Unknown: He's one of the most scrutinized characters in the Old Testament. In fact, critics will often bring up his name. I mean, you really believe that a guy was swallowed by a fish and he lived to write about it. I mean, to be fair, it's the makings of fables. Like a fish saves a man by swallowing him then Ubers him back to land, like that's the stuff you really believe. Well, Jesus did. I mean, Jesus talked about Jonah and the fish, and it may have the makings of fantasy. His story may be seen as one. It's more just reserved for children.
Unknown: But for the next few weeks, we're gonna find that Jonah's story goes well beyond a fish.
Unknown: We're gonna meet a prophet who was not used to having any sort of confrontation. We'll follow him through the gates of one of the most intimidating cities that has ever sat on planet Earth, and we'll discover some bitterness lodged in his heart.
Unknown: And throughout the journey, we're gonna find that we all have a little bit of Jonah in us. It's gonna be great. It's gonna also hurt, but it's what we do around here. Jonah chapter one, if you're following along in the Bible, it's in the chairs. PAGE 774, in those Bibles. Otherwise, phones, tablets, we have the bridge app.
Unknown: But I really encourage you to grab a Bible, because this is just what we like to do around here. We like to grab a section of scripture and then just go right through it, and we're going to be in this book for the next few weeks. Here.
Unknown: It was a it was four years ago, almost of the day, but it was a day that I won't soon forget. So our flight was that night, and we had a full day to burn. It was Jordan, our campus pastor ranchers, he and I, we spent the whole day in in Jaffa, and locals had told us that there were remnants of a massive like massive wood dock pillars from the time of Jonah that could still be seen in the water, and we had a whole day to waste, and so we walked around the small downtown and that's when we ran across this little hole in the wall barber shop. Now, we didn't need a haircut, but we went in and hung out with the barbers.
Unknown: They were they were fun to hang out with. And I noticed a ladder going up into the attic, and the light was on up there. Said, Well, what's up in the attic?
Unknown: The barber said, well, oh, my wife, she gives tattoos up in the attic. I said, Really, you know, we have like, an hour to kill. Can she tattoo like right now? Now, we were not planning on getting tattoos in an attic from a stranger, or really getting tattoos really at all, especially in a non discrete area. We got our hands tattooed, and it made us really, really late to our flight. Maybe we didn't make the brightest of decisions in Jaffa, but to our defense, 3000 years before, there's a man who made an even worse decision in this little port town of Jaffa, and the circumstances surrounding that decision are absolutely worth unpacking, and that's what we're going to do right now. Let me pray, and we'll jump in, father.
Unknown: We do. We thank you for the scripture that we hold in our hands. We thank you for this story, this story that has been preserved for generations upon generations upon generations, a story that, in some aspects, is a little bit difficult to believe, but it's a story that hits us right between the eyes, and so Father, may we not spend this time fighting off any sort of conviction, but just be open to what you have for us here today on these pages, we pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.
Unknown: Well as the lens of Scripture zooms in, we actually find ourselves far from that little port town of Jaffa, actually the hills near where Jesus will grow up. It tucked in the northern bluffs of Israel. So it's a tiny little town called Gath hepher.
Unknown: It's a town that has very little to offer. There's just not much to see or do. If it were a town today, it might have $1 General if you're lucky. Historically, it's a no name village made up of mainly just poor blue collar farmers, but today, one man is putting this little town on the map. He's a prophet, and he's a rare Prophet in that he has a great approval rating among his people. See, most prophets were very lonely because they would ruffle feathers. They would say things that people didn't like.
Unknown: That was their job. But Jonah, up until this point, mainly had positive messages for the people. He was well liked. But with that favorable popularity can also come this challenge.
Unknown: See, when people really like you, can you risk that? Can you risk your approval rating and damage your image? To confront people, and Jonah is about to struggle with that tension.
Unknown: Verse one, it says The Lord gave this message to Jonah, son of Emma Ty he said, Get up, go to the great city of Nineveh, announce my judgment against it, because I've seen how wicked his people are now. Because this is such a popular kid story, maybe like gripping church, or maybe you visited church growing up.
