What will it take?
Jonah 1:1-2
Intro: Jonah 1:10
Matt 12:40 For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly;
so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the
heart of the earth.
1. Because of his Reasoning? 1:2
The late Manley Beasley defined faith as a "reason at rest with God." To
me, that's powerful, but it hits me even harder when I remember
that he went on to say, "Faith is dependency upon God, and this
God-dependency only begins when self-dependency ends.
Nah 3:1 Woe to the bloody city! it is all full of lies and robbery; the
prey departeth not; 2 The noise of a whip, and the noise of the
rattling of the wheels, and of the pransing horses, and of the
jumping chariots. 3 The horseman lifteth up both the bright sword
and the glittering spear: and there is a multitude of slain, and a
great number of carcases; and there is none end of their corpses;
they stumble upon their corpses: 4 Because of the multitude of the
whoredoms of the wellfavoured harlot, the mistress of
witchcrafts, that selleth nations through her whoredoms, and
families through her witchcrafts.
Ps 11:5 The LORD trieth the righteous: but the wicked and him that
loveth violence his soul hateth.
2. Because of his reputation? 4:2-3
Better for me to die than to live????
What good’s a prophet that prophet’s wrong?
Deut 18:22 When a prophet speaketh in the name of the LORD, if the
thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the
LORD hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it
presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him.
Prov 22:1 A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches, and
loving favour rather than silver and gold.
Too lazy to work and too nervous to steal…
3. Because of his ruthlessness? 4:11
120,000 people, and Jonah didn’t care.
Eph 4:32 And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one
another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.
1 Cor 13: 1 Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and
have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling
cymbal. 2 And though I have the gift of prophecy, and
understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have
all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity,
I am nothing.
A Pastor was doing his Children's Church sermon where all the kids come down to the front & hear a story. The Pastor was discussing the story of Jonah. He quoted the Scripture from Jonah: "The Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah upon the dry land."
When the Pastor finished the verse, he started trying to solicit input from the children to help him complete his mini-sermon. He asked, "So, boys and girls, what does the fish vomiting Jonah out on dry land teach us today? One of the little boys spoke up with great enthusiasm for the entire congregation to hear and yelled out: "Pastor, It proves that even a fish can't stomach a bad preacher! “
Someone once asked Jay Kesler, former president of Youth for Christ International, if he believed that God could make a fish big enough to swallow a man.
As a college president and above average in intelligence, in a world in which we have learned to split the atom and go to the moon and send spaceships to Neptune, did Kesler really think that God can make a fish big enough to swallow a man? I mean really?
Dr. Kesler’s reply is one of simple trust in a great God.
He answered, "Let me tell you, I not only believe that he can make such a fish, but the God who made the sun and the moon and the stars, if he wanted to, could air-condition and carpet the fish!"
