Pastor Bob Erbig: Well, this morning we're continuing our series on Jonah, running from mercy.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We have come to Jonah chapter 4, and one of the it's it's if you've not read Jonah 4 recently, it is one of the most uh intriguing chapters and conclusions in all of Scripture.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Uh and if you're just joining us, let me just recap for you.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Uh Jonah, the prophet, uh, was called by God to preach repentance to the city of Nineveh, a major city in the Assyrian Empire.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But instead he runs away.
Pastor Bob Erbig: God stops him with a storm.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Uh he gets thrown into the ocean, swallowed by a big fish, of course, in Jonah.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That fish then vomits him back on the shore, where he chooses to obey God, go and go to Nineveh to preach to them.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, last week Pastor Dave covered chapter three, uh, where we saw Jonah's missionary efforts in a hostile culture, and shockingly, the Ninevites turned from their wicked ways and believe in Yahweh God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Chapter three ends on a high note in verse 10.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We read this: When God saw what they did, 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.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now that verse is a majestic picture of God's mercy toward people who don't deserve it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: His mercy and grace are what he offers to us also in the gospel message.
Pastor Bob Erbig: This mercy is what all people need to hear, and it is the cause for which missionaries give their entire lives.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And that was the story of Mer Merilyn Escher.
Pastor Bob Erbig: If you don't know Marilyn, she's a world venture missionary deployed to Senegal, West Africa, uh, focusing on Bible translation.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And also, if you're not aware, MBC has a strategic mission focus on Senegal.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We've been doing that for over 20 years.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Uh, thank you to Paul Wilford for his visionary leadership in those efforts.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Um, we have another trip planned, uh, April 1st to the 11th, 2027, so that's next April.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Uh, save the date.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And if God is nudging your heart this morning or later on to go, uh, please talk with Paul.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He can tell you all the details.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Again, our series on Jonah is focused on missions.
Pastor Bob Erbig: VBS is a way to live out our missionary call locally, and traveling to Senegal is a way to live it out globally.
Pastor Bob Erbig: In fact, I remember visiting Senegal about a decade ago where I met Marilyn and heard her passionately speak about translating the Bible into the dominant language of Senegal, which is Wolof.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Uh, Woloff.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, World Venture had begun these efforts as early as 1963.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Marilyn here joined the team in 1972, and so she's been laboring for over 50 years trying to learn the language and lead a team of translators to bring God's word to the Woloff people in Senegal.
Pastor Bob Erbig: The Wolof are notoriously difficult to reach for the gospel, and removing that language barrier would help open doors for Jesus.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now that translation, which Marilyn has worked on for over 50 years, was finally completed in early 2026.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And Christians across Senegal have been holding celebrations.
Pastor Bob Erbig: You can see some pictures here.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It's a big deal for missions in Senegal.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And Marilyn, now in her 80s, attended these celebrations, marking the completion of her life's work.
Pastor Bob Erbig: A huge missional success story.
Pastor Bob Erbig: The gospel may now explode in Senegal as a result.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, how do you picture her reaction at these celebrations?
Pastor Bob Erbig: I suspect you might think there will be joy on her face.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But what if something different happened?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Imagine for a moment that Marilyn stood up holding the finished translation of the Wolof Bible in her hands, listening to reports about the Wolf people turning to Christ, and instead of joy, she became enraged.
Pastor Bob Erbig: She took the Wolf Bible and threw it out the window and then stormed out of the room.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Would you find that startling?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Confusing?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Awkward?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Well, that's exactly what happens in Jonah chapter 4.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That after the missionary success of chapter 3, you would expect Jonah to be dancing in the streets like King David, praising God's goodness.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But that doesn't happen.
Pastor Bob Erbig: In fact, quite the opposite.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah has some words with God about his character and his goodness and his mercy.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so Jonah's running again, but this time in his heart.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, before we dive into the text, I want to invite you to ask yourself a question today.
Pastor Bob Erbig: What makes you angry?
