Jonah 3:1-5
The word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time, saying, 2"Get up, go to Nineveh, that great city, and proclaim to it the message that I tell you." 3So Jonah set out and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly large city, a three days' walk across. 4Jonah began to go into the city, going a day's walk. And he cried out, "Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!" 5And the people of Nineveh believed God; they proclaimed a fast, and everyone, great and small, put on sackcloth.
Jonah 3:10
When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity that he had said he would bring upon them; and he did not do it.
INTRODUCTION:
A wealthy businessman hosted a spectacular party in which he had filled his swimming pool with sharks, barracuda and other assorted dangerous fish. He announced to his guests that he would like to challenge any of them to try swimming across the pool, and he would offer a prize of either a new home in the mountains, a trip around the world for two or a piece of his business. No sooner had he made the announcement than there was a splash and a man swam rapidly across the infested waters and jumped out on the other side.
While the man was trying to catch his breath, the millionaire came over and started asking his hand and said, "That was an absolutely stunning performance. What prize do you want?"
The swimmer answered tersely, "Right now I really don't care about the prize. I just want to get the name of the turkey who pushed me in." (1)
One of my favorite fish stories is this shrimpy little book with the whale of a story found in Jonah. On a scale of one to ten it gets a ten. There's something fishy about Jonah. While Jonah crawfishes and flounders after hearing God's call, God is perched in heaven with a whale of a plan to hook Jonah up with the Ninevites. And when Jonah is finally reeled in, hook, line and sinker, he tackles the plan and nets a great catch for God.
Sorry for all of the puns. (Well, I'm not really.) This is a great story. And it is particularly poignant for me. You see, this is the story that slapped me up along side the head and allowed me to answer God's call to preach. I knew my pastor knew I was struggling with the call, actually I was running from the call. I didn't want to preach. I was happy doing what I was doing.
And I just knew Bob was aiming all of his sermons at me. That's what it felt like he had been doing for the past three months. (Of course, he wasn't really, it was God, but I thought he was.) So, when Bob announced that he would be gone and the DS was going to preach, I let all my defenses down and went just to listen to a good sermon. The DS preached about Jonah running from God.
Well, let's take a look at the story.
I. GOD CALLED, JONAH STALLED:
A. The first thing we find is that when God Called, Jonah Stalled. Unlike Philip and Nathanael from last week who were excited about sharing their faith, Jonah didn't want any part of this business. Jonah may have preached the most reluctant sermon in the whole Bible. Even though Jonah told God, "Sure I'll go." He didn't. God had called Jonah to hold a city wide revival. A revival of God sized proportions in Nineveh. But Jonah didn't want any part of it. He basically tells God, "Why should I go and preach, you're just going to forgive them."
Jonah was reluctant to go to Nineveh. Why? Well, because Nineveh was in Assyria. Assyria is modern day Iraq, and you know how well Israel and Iraq get along. That enmity goes back a long way. Jonah didn't want any part of that kind of plan. Assyria was the Evil Empire, the Nazi regime of the time. And Nineveh was the capitol. Sin Central. As an old Jazz song says, "Nineveh City was a city of sin, the jumpin' and a jivin' made a terrible din."
Jonah sure didn't want any part of that, so when God Called, Jonah Stalled.
B. Haven't you ever done that? Sure you have. I think we call it procrastination nowadays. But we've all done it. I know I have. The last thing I wanted to do when I was 22 was to preach. I tried doing all kinds of other stuff instead but none of it satisfied. God called and I stalled just like Jonah. It wasn't because of prejudice, mine was probably more related to fear. You've probably had similar feelings.
There was a statistician who had never taken care of his four small energetic children all by himself. He reluctantly promised to look after them one Saturday afternoon while his wife went shopping. When she returned, he gave her a note that read:
"Dried tears-11 times. Tied shoelaces-15 times. Blew up toy balloons-5 per child. Average life of each balloon-10 seconds. Warned children not to run across street-26 times. Children insisted on running across street-26 times. Number of Saturdays I will go through this again-0!"
That's how Jonah felt. He was reluctant to listen to the call of God. God Called and Jonah Stalled.
II. GOD SAID, JONAH FLED:
A. Notice that even though Jonah Stalled God Called again. Actually, Jonah did much more than just stall, when God Said, Jonah Fled. That's right, Jonah said, "Sure, I'll go." And then he took off in the opposite direction. I don't know where he thought he could run to get away from God. It's just not possible.
Notice that the Scripture says that "The word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time." Just because Jonah ran doesn't mean that God gave up. Jonah's disappearing act didn't negate God's call. God still had a job for Jonah to do. God didn't give up even when Jonah didn't want to do what God had called him to do.
But Jonah ran. God Said and Jonah Fled. Not the brightest thing to do was it.
B. Every now and then you run across a newspaper article that makes you think that the whole world is going bonkers. There's one from a paper in Kentucky: It seems a youth pastor was charged with calling in a bomb threat to a Western Kentucky church where he was scheduled to preach that night. This young pastor said he made the call on a Sunday evening because he was unprepared for the service that night. He told police he called 911 from the church about 6:30 p.m. and told the dispatcher there was a bomb in the church. When he was questioned, he was cooperative and told the police he made the call. The church was evacuated after the call, and a police search revealed no bomb. However the 7 p.m. service was canceled.