Unknown: You're like, oh yeah, I think I remember this story, because we can kind of think of the story as a child. We can easily oversimplify what's going on here. Jonah. Spoiler alert, Jonah, Jonah is about to ditch an assignment, and right away, we can sit here. We can read this. We can think like, what my Sunday School teacher taught me when I was little, is like, naughty, naughty. Do.
Unknown: Jonah, you should listen to God, you should go to Nineveh. It's like, well, yes, but let's also not make the mistake of thinking that if we were in Jonah's shoes or sandals, that we would do any better. Like, my goodness, we like to whine about being in Illinois and Chicago. I don't think we would do any better about marching into Nineveh.
Unknown: There's a lot going on here. So to Jonah's credit, this right here. This doesn't make any sense for a couple of reasons.
Unknown: First off, Jonah. For Jonah, he's a prophet. He's a Jewish prophet to Jewish people. He's a Jewish man living in a Jewish town, speaking to Jewish people, but the Jewish God, Yahweh, that's Jonah's job description, if there was one Nineveh, is not a Jewish city with Jewish people at all, like, by any stretch. So right on the front end, this is a total job change. You ever had that happen?
Unknown: Like, you got your job and you've been doing it for months, or maybe doing it for years, and you're sitting, you're doing your job, and then the boss comes up to you, he's like, Hey, we're changing, like, everything up. And then you kind of get frustrated because, like, wait, what? This is not what I signed up to do. It's kind of like if you were to go to work tomorrow and your boss were to come into your cubicle and say, Hey, little job change for you. Okay, you still work for us, but we're flying you to North Korea tonight, and you're gonna tell the regime to their face that they're really wrong that, I mean, that's, that's really what Jonah's looking at here. So we're, I think we can be way too quick to go like naughty, naughty Jonah, because we don't know much about Nineveh. So let's get to know Nineveh just a little bit. Excavations are currently being done as we speak. Nineveh is in northern current Iraq, and we're finding more and more about this place, and it's actually pretty horrific the more we find out about Nineveh, here's what it would have looked like during the time of Jonah. It had a lot to see. It had world renowned hanging gardens, it had parks, it even had a zoo. But don't let the beauty deceive you, this city was brimming with like the worst kind of sadistic acts.
Unknown: Even today, Nineveh is known for its creativity in torture. They were very proud of it, like throughout Nineveh Palace on the wall, depictions on the palace wall were of torture that were plastered there. They had libraries of tablets to educate you in how to torture. In fact, many of these tablets have survived today. Their most common form of torture was flang. That was their favorite skinning people alive. That was their favorite torture. But that was just the start. Many depictions speak of taking innocent people and cutting off their limbs and gouging out eyes and then allowing them to roam the city, just as like billboards of the brutality for anyone who dare opposed them.
Unknown: There were accounts of sewing people together for entertainment. I'm not going to go into the specifics of it, because I don't want a full email inbox tomorrow morning, but it is said that they devised ways of exploding victims bladders as part of their entertainment. So there's libraries of ancient manuals on how to torture people for sport.
Unknown: That's Nineveh, and it wasn't just a torture method. It was the amount of victims that they would torture. Nobody was safe.
Unknown: So let's set aside that whole like kids led lens that we can have when we approach this text and really put ourselves into Jonah sandals here, Nineveh is not your target audience.
Unknown: Nineveh is only the place that you've really seen or talked about in your nightmares. It's an empire that has attacked your people. Oh, and almost forgot, it's 700 miles away. It's about two months two two month walk.
