WEBVTT 00:00:00.479 --> 00:00:05.040 So this is our last week, our last Sunday sermon in the book of Jonah. 00:00:05.120 --> 00:00:12.320 I think maybe it's been eight or nine weeks, and then the next few weeks I'll be out of town on sabbatical taking rest with my family. 00:00:12.400 --> 00:00:19.280 And so we're always incredibly thankful for that, that you guys are church, and the elders uh do that for us. 00:00:19.359 --> 00:00:32.320 And so we have three elders preaching for the next three Sundays, and then we have uh another gentleman in our church who's willing to uh take it on and be willing to stand up in front of you guys and uh be brave enough to do it. 00:00:32.399 --> 00:00:35.920 And so uh that's what's going to be going on for the the next month. 00:00:36.000 --> 00:00:38.799 But today is back finishing off the book of Jonah. 00:00:38.880 --> 00:01:03.840 So uh perhaps you've had a neighbor or maybe a friend at school, a person at school, or um maybe somebody you know at work, and maybe they're bossy or they're braggy or they throw late parties, or or maybe the opposite, they're quiet and they're snobby, but you know, they said that thing or they did that thing to you, and she said that and he said that, and you just couldn't believe it, right? 00:01:03.920 --> 00:01:08.719 Like you couldn't believe that they do that or they say that or they're like that. 00:01:08.879 --> 00:01:10.079 You just it's unbelievable. 00:01:10.159 --> 00:01:11.359 You couldn't believe it. 00:01:11.760 --> 00:01:19.280 And whatever they are, or whatever they were, what you did know is you knew you are not that, right? 00:01:19.760 --> 00:01:21.760 And so you're all judgy on them, right? 00:01:21.920 --> 00:01:23.840 Like you like we do. 00:01:25.120 --> 00:01:28.959 And so to you, uh they're they're those, right? 00:01:29.040 --> 00:01:36.719 Like those people, like those, those, oh, those party people, or those conservatives, or you know, those liberals, you know, those people, right? 00:01:36.799 --> 00:01:39.920 Like whatever it is, it's just you know you're not them. 00:01:40.799 --> 00:01:43.920 And so they are the they're the those, those people. 00:01:44.239 --> 00:01:52.799 And so what's clear when we do that is obviously what we do is we build a box, we put the person in a box, and we de we depersonalize them, really. 00:01:52.879 --> 00:02:04.239 Like we we objectify them, put them in the box, and we we slap a label on that box, and when we objectify people, what this does for us is it it keeps things so simple, doesn't it? 00:02:04.480 --> 00:02:08.639 Because then they can just remain that, like those people. 00:02:09.439 --> 00:02:16.639 But then you know what happens is that person they bring you groceries when you're sick, right? 00:02:17.439 --> 00:02:25.039 Or or the the kid in class that you you thought was just oh, is just she's just always so bossy, all of a sudden she drops you like a kind comment, right? 00:02:25.120 --> 00:02:30.800 Like she forces herself outside of the box, and it gets more complicated, right? 00:02:31.439 --> 00:02:46.240 Or you learn something about their backstory, you learn like they have a sick child, you learn about her wounded past, you learn about the difficult work situation, and suddenly a new feeling starts up in you, right? 00:02:46.400 --> 00:02:50.000 Like a little bit of compassion or care. 00:02:50.560 --> 00:03:03.520 And simply because, and here's the point, simply because, because when you quit seeing a person, when you quit seeing them as objects to judge, and you begin to understand them as people to love. 00:03:04.639 --> 00:03:08.240 So when we objectify people, we love them less, always. 