Pastor Bob Erbig: In fact, perhaps there's a listener here today who has never been angry a day in their life.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And if that is you, find me after the service because we could put your counseling skills to work.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But of course, all of us get angry at some point in our lives.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So what makes you angry?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Maybe somebody cuts you off in traffic and waves like it's your fault.
Pastor Bob Erbig: A friend talks about you behind your back and then you find out.
Pastor Bob Erbig: A spouse leaves one drop of milk in the container and then puts it back in the fridge.
Pastor Bob Erbig: See, we live in a fallen, broken, dysfunctional world full of fallen, broken, dysfunctional people, and at some point we all get angry at somebody.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now let's raise the stakes.
Pastor Bob Erbig: What makes you angry, or what could make you angry at God's mercy towards somebody else?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, I don't mean here the kind of anger when life doesn't go your way.
Pastor Bob Erbig: I mean something a little more uncomfortable.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Has it ever bothered you when God has been good to somebody who you think didn't deserve it?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now I know we're all good Christians here today, and we're not supposed to admit something like this, but I suspect that some of us have felt exactly that at some point in our lives, even if we didn't say it out loud.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Maybe you knew somebody who cut corners or broke rules or hurt somebody along the way, and they end up being blessed anyway.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Right?
Pastor Bob Erbig: That promotion, that reputation, that second chance that you never got, this person got it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And you say, God, why have you been good to this person?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Maybe it's a parent who was never there, who caused real damage, or simply wasn't present for any of your life, and then they call you from a hospital bed in their final weeks and say they've made things right with God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And everybody around them calls it beautiful.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And part of you wants to believe that too.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Part of you thinks, though, that this person got 60 seconds of Jesus, I'm sorry, on their way out, and that's supposed to undo everything.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Or if you take it further still, right now in northern Nigeria, there's militants tied to groups like Boko Haram who have burned churches, kidnapped schoolgirls, and murdered Christians for their faith by the thousands over years.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now put yourself in their shoes.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Suppose you woke up tomorrow to the news that all those people who had done all those murders laid down their weapons and gave their lives to Jesus.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Would your first reaction be joy?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Or would some part of you think, not them, not after what they did.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's not a small thing to feel.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And it's not new.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It's the exact thing happening in the heart of a prophet named Jonah.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Because here's what we actually do sometimes with salvation without realizing it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We treat salvation like a privilege instead of a gift.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We love it when God shows us grace.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We're just not always so sure.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We want him to show it to those people.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And that's where we find Jonah in chapter four.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And that's why Jonah's ending is both fascinating and overlooked.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Because it invites us into an uncomfortable question.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Is it possible to know God accurately and still be at war with him?
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's the topic of Jonah chapter four, verses one through four.
Pastor Bob Erbig: The chapter is so interesting, I'd like to split it into two sermons.
Pastor Bob Erbig: The first section unfolds in three scenes.
Pastor Bob Erbig: First, we're going to see an angry prophet.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Second, we're going to see a gracious God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And then finally, we experience a revealing lament.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So let's pray, and then we will look at our text today.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Heavenly Father, I thank you for each person who is here, for each person who is listening right now, Lord.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And I pray this morning that you, Holy Spirit, would come and meet us where we are.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Meet us in our anger, meet us in our disappointments, meet us in our fears.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And Lord, would you turn all of those things into joy and trust?
Pastor Bob Erbig: And may you get the glory for that, Lord God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Father, there's a little bit of Jonah in all of us, Lord.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so I pray that you would remove that, bring us to repentance and a new delight in you and your gospel and your grace, Lord God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Thank you for your word.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We now give you this time and ask that you would speak to us in Jesus' name.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Amen.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So Jonah chapter 3 ends with Nineveh's repentance and God's relentance.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It's a story made for a Sunday morning testimony of God's grace in somebody's life.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We had a baptism at the end of the set at the first service.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We have another one at the end of this service.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We're going to hear about God's grace in people's lives.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah now is a picture of missionary success.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He courageously preaches, even when his life is at risk.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And it worked.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Right?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah chapter 4 begins this way, though.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It says, but, but despite those efforts, it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah's angry.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, for you Seinfeld fans out there, this verse deserves the Kramer reaction.
