Sermon Date: February 4, 2007
Sermon Text: Jonah 1:1-3 (NASB)
1 The word of the LORD came to Jonah the son of Amittai saying, 2 "Arise, go to Nineveh the great city and cry against it, for their wickedness has come up before Me." 3 But Jonah rose up to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the LORD. So he went down to Joppa, found a ship which was going to Tarshish, paid the fare and went down into it to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of the LORD.
Jonah 1:1-3 (NASB)
INTRODUCTION:
She stood there frozen in time and terrified to move. The beautiful countryside around may have brought her peace at any other time, but now she was just terrified!
He had said that she could trust him and that he loved her more than anything else, and now she believed he had gone WAY too far… this was asking WAY too much!
Becky was standing on top of a pole and terrified to move and her dad was standing behind her at the foot of the pole. He was urging her to relax, lean back and fall and that she could trust him.
Becky had always known she could trust her dad, but there was something about this situation that was NOT allowing her to believe in him. What if he dropped her? Would she get hurt?
What if he was just kidding and let her fall so he could laugh at her? Was he really standing right behind her or had he left her… and even though she could hear his voice was he in a position to save her if she fell?
Becky believed her dad loved her, but she had all of these thoughts going thru her head when he urged her to trust him and just lean back and let go…
Have you ever been there in your walk with God? So often, as believers, God leads us to a point in our walk with Him when He speaks to our heart and He says to us… TRUST ME, lean back and let go! And so many times we find ourselves acting just like Jonah did here in our passage this morning…
Would you stand with me as we read the Holy, Infallible, Immutable, Inerrant, Word of God! I will be reading from Jonah 1:1-3 (NASB)
1 The word of the LORD came to Jonah the son of Amittai saying, 2 "Arise, go to Nineveh the great city and cry against it, for their wickedness has come up before Me." 3 But Jonah rose up to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the LORD. So he went down to Joppa, found a ship which was going to Tarshish, paid the fare and went down into it to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of the LORD.
Jonah 1:1-3 (NASB)
You may be seated…
Now when we look at this morning’s passage we can see that there was definitely something that challenged Jonah’s faith in God.
Jonah did not articulate WHY he ran but there are some implications in Scripture that can lead us to some pretty good reasons as to WHY Jonah did run… and why Jonah was not obedient to God’s call on his life.
This morning I want us to see 3 challenges to our faith when obedience is on the line! The first challenge we have is that our obedience is a challenge to our faith when…
1. WHEN GOD ASKS US TO DO ANYTHING!
Our flesh is weak and selfish and we want what WE want and rarely do we settle for doing it some other way. When I was in the Air Force I can remember this one young airman that came into our office. She was arrogant and pushy and she did not believe she had to listen the other airmen in the office.
Each month we had a workday where all the airmen were expected to get out and cut grass, weed around our building and other menial tasks.
She did not believe it was her duty to do these things and whenever you would approach her and ask her to do ANYTHING she would get upset and defensive and there were times when she would simply disappear when there was work to be done.
When we look at our passage this morning we can see that Jonah treated God like this… it really didn’t matter what God was asking Jonah to do, it seems as if Jonah did not want to do anything… and he wanted to disappear when God called him to go…
Jonah does not even question God, he simply gets up and runs away! How many people like that do you know?
Spiritually speaking I know many people who act just like that when God comes to them and asks them to do ANYTHING! They simply do NOT want to do anything… salvation is free and they want to live ‘in Christ’ with NO responsibilities or duties…so they choose to run away from any request made by God or by God’s people.
However, although salvation is free, it is NOT cheap! Salvation comes with a very high cost of discipleship… to be His disciples cost us ALL of who we are!
In Mark 8:34-35 we read,
“…34 And He summoned the crowd with His disciples, and said to them, "If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. 35 "For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it. Mark 8:34-35 (NASB)
When we come to Christ for salvation we are freed from sin and forgiven of our sin. But the forgiveness of that sin comes from the purchase that Christ made on the Cross at Calvary.
