The Jonah Attitude
Scripture: Jonah 1-4; Matthew 12:40; Psalm 139:7-10; James 4:17
Introduction:
This morning I have a question to ask you, "Have you ever met someone with a Jonah attitude?" I will tell you more about Jonah later, but right now I just want you to begin thinking about whether or not you’ve ever met someone with his attitude. Maybe you know one really well or maybe you looked in the mirror and saw Jonah’s face instead of your own. In my message today, we will look at the traits (ways to identify) the Jonah attitude that is literally killing the Church.
There are many times when I find myself talking with people and trying to convince them about how good God is and how He will take care of them. Many times I am not sure if I am getting through to these people. I mean people who claim to be Christians are the hardest ones to convince about God’s goodness. These are people who actually believe in God yet because of their own individual struggles take the stance that maybe all of this goodness that we talk about with God is only hype. Is it hype or is God really good and we are Jonahs? This morning I want you to consider the story of Jonah in a manner unlike before. As I get deeper into the message, ask yourself "Do I have a Jonah attitude?" I will tell you that I have had a Jonah attitude before and I am sure that I do not want that attitude again.
Let me give you an example of a situation when someone is drowning. I am not sure how many of you understand what happens when someone who cannot swim begins to drown. They say that your life flashes before your eyes as you are slowing sinking, I am not sure. But one of the things that often happen is that the individual who is drowning often out of panic begins to struggle against the person who has jumped into the water to save them. There have been times when the rescuers had to knock the person out in order to save their own lives and the life of the person they were trying to rescue. When you consider that scenario, the one who jumps into the water to save the life of the one who was drowning must hurt the person physically in order to save them. They did not do it because they angry, they did it to save their lives. The reason I am sharing this with you is this, if God is trying to help you and you are fighting against Him, there are times when He must knock us out so that He can save us. Our Jonah attitude influences us to fight against God.
This morning we will look at the goodness of God compared to what I will call throughout the message, the Jonah attitude. Turn with me to the book of Jonah where we will look at he man who decided to fight again God, lost and then became angry at God for His goodness and mercy.
Before we talk about Jonah, let me clarify something first, again as proof of God’s goodness. Throughout history, there has been a lot of discussions as to whether or not Jonah ever existed or if this story is factual. It has also been questioned as to whether or not there was every a large fish that could swallow a man and preserve Him. To these points I would submit this: while the throats of most whales are too narrow to swallow a man, the sperm whale can as well as some other species of whales. These whales could swallow a man and preserve his life, this is a proven fact. As it relates to the rest, I would quote Jesus. If anyone would know if the story was real it would be our Savior who was present on the day of creation. Jesus said in Matthew 12:40 "for just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth." If Jesus believed the story then that is good enough for me. Now let’s get to the heart of the message.
I. In The Beginning Was God’s Goodness and Jonah’s Attitude
In the first two verses of chapter one of the book of Jonah we find God’s goodness. Verses one and two reads "The word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai saying, ’Arise, go to Nineveh, the great city, and cry against it, for their wickedness has come before Me." (Jonah 1:1-2) God looked down and saw the wickedness of the city of Nineveh and selected Jonah as His messenger to save the city. God was acting out of His goodness and His love for those people, not necessarily the city itself, but the people who dwelled therein. You see, God is good, all of the time. He is not like we are, He is always good. He did not have to reach out to the people of Nineveh, but that was His nature.
In verse three of chapter one, we get the first glance of the "Jonah Attitude." Verse three reads "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 1:3) I am not sure what Jonah was thinking in his desire to "flee from the presence of the Lord." Maybe he did not understand what David knew when He wrote "Where can I go from Thy Spirit? Or where can I flee from Thy presence? If I ascend to heaven, Thou art there; if I make my bed in hell, behold Thou art there. If I take the wings of the dawn, if I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, even there Thy hand will lead me and Thy right hand will lay hold of me." (Psalm 139:7-10) Jonah found this to be true, but let’s examine his attitude. First he was one of God’s prophets so he should have understood that he could not run from god. Also, as a man of God, you would think that he would have been extremely happy to be called upon by God to reach out to people who were on their way to hell. But, the Jonah attitude did not allow for this. Instead of Jonah doing what God told Him to do, he went in the opposite direction, he literally made the decision that he was not going to do what God had commanded him to do. With that decision, he began to fight against God.
One of the first identifier of a Jonah Attitude is when a person believes "they can pick and choose the things of God that they will do." A Jonah attitude says that regardless of what God is telling me or what He is trying to do in my life, I can choose whether or not I do it. In some ways this is correct in that God made us with the ability to choose, being totally free to make our own decisions. He gets joy when we choose to follow Him, He will not force us. He wants us to love Him so much that we choose to obey and walk in fellowship with Him. However, if I have a Jonah Attitude, that will be hard to do because I will only walk in fellowship with God when it pleases me or when I am getting something out of it.