Pastor Bob Erbig: What in the world?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Come on, Jonah.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now to make it even more jarring, a literal translation of the original Hebrew here would read, It was evil.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It was evil to Jonah with great evil.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So he's not just really upset here.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He thinks God's action of saving the Ninevehites is evil.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Make no mistake, Jonah hates what God has done here.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But notice there's a powerful word play at work, right?
Pastor Bob Erbig: The Hebrew word for evil, raha, can refer to wickedness, but it can also mean disaster and misery.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so in Jonah 4, 1, we see the reversal of this use of evil.
Pastor Bob Erbig: First, it was characteristic of the Ninevehes, and now, now it describes the prophet of God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It's ironic that that word evil in the narrative has shifted from the pagan city to the covenant prophet here in chapter 4.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So don't miss this shocking reversal in the narrative.
Pastor Bob Erbig: In Jonah chapter 3, God's anger and judgment were laser-focused on Nineveh, but when that changed, it was Jonah's anger that was incited.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That word angry can be translated as to burn, and it's a thematic thread in chapter 4.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It begins here in verse 1, shows up again in verse 4, and then verse 9.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now the natural question you might ask yourself today is why exactly is Jonah so angry?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah, like, dude, chill out.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Why is he so angry?
Pastor Bob Erbig: You might say, I don't get it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: This would not make me angry.
Pastor Bob Erbig: I'd be dancing like David.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But that's usually because we're not putting ourselves in the shoes of somebody who maybe is reacting as a husband, a father, a son, with real people to protect.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So let me just start with your own family.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Imagine you knew, you really knew, that a specific group of people was planning something devastating against your children or your extended family.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now I'm not talking about evil that's kind of out there that we watch on the news, but a credible threat aimed at your house and your neighborhood and your future.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And now imagine that God comes to you and tells you his plan is not to stop these people from acting, not to dismantle them, but to send you or to send somebody to preach to them and hope they change and then they do.
Pastor Bob Erbig: No visible justice, no reckoning in court, no just just mercy given to the very people you believed were coming for your family.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, if you stretch that instinct out to what we see in the world, picture an Israeli parent who lost a son or daughter in an attack.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Somebody who has been buried, who has buried a child and now lives with sirens and rockets and the knowledge that some on the other side want to do it again.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Or a Ukrainian family whose home was destroyed by a missile, whose father or son died in the fighting of the war, for them, the other side isn't an abstract headline, it's the face of the people who shattered their family.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And if those families heard that God had decided to show mercy to those very leaders and fighters, rather than hold them responsible with no trials, no clear justice, just forgiveness, because they repented, would you rejoice?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Or would it feel deep down like God was betraying your loved ones?
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's the emotional world that Jonah is living in.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That when he hears that Nineveh is getting mercy, he isn't thinking about cartoon villains in a children's story.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He's thinking about the capital of an empire who has already torn families like his apart and may soon tear them apart again.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so if we're honest, when we picture our spouse or our kids or our parents in those Israeli or Ukrainian homes, most of us would feel the same knot in the stomach that Jonah feels.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We look at God's mercy and say, God, for them?
Pastor Bob Erbig: After what they've done to us?
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so that's that's the tension this verse is exposing in our hearts.
Pastor Bob Erbig: How would you respond?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah 4-1 forces us to confront an uncomfortable reality.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Sometimes what delights God can disturb us.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That God's joy here becomes Jonah's offense.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And have we so quickly forgotten the central theme of Jonah chapter 2, verse 9?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah in the belly of the fish, praise.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But I, with the voice of thanksgiving, will sacrifice to you what I have vowed, I will pay.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Salvation belongs to the Lord.
