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Good morning!
Last weekend we started into an adventure in the book of Jonah. Jonah is a tiny little book in the middle of the sticky pages of the Old Testament. It’s also one of the most famous stories in all of literature. If you stopped 100 random people on the streets of Oceanside and asked them if they’ve heard of Jonah, and most of them would say “yes.”
Last week we learned about responding to God’s greatness. This week we’re going to learn about responding to God’s correction.
When I got into trouble as a little guy, my parents would spank me when I got out of line. As I got older, they would send me to my room. When I was still older they would remove a privilege. Probably your parents did the same.
No matter what our age, we all need a little correcting from time to time. I need it, you need it. You see people on the freeway who need it and people at ballgames who need it. We’re learning these days that even the housing market needs correcting once in awhile.
All corrections are painful, aren’t they friends?
I want to suggest to you today, that experiencing correction just might be a good thing. Because if you respond well to God’s correction, you can become a better person. You might become one who is more useful to God than you ever imagined. That’s what happened to Jonah. 2 Kings 14 tells us that he was a good spokesman for God before he ran, and we’ll see next week that he became a GREAT spokesman for God after he ran.
As you walked in this morning, you were handled a sealed piece of paper labeled, “Do not open until instructed.” (Hold one up.) If you received one of those, would you hold it up for me? – All of you should have one, or at least one per couple.
Great. As we play a little music for you, I’m going to give you 60 seconds to open this and follow its instructions. Ready, set, open. (Note to reader: Each person was given a folded and seal paper that directs them to move to a specific section and row in the auditorium. Those who are obedient will now get up and move as we play “Dare You to Move” over the house speakers.)
Welcome to a new seat, and a new level of living. How do you feel right now?
Raise your hand on any of these that apply to you (show them all on one slide)
Awkward
Resentful
A little confused (as to why we did this)
Comfortable
Excited to be in a new place
Wishing I could go back to my old seat
If you’re feeling awkward, maybe resentful, a little confused, and/or wishing you were back in your old place of comfort, then you’re feeling a little of what Jonah felt after Jonah ran away from the Lord. We’ll learn today about Jonah’s feelings while he was in the belly of the big fish.
Before we turn to the book of Jonah, I invite you to find a Bible under a chair near you and turn to the book of Hebrews, which is on p. 1193. Open a Bible to Hebrews 12:5, p. 1193.
Read Heb. 12:5-11.
What the author is saying is:
Lessons on Discipline:
1. Everyone needs to be disciplined from time to time.
2. Loving parents discipline their children.
3. Discipline is a good thing.
4. Discipline is painful.
5. Discipline can produce a harvest of righteousness.
In Jonah 2, 3, and 4, we’re going to see in high definition that God loves Jonah, that the discipline he receives is a good thing, though painful, and that it produces a harvest of righteousness like few harvests in all of history.
Turn to Jonah 2, p. 916.
As you’re turning there, let’s review. We learned last weekend that the book of Jonah isn’t actually about Jonah.
Review:
1. The book isn’t about Jonah.
He’s the best supporting actor. The book is about God,
2. The book of Jonah is about a great and gracious God who is center stage on every page. That explains why this scene in the drama opens with Jonah talking to God and closes with God talking to the great fish, who spits Jonah onto dry ground.
Before we look at that, look for a minute at Jonah 1:9. Last week we noted that the two great characteristics of God are His greatness and His graciousness. These are the twin peaks of God’s nature. You can see the first characteristic in Jonah 1:9. If you own the Bible in your lap right now, I encourage you to circle the two words, “who made.” In Jonah 1:9, the sailors on the boat are wondering whose god it was that was rocking the boat. Was it the wind god, the sky god, or the sea god? Jonah raises their sights higher as he describes a God they had never heard of before: “the God who made” – the Creator God. “The God of heaven who made the sea and the land.” That’s twin peak number 1, the Great God.
Twin peak number 2 can be seen in the opening lines of Jonah 2. Follow as I read.
“From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the Lord his God. He said, “In my distress I called to the Lord, and he answered me. From the depths of the grave, I called for help, and you listened to my cry…” If you own the Bible you’re reading from, circle, “you listened.”
“You listened” highlights the second great characteristic of God: He is gracious. He not only made us, He’s interested in us. He’s not only interested in us, He loves us. Which is why He disciplines Jonah, and why He disciplines you and I from time to time as well.