Unknown: So you might want to get started on that road. Now today, we complain about traveling today, where we can drive to an airport, get in this tube jet across the sky, over oceans, as we eat a little biscuit watching reruns of the office land in another part of the world. And yet we still complain the whole way there. Here's Jonah God's saying, hey, I want you to take a two month walk, basically a death march, to a bunch of sadistic monsters and tell them that they're wrong. Best case scenario, they're gonna stab you on the spot, and you'll die quickly. All right, go do that like nothing about this assignment is appealing. Nothing verse three, but Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish. Now, the location of Tarshish is, like hotly debated, but many scholars believe that Tarshish was West Spain. So this is like the furthest west of the known world at the time. So God says, Hey, go east, young man. Jonah finds the most West spot on a map and says, it kind of feeling, this feels right, right here. And knowing Nineveh, I don't know, it's kind of hard to blame him.
Unknown: It's even harder to blame him when we begin to realize, at some level, you and I are doing the very same thing as Jonah is right now. So we'll take a time out from this narrative for just a second. We'll get back to in just a second, but I venture to say there's a piece of your life where you're playing Jonah like there's part of your life where God has called you to something.
Unknown: Thing and you don't like that something. God has called you to step in. God has called you to step up. God has called you to stay in that. God has called you to lead out. God has called you to be a presence there, to sacrifice there, like there's something, whether it's big or small, God has called you to that something. And our initial response, mine, too, can be like, well, then I need to get as far away from you. Fill in the blank. I need to get as far away from this marriage. I need to get as far away from this situation. I need to get as far away from this city. I need to get as far away as I can from this conviction. I need to have that conversation with that person, but I'm walking away from it. I need to come clean on this. I need to apologize. I need to lead here. I need to serve here. I need to sacrifice here. But I'm not going to I'm getting away from that. I'm not gonna submit. I'm going the other way. And as I avoid I'm going to justify it. I'm gonna grab my own narrative as I run away from it.
Unknown: So again, it's really easy to look at Jonah. You're like, Jonah, what are you doing here?
Unknown: Well, come on, man, but we do this all the time.
Unknown: Where might you be doing? What Jonah's doing?
Unknown: Or maybe a better question, what's your Nineveh? What is your Nineveh? Because God's called you to something. What is it for you? Maybe it's a person that God put on your heart and God's been pushing you to invite them, or God's been pushing you to speak life into them or serve them. But they're a headache and they're really hard to deal with. Or maybe it's an apology.
Unknown: Your Nineveh is an apology you need to make you were wrong. You didn't handle that right, and you try to be nice to make up for it, but at the end of the day, an apology is needed. It's just kind of your Nineveh that you've been running from it.
Unknown: Maybe it's somewhere to serve.
Unknown: Maybe it's getting baptized, like we did last weekend. Maybe it's a marriage that needs attention, maybe it's an addiction that needs addressing, maybe it's bitterness that you just need to release, or it's a relationship that needs to end.
Unknown: Maybe it's something to surrender, but you have a Nineveh, I have a Nineveh, what's your Nineveh?
Unknown: What do you tend to maybe not physically run from, but you just avoid rest of verse three has this fascinating idea. Again, I just like to picture this because it's a narrative, and so you're like invited into the narrative to just imagine what's going on here. There stands Jonah. He's on the shores of Joppa or Jaffa.
Unknown: He's staring at the beautiful Mediterranean. Behind him is a road that leads to Nineveh, but on the docks, sways a boat. This is an out end of verse three, it says, so he paid the fare, went down into the boat to go with them to Tarshish away from the presence of the Lord. Now I find that that phrase right here is really interesting. Scripture is clear that God is what we call omnipresent, a little theology sidebar for a second. But omnipresent means that God is is everywhere, that nothing is out of his reach. I loved how my my theology professor when I was in college, he explained it actually my theology professor that was a pastor here for a while. He explained it that when he was newly married, he he and his wife, they had this tiny, tiny, tiny apartment with this tiny, the tiniest kitchen he'd ever seen. He said we could sit at our table, and as we're sitting at our table, everything in the kitchen was, was within our reach. So if my wife asked, Could you grab the butter? I would grab it off the off the counter. My wife said, Hey, could you grab a spoon? I would open the drawer and grab, grab a spoon and give everything was within my reach, in in the kitchen. That's how God is fact.