Pastor Bob Erbig: See, in the depths of the sea, in the dark belly of a fish, Jonah cries out for grace.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He pleads for mercy.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And it's in that moment that he declares this great truth: salvation belongs to the Lord.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It belongs to Yahweh, the true God above all other gods.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But when that very salvation is extended to those Jonah hated, his heart starts to question God's character.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, if you come back to me, come back with me to that opening scene I described in Senegal, Marilyn Escher, this missionary who sacrificed her whole life for the will of people, imagine her leaving that celebration, enraged at the prospect of salvation coming to this people far from God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It is jarring and uncomfortable when a moment of rejoicing turns to anger and resentment.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And yet, have our hearts ever gone there?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Do the desires of my heart match the desires of God's heart?
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's the question here.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so I'm gonna ask you to be vulnerable for just a moment, church.
Pastor Bob Erbig: As you sit there before the Lord, hearing his word, would you confess to him?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Would you talk to him?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Is there a person in your life, right now or in the past, whose conversion would test your heart?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Picture somebody maybe you knew in high school who had been unkind to you, who had a dark past.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And then you see them at a high school reunion and you find that they've given their life to Christ and maybe they're a pastor.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Would it shock you?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Would you accept it?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Would you believe it?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Right?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now I know we're not supposed to admit some of these thoughts, but God already knows what's in our heart.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And if our desires are to match his desires, we must confess the deep, dark places that we ignore or we hide.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Or maybe there's a fellow brother or sister in Christ with whom you're angry right now.
Pastor Bob Erbig: You don't believe they deserve grace and mercy.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Perhaps it's somebody even in our own body, or somebody in your family, or a close friend.
Pastor Bob Erbig: I would exhort you this morning, ask, why am I so angry?
Pastor Bob Erbig: And examine it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Bring it to the cross of Christ.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Allow his blood to wash you clean and move forward with his love for the world.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Friends, we don't need more angry prophets.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We need more people captured by a gracious God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And that's point number two, a gracious God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, while verse one is pretty startling, verse two is rather breathtaking.
Pastor Bob Erbig: The audacity of Jonah forces us to look into a mirror and go deeper into our own hearts.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Verse 2 explains why Jonah is angry with God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We read this.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And he prayed, that's Jonah, to the Lord and said, Oh Lord, is this, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country?
Pastor Bob Erbig: That is why I made haste to Tarshish, for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and relenting from disaster.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Can you sense the vitriol in Jonah's voice as he speaks?
Pastor Bob Erbig: This is a man who may have been obedient to God's command in chapter 3, but his heart was not fully submitted to God's mission.
Pastor Bob Erbig: His actions were correct, but his heart was resentful.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so I want to spend some time here in verse 2 because it is the heart of this section and it's the preparation for the climactic scene we'll see next week.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Notice first that it says Jonah prayed.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah prayed.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now we have to give the prophet some credit here because he didn't run off and start complaining to friends about God's actions.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That would be talking behind God's back, but right to his face.
Pastor Bob Erbig: No, he confronts God directly.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's a good thing.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And I wish more of us would do this because I think too many Christians are afraid to share their disappointments and anger with God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Perhaps we think maybe we're not supposed to feel a certain way.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Perhaps we think God will punish us if we're completely honest with him.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And here's what I would say: God can handle your honesty.
Pastor Bob Erbig: In fact, he wants it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He can handle your doubt and your disappointment and your anger.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He is God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He wants to hear from his children.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And here's what happens if we're not honest with God when we pray.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We start to stew.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Is there any stewers out there?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Right?
Pastor Bob Erbig: We shut down, we sulk.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Some of us right now we're walking through life with a constant low-grade anger that explodes when somebody irritates us and you say, whoa, what happened there?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Do you know anybody like that?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Are you like that?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Let me give you an illustration.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Just imagine right now that you're in a group text, right?
Pastor Bob Erbig: And somebody says something that really bothers you in this texting thread.
Pastor Bob Erbig: You say, maybe it feels unfair, maybe it feels hurtful, but you know what?
Pastor Bob Erbig: You don't want to start the drama, right?
Pastor Bob Erbig: So you read it, you get this knot in your stomach, and then you say nothing.