00:03:08.479 --> 00:03:16.080 And when we de-objectify people, allowing them to be persons, we're enabled to begin to love them. 00:03:16.400 --> 00:03:25.759 And this is why this last verse in Jonah is so interesting, what God just kind of drops in here, the very end, the last verse, the last thing he says to Jonah. 00:03:25.840 --> 00:03:28.560 And here's the setup because maybe you hadn't been with us, you're visiting. 00:03:28.639 --> 00:03:31.039 So we've been in eight weeks here of this book of Jonah. 00:03:31.120 --> 00:03:38.080 Jonah's this religious prophet, religious guy, and God comes in and says, Hey, I need you to, I want you to go and preach to Nineveh. 00:03:38.319 --> 00:03:40.240 And Nineveh was his enemy. 00:03:40.400 --> 00:03:42.240 These were horrible people, right? 00:03:42.319 --> 00:03:42.960 We've learned that. 00:03:43.039 --> 00:03:46.080 Second Kings talks about these people they called terror. 00:03:46.240 --> 00:03:48.960 I mean, they they caused it, they were horrible people. 00:03:49.439 --> 00:03:51.439 He says, I don't want to go to them. 00:03:51.680 --> 00:03:53.120 Like they've hurt me. 00:03:53.199 --> 00:03:55.680 They've hurt my people, they've hurt people I know. 00:03:55.759 --> 00:03:57.680 I don't I have no interest in that. 00:03:57.840 --> 00:04:02.159 I want to keep them in a box, slap a label on them, keep them objectified. 00:04:02.240 --> 00:04:03.039 It keeps it simple. 00:04:03.120 --> 00:04:04.000 I can hate them that way. 00:04:04.080 --> 00:04:06.719 I don't have to understand anything more about them. 00:04:06.800 --> 00:04:07.919 And so he said, I'm not going to them. 00:04:08.000 --> 00:04:13.520 So he runs the other way, he boards a ship, the storm happens, he gets thrown over into the sea, under the sea. 00:04:13.680 --> 00:04:15.840 This is where we get that great miraculous story. 00:04:16.000 --> 00:04:19.920 The fish swallows him, he's in the belly of the fish, finally, he's at the end of himself. 00:04:20.000 --> 00:04:21.120 He has nowhere else to go. 00:04:21.199 --> 00:04:23.040 He is at the bottom, right? 00:04:23.120 --> 00:04:26.639 And he prays to God, okay, like I surrender to you. 00:04:26.800 --> 00:04:32.639 Miraculously, he's thrown up out onto the beach, and finally he goes to Nineveh and he preaches. 00:04:32.720 --> 00:04:35.120 And that's where we think, hey, they're gonna be best friends. 00:04:35.199 --> 00:04:52.800 Everybody's gonna be a big family, they're gonna hug, they're gonna be all together, but no, Jonah still is not done with this, and so he is angry that God has been merciful and loving to them, and he pouts his way out of the city up onto the hill, and he is angry and he is full of self-pity. 00:04:54.079 --> 00:04:56.480 And then God speaks, verse 11. 00:04:58.560 --> 00:05:11.759 And should not I pity, have compassion on Nineveh, that great city in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle? 00:05:12.160 --> 00:05:14.959 So, not a hundred and twenty thousand Ninevites, right? 00:05:15.040 --> 00:05:16.319 He switches the word here. 00:05:16.560 --> 00:05:18.319 A hundred and twenty thousand persons. 00:05:18.399 --> 00:05:20.480 Now that word persons is the word Adam. 00:05:20.800 --> 00:05:24.720 This is the word that we get in the Genesis account of creation, Adam. 00:05:24.879 --> 00:05:26.399 We get Adam, person. 00:05:28.240 --> 00:05:30.240 And God's saying, those Adams? 00:05:30.560 --> 00:05:31.439 120,000? 00:05:31.680 --> 00:05:36.000 Those Adams come from the same place you come from. 00:05:37.439 --> 00:05:38.399 You and them? 00:05:39.360 --> 00:05:40.800 You're the same. 00:05:42.000 --> 00:05:45.920 That's what would have registered in Jonah's mind when he heard Adam. 00:05:46.560 --> 00:05:51.199 So point number one is this, and we've been reviewing these points kind of over, they've been cycling the past few weeks. 