AN UNLIKELY REVIVAL
Jonah 3:1-10
INTRODUCTION
A. HUMOR: SHE WENT THE SECOND MILE
1. Actress Carol Burnett got out of a cab one day and caught her coat in the door. The driver was unaware of her plight and slowly began to edge out into traffic.
2. To keep from being pulled off her feet, the comedienne had to run alongside down the block. A passerby noted her predicament and quickly alerted the driver. He stopped, jumped out, and released Carol’s coat.
3. “Are you all right?” he asked anxiously. “Yes,” she gasped, “but how much more do I owe you?” Bits and Pieces, November, 1989, p. 6
B. SETTING OF THE SCENE “try to imagine the scene”
1. It's 862 BC. An ancient city awakens to a rosy dawn.
2. It's moated walls/ramparts soar 100 feet in the air, dotted with 1500 lofty towers. It's circumference stretches over 60 miles.
3. Already the Gates are open for the early traffic, and conspicuous among the crowd, a stranger enters.
4. The stains of travel are on his clothes, and he looks with curious awe at the figures of winged colossal bulls that keep silent guard over the gate under which he passes.
5. The markets fill, the bazaars come alive with crowds.
Soldiers and war chariots clatter in the streets. Barbaric wealth and power are everywhere as luxury, corruption,
lust, violence and idolatry fill every sight. Smoke arises
from 100 altars as sacrifices are offered and idols worshiped.
6. The stranger is deeply moved. Surprise gives way to horror – and righteous anger
7. With trumpet voice and eyes of fire he utters the words of DOOM, "Forty Days, And Nineveh Will The Destroyed!"
8. Through streets and parks, neighborhoods and markets, he shouts his doleful message.
9. It’s met with unbelief, then with alarm. News spreads like wildfire, and with it, panic. It penetrates to the King
upon his throne. It moves society to its depths.
10. We're going to look at a people, very similar to us, who should NOT have been sensitive or open to the Holy Spirit, but were, and we should consider whether WE are as challenged and open as they were!
C. TEXT
Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: 2 “Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you.” 3 Jonah obeyed the word of the Lord and went to Nineveh. Now Nineveh was a very important city—a visit required three days. 4 On the first day, Jonah started into the city. He proclaimed: “Forty more days and Nineveh will be overturned.” 5 The Ninevites believed God. They declared a fast, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth.
6 When the news reached the king of Nineveh, he rose from his throne, took off his royal robes, covered himself with sackcloth and sat down in the dust. 7 Then he issued a proclamation in Nineveh: “By the decree of the king and his nobles: Do not let any man or beast, herd or flock, taste anything; do not let them eat or drink. 8 But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth. Let everyone call urgently on God. Let them give up their evil ways and their violence. 9 Who knows? God may yet relent and with compassion turn from his fierce anger so that we will not perish.” 10 When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he had compassion and did not bring upon them the destruction he had threatened.
D. THESIS
1. God is speaking to us about right hearts and right lives. We all know that America needs revival. Maybe
there’s a clue to revival FOR US in this account about the Ninevites -- how they listened and responded to God.
2. Title of this message: “AN UNLIKELY REVIVAL.”
I. AN UNLIKELY REVIVAL
This revival was the greatest one in biblical history, maybe all time. But it was also a very unlikely, because:
1. No Nice Building, no comfortable seats; No Music, or humor; no Carpet, Lighting, or altars to pray at.
2. There were no dramas or skits; nothing “listener-
friendly.” There was nothing cool or trendy; the preacher wasn’t friendly. There was nothing about this revival that made it comfortable or easy to accept.
A. EVANGELIST: ONE OF CONQUERED ENEMIES
1. To the Assyrians, Jonah was from a third world country, uneducated; come to tell the most advanced people what to do! It's a marvel they would listen.
2. Jonah's God hadn't been able to stop their armies before, so how could He overcome them now?
3. Hostile nations in those days always claimed their gods would destroy their opponents. So why should they listen?
B. SO LITTLE KNOWLEDGE OF TRUE GOD
1. The Ninevites had never heard the Scriptures. They had little or no concept of the True God.
2. Jonah didn't bother to quote scriptures to them, but just yelled a few sentences about destruction.
C. JONAH WAS BY HIMSELF
In the Jewish tradition, there were always 2 witnesses to prove anything. Jonah didn't have one other person who believed his story, yet he wanted 120,000 people to obey his words.
D. UNLIKE THE REVIVAL IN ACTS 2
1. NO HOLY GHOST POWER. The Holy Ghost never fell
here to help convict and convert.
2. LOUSY PREACHING -- he preached the same old message of doom and gloom, with no explanations. He didn't even care if they listened!
3. HUMOR: A Pastor went on vacation; he had his assistant preach. When he got back, the people told him it had been a “poor sermon.” Asked the assistant what he’d preached, “Oh, I just used one of yours!”