Pastor Bob Erbig: You just leave it on red.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And then those, maybe those three little dots start popping up.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Everybody can see that you're typing, and then they disappear, and then you start it again, it's clear that you're typing, and then you delete it again, right?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Then maybe you go and you draft a really long response in your notes app so you can vent without everybody seeing that you're you're typing this really long note, but then you never send it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: See, on the outside you look calm, you look reasonable in the chat, but on the inside you're angry and you don't want to admit it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And that's what so many of us do with God, right?
Pastor Bob Erbig: We we read, we read what He's said and done, we feel those three little dots creeping up in our heart, we start to form an honest prayer, like, I don't like this, I'm mad at you, and then we erase it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We go quiet.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We stay polite in our prayers, in our church answers, but the real message is never sent.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And it's Jonah in this chapter showing us what it looks like when somebody finally stops deleting the message and actually says to God, I'm angry about your mercy.
Pastor Bob Erbig: See, we need honest reflection with God in prayer so his word and his spirit can correct our wrong attitudes of our heart.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Because Jonah has a grievance with God here.
Pastor Bob Erbig: What does he say?
Pastor Bob Erbig: He says, God, I told you this would happen.
Pastor Bob Erbig: This is why I got on that boat to Tarshish back in chapter one.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's why I tried to flee from your presence.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now pause there.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's a crucial setup for what Jonah says next.
Pastor Bob Erbig: I want you to notice that his grievance and his anger, as we've examined in this book, are not irrational.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Right?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah had a real reason to fear the Assyrians.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He had a real claim to justice against the atrocities they committed against his people.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He had a reason not to go to Nineveh.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And his words reveal that maybe he even resented God for even sending him.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Have you ever resented God for something he asked you to do?
Pastor Bob Erbig: For someone he called you to forgive.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Again, I know, I know, I know so many of us, we don't want to admit this because it's not the right theological answer, but it is a real human struggle.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And the only way to overcome is to confess, is to remind ourselves who God is.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And that's what the second half of verse 2 does.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah says, For I knew that you're a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So Jonah, listen, Jonah is not a newbie prophet.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah is not a brand new believer who knows little about the scriptures.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He knows who God is.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And it's here in Jonah 4, 2 that he gives a direct quotation from Exodus 34, verses 6 and 7, which involved God's self-revelation to Moses after the scene with the golden calf.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Do you remember?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Right?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Moses, after the nation of Israel passed over the Red Sea, they stopped at Mount Sinai, they spent some time there.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah, I'm sorry, Moses goes up to Mount Sinai, he talks to God, God gives him the law, the Ten Commandments, which were to be a guardrail for his people.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Moses then descends from the mountain to present the law, and what does he find?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Well, while he was up there talking to God, God's people quickly fashioned a false God, a golden calf, and they forgot their God, Yahweh.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so Moses breaks these tablets in righteous anger.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And then he goes back up the mountain to meet with God again, and God graciously gives Moses two new tablets, and he reveals himself to Moses.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so it's worth looking at the original text, Exodus 34, verse 6.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It says, The Lord passed before him, that's Moses, and proclaimed the Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children to the third and fourth generation.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So this is God's self-revelation to his people.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And if you read the Old Testament, verse 6, Exodus 34, 6, in particular, is the most repeated theological formula in the Old Testament.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It functions as Israel's core confession and creed.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so a devout Israelite like Jonah would have memorized this in his heart.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It would have been the bedrock of his theological life.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, perhaps the modern equivalent for us would be something like the Apostles' Creed or the Nicene Creed.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It's a statement about who God is.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Or think of the soaring words of the question one of the Heidelberg Catechism.
Pastor Bob Erbig: What is our only hope in life and death?
Pastor Bob Erbig: That I am not my own, but I belong body and soul to my faithful Savior Jesus Christ.