00:05:51.439 --> 00:05:55.360 Point number one is this your enemy is a person also. 00:05:56.399 --> 00:05:58.160 Your enemy is a person also. 00:06:00.079 --> 00:06:01.360 You remember Brandon? 00:06:01.519 --> 00:06:03.439 It's been a few weeks I told this story, right? 00:06:03.519 --> 00:06:04.639 I was in the sixth grade. 00:06:04.879 --> 00:06:05.519 Do you remember this? 00:06:05.600 --> 00:06:06.639 I was in the sixth grade. 00:06:06.720 --> 00:06:07.920 I had just finished lunch. 00:06:08.079 --> 00:06:09.439 I got my ice cream. 00:06:09.519 --> 00:06:12.720 I'm lined up on the cafeteria wall to go out. 00:06:12.879 --> 00:06:15.360 We ate our ice cream out in the parking lot. 00:06:15.519 --> 00:06:26.079 And so we were lined up on the wall, and there was an eighth grade class there, the table right there by the wall, and I knew this kid named Brandon through another kid in my neighborhood, and it's eighth graders. 00:06:26.160 --> 00:06:42.399 I'm sixth grade, fragile little, you know, 50-pound sixth grader, and I'm standing there, and I think to myself in front of my classmates, man, if this eighth grader says hi to me, can you imagine what that would do for me in the status ranking of my sixth grade Mrs. 00:06:42.560 --> 00:06:43.439 LaBeouf class? 00:06:43.600 --> 00:06:44.800 This would be amazing. 00:06:44.959 --> 00:06:52.800 And I'm standing there, and just when I think I'll be welcomed by Brandon, he calls me a name. 00:06:53.040 --> 00:07:01.279 And I'm embarrassed, and so I mouth right back because I got some arsenal ready for that kind of thing, and we go back and forth a little bit there. 00:07:02.240 --> 00:07:11.120 And I went out and ate my ice cream, but what is for sure what happened is I immediately turned him to an enemy, right? 00:07:11.360 --> 00:07:14.319 Even to this day, still struggling, processing this Ella. 00:07:15.680 --> 00:07:20.079 I transformed him from a person to an enemy so I could hate him. 00:07:20.959 --> 00:07:31.120 Because if I do this, I can hate him, and I don't have to consider what is much, much more complicated and real, and that is that Brandon is a person. 00:07:32.720 --> 00:07:40.399 Like he has a family, and like maybe that morning he has an older brother who yelled at him, or a dad that beat him, or something. 00:07:40.560 --> 00:07:47.279 I don't know, but he has he has a story, he has a family, he's a person, and that's complicated. 00:07:48.399 --> 00:07:50.240 So you know what's easier? 00:07:51.199 --> 00:07:54.319 Just objectify the person so we can hate him. 00:07:55.759 --> 00:08:02.480 It's much, much harder to go, oh, 120,000 Adams. 00:08:05.680 --> 00:08:12.480 It's possible that the person you don't like is a person with a story. 00:08:13.439 --> 00:08:19.600 And what I keep learning over and over again is that there's always a backstory. 00:08:19.839 --> 00:08:20.079 Right? 00:08:20.240 --> 00:08:24.480 There's always the story you see on the surface, but then there's always a whole nother story. 00:08:24.639 --> 00:08:29.839 The story on the surface was Brandon's a punk and he used foul language to call me a name in front of my friends. 00:08:29.920 --> 00:08:32.639 That's the story on the surface, but there's always a backstory. 00:08:33.120 --> 00:08:36.639 You know the power of backstory because you watched American Idol one time, right? 00:08:37.600 --> 00:08:40.559 Three of you still watch it, but all of us watched it at some point. 