Unknown: King David wrote in Psalm 139, man, if I go to the heavens, you're there. If I make my bed in the depths, you're there. God doesn't reside in one location where it's like you go to church, and that's where God resides. No, he's everything is within his reach. He's at your home. He's at your office. He's in traffic off, which is tough.
Unknown: Sometimes he's omnipresent. He's everywhere, which makes this phrase right here, really, really intriguing.
Unknown: Jonah went away from the presence of the Lord.
Unknown: Well, that seems like a contradiction, doesn't it? It's not something that we have to keep in mind is Jonah wrote this account in Hebrew. Hebrew is a very picturesque language. It's far more picturesque than our English language. The original Hebrew here in verse three, paints this image of Jonah turning his face from God.
Unknown: It's a bit like, what's the meme say, where it's nothing on earth is faster than a child with something in their mouth after you've asked them what's in their mouth? You know, talking about, like, maybe my kids were the only ones who would do this, but they'd like, pop a toy in their mouth and be like, Hey, what did you put in your mouth? And then they, like, try to, like, run off. You know, they're like, a year and a half, all I had to do is, like, extend my arm and grab them, be like, what's in your mouth? That's the picture here that Jonah is, like this toddler with something in their mouth, turns his back from God Almighty and tries to run.
Unknown: You can't run from God, but Jonah did turn his back from God.
Unknown: But here's what I find so fascinating in this verse here, according to verse three again, which I hope you have in front of you. Verse three, where is the presence of the Lord?
Unknown: Well, it'd be like behind Jonah's back, okay, but where specifically is the presence?
Unknown: Now, it's everywhere. But for Jonah, what would it be like to get into the presence of the Lord?
Unknown: Oh, it'd be Nineveh, that's wild to me in the godless city of Nineveh, what I've missed this before?
Unknown: What a massive, massive point here in Scripture. If Jonah wants to draw close to God, yeah, God is everywhere. But if Jonah wants to draw close to God, Jonah must go to where God has called him, the godless city of Nineveh.
Unknown: Same might be true with you, and this, though this might not taste well, this might help answer some of your fear, your spiritual frustration.
Unknown: You ever feel spiritual, spiritually frustrated? Just kind of feel like, Man, I'm like, out of sync with God, you know, like just a little distance. Distant, you know, like you have your connection with God, but I don't know it's just kind of like, cool. Do you ever feel that, just like, almost like, in a spiritual funk? It's like, all right, you're in church, which is great. You should be in church, and you're trying to read your Bible, which is great. And you're praying when you remember, maybe even, like a small group, and you're serving and you're giving and all that's great. And you love God for sure. You don't like don't doubt that, but for some reason, you just kind of feel spiritually off. You ever feel that? Because I can feel that it's like that spiritual frustration. It could be that you're experiencing Jonah one three here, that you're avoiding a situation, you're avoiding a person, a conversation, a confession, an apology. God is calling you to it. His presence is there, but you've turned your back like a little toddler with something in their mouth running away. Their mouth running away from it. To draw close to God is to draw close to that situation. To draw close to your Nineveh, to draw close to God practically might look like drawing close to your spouse.
Unknown: To draw close to God might practically look like ending that relationship. To draw close to God might practically look like confessing. To draw close to God might practically look like releasing that bitterness.
Unknown: It looks like going to your Nineveh. And that's like an incredible thought when you meditate on that. So you can't, this is in your notes, you can't draw close to God while refusing is leading.
Unknown: And maybe that's like, well, obviously, but if we're to be honest, I think part of us is there. God's leading us somewhere, but we're refusing, and we feel frustrated.
Unknown: The way I see it, it's like, it's a bit ago, my daughter, who shall remain, remain nameless, but she's my youngest. She she needed help with her school project, and since it wasn't math, I helped her out. My daughter's math teacher asked me not to help her with her homework, not because she was getting things more right we were cheating, but because I was making it worse. I guess I was getting worse grades than just her on her own, but English and history I can, I can help her with and so we started this project, and I had this like idea for her, and she wasn't listening to anything I had to say, any sort of like recommendations I had, she wanted nothing to do with it.