Pastor Bob Erbig: The point that I'm making here is that Jonah is a theologian.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah knew who God was.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But notice when he brings it up in chapter 4, verse 2, he's missing the mercy and grace of God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He misses the part about God being slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Instead, Jonah wants to focus on the second half.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Right?
Pastor Bob Erbig: God will by no means clear the guilty.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Oh yeah, we like that.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's right, God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: You get him.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But friends, God is both merciful and just.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And he demonstrates that on the cross through the sacrifice of his son, Jesus Christ.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Mercy and justice meaning.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah misses it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But that's not the worst part of this.
Pastor Bob Erbig: If you look back at Jonah 4, 2, before he quotes this theological formula, he prefaces it with three words.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He says, For I knew.
Pastor Bob Erbig: In other words, I knew who you were, God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Oh yeah.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He takes that core theological statement, that self-revelation of God, and he turns it now into an accusation to God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: How dare you, God, actually show mercy?
Pastor Bob Erbig: See, Jonah's a pretty complicated character.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so are we.
Pastor Bob Erbig: How many of us would have reacted the same way as Jonah?
Pastor Bob Erbig: How many of us are holding a grudge against our creator and our Savior in certain areas?
Pastor Bob Erbig: How many of us have cursed the very name and character of God in our hearts because he dared to act in accordance with his character?
Pastor Bob Erbig: The Lord! The Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's who God is.
Pastor Bob Erbig: I'll give you another illustration.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Some of you may have followed the news about Charlie Kirk's murder trial these past couple weeks and maybe watch pieces of the courtroom proceedings.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now imagine sitting there in the courtroom, not as a distant observer, but as his wife, Erica, or a close family member, and you're listening to this graphic evidence, you're reliving the worst day of your life, you're hearing every detail of what happened to the person you loved, and part of you longs for clear, decisive justice.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Let the truth come out, let the jury see, let there be a reckoning for what he's done.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And another part of you, as a Christian, is painfully aware that even the accused is not beyond the reach of God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That salvation belongs to the Lord, that no one is too far gone, that the cross is big enough for victims and perpetrators alike.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So you sit there in the courtroom feeling the tension of God's love and his justice pressed right up against your grief.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's the tension of Jonah 2.9, Jonah 4.2.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That in chapter 2, Jonah can say, salvation belongs to the Lord.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He loves the mercy of God when he's sinking into the sea, but in chapter 4, when that same mercy is now applied to the people he believes deserve judgment, he's furious.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He knows God is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and that's exactly what bothers him.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He wants the courtroom without the possibility of pardon.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He wants justice without the threat of grace.
Pastor Bob Erbig: What kind of God do you believe in?
Pastor Bob Erbig: What kind of God do you love?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Would you go anywhere on mission for the God who is gracious and merciful?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Or does God's mercy offend your sense of justice?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Friends, I would challenge you today.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Is God's mercy something we discuss during our in-depth Bible study, but resist when the rubber meets the road?
Pastor Bob Erbig: When you're sitting emotionally in the courtroom listening to the evidence about what was done to you or your family.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Because when you really and truly understand and experience God's mercy, it will transform you from the inside out.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And some of us maybe need a deep transformation today.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We believe, but we're still fighting with God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We're still silently arguing with his mercy in the gallery of our hearts.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's where Jonah was.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Is it possible to know God accurately and still be at war with him?
Pastor Bob Erbig: I think Jonah shows us yes.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He was an angry prophet who encountered a gracious God, and now that encounter finally produces a revealing lament.
Pastor Bob Erbig: A revealing lament.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So verses three and four are really intriguing verses that leave us on this cliffhanger for next week.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So verse 2, Jonah uses God's character against him, and then in verse 3 and 4, Jonah's heart is exposed, and then God responds.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Look at what Jonah says in verse 3.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He says, Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it's better for me to die than to live.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, friends, is this a head scratcher for anybody else?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Again, if I recap this whole scene, just we're all on the same page, at the end of chapter 3, Jonah has tremendous missional success with the Ninevehes preaching repentance and destruction, real fire and brimstone stuff, and they respond.