3. The Twin Peaks of God’s Character are His Greatness and Graciousness.
For those of you who are keeping up with us in your reading, you know why these two characteristics are so important. They’re spelled out in week one, day five of the book. If you didn’t get a copy last week, or thought you’d share a copy with your spouse and discovered that that doesn’t really work, you need your own copy if you’re going to read every day, there are copies still available.
“Who made,” and “You listened,” resonate with the greatness and graciousness of God.
Let’s continue reading:
“You hurled me into the very heart of the seas, and the currents swirled about me; all your waves and breakers swept over me.” – Sounds like he’s drowning, doesn’t it?
What do people do when they think they’re drowning? They start to panic: “I said, ‘I have been banished from your sight;’” (then, his saner side kicks in): “yet I will look again towards your holy temple.”
He goes back to the narrative: “The engulfing waters threatened me, the deep surrounded me; seaweed was wrapped around my head. To the roots of the mountains I sank down;” – Last week we noted that when you run from God, the only direction to go is down. This is the bottom for Jonah. You can’t go any lower than the bottom of the sea. “…the earth barred me in forever.” That’s a statement of finality, isn’t it? He’s saying, “I am going to die at the bottom of the sea.”
That’s the low point.
The next phrase starts the upward ascent: “But you brought my life up from the pit, O Lord my God. ‘When my life was ebbing away, I remembered you, Lord, and my prayer rose to you, to your holy temple.”
In chapter 1, when everyone on board ship is panicking? They were all praying. All, except Jonah. Jonah never prays in chapter 1. This is when he starts to pray – as a response to God’s correction.
We are so much like Jonah, aren’t we?
Jonah is at the bottom of the Mediterranean. He’s starting to black out. One or two more seconds are all that’s left for him, so he prays. And God answers.
We don’t know if Jonah blacked out and was swallowed, or was swallowed before he blacked out. What we do know from v. 6 is that when Jonah’s life was ebbing away, God lifted him from the pit.
Inside the belly of the fish, Jonah makes this observation: Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs. – Jonah 2:8
We’ll come back to this verse in a few minutes. But here’s what I think happened: I think Jonah finally responded the right way to God, and found grace.
Here’s the tale.
Jonah’s Tale: Here’s how Jonah’s life has gone since we were introduced to him in chapter 1. Jonah begins with
1. Disobedience. (Jonah 1:2)
God says “warn the people of Nineveh.” But Jonah doesn’t want to. He hates the Ninevehites, so Jonah runs.
And God watches. God always sees when we run. So, God does what He must always do when we’re disobedient. He disciplines.
2. Discipline. (Jonah 1:4-17)
The remainder of chapter 1 is about the discipline experienced by Jonah as first the wind, then the waves, then the sailors trouble him, and finally he’s dropped into the sea and a fish swallows him. Discipline is a fundamental part of life. – Read week 2 day 1 tomorrow (if you haven’t already done so). It’s all about disciplining your children the way God disciplines you.
Sometimes God disciplines immediately. Sometimes He gives us time to correct ourselves. (That’s what He did with Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel 4. He gave Nebuchadnezzar a full year to repent before inflicting him with a delusional disease that caused Nebuchadnezzar to eat grass.) Sometimes God waits a long, long time. But because He loves us, He always disciplines in areas we need stimulous. One of the great lessons of Jonah is, you can run, you may even be able to run for a LONG time… but you cannot hide. God disciplines His children because He oves us..
God is fair too creative to spank Jonah, or send him to his room. Who but God would think of sending a wayward son into the stomach of a fish, where he would have time to stew in his juices and think a little bit about what he’d done? That’s where chapter 1 ends. Chapter 2 begins with Jonah in distress.
Discipline, inevitably, leads to distress.
3. Distress. (Jonah 2:1)
Hebrews 12 told us that “No discipline seems pleasant at the time.”
Most of you experienced mild distress when you switched chairs. Imagine the distress Jonah felt every time the fish swallowed, or tried to eat? All the walls of his prison would contract.
Imagine the smell inside that fish?
Imagine what it must have felt like to begin to be digested? Scholars speculate that by the time Jonah’s discipline was complete, all his hair would have been digested, including his eyebrows and eyelashes, all his epidermis would have been gone, and maybe several more layers of skin as well. Plus, have you ever tried to sit in one position without moving for an hour or so. –Try it for the rest of the service: don’t move, and imagine what it was like to have the walls pressing in on you, and then multiple that by 36 or more hours.
By the way: if you think Jonah was in distress, imagine how the fish felt, and it hadn’t done anything wrong…. Sometimes we get to experience discomfort not because of something we’ve done, but because of something someone else has done.