II. NOTE: THE INCREDIBLE RESPONSE
A. RESPONSES THEY MIGHT HAVE HAD
1. Telling him to “SHUT UP," like King Amaziah told a prophet in 2 Chronicles 25:16.
2. Run him out of town, STONE HIM -- like the Israelites did with several of their prophets.
3. MOCK HIM -- use him as the butt of jokes in bars and the sitcoms of that day (as is the fashion in the USA).
4. Amazingly -- they took him seriously!
B. HOW EXTREME THEIR RESPONSE
1. WHAT WOULD WE DO TODAY?
a. Well, if it wasn’t the…
1). Super Bowl or World Series
2). Deer season or White bass spawning
3). Didn’t get in way of our kid’s sports/dance,
b. We might Pray, maybe fast, call a meeting.
c. How far would our GOVERNMENT go? Would they mandate a religious shutdown? (Ha!)
2. WHAT THEY DID:
a. The Whole LEGISLATIVE POWER of the Nobles voted unanimously for a fast.
b. The King Himself [President of the country] rose from his throne, took off his robes, and put on sackcloth (potato sacks) and fasted.
c. DECLARATION OF KING – 3 fold
1). Demonstrate your BROKENNESS BF GOD
a). No Man or Beast, Eats or Drinks
b). Every Man and Beast, put on sackcloth of humiliation -- even on cattle and other animals!
c). Required to Display Sorrow For Sin. They had genuine sorrow for their sin and the sin of their country. Do we?
2). URGENT PRAYER
If we want revival, we must "cry mightily unto God."
WHY URGENT NOW? Debt in 2000, 5.6T; now 31.5 Trillion
Chinese Military – soon surpass us. US weakening
93% of Taxes paid by Corps, who could relocate.
In 50 years, we’ve seen the collapse of morality.
100 years since we've had a revival that shook our nation!
In 1 Thess. 5:17, Paul didn't say to sing without ceasing, or fellowship without ceasing, or even preach without ceasing. He said to, "Pray without ceasing." That's revival praying!
3). HOLINESS -- CLEAN LIVES
a). "Let them give up their evil ways and their violence" (3:8). Psalm 66:18, "If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened." Changed hearts should equal changed lives!
b). ILLUS. A traveler in London was describing his sight of a true Christian swimming in the Thames River. When a friend asked him how he knew the man was a true Christian, he replied, "Because he was swimming against the stream." This ought to be a description of every mature Christian. Paul said, “Do not [be] conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind!” Rom. 12:2.
c). This final aspect -- change -- was the main thing God was looking for.
d). Jonah 3:10 says, "When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, He had compassion and did not bring upon them the destruction He had threatened."
III. THE STANDARD OF THE NINEVITES
Jesus said, “The men of Nineveh will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now one greater than Jonah is here” Mt. 12:41.
A. THEIR LEVEL OF PROFITABLENESS
1. THEY GOT LITTLE:
a. A preacher who wished they would die.
b. A message of condemnation without a hint of hope or grace.
c. No power of the Spirit, No story of the love of God.
2. YET THEY PRODUCED BIG:
a. The entire city of 120,000 from top to bottom repented.
b. Their repentance was real,
[See what this godly sorrow has produced in you: what earnestness, what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what alarm, what longing, what concern, what readiness to see justice done. 2 Cor. 7:11].
Had Sorrow for sin
Called on God
They changed their lives. The “Gold Standard!”
B. HOW DO WE COMPARE TO THEM?
1. WE’VE HAD EVERY CHANCE, FAR MORE THAN THEM!
a. God gave HIS SON to die for us on the Cross;
b. God sent HOLY SPIRIT to convict & open our eyes;
c. Gave us His WORD, at the cost of many lives!
d. We’ve had the Gospel flooding our TV & radios for 80 years; church everywhere; Bibles abound. “How shall we escape, if we neglect so great a Salvation?” Heb. 2:3.
2. Are we As Broken About our Sin?
Are we Crying Urgently to God?
Are we living the Crucified, holy Life Jesus called us?
CONCLUSION
A. ILLUS. #1: Going Deeper
1. A small company in the early days of gold mining in South Africa sank shaft after shaft in different locations, finding only a small amount of gold in each shaft.
2. Ultimately, the prospectors discovered that all they needed to have done was to go deeper in the first shaft for, as they did so, they found gold in abundance.
3. Some of us haven’t gotten much out of Christianity because we’ve never gone very deep with the Lord. I challenge you to commit to go deeper at His cross, every day. [Roy Hession]
B. ILLUS. #2: Sin's Chain
1. An overladen coal barge stood in the Mississippi river. A sailor reported to the captain that it had developed a leak and that the vessel would soon sink.
2. The captain, a braggard, drove him away, scoffing, “Yes, but we’ve got plenty of time to abandon ship.” Two more times the nervous sailor, with increasing alarm, warned the captain, but was mocked and ignored.
3. At last the barge began to tilt and was obviously sinking. The captain ordered the men to the life boat. As they took their places, he said, "See, I told you there was plenty of time."
4. Then he took out his knife to cut the cable to the barge. He fell back with a cry of horror; the cable was an iron chain. The chains of sin are too light to be felt, until they’re too strong to be broken.
C. THE CALL
1. How many are SORRY FOR YOUR SINS & ready to ABANDON YOUR OLD LIFE & surrender all to Jesus Christ?
2. How many are tired of a shallow Christianity and WANT TO GO DEEPER with Jesus and His Cross?
3. Stand. Come to the altars. Let’s commit to Jesus with all our hearts!