Pastor Bob Erbig: They repent, they give their lives to God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: God shows them mercy.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And it's in the midst of that success that Jonah then gets angry at God, demeans his character, and finally he asks to be killed.
Pastor Bob Erbig: What are we supposed to do with this guy?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Can somebody come and talk to Jonah?
Pastor Bob Erbig: The reaction shows us that Jonah was obedient but lacked true submission to God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Or if I put it another way, it shows us that God's mission was not Jonah's mission.
Pastor Bob Erbig: God's mission was not Jonah's mission.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah's heart was not aligned with God's heart.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah does not want God's love extending to the Ninevehes.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It seems that Jonah went to Nineveh, assuming his preaching would bring about their destruction.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But when God had something different in mind, salvation, it made Jonah say, I'm angry and I feel as if life is not worth living.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So verse 3 here is a classic prophetic lament genre.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Throughout the Psalms, if you read them, individual laments frequently address Yahweh God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And here's the formula.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Usually, there's a complaint about the situation, there's a confession of trust, there's a request, there's words of assurance, and then there's a vow of praise.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's how it usually works in the Psalms.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But here Jonah addresses God, he complains, and then he requests to die.
Pastor Bob Erbig: So notice he misses the part about trusting God and praising him.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, to be fair, Jonah is not biblically alone in his death wish.
Pastor Bob Erbig: The prophet Elijah also had a death wish request in 1 Kings 19.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We read this: but he, that's Elijah, himself went a day's journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a broom tree, and he asked that he might die, saying, It is enough now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my father's.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And then even Moses, Moses, right, the man who met God on the mountain and received the Ten Commandments, had a death request.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Speaking to God, he says, If you will treat me like this, kill me at once.
Pastor Bob Erbig: If I have found favor in your sight, that I may not see my wretchedness.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, here's the major difference between Elijah and Moses and Jonah.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Elijah and Moses were lamenting rejection and failure, but Jonah, Jonah was lamenting missional success.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah was upset at a revival.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, if I put that in modern terms, over the last few years, there have been numerous reports of revivals happening around the country on college campuses, Asbury University, Auburn, Florida State, others have told stories of numerous baptisms, people coming to faith.
Pastor Bob Erbig: In fact, national data shows that there's an increase, increasing interest in Christianity among Gen Z and millennials who now attend church more regularly than older generations for the first time in decades.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Here at NBC, we've started an event called the Night of Revival each January to lift up our eyes to God as we begin the new year.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now, again, imagine walking on a college campus or into a night of revival event and shouting in anger as the worship music is playing or as the preacher is speaking.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Imagine going home after an event like that, locking yourself in your room and then shouting in anger at God because people were coming to Christ.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Imagine wanting to end your life because others were being saved.
Pastor Bob Erbig: If that happened, would you be able to look in the mirror and say, God, something's wrong in my heart?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Is it possible to know God accurately and still be at war with him?
Pastor Bob Erbig: I think Jonah shows us yes, because Jonah's real crisis wasn't that he doubted God's character, it was that he resented it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah's crisis wasn't that he doubted God's character, it was that he resented it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Does that resonate with anybody today?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Don't raise your hands.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But in a room this large, and when people are listening from afar, I suspect there are some angry people.
Pastor Bob Erbig: I suspect that somebody out there today has a beef with God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: I think some people are angry at who God is and what he's doing in somebody else's life.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And you think God has not given you the life you wanted.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And that's where Jonah was.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He was resentful.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He hated what God asked him to do.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He didn't like the outcome.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But God sees his heart and he shows mercy and grace to Jonah even now.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Look at verse 4 now.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And the Lord said, Do you do well to be angry?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Do you do well to be angry?
Pastor Bob Erbig: That's a pretty profound question.
Pastor Bob Erbig: In fact, it might be a question I think somebody here today needs to hear.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Because somebody out there might really be angry at God, and He's speaking to you right now through His Word and through His Spirit, and He says, Is it good for you to be angry?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Friends, can I lovingly suggest that the reason we become angry is because we've forgotten our past?