Unknown: She had her way of doing things, and anytime I would like, step in, she's very resistant or had excuses, you know, of why that, why that wasn't gonna work. And so after a while, I said, Baby, I love you. When you want daddy's help, turn to me and I will be there to help. But it's obvious you really don't want my guidance on this. Five minutes later, she's crying. She's like, Why won't anyone help me? It's like, Baby, all you had to say is, all right, Dad, I'm listening. I could use your help here, and I'm there. Like, Why won't anyone help me? But as silly as that, as that looks like, that represents so many of us that there's this desire in you for God. I mean, yeah, God designed you with that desire for your Creator. And so we feel this pull to want to be close to God, but the flesh part of us wants things our way. That's why we hate submission. And so you and I can go throughout life.
Unknown: Can go throughout our week as like the seven year old working on a school project is like my way, my opinions, my thinking, my desires, my feelings, and God dad steps in with some conviction and says, Hey, that's not good. You should own up to that. Hey, you should have that conversation. You need to go back and apologize. You need to stay in that. You need to humble yourself. You need to submit here. You need to let that go, but we have all excuses. No, God, that won't work, that won't work, can't do that. Meanwhile, we're getting more and more frustrated, and God's God's saying, Man, I've taken great steps toward you, but you keep resisting me every time I'm calling you to something. You're resisting making this marriage better. You're resisting submitting to those people that I put over you. You're resisting my conviction to confess and apologize, and so I'll be right here. I'll be right here when you're ready to do this with me.
Unknown: And I wonder how many of us just lived a week of Jonah one, three.
Unknown: Maybe you'd never outright say this, but in reality, you've turned your back on what God is calling you to. You're avoiding people, you're avoiding situations, you're avoiding responsibilities, you're avoiding conversations, you're avoiding attitude change. And the scariest part is nothing will change until we admit that many will go decades with their back on God's calling. I see it all the time. It's Christians who age badly because they just resist God's leading. And they actually kind of.
Unknown: Get used to resisting God's leading and resisting God's conviction, and it scares me, because I could easily find myself there, maybe none of us in this room. It's an incredible picture here. It blows my mind.
Unknown: The presence of God for Jonah, for Jonah to draw close to God was to go to Nineveh, and it's for us too. Verse four, it says, But the Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship threatened to break up. So the storm is building over the Mediterranean, darkening the water. The waves become white capped and grow in size. The winds move the dark, shelved cloud into the boat's path. The temperature drops, the winds pick up, sweeping the mist across the water. The boat creaks. The hearts skip a beat.
Unknown: I love, I love a good storm.
Unknown: Last year, I was on a big boat, never been on, like a large ship, and we were out on the waters as Hurricane Debbie was picking up steam, and it was just like so fun to watch it roll in. There was one night where Nicole and I and the girls, we sat on the deck, and we're just watching these dark clouds like dance, almost like dance over the waters, and this distant lightning and the waves below growing angry, and the boat we were around was like massive, like, these huge stabilizers below deck, like we were hardly rocking at all. The storm was fun because we were totally safe. But I remember, in that moment, like I'd said to the girls, like girls, think about being Jonah though, imagine we got on a small, little dinghy out on those waters, being tossed like a rag doll and the dark water be terrifying, but notice a series of events here in Scripture, Jonah runs storm brews, and it gives us point number two, we create some storms. We create some storms. Now, I know, yes, I know, I know. I know. Verse four says, God created the storm.
Unknown: Absolutely, God created the storm, of course, but Jonah's actions triggered it, and so do ours. Sometimes we create some storms. In fact, you might be dealing with some storms, even today, this last week that you had a hand in making we create some storms, not all storms. Sometimes this broken, sin, stained world will throw us a tragedy, one that we did not create, and we have to navigate it. But like Jonah here, many storms in life we create, and it sucks to own it. But I will say personal experience. The people I see who are who are healthiest spiritually, they're people who are very quick to own their part in creating a storm.