A second identifier of a Jonah Attitude is when "we refuse to do good to someone because of our dislike towards them." In Jonah’s case it appears that he simply did not like the people of Nineveh and did not want to do anything that would save them. He actually looked forward to their destruction as we will see later. When we as individuals get to the point where we are refusing to do good because we do not like someone or for whatever reason, that constitute sin for us. James 4:17 says "Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin." This is very serious because it is not limited to just doing the right thing as it pertains to your interactions with another person. It means doing the right thing all the time. If you are on your job and you know you should do something although you will not get into trouble if you do not do it, for you it is sin if you do not get it done. Again, a Jonah Attitude thinks we can pick and choose what we will do, regardless of the circumstances, but that is not the case. Let’s move on with Jonah.
II. One Response To A Jonah Attitude
In keeping with the flow of the book of Jonah, I want to touch on one response we should have with our Jonah Attitudes and when it is present in others. As you have read the story of Jonah, you know that he got on a ship in his attempt to get away from God and not fulfill what God had told him to do. When they got out to sea, Jonah fell asleep without even worrying about the storm that was coming. You see, Jonah had enough faith in God that he knew he would be okay, so he went to sleep without a care in the world. Maybe he thought he had actually gotten one over on God, but he was wrong. God brought a great wind on the sea to where the boat almost sunk. The sailors began throwing their cargo over the side in an attempt to stabilize the boat. Through all of this, Jonah was asleep. All of these men called upon their gods to save them, to no avail. Finally they found Jonah and were surprised that he was asleep. They asked him to call on his God to save them. Then they cast lots to see who had brought this "bad luck" on them and the lots felled on Jonah. When they realized who he was and that he was running away from his God, they became very afraid. When they asked him what they should do he calmly told them to throw him off the boat, but they did not want to be responsible for his death. They tried harder to row. Finally they had no choice. Jonah 1:13-15 records the following:
"However, the men rowed desperately to return to land but they could not, for the sea was becoming even stormier against them. Then they called on the Lord and said, ’We earnestly pray, O Lord, do not let us perish on account of this man’s life and do not put innocent blood on us; for Thou, O Lord has done as Thou has pleased.’ So they picked up Jonah, threw him into the sea, and the sea stopped its raging."
I want you to notice what that can happen when you are dealing with a Jonah Attitude (whether your own or someone else). In the story, as the waves began to crash over the boat, their first response was to stabilize the boat and make it to where it would not sink. The way to do that was to minimize the weight they were carrying, make the boat lighter. To accomplish this goal they began to throw into the sea their precious cargo. This cargo could have been anything, goods to be sold or goods they had just purchased. Whatever it was, it was lost because of Jonah. When you are dealing with a Jonah Attitude, it could cause you to lose friends, opportunities, job promotions and other things that you hold dear. A Jonah Attitude will not lead you to the blessings of God but will actually cost you your blessings. Notice what Jonah was doing while these sailors were throwing their cargo over the side of the boat in an attempt to save the boat – he was sleeping. He was asleep – not even caring that he had put the lives of the sailors in jeopardy. People with a Jonah attitude will suck you dry and still seek more. If you are losing everything because of them that is okay, they are still benefiting from your loss. If you lose all of your friends because of them, they will not care. If you have a Jonah Attitude, you won’t care about those you end up hurting. Yes you may care initially, but you quickly move on. Why? Put simply, you expect people to make sacrifices for you. But now we get to where I was going with this. As Jonah recommended to the sailors, I recommend to you, if you have friends who have a Jonah Attitude or if you have a Jonah Attitude, cast them over the boat and/or cast your attitude off the boat.
If you have friends and even family with a Jonah attitude, pray for them and let them go. I am not saying that you should be harmful to them or anything like that, but stop allowing them to negatively influence your life. Sometimes you have to cast some things (and people) off that are not positively influencing your life. Let the attitude and the people go. Why? If you do not, you will find yourself on the losing end of many things. God has great plans for you but He will only be able to fulfill His plans for us when we get our Jonah Attitudes out of the way. We must also rid ourselves of others with this attitude because of the influence that they may have on us. Many of you have had friends that you are no longer in contact with because they were not good for you. At some point you made the decision to move on because you realized that the person was doing more harm to your life than good. When the sailors were faced with the decision to cast Jonah off the ship, they tried their best to find a way to secure the boat without throwing him off. However, they finally came to the point where they had to make the decision and they cast him off. Once Jonah hit the water, the winds stopped blowing and the waves stopped crashing against the ship and everything was calm.
When you identify people in your life with a Jonah Attitude and you begin to realize that they are sucking you dry, you come to realize that you have to make some tough choices. When the sailors saw what happened when they cast Jonah over, they were immediately overcome with fear of the Lord and offered Him a sacrifice. With their sacrifice, they also made vows to Him. We are not told what those vows were but I would like to think that they made some serious promises about their beliefs. They were almost killed and they had an interaction with the real God after having prayed to their pagan gods with no success. They became very aware of who the real God was and I believe that it left a lasting impression. When you take control of your life and get rid of your Jonah Attitudes as well as those you hang around with that have the same attitudes, peace will come into your life. It may take some time for you to realize it, but the peace will come.
We are not done with Jonah so e will continue this next week. God Bless.