The young man had been youth pastor at the church for more than two years, according to the church's associate pastor. He had delivered sermons before. But this time he was not prepared. (3)
When I first read that article my reaction was, HE DID WHAT? He called in a bomb threat because he wasn't prepared to preach? I guess every preacher has been tempted at some time or another to do something drastic like that. My guess is that so has every teacher and or lawyer and or sales person or whoever when their not prepared.
Sometimes when we're not prepared or when something just doesn't feel right or we simply don't want to do something, we will go to desperate extremes. Jonah wasn't prepared to do what God had called him to do. So, Jonah hit the road and ran in the opposite direction. God Said and Jonah Fled.
III. JONAH SAILED, GOD WHALED:
A. And that brings us to the fish story. What a whale of a story it is too. Jonah fled out of the fire and into the deep fryer. He not only ran away, Jonah ran away to sea.
I've got a friend who joined the Navy. He says he was taken in by the recruiting posters. They all said: "Join the Navy and see the world." So, he did. But what they didn't tell him was that two-thirds of the world is covered by water. He also says, he spent so much time aboard ship that he's sure he saw all but a few square yards of the that portion of the world and very little of the rest of it.
Jonah wound up at sea. Jonah Sailed. And when Jonah Sailed, God Whaled. Oh, I don't mean that God began crying and moaning, not that kind of wailing. But God sent the big fish.
Now if you think about it. God did Jonah a favor. You see, the crew had run into a storm that just wouldn't let up. At first they thought it was just a normal storm. But when it didn't let up and when they began to fear for their lives, they began putting two and two together. They knew that something was amiss. Or God was angry with somebody. And they knew it wasn't them. There was only one other person aboard ship, Jonah. So, they discussed and voted and decided that if Jonah was the problem, then they better scuttle him right away. And they did. They tossed him overboard.
No sooner did Jonah hit the water when the storm quit. It was like a light switch. One minute it was dark, raging winds and 12 foot waves. Then next it light and calm.
And that was when the big fish came along and pulled Jonah's bacon out of the fire. Jonah Sailed and God Whaled. With one big gulp, God's mellow submarine took off with it's only passenger, the reluctant prophet, Jonah.
B. After telling the story of Jonah and the whale to her Sunday School class, the teacher decided to quiz them. She asked, "Timmy, what is the moral of the story?" Timmy thought for a minute, then said, "People make whales throw up!"
Timmy wasn't too far off was he? This prophet made the big fish sick to its stomach. And after three days of sitting in the belly of this big fish, covered with smelly belly slime, "The Lord spoke to the fish, and it spewed Jonah out upon the dry land." (Jonah 2:10)
Spewed, what a great word. It literally means "vomited". Not a pretty sight, isn't it?
And think about the smell. Jonah Sailed and God Whaled.
IV. JONAH PRESENTED, NINEVEH REPENTED, GOD RELENTED:
A. There's Jonah. When someone said for the first time, "something smells fishy around here" they had to have been talking about Jonah. Covered from head to foot in fish smell Jonah trudges off to Nineveh to finally do God's will.
You see, Jonah knew God's will. Jonah knew what God wanted him to do. God wanted Jonah to conduct revival services over in Nineveh. He wanted Jonah to tell the people of Nineveh to shape up or ship out.
Jonah knew what God wanted him to do. Knowing God's will was not the problem. It never is. DOING God's will is the problem. Knowing and Doing are two different things. Jonah was reluctant to preach because he feared that God would do the unthinkable and forgive Jonah's enemies.
B. So, Jonah reluctantly did what God had called him to do. Jonah got to Nineveh, walked halfway in and began to preach. Well, actually he almost ended before he began. He message consisted of eight words. He basically said, "Either straighten up and fly right or in forty days, God's going to get you."
Jonah Presented. And then the Ninevites did the unthinkable, at least in Jonah's mind. They repented. Jonah Presented and Nineveh Repented.
It didn't take anymore than those eight words to straighten out the whole city. The Good News spread like wild fire. People were repenting left and right. They even made the animals sit in sack cloth and ashes, the sign of repentance.
And when God looked down and saw the success of this revival, God Relented. Jonah Presented. Nineveh Repented, and God Relented. Hearts were changed so God changed God's mind. God forgave them, which is exactly what Jonah was afraid of. Jonah wanted fire works and fire in the sky. God wanted changed hearts.
CONCLUSION:
So, what is this all about. I think Jonah is about repentance and a God who loves us so much that God searches for us even when we run off in the wrong direction. It's about a God who creates opportunities in which we can repent and turn back to God. This is the story of our God. A God who is a God of second chances.
You see, God could have just let Jonah go and gotten somebody else. God could have told that big fish to take the final gulp. But God loved Jonah so much, that "The word of the LORD came to Jonah a second time."
Would God have given Jonah a third chance? I don't know. But God gave Jonah a second chance and that's all Jonah needed.
Jonah might not have had a change of heart but the Ninevites did and so did God. Jonah may have delivered the most reluctant sermon ever preached but it did it's work. God offered Jonah a second chance. And God offers us second chances, too.
It doesn't matter how far we've run or how deep we've stepped into it. If God can pull Jonah out of the belly of fish and use him, God can lift us up and out of the deepest hole and use us. Our God is a God of second chances.
Nobody's going to push you in. But if that's what you need right now, then what are you waiting for? Take it.
1. Parables, Etc. (Platteville, Colorado: Saratoga Press), May 1984
2. The Pastor's Story File (Platteville, Colorado: Saratoga Press), March 1985
3. LEXINGTON HERALD-LEADER, August 8, 1996, p. C1.
4.