Pastor Bob Erbig: That all of us here today were former Ninevites.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now some of you might say in your heart, oh Pastor Bob, how dare you?
Pastor Bob Erbig: I was never as bad as those people.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But you don't have to have committed the atrocities of the ancient Assyrians to be a Ninevite.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And what do I mean by that?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Well, the Apostle Paul wrote a letter in the New Testament to the church at Rome, and he told them, hey, you guys have a problem.
Pastor Bob Erbig: You are an enemy of God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And you say, What?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Me?
Pastor Bob Erbig: An enemy?
Pastor Bob Erbig: Yes.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Because all of us have rebelled against God in our hearts, and we need the saving work of Jesus Christ.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We love grace for ourselves, but not for our enemies.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jesus told a whole story about that.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And Paul writes a letter to the church at Corinth.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He makes it even clearer.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He says this, 1 Corinthians 6, verse 9.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?
Pastor Bob Erbig: And such were some of you.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ by the Spirit of our God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And such were some of you.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And you were washed.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And if you get that, you should want everybody else to experience that cleansing as well.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We are all former Ninevehes trying to reach current Ninevehes.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We have the saving power of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Yesterday you were Nineveh, today you're a missionary.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Jonah 4 shows us that it is possible to know all the right answers but miss the grace of God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It's possible to speak about God's grace and his mercy, but not experience joy when others receive it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: God doesn't want that for you.
Pastor Bob Erbig: He wants you to share the mercy and grace that you've been given, to bring other more people into his kingdom, but you have to leave that anger at the foot of the cross because God says, it's not good for you.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It's not good for you, and I love you.
Pastor Bob Erbig: As the worship team returns for one final song, I would just invite you this week to take two actions.
Pastor Bob Erbig: First, we need to name our resentments.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Some of us today are dealing with some things very deep in our soul.
Pastor Bob Erbig: We're angry.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But some of us also have to be honest about the fact that that anger is really at God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so I would invite you, just as Jonah did, to pray, to bring it to God, because He can handle it, to spend every day this week naming and confessing your anger and resentment to the only one who can really heal it.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And then, second, you embrace God's mission.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Now that is only possible if you take that first step, because if we're resent, if we are resentful of God and we don't get our hearts right with him, the mission will be hindered.
Pastor Bob Erbig: But when you experience the mercy of God yourself, you will be on fire for him.
Pastor Bob Erbig: People who have received mercy and get it, they display mercy.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so here's what this might look practically like this week.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Join us for our October missions conference.
Pastor Bob Erbig: You can save the date, October 2nd through 4th, where we'll hear stories of people sharing God's mercy around the world.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And before that, I want you to do one specific thing.
Pastor Bob Erbig: I want you to think about one person, just one, that you can show mercy toward this week.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Not in general, not someday, but this week, name it and act.
Pastor Bob Erbig: You gotta name your resentments, embrace God's mission, and through that may He receive all the honor and glory.
Pastor Bob Erbig: I want to close by bringing you back to Merilyn Esher one more time.
Pastor Bob Erbig: When the Wolf Bible was finally complete, she didn't stand up and take credit for 60 years of her life.
Pastor Bob Erbig: What she actually did at those celebrations was stand in front of the crowd and celebrate.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Because the word of God was now in the hands of the Wolf people, and God's mercy could now extend further into Senegal than it had before.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And here's what she said.
Pastor Bob Erbig: She said, in the long run, this wasn't my idea, it was God's.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It is his project and his grace that enables.
Pastor Bob Erbig: It was God's idea to save people, not ours.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And our job isn't to gatekeep the mission, it's to align our hearts with his.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And so let me close with the words of Psalm 67 and receive this blessing.
Pastor Bob Erbig: The psalmist writes: May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face shine upon us.
Pastor Bob Erbig: That your way may be known on earth, your saving power among the nations.
Pastor Bob Erbig: And let the peoples praise you, O God.
Pastor Bob Erbig: Let all the peoples praise you.