00:08:40.639 --> 00:08:42.000 We all watched it. 00:08:42.480 --> 00:08:46.480 And some girl came walking out, and she looked like a mess. 00:08:46.960 --> 00:08:59.759 And we got all judgy on her, and we had our opinions, and you, whoever you're watching with your friend or roommate or spouse, and I just can't believe what she's wearing, and look how short that whatever is, and what she showed, and you have all those opinions, right? 00:08:59.840 --> 00:09:01.120 And then they show the backstory. 00:09:01.200 --> 00:09:21.919 They jump to her hometown and they show where she grew up, and they show the trailer that she lives in, and she walks eight miles to work at the huddle house to support her mom who's dying of cancer, and all of a sudden, this backstory is laid out for you, and all of a sudden the objectification that you put on her starts to disappear, right? 00:09:23.200 --> 00:09:23.759 Right? 00:09:24.080 --> 00:09:26.159 Because she's no longer an object, she's a person. 00:09:26.320 --> 00:09:33.120 All of a sudden, once she's a person, she has a backstory, and when she's a person with a backstory, all of a sudden this thing called compassion begins. 00:09:34.399 --> 00:09:35.919 Now, this works the other way around. 00:09:36.000 --> 00:09:41.279 It doesn't always work in the socioeconomic ladder looking down, it can work in the socioeconomic ladder looking up. 00:09:41.360 --> 00:09:48.480 So let's say you and your spouse, uh, it's your anniversary, and you're gonna splurge. 00:09:48.720 --> 00:09:51.759 So you're gonna go to Bones Steakhouse and Buckhead. 00:09:51.840 --> 00:10:12.159 It's your one big restaurant splurge of the year, and you get all specially dressed up for this, and you're there, and you're chowing down the bread and the wedge salad, and you got it going on, and you're all having a great time, and in walks the one wealthy, like really, really, really wealthy couple you know in your life. 00:10:12.799 --> 00:10:17.919 And they walk over to you and they say hi, and she says, Oh, don't you just love bones? 00:10:18.240 --> 00:10:20.559 And you say, Yes, we we do, yeah, we do. 00:10:20.720 --> 00:10:28.159 And she says, and then she says, We come here every week, and you're like, Great, you know, you're thinking that makes us feel horrible. 00:10:28.480 --> 00:10:31.759 And she says, We've never seen you here before. 00:10:31.919 --> 00:10:33.519 And you're like, Okay, that's great. 00:10:33.600 --> 00:10:38.799 And you say goodbye, and she says goodbye, and you go on with your meal, but your brain starts going, right? 00:10:38.960 --> 00:10:45.679 Like, off you go, because what goes every Wednesday, of course they eat here every Wednesday. 00:10:45.840 --> 00:10:48.320 Of course they do, and they've never seen us before. 00:10:48.480 --> 00:10:50.480 Don't you like how she added that in there, right? 00:10:50.559 --> 00:10:57.279 Like she made sure to add that, and they have no problems in their status and in their wealth, everything's just fine, right? 00:10:57.440 --> 00:10:59.600 Off you go, objectifying, right? 00:10:59.759 --> 00:11:01.039 Anybody do this? 00:11:01.360 --> 00:11:02.080 Only me. 00:11:02.399 --> 00:11:02.720 Okay. 00:11:03.679 --> 00:11:23.759 And then you're going to bed that night and you pull your phone out and you start swiping through Instagram and you're scrolling up, and then you see that that same lady, after she finished bones, she got home, and what you didn't realize, she posted something on Instagram, and it's about how her dad has dementia and is living with him, and he had wandered off while they were at the restaurant, and you go, Oh my gosh. 00:11:26.240 --> 00:11:37.759 And then you keep scrolling, and there's a post by her 18-year-old daughter who is rebelling, and she's an addict, and she's a burning man, and she looks like she hadn't eaten in six months. 