- Jonah calls out to God in his distress, and it is at that moment that things begin to look up for the first time - now that he’s aligned with God’s plans.
But, when his distress became great enough, he made the decision to obey.
4. Decision to obey. (Jonah 2:9)
It may seem childish and shallow, but that’s what we do too. We say, “No, I’m not going to forgive.” But over time, the discomfort of living in an awkward world overtakes us, and we decide to do the right thing. We try to get away with doing less than our best, but then our conscience, or our boss, raise our distress level and we say, “I can’t live that this anymore.” And we decide to obey.
Jonah says, “But I, with a song of thanksgiving will sacrifice to you. What I have vowed I will make good. Salvation comes from the Lord.” (Jonah 2:9) – What do you suppose Jonah vowed?
I’m guessing Jonah vowed that, if given another chance, he would do exactly what God said. We’re going to see that take place next week as we study chapter three. I believe Jonah vowed that he would do what God asked. We’re going to see the success that comes from that in chapter three.
Disobedience – discipline – distress – decision to obey.
It doesn’t always happen this way. Sometimes we decide to obey, and that decision results in us making many more good decisions over many more months and eventually the sum total of those good decisions bring us back to a good place again. But God is microwaving His lessons in the life of Jonah, in part, so that you and I can see the whole cycle in just four short chapters.
For Jonah, the minute he decides to obey, he enters into the next phase of the correction cycle, which is deliverance.
5. Deliverance. (Jonah 2:10)
v. 10 “And the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.” – Wouldn’t you have liked to be there to see that?
Imagine standing on the shore of the Mediterranean, minding your own business. You’re sunning yourself, or taking a walk, or maybe fishing, and this 50 foot long whale shark jumps out of a wave, lands on the beach in front of you, convulses three or four times, and suddenly, at your feet, curled up in the fetal position, is a half-digested human being.
“Martha!,” you say, “look what the fish coughed up!”
At that moment, Jonah was a human hairball. He’s naked, hairless, covered in mucus and stomach fluids.
You’re thinking:
“This is gross! This is terrible! This is one of the worst things I’ve ever seen happen to a person!”
At the same time, Jonah’s thinking:
“I’m alive! I’m safe. This may be the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”
See, when you respond rightly to God’s correction, your way of seeing things changes. Your values change, your sense of what’s right changes, your perspective on your circumstances changes.
Most of us walk around thinking, “I don’t have enough! I need more!” Then we lose our job and suddenly we have less. When we get another job, suddenly the less we have seems like more.
Do you know what I’m saying?
One reason I’m always excited when I hear of a New Songer going on one of our missions trips is that I know they will come home changed, without having to go through a discipline process.
The belly changed Jonah’s mind, so that naked and pus-covered was a great thing, because he was headed up again, not down. It meant that instead of being distressed, he had been delivered.
That’s the result of God’s correction. – You sit in a place you’ve never been in before. Probably you’ve never wanted to be in that place before. But you look around, and suddenly, it’s like you’re seeing the word with new eyes.
Okay, now that we’re through with the disobedience – discipline – and distress, you can return to your original seat.
With the few minutes remaining, I want to go back to the verse we skimmed over: Jonah 2:8.
After making his decision to obey, Jonah realizes something. Jonah 2:8 says, Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs. – Jonah 2:8
Think about the word “cling” for a minute. What do you see?
Do some of you see plastic wrap, that plastic wrap, wrapped around a piece of fruit or a bowl of leftovers?
Do some of you see a clenched hand, holding onto something for dear life?
For 75 years, from 1916 to 1991, the Soviet Union clung to laws and customs that kept their people impoverished and restricted, when freedom could have been theirs. People who lived during those days missed out on so much, because their country “clung” to an inferior form of government. But it was all they knew, so they CLUNG to it. We think, “What a shame that was!” “What a shame!”
The shame is much deeper when it involves not 75 years, but eternity.
Jonah, while he’s in the belly of the big fish, thinks to himself, “I finally let go of what I was clinging to, and God rescued me.” Then, he starts thinking about people who are still clinging to things that keep them from fully surrendering to God. He calls them, “idols.”
Idols in our day aren’t made of wood or stone. They’re far more subtle than that. Idols today are things like, pride. I have a relative that won’t bow to God because he’s too proud. There’s just too much pride to admit, “God, you’re smarter than I am. My life would go better if I would let go of my pride and reach out my hand to you.”
I have another relative that won’t let go of pain. His brother died prematurely, and that hurts so much that he won’t even consider letting God into his life. Instead, he wants to hurt God and his way of hurting God is to pretend he believes that God doesn’t exist. He’d rather hold on to the pain he’s got that open his hand to a great and gracious God.