Unknown: I talked to a lady just the other day, and it's feeling for just like this huge family mess, and it's just awful. And my heart broke her, and I just thought, Man, I'm I'm so sorry.
Unknown: And she said something that really took me back. She said, Yeah, but I created a lot of this, like, what? Yeah, I contributed here and here and here years ago. And some of this is consequences of what I created. It's not shame. It's like, Man, she's in a position to pull through and not create another storm. It's a very healthy way of seeing things.
Unknown: Now, on the flip side, some of those most bitter people I know rarely, if ever, consider how they contributed to creating their struggles. So a storm will hit in life, and when a storm hits in life, we must think, did I create any of this? Sometimes the answer is, No, I didn't. But usually, if we have the humility, we can find somewhere we contributed to this. How I wasn't leading the family? Well, we were not poised to handle this, or I wasn't wise financially, I wasn't caring about my health. And when we own that, then change is possible.
Unknown: He went in the next in the next few verses, verse 12, Jonah owns the storm. It's like this storm is my fault. And it's verse 12 where the narrative begins to change in some of our lives, we need narrative changes because you're struggling. You're dealing with these storms, marriage, Storm, financial, Storm, family, Storm, work, Storm, your attitude is your casualty. You need this narrative change in your life, and it happens here in verse 12, and Jonah owns up. He doesn't play the victim, he doesn't shift any blame. He says, Yeah, I've been running for my responsibility here. Now the storm still rages. Consequences are still in effect, but the narrative begins to change. And I wonder, I just wonder, if you are one humble admittance away from really changing the narrative of your family.
Unknown: I wonder if you are one humble admittance away from really changing the narrative of your career or your life.
Unknown: So verse 12, Jonah owns up.
Unknown: Verse 13 says, Nevertheless, the men rode hard to get back to dry land, but they could not, for the sea grew more and more temptuous against them.
Unknown: Therefore they called out to the Lord, O Lord, let us not perish for this man's life and lay not on us innocent blood, for you, O Lord, have done as it as it pleased you. Verse 15, so they picked up Jonah, hurled him into the sea, and the sea, the sea ceased from its raging. Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly, and they offered to sacrifice the Lord made vows. Are you picturing what's going on here?
Unknown: I like to picture a few burly sailors pick up a prop, pick up the Prophet. You know, just like He Ho over the rail, the Prophet's body slaps the water and the storm begins to calm.
Unknown: But here's, there's some beauty here that we can easily miss the storm.
Unknown: Ends up being a blessing, a tool to bring Jonah to a better place.
Unknown: And I think we can easily miss the beauty of what's going on here, because you and I can often have an off view of God.
Unknown: Most people tend to view God through the way we see our earthly dad. So some of us who had more of like absent dads, which is very deep pain. And I hurt for you if your dad is absent, very deep pain. And because of that experience with our earthly Dad, we can kind of view our heavenly dad as like on the verge of being absent. So we can live with this feeling of like, Man, if I upset god, he's about to take off. Because we kind of experience that with our earthly dad. So some people really struggle through that.
Unknown: Those of us who had more of a passive dad didn't really lead the home much of the marriage, much, just kind of coward to Mom was present, but didn't really take the lead much. We then tend to view God or our Heavenly Father as being as being one who exists. But he's not really all that super active. He's not super missional or highly active. He just kind of bends and sways, kind of winks at things, because that was really more of our earthly dad, then those of us who had, like, more of an authority, authoritarian dad, a little bit more cold, very, very heavy discipline, not so much fun. We tend to view our Heavenly Father as like chomping at the bit to punish us and judge us like he wants to catch us doing something wrong. And so for many people, their journey to having a healthier relationship with God is separating how they view their earthly dad versus their Heavenly Father. And I bring this up because, if you tend to view God as this, like, authoritarian, power hungry, you know, looking to catch us doing something wrong, which is a lot of people, then we can read this part of Jonah, and we see this storm is like, God is like, brewing up the storm, going, oh man, Jonah, I'm coming for you.