On the Cross Jesus paid the price for our sins… He bought us and when we accept Him as Savior, we must honor Him as Lord of our life.
When Christ comes into our hearts, He comes as a King, as a ruler, as a deliverer who had saved our souls! We owe Him our allegiance and obedience.
Jonah was not happy that God asked him to do something and we can see that Jonah chose to run away and hide from God!
What about you this morning? When God comes to you and asks you to get involved with a ministry or that you should be teaching or that you should be working with the children or the youth… what is your response to Him?
Are you like that young airman I knew so many yrs ago, and you complain and whine at every task God places before you OR are you like Jonah and you just try to run away from God!
I can tell you from experience that running away from God does not work. I ran for 10 yrs away from God and His calling on my life… but what I did not realize is that even though I ran to other parts of the country and tried to hide myself in doing other things in the church… God did not lose sight of me and what He had in store for me!
Are you being obedient to God’s call on your life or are you being disobedient to God’s call? When our obedience is lived out to the fullest it is always going to challenge our faith, but not only is our faith challenged when God seeks our obedience in ANYTHING He asks, but I can also see that our obedience is challenged in a mighty way…
2. WHEN GOD ASKS US TO WHAT WE BELIEVE CAN’T BE DONE:
Here we find Jonah being challenged by a seemingly impossible task.
• Jonah knew of the wickedness of the city of Nineveh and…
• Jonah knew just how large a city it was as well…
So I want us to use our ‘holy imagination’ here this morning and I want you to think about just what was going thru Jonah’s mind when God came to him and asked him to go to Nineveh and preach!
I truly believe that Jonah thought things like… WHAT!? You want me to go WHERE? You want me to do WHAT? You want me to say it to WHOM?
Nineveh was on the eastern bank of the Tigris River in what we now know as modern-day Iraq, it was near the city we know as Mosul.
And God had informed Jonah that Nineveh was a wicked and evil city… Can you imagine being sent to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ in a land where EVERYONE is hostile toward Jesus?
Imagine if God woke you from your sleep today and told you that you had to go to Iraq and begin preaching that if they did not turn to Jesus… in 40 day they would perish! What would YOU do?
So often we look at this story of Jonah and we think HOW could Jonah just run away from God! Well Jonah was not only running from God… Jonah was running from what he believed to be impossible!
Those people in Nineveh were heathen people… they were wicked and evil… they wouldn’t listen to him… they would probably make fun of him and eventually rise up and kill him like so many other prophets!
Jonah saw NO way that this could work out for the good. He saw NO happy ending! Jonah saw no hope for the people of Nineveh and Jonah had given up on the people of Nineveh!
But God had NOT given up on them, He was angry at the way they were living, but He was sending Jonah to give them the chance to repent and turn to Him! Even though Jonah saw NO hope… God knew there WAS hope!
When Jesus told His disciples how hard it was for a rich man… a man focused on his material wealth and possessions… how hard it was for him to be saved… they were astounded and they asked Jesus… well WHO can be saved?
Jesus then said, “…With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” Matt 19:26 (HCSB)
And likewise even though Jonah did not believe it was worth his time to go to Nineveh… God did! What was impossible in the sight of Jonah was possible thru the power of God!
Where are YOU this morning? Has God come to you and told you to do something for His kingdom and you have looked at God and said… You want me to do WHAT? You want me to go WHERE? You want me to share my faith with WHO?
I can empathize with you this morning because there was a time when God came to me and told me I was to preach His Gospel and I was going to be a pastor.
I said WHAT? WHERE? WHO? HOW? God I can’t do that… God I can’t do that… God I can’t do that! And I ran from God, just like Jonah.
• Only I did not hide on a ship, but I hid in other areas of the church, I hid in helping out with RA’s… I found out very quickly that I was hiding in the wrong place!
• I hid out teaching Sunday School in the youth department…
• I even hid out at Seminary when I was a Youth Pastor…
But it wasn’t until I surrendered to God and gave all over to Him that I found peace. What I never thought could be done, God has done and God is still working in my life and molding me to be what He wants me to be…
So many times we are hesitant in our obedience to God because we just cannot see how God can work it out… it seems TOO much for us… it seems impossible. It seems like it cannot be done!