I have another relative who has never let go of her stuff, and another one who clings to her family. I have a great family, but we’re all clingers. (smile)
What about you?
What are you clinging to today?
King David in the O.T. say, My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me.” – Psalm 63:8
Sometimes, in our moments of being disciplined you can see so clearly: you either cling to worthless idols, things that can’t deliver you or give you happiness or direction or hope, or you cling to God. Which do you choose to cling to today?
You can only cling to one thing. Is there something you need to let go of, so that you can let your soul cling to God?
Jonah ran away from God, but God loved him too much to let him go. So he sent wind and then waves, then a fish, before Jonah would let go of the prejudice he was clinging to.
Clench your fist for a minute. Now, imagine for a minute that the thing you’re having a hard time letting go of is inside that fist. You’re clinging to it…. Now, let it go (open your fist). Let it go.
Your hand is opened now. What’s the most natural movement for a hand? Is it to flex? To wiggle your fingers? To shake? The most natural motion for your hand is to clench. Which means that you will probably end up clenching it around something again soon. So now that it’s open, why not let that something you clench onto be God?
I’m going to pray three prayers as we close.
1. Releasing something prayer with those of you who have been holding onto something you need to release.
2. Embracing God for the first time prayer for those of you who need to reach your hand to Him, really, for the first time.
3. Reaffirming that you have been and will continue to cling to God. You’ve been walking with Him faithfully, and you just want to affirm that you intend to continue.
For this second prayer, you need to know something. You need to know that the way to embrace God is to invite His Son Jesus into your life. Why Jesus? Because Jesus is the member of the Godhead who came to earth and paid the price for our sins by dying on the Cross on our behalf. It was His death that enabled God to say, “I can extend grace, because payment has already been paid by Him, so now I can give you grace instead of judgment.”
So, if you’ve never invited Christ into your life before, this second prayer is for you.
Let’s start with the first.
With everyone’s eyes closed and heads bowed, how many of you want to release something to God today? Maybe it’s a sin you’ve been committing, or a harmful practice. Maybe it’s a relationship or a selfish attitude. Whatever it is, raise your hand if you want to release something, so I can pray for you.
Alright, you can put your hands down.
Prayer: “Lord, I am releasing this today into your hands and entrusting myself to you. I will not cling to it any longer. But I recognize that hands naturally tend to cling, so before I grab back onto that thing, I am wrapping my hand around yours and clinging to you.”
Okay, everybody look up here for a minute. If you prayed that prayer, Phil. 4:13 says, I can do all things through him who gives me strength. Phil. 4:13
This afternoon you may be tempted to wrap your hand around that thing again, but if you will wrap it around Jesus instead, he will give you strength. Sometimes Jesus gives you strength by giving you a friend to talk to, so you don’t have to keep your release today a secret. If you can, share what you’ve done today with a friend so they can be part of God’s strength for you to keep clinging to Him and not clinging to what you’ve released.
Let’s bow your heads again.
This prayer is for you if you’d like to embrace Jesus as your Lord and Savior today. If you’d like to do that, would you raise your hand, so I can pray for you?
Pray salvation prayer.
Look up again. If you prayed that prayer, Jesus has forgiven you and entered into your life. So this is the beginning of a whole new life for you. In order to grow in your relationship with Him, I want you to do two things this week:
1. Take a Bible and start reading the book of Luke.
2. Come back next weekend and get involved in the church. (You need God’s people to help you grow.)
Okay, let’s bow again. This prayer is going to be for those of you who would say, “I am steady in my relationship with the Lord. All week long I’ve been walking with Him and I just want to reaffirm to Him that I’m going to continue to do that.”
All heads bowed, how many of you want to pray this reaffirmation?
Prayer: Lord, I’m Yours. Thanks for walking with me. I plan to cling to you this week like I did last week, and I plan to do that the week after and the week after and the week after. You are my Lord and Leader.
Look up for a second: I want to applaud you for your faithfulness. I Cor. 4:2 says, Now it is required that those who have been given a trust must prove faithful. I’m glad you’re proving faithful, and the Lord is too.
Father, bless your people, and this offering we’re giving You. You are a great and gracious God who corrects us because You love us. We don’t like the pain correction brings, but we like the feeling of seeing with new eyes when it’s over. If You’d use us like you used Jonah, well, then it would all be more than we could ask for, so we ask You to use us to the best of our abilities to further Your kingdom.
Thanks Lord, Amen.
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