look back through chapters one and two. Surely chapter one was a complete and utter disaster for Jonah, orchestrated by God. Jonah ran away, and God hurled a great wind upon the sea. Surely there wasn't much relenting from disaster for Jonah. Yes, the sailors were saved. They saw God stop the wind and the waves and how disaster didn't end up coming upon them. But for Jonah, that was a disaster and God's hand was in it. Yet as we take the time to read the whole book and follow what God is doing through the whole thing, we see, don't we, that God used that wind in chapter one to restore Jonah and to bring him back. And not only for Jonah, but through bringing him back, God uses Jonah to save his enemies. Seeing it all in that light makes us see that God graciously used what seemed like disaster to save not only Jonah, not only to bring Jonah back, but to save many, many people. What disasters have you faced in life? What disasters do you fear the most? How do you relate them to God? How do you relate them to his sovereignty? These are some hard questions, aren't they? What happens if this thing or that thing is taken away from me? Maybe it can feel like we're being punished. It feels like something is happening to us that's just so cruel. Maybe we reason with ourselves and think, okay, well, I'm supposed to learn something here. This is making me into the person I'm meant to be. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger and all that. That's still really hard. Saying those things doesn't always cut it. What we find here in chapter three is a city. A king who realizes who realizes that they have nothing, that they cannot hold back this impending disaster. They're gonna be overthrown and they can't do anything about it. They see their empty hands. They see that they can't fight this off. They see that they can't do enough to stop this. They can't do it in their own efforts. What do they do? They turn to God. They believe Him. They look to Him. They cry out for mercy. What do they find? They find a God who relents from disaster. And that's what we find too. It's not necessarily easy. But that's what we find. Encounter this God who relents from disaster. Trust this God who is merciful. Worship this God who saves his enemies. In the depths of worry about impending disaster, encounter this good and merciful God. Well, how can this be? How can God just relent from destroying evil like that? When you think about it logically, you think, well, God, if you don't punish sin, if you don't get rid of evil, then you're just being unjust. And that's true. Did the evil of the Ninevehes just dissolve into non-existence? The love we see God having for the Ninevites here, it actually requires justice. It's not loving to the people that they were violent against. It's not loving to the people who are affected by their evil to let them go scot-free. That's where we see the gospel most clearly. The God who relents from disaster is the God who took disaster on himself in the cross of the Lord Jesus. Not only does God turn from destroying these enemies, he takes that destruction on himself. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Jesus was plunged into the grave, to the depths of death for the sake of his enemies. He was in the belly of Sheol for three days. He's the king who came down from his throne and humbled himself, not because of his evil. He had none. But to take on the evil of his enemies. He took on God's fierce anger and wrath for our sake. On your behalf, on my behalf. God shows mercy to us not only in relenting from disaster, but taking that disaster on himself, taking our punishment, dying our death. This is the God we find in the gospel message that He proclaims to us. This is the Christ we meet when we turn from our evil and when we seek mercy. This is the powerful message that we share far and wide. This is the Christ we worship and adore. This is the God we receive when we bring our empty hands. So, brother, sister, bring your empty hands and receive Him. Let's pray. Lord Jesus, you came down from your perfect heavenly throne in humility to become like us. You took on flesh like us and lived among us. Yet not only did you live with us and among us, you took on the disaster that was coming for us because of our sin. We can know grace upon grace because you were destroyed for our sake. We receive mercy beyond comprehension because you died for us. Would you drive those truths deeper and deeper into our hearts? May the gospel so shape and transform us that we turn from our evil again and again, that we would repent with greater sincerity and find you more and more, the God who is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and who relents from disaster. We praise you, our merciful God. Amen.

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