But just as God proved with Jonah…
God will make a way…
When there seems to be NO way…
He works in ways we cannot see…
He will make a way for me…
Our faith is challenged when we are called to obedience to God. When he asks us to do something we get our feathers ruffled and when He asks us to do something we cannot do… or that we believe cannot be done, we sometimes run away from Him…
But finally this morning I can see our faith challenged in a great and mighty way…
3. WHEN GOD ASKS US TO DO WHAT IS AGAINST OUR WILL OR NATURE:
Aww, God why are you asking me to do this… is the 1st challenge we looked at, and we know this because it is in our nature to be selfish and desire only what we want…
God, HOW can you ask me to do this, it is impossible! This is the 2nd challenge to our faith that we face because we think that if we cannot see it or touch it or even conceive of it… then it cannot possibly be something that is possible!
But what we haven’t looked at is the darker side of ourselves… and that is the sinful nature that we battle on a daily basis! There are times when God calls us into obedience by doing something for him and we simply ignore God… all because it is against our will or our very nature!
When God calls you to share your faith, it is so easy for most of us to simply ignore God because we feel He is asking us to do something that is NOT who we are…
Jonah did not fancy himself as a prophet…and I am sure…
Jonah did not fancy himself as the bearer of bad news…
Jonah did not believe he was going to be the lightening rod God would use to turn an entire city around…
So often we are like Jonah! God I am NOT gifted in the witnessing and soul winning area. God I don’t what to bring these people down with the news that if they don’t have you… they are doomed to hell.
Or you may be sitting in that pew this morning and thinking that you have failed God time and time again and that there is NO way He can or will use you… and with that in your heart you stop listening for the will and the call of God on your life!
Serving God goes against EVERY fiber of our sinful beings! The enemy is out there and he is trying to fill our heads with excuses and reasons as to WHY we cannot serve!
But the main reason is that serving God goes against our sinful nature… we seek to serve ourselves… NOT GOD!
Jonah, was NOT going to go to Nineveh! He was gonna run away and hide from God’s commands. He got up and ran away from God because the very nature of his soul demanded him to run away… it was not his nature to care for and have compassion for the lost.
For the early Jewish believer, the rest of the world was doomed to hellfire because God had chosen them, but here Jonah was sent to the Gentile… sent to those who did not know or serve their God!
And for God to even suggest the need of these people to know Him… for God to even suggest that these people were NOT automatically bound for hell… that would have set wrong with Jonah because Jonah believed that these people were hopeless and out of the reach of God!
God’s command for obedience will go against our own selfish nature and evil desires. We will want and desire to be something other than what God would have us to be…
CONCLUSION:
Like Jonah, we have times like that in our lives… times where we look at others and judge them thru our eyes and not thru the eyes of God.
When we judge thru our eyes, we quickly condemn and pass judgment, but when we see others thru the eyes of God, there is compassion in our hearts and love shouted to all.
God challenges our faith through calling us to obedience to Him. We are called to be obedient when it is against our innermost nature.
We are called to be obedient when it is something that we believe cannot be done, but finally tonight I want you to know that our obedience is challenged simply when God asks us to DO something…
Obedience is a calling from God and to be obedient and submissive to His will and call on our lives we have to surrender to Christ as our Lord!
We have to learn to step out on faith and no matter WHAT God has called us to do… no matter WHERE God has called us to go… and no matter WHO God has placed in our path…We would be faithful and fruitful in our walk with Christ…
As Bro Jerry comes to lead us in our hymn of invitation I call on all believers to surrender ALL their hearts this morning! Know that God is calling and when He calls we are to answer… when obedience is demanded, I pray that we are willing to submit to His calling…
Where are you this morning, as Bro Jerry leads us in our hymn of invitation I want all to pray that God is using you to serve Him… in all areas of your life!
Come as we begin to sing…