00:11:38.559 --> 00:11:39.600 Oh wow. 00:11:41.200 --> 00:11:45.519 Like all of a sudden, she's out of that box, isn't she? 00:11:46.720 --> 00:11:49.200 She's not just an object to hate. 00:11:50.080 --> 00:11:51.200 She's a person. 00:11:53.360 --> 00:11:54.639 She's an Adam. 00:11:55.840 --> 00:11:59.440 Point number two is this we are called to love our enemies. 00:12:00.240 --> 00:12:02.000 That's what God's doing here with Jonah. 00:12:02.159 --> 00:12:04.399 Jesus tells it in the New Testament. 00:12:04.559 --> 00:12:06.639 There's a story in Luke 19, right? 00:12:06.720 --> 00:12:10.000 There's an interesting story, kind of a famous story we talk about a good bit. 00:12:10.159 --> 00:12:11.200 Jesus is walking through a town. 00:12:11.279 --> 00:12:13.519 There's this guy named Zacchaeus, he's a tax collector. 00:12:13.600 --> 00:12:18.159 So what that means is this guy, he collects taxes in their area for Rome. 00:12:18.240 --> 00:12:22.159 And so there's a certain percentage he'd be collecting, so automatically you don't love the guy. 00:12:22.320 --> 00:12:26.639 But then these guys would collect even more because they hold power. 00:12:26.960 --> 00:12:34.080 So they would collect enough for Rome and pay Rome, but then they would collect even more for themselves to get rich and wealthy. 00:12:34.240 --> 00:12:38.480 So let's just imagine there's a guy like this in Marietta. 00:12:39.360 --> 00:12:48.240 And not only does he collect the Marietta taxes, but he has so much power that he's circling around your house once a week and he's just demanding a hundred bucks every week. 00:12:48.399 --> 00:12:49.200 Just because. 00:12:49.759 --> 00:12:51.360 Just because he wants to. 00:12:52.639 --> 00:12:54.399 And how do you feel about him? 00:12:55.039 --> 00:12:56.559 Oh, you hate him. 00:12:57.200 --> 00:13:01.279 Maybe not the first couple times, maybe the first couple times you kind of deal with it. 00:13:01.679 --> 00:13:03.360 But eventually you hate him. 00:13:03.840 --> 00:13:06.320 You guys four, that's$400 a month. 00:13:07.919 --> 00:13:10.159 $400 a month to this man for no reason. 00:13:10.799 --> 00:13:12.480 That hate just begins to conjure up. 00:13:12.559 --> 00:13:13.279 And that's what's going on. 00:13:13.519 --> 00:13:16.080 This is how these people feel toward this man. 00:13:16.879 --> 00:13:18.159 They hate him. 00:13:18.559 --> 00:13:25.120 And Jesus does this bizarre thing and says, hey, uh, I best go with you to your house today. 00:13:25.840 --> 00:13:32.159 And Jesus is teaching that Zacchaeus is not just a tax collector to objectify and hate. 00:13:32.240 --> 00:13:36.879 Zacchaeus is a person with a home and a story. 00:13:40.159 --> 00:13:48.080 It seems like for Jonah, thinking through this whole story, it seems like for Jonah, it seems like Jonah never really tried to understand the Ninevites. 00:13:49.919 --> 00:13:52.399 It doesn't seem like he really forgave them. 00:13:54.159 --> 00:13:58.559 He just kept them as enemies, even when he went to preach to them. 00:14:00.080 --> 00:14:06.240 Because if they're objects, then we don't have to face that we're both Adams. 00:14:07.360 --> 00:14:17.519 I read a quote recently from Minister Jacob Smith in New York City's minister up there, and his quote was this we are all three bad days away from ruining our lives. 00:14:17.600 --> 00:14:20.799 And most of us are on day two. 00:14:22.000 --> 00:14:24.240 I mean, it's just sort of a comical way of what St. 00:14:24.399 --> 00:14:24.960 Paul, when St. 00:14:25.120 --> 00:14:28.639 Paul says, I'm the chief of sinners, it's the same as the same thing. 00:14:28.960 --> 00:14:29.600 And yet St. 00:14:29.679 --> 00:14:32.799 Paul, he says, the chief of sinners, and other places he says he's a saint. 