Unknown: I'm gonna squash you like a freaking bug. How dare you run from me. I'm going to crush you.
Unknown: And then when Jonah's body hits the water, it's like, I was like, okay, Storm's over.
Unknown: Gotcha? That's not what's going on here.
Unknown: Yes, this storm is a consequence of Jonah's sin. But consequence, consequences aren't God losing his temper and trying to, like, get even God is not a toxic father. Now God likes to use consequences, which hurt for sure, but God's desire is to use consequences to turn us back to him. It's why Hebrews 12 six says God disciplines those he loves. That there's love is linked to discipline. That's a big that's a big deal. It's big in our families. I'm gonna love your kids. There's discipline with our kids. I think about it in the context of, this is my dog. Her name's Luna. She's a mutt, and she's a rescue. She's She's a great dog.
Unknown: We love her. She's very good with the kids, and she's my wife running partner, and her little bed is like next to my nightstand. And she loves our family, and we love her, but she's been disciplined, especially in those those early days, she was like, she's a rescue. And so there's some early moments where I had to remind her, like, you're not the alpha. And she'd like, guard her food and growl anytime anybody would walk by. And so I take it away, don't know, like, then it's my food. I'd, you know, wrestle it away from her. I'd put her on her back and show her that, no, we're stronger. Didn't hurt her, but it's just discipline. Now today, years later, she enjoys our home. She enjoys the kids. She sleeps by me. If there's a storm, she'll like, jump up into bed and curl up next to me like we're her safety. She's a happy, loved dog because of the healthy discipline that steered her to have behavior that positioned her to enjoy the home that we created. Now, had I not disciplined her, either we couldn't have kept her or she'd be miserable, snapping and growling all the time, seeing us as her competition.
Unknown: It's the same with us and God.
Unknown: This is why God disciplines This isn't this storm is not like God flying off the handle like, No, I'm gonna drown you, you disobedient prophet. No, God is steering Jonah to a healthier direction. It hurts, but there's a reason for it, and I wonder if God might be doing the same in your life.
Unknown: It's why consequences can be sort of last notes. Consequences can be valuable, pending our response to them. Consequences can be very precious.
Unknown: See, it's this very moment as Jonah gasps for air, tasting the salt of the water, fighting to keep his head above each wave.
Unknown: It's this very terrifying, painful moment that is so pivotal in his life. The rest of Jonah's life will be, will be determined by his response to this. He's now treading water, sucking in Mediterranean water, but more than that, as Jonah's body hits the water, he's at this fork in the road. It's a fork that you and I often find ourselves at when we face a storm. Every single time you face a storm, whether it's a bump in your marriage or some difficulty at work, financial strength, any time you face a storm in life, you're really faced with a fork in the road, the four kids. How am I going to handle this storm? How am I going to handle this pain?
Unknown: Because it's either bitterness and anger or surrender and don't. Don't be too quick to answer this, because most people go the bitterness route.
Unknown: Most people go the anger route.
Unknown: Of I'm going to pack it away.
Unknown: I'm.
Unknown: It, and then it hollows you out.
Unknown: This is why some people struggle to worship. This is why some people struggle to feel empathy.
Unknown: They've just been hollowed out by bitterness and anger because they packed it away.
Unknown: And Jonah could have done that here. I would have understood it's like, come on, God. I serve you faithfully. I'm your prophet. I worship you. I devoted my life to you. Then you decide to send me on this death mission, and then you wreck my boat.
Unknown: I'm bitter, angry. I've been understandable. This is many, many, many professing Christians, and I would venture to say at somewhere in your life, this is you. You went the bitterness route. You chose anger, not like intentionally, but you just did. You became bitter. And then when God blesses other people, it kind of bothers you, because they got blessing, and I got a storm.
Unknown: And so what happens is there's a spiritual chip on your shoulder and the circumstances that God wants to use to bring you closer to him, some of that pain you used it to push him away. It's what Scripture calls a stiff neck.