00:14:32.960 --> 00:14:34.240 Isn't that interesting? 00:14:36.000 --> 00:14:39.039 This is the brilliant foundation of the Christian faith. 00:14:39.679 --> 00:14:42.399 It's why we say every week, hey, cheer up. 00:14:42.639 --> 00:14:43.519 Cheer up. 00:14:44.159 --> 00:14:46.799 You are more sinful than you originally thought. 00:14:47.039 --> 00:14:47.600 Cheer up. 00:14:47.759 --> 00:14:49.360 The diagnosis is true. 00:14:49.679 --> 00:14:49.919 Right? 00:14:50.080 --> 00:14:52.559 And then we also get to say, equally, cheer up. 00:14:52.720 --> 00:14:56.240 God loves you even more than you could ever dare to dream. 00:14:56.399 --> 00:14:59.200 So you're both humbled and relieved. 00:15:02.080 --> 00:15:13.120 You're humbled into your sin, and you're relieved that all of that's been cast upon Christ on the cross and his righteousness given to you, so you're fully and always beloved by his work, not your own. 00:15:13.279 --> 00:15:14.559 Now that's powerful. 00:15:14.720 --> 00:15:23.519 It is powerful because we get to live both in our humility of a dominance, of being just a person who's not perfect. 00:15:24.159 --> 00:15:33.279 And yet at the same time, we have this inner wealth of acceptance in Christ by Christ's work alone that nobody else can touch. 00:15:33.679 --> 00:15:35.679 So we're sinner and saint. 00:15:37.039 --> 00:15:39.440 Point number three is this overarching point. 00:15:39.519 --> 00:15:49.279 It's been mentioned over and over and over again because it's just the fact that God just never leaves Jonah and He is steadfast certain he's gonna reach out and love these Ninevites. 00:15:49.360 --> 00:15:55.200 And the point is this God never stops caring and redeeming you. 00:15:56.320 --> 00:16:04.480 And this is not halfway love, like hey, God's gonna love you halfway, and you get, you know, pull your bootstraps up and you meet him halfway, and then maybe y'all can work something out. 00:16:04.720 --> 00:16:11.519 This is God fully, unconditionally love without contingencies, love for you, secure. 00:16:13.519 --> 00:16:14.799 Let's think about it this way. 00:16:14.960 --> 00:16:17.600 How do you feel when you hear these names? 00:16:18.399 --> 00:16:19.679 Mike Tyson. 00:16:20.000 --> 00:16:21.519 You don't have to answer out loud. 00:16:21.840 --> 00:16:23.039 Mike Tyson. 00:16:24.080 --> 00:16:25.519 Lance Armstrong. 00:16:26.480 --> 00:16:26.879 O.J. 00:16:27.039 --> 00:16:27.679 Simpson. 00:16:29.200 --> 00:16:30.480 Art Simpson. 00:16:32.240 --> 00:16:33.840 You think certain things, right? 00:16:34.000 --> 00:16:35.120 About all of them. 00:16:36.960 --> 00:16:42.320 It's hard to regard them apart from their scandalous past behavior. 00:16:43.519 --> 00:16:45.919 And sort of we hedge our love in that way. 00:16:46.080 --> 00:16:47.519 Our love's affected in some way. 00:16:47.840 --> 00:16:52.320 Our love, human love, to some degree is imperfect, even when we try. 00:16:52.639 --> 00:16:56.960 But God's love is secure, it's totally different because it's not based on any of our merit. 00:16:57.200 --> 00:17:02.240 It is full-on, unconditional, one-way love because it's based in his grace, not our merit. 00:17:02.480 --> 00:17:05.920 One-way love doesn't see and objectify us. 00:17:06.079 --> 00:17:09.119 One way love sees us fully. 00:17:09.519 --> 00:17:11.599 That you can be fully known. 00:17:11.759 --> 00:17:23.920 And because it is imputing, because God is an imputing God, He's imputing, giving to you His righteousness, and that's what His love is, He can fully know you and all your mess. 00:17:28.240 --> 00:17:31.920 Paul Zall in his book, Grace and Practice, he writes this. 00:17:32.160 --> 00:17:38.480 To impute means to ascribe qualities to someone that are not there intrinsically. 