Unknown: It's most people. It's like we stiffen. It's a defense mechanism. It's like something bad happens. I'm going to stiffen because I don't want to feel this pain, so I'm gonna stiffen, but when we stiffen to not feel pain, we don't feel anything, we don't feel excitement, we don't feel empathy, we just become desensitized.
Unknown: Holistically. That's why many professing Christians haven't grown in decades.
Unknown: Been church, maybe every weekend, but they just they look the same as they did 10 years ago. Spiritually, they've just stiffened. And if you were to dig deep into their life, you'd find that there's some anger buried in their past from a situation that they didn't surrender. They just stiffened.
Unknown: But as we'll see with Jonah next week, the few who walk through that storm and surrender, it's in that surrender that they're able to open up their hands to what God has for him in that.
Unknown: And so the big question is, where are you at?
Unknown: Like you have a Nineveh, and if the Holy Spirit convicts you, like the Holy Spirit convicts me, something came to mind, that Nineveh came to mind somewhere, someone, something, that God's calling you to and maybe he's been calling you to that for years, but you've been avoiding it because it's humbling, it's hard, it doesn't seem fair.
Unknown: Somebody else should be doing that. Somebody else should take that responsibility. But deep down, you know, God, put it on my plate. It's a person to love.
Unknown: It's a job to do. It's a confession to make, it's a place to serve. It's a situation where I need to submit.
Unknown: What's your response going to be? Because it's either surrender and go to Nineveh or it's I'm going to avoid and the only other way is bitterness and anger.
Unknown: What has your response, Ben, have you found yourself walking down that road of anger, bitterness, desensitized, stiffened my neck proof is in the pudding. It's like, No, my marriage hasn't gotten any better. My heart hasn't gotten any better over the years, my work hasn't gotten any better over the years, my relationship hasn't gotten any that. Nineveh hasn't gotten any better over the years, proof is in the pudding because I've stiffened up and I've avoided it, or have you surrendered God? You know, I don't love this, you know, I'd rather not go here, but it's what you're calling me to. It's where you are. And since it's where you are, it's where I want to be.
Unknown: Your will be done.
Unknown: Where are you at when it comes to this really leads us to our So what questions, question we ask every, every time we get into God's word. Okay, so what? It's a fun narrative, and we're gonna have even more fun with this narrative in the coming weeks. A lot of fun. But this also has to change our own week. And so, so what? How's this gonna change your week? I got a bonus. So what question two this week?
Unknown: First off, it's a question we've already asked, What is your Nineveh? And I'm sure something already came to mind, but what is it? And maybe you've been fighting it off, but what's your Nineveh?
Unknown: It's a person, it's a place, it's an action.
Unknown: What's been what's God been calling you to that you've been avoiding.
Unknown: The second question is, what's it gonna look like to take a step toward your Nineveh, this week?
Unknown: What's that step this week?
Unknown: Tomorrow, tonight? Really look like maybe it's starting that conversation. And you know, it's gonna be a series of conversations, but it's gonna start tonight. I'm gonna take a step tonight. Maybe it's I need to get into counseling. We need to get this marriage into counseling. Maybe it's confession. I need to go and confess. Maybe it's an apology that you've been withholding.
Unknown: What does it really look like to take a step toward your Nineveh, Father, we thank You for this text and.
Unknown: We thank you for I just thank You that Scripture doesn't Candy Coat everything, because it's it's so easy to see ourselves here in Jonah and Father, as we come before you, just in this time of reflection as we sit before you and reflect on your word and reflect on your conviction. God, I ask that you continue to speak to us. You so just take this time before God.
Unknown: What's that next step toward your Nineveh, look like this week.
Unknown: Maybe make some confessions and some commitment. I'll close this out in prayer. In just a second, Father, we thank you that because of Jesus, you offer us forgiveness that you are ready to meet us with grace and mercy, just like as we'll see next week, that you met with Jonah, Father, we may we exercise just our faith in you and our thankfulness for the cross and the empty tomb By constantly living open to you, walking toward the places toward that which you've called us to.
Unknown: We pray this in Jesus name Amen.
Unknown: You.