00:17:38.640 --> 00:17:43.519 To regard somebody as a person that he or she is not. 00:17:44.640 --> 00:17:48.480 Imputation calls bad things by a good name. 00:17:48.799 --> 00:17:51.039 And this is what grace does. 00:17:52.160 --> 00:17:55.359 This is what God's been doing the entire time through the Jonah story. 00:17:55.440 --> 00:17:57.680 I mean, he should have left Jonah a long time ago. 00:17:57.839 --> 00:18:02.559 He should have never dealt with the Nineveh if it had anything to do with merit for any of these people. 00:18:03.599 --> 00:18:10.960 Yet God's been regarding Jonah and the Nineveh as his beloved children the entire time, never leaving them alone. 00:18:13.680 --> 00:18:16.160 No matter how ridiculous Jonah got. 00:18:17.680 --> 00:18:22.559 No matter how severe and scandalous the Ninevites' past behavior was. 00:18:24.960 --> 00:18:26.160 I close with this quote. 00:18:26.319 --> 00:18:28.160 I read it last night as I was laying in bed. 00:18:28.240 --> 00:18:30.079 I was reading this book called Surrender to Love. 00:18:30.240 --> 00:18:32.480 Great little book by a Christian psychologist. 00:18:32.559 --> 00:18:33.279 His name is Dr. 00:18:33.359 --> 00:18:34.160 David Benner. 00:18:34.240 --> 00:18:43.680 And here's the quote: What a different relationship begins to develop when you realize that God is head over heels in love with you. 00:18:45.119 --> 00:18:47.200 God is simply giddy about you. 00:18:47.920 --> 00:18:50.880 He just can't help loving you. 00:18:51.359 --> 00:18:58.000 He loves you deeply, recklessly, extravagantly, just as you are. 00:18:58.319 --> 00:19:05.839 God knows you are a sinner, but your sins do not surprise him, nor do they reduce in the slightest his love for you. 00:19:06.480 --> 00:19:13.599 Perhaps you find yourself wanting to believe that this is true of God, but still not convinced. 00:19:14.640 --> 00:19:19.680 Fortunately, we do not have to be uncertain about God's attitude toward us. 00:19:20.240 --> 00:19:24.799 It is clearly revealed in the life and teaching of Jesus. 00:19:25.599 --> 00:19:32.640 My brothers and sisters, you are recklessly and extravagantly loved by God in Christ Jesus. 00:19:32.799 --> 00:19:35.279 And he is always with you like he was with Jonah. 00:19:35.519 --> 00:19:40.799 Always with you, always redeeming you, imputing to you your righteous standing in him. 00:19:41.200 --> 00:19:42.640 Let's pray together. 00:19:43.200 --> 00:19:54.720 God, thank you for your good grace and this great book of Jonah that has taught us that you are always with us no matter how ridiculous we are in mind, heart, spirit, or behavior. 00:19:55.839 --> 00:20:02.880 And that you are constantly gracious, caring for us, leading us, speaking to us, guiding us. 00:20:04.160 --> 00:20:16.559 For many of us, we have so much baggage for what we heard and what we think about who you are, rather than the God of love that the scriptures teach. 00:20:17.519 --> 00:20:21.039 God, would you increase our faith and trust? 00:20:21.680 --> 00:20:28.640 That you are a redeeming God who loves us without hesitation, without contingency, with no conditions. 00:20:29.519 --> 00:20:34.799 That we are accepted by you in all moments by your grace and not our behavior or our merit. 00:20:36.480 --> 00:20:44.079 Would this great redeeming love be the transformative power of our hearts that your Holy Spirit uses to create new life? 00:20:46.720 --> 00:20:48.480 That our lives would honor you. 00:20:50.160 --> 00:20:54.720 That we would live deeper and deeper in the great wealth of our acceptance we have in Christ Jesus. 00:20:54.880 --> 00:20:57.440 We pray this in the power of Jesus. 00:20:57.759 --> 00:20:58.400 Amen.