Jonah’s Defiance
Jonah 1
Introduction:
My son and I were bass fishing in a boat on the Kanawha River in West Virginia, when I hooked a really big bass. My line got snarled on my casting reel, and I didn’t have a lot of extra line to let out. When the big bass hit the end of the free line, he was so big and had such strength, that he started pulling me out of the boat. I yelled for my son to help me, and just as I was about to go completely into the river, he grabbed my leg and pulled it about as hard as I’m pulling yours right now.
Jack Brannon
WBTU:
A. There are two reasons why fishing can be dangerous to ones spiritual life.
1. The lying.
2. Running away from God.
B. Let me tell you a true tale. A man tries to get away from it all, to run away from God’s will, and he ends up not fishing but getting swallowed by a fish.
Thesis: Let’s look at Jonah’s defiance, Jonah’s defeat and Jonah being devoured.
Scripture text: Jonah 1 (Read it now)
For instances:
1. His defiance. Vs. 1-3
A. Nineveh- The leading city of the Assyrian empire.
B. Tarshish- A city founded by the Phoenicians on the east coast of modern day Spain. The Phoenicians were sea fearing people and were big into trade.
C. Nineveh and Tarshish were thousands of miles apart.
D. This is more than disobedience, it is defiance. Defiance is a bold resistance to an opposing authority; intentionally provocative behavior or attitude.
E. From the presence of the Lord. How foolish? (Psa 139:7 NIV) Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? (Psa 139:8 NIV) If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
F. However, people try it all of the time. Avoid at all costs church or anything that reminds them of God.
G. He was fleeing so that he would not have to be the Lord’s minister and servant. The Lord gives us free will to do this.
H. Jonah was a prophet of the Lord. How do we know this? (2 Ki 14:24 NIV) He did evil in the eyes of the LORD and did not turn away from any of the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, which he had caused Israel to commit. (2 Ki 14:25 NIV) He was the one who restored the boundaries of Israel from Lebo Hamath to the Sea of the Arabah, in accordance with the word of the LORD, the God of Israel, spoken through his servant Jonah son of Amittai, the prophet from Gath Hepher.
I. He evidently was a faithful prophet up until this point.
J. He was open to doing what God told him. Finding the will of the Lord and doing it.
K. How can we know the will of the Lord?
1. The will of the Lord is for everyone to be saved, make Jesus Christ your Savior.
a. God wants all men to be saved, to come to a knowledge of the truth.
b. Believe
c. Repent
d. Confess
e. Be baptized.
2. The will of the Lord is for everyone to live for Jesus, make Jesus Christ your Master, your Lord.
a. Pray and meditate on his Word.
b. Stop sinning.
c. Help others, give, use our talents and gifts to help the church and others.
d. Spend time with others. Make friends of God’s children.
e. Share the message of the gospel.
3. His specific will must be focused on this. The details will be revealed.
L. Why would Jonah do this?
1. Jonah hated the Ninevites, and he did not want them to be saved. Don’t be too hard on him. Assyria was one of the most brutal nations of the ancient world. They were feared and dreaded by all the peoples of that day. They used very cruel methods of torture. They were the first peoples to bury someone up to their neck and then leave them for days and then behead them. They were the first peoples to use crucifixion (the Romans perfected it). They would often invade a town and kill all of the men and children, rape the women and make them their slaves. Many towns would not surrender to them; they would all commit suicide before they would be taken alive by the Assyrians. Just a few decades before this story, the Assyrians invaded some of the nation of Israel. They is a good chance that they into Jonah’s hometown of Gath-Hepher. They may have come even to his home, and he may have seen his own father and mother cruelly, brutally slain before his eyes. Or he might have seen his sisters raped by the Assyrians. Jonah did want those people to be saved.
2. But Jonah’s message was not one of salvation. His message was of judgment. Although it is true that it was to be a message of judgment, Jonah knew God, and it was because Jonah knew God that he went in the opposite direction. This is why God sent Jonah. If he wanted to destroy the city, he would have just destroyed it. No, if the people did repent, Jonah knew that God would not judge them but save the city!
3. Jonah was comfortable in Israel. It was a time of prosperity for the nation of Israel. The Assyrians were on a temporary decline and the nation of Israel had reclaimed all of there land. It was comfortable for Jonah. No persecution, the people didn’t listen, but there seemed to be no persecution.
4. Jonah probably believed that God was only for the Jews! God should not be concerned about those heathen dogs, the Gentiles. Very prejudiced.
5. Jonah was a patriot. He loved his nation and he hated what the Assyrians had done to it in the past. Jonah believes that his culture was superior.
6. The people of Israel and his hometown would have looked down on him for doing something so different and crazy. He refused to risk his reputation.
7. Last reason. Have we ever noticed that in the Old Testament God never sent His messengers as missionaries to other countries? The method that God used in the OT is really the opposite of His method today. God had placed Israel at the heart of the world, at the crossroads of trade routes. They built a temple for a witness to the world. The invitation was, “Come, and let us go up to the house of the Lord and worship Him.” The world came to them. However, today it is the Great Commission. Go!! We often criticize Israel for their failure, but we build a church on the corner and expect the world to come to us, when instead we are supposed to be going out to the world. This is why Jonah is so surprised. All of the prophets stayed in Israel. Why do I have to do something different? I don’t like this method.
M. This has great application for us today. We need to share the message with whoever the Lord places in our path, whether we like them or not. We need to realize that God is a God of mercy and grace and he wants to share this with others. We don’t need to think about our own comfort. We need to sacrifice our comfort and risk our reputation. We need to go and share in whatever way possible, not sit and expect the world to come to us. If we do not do these things, then we are just like Jonah. We are defiant.
2. Jonah’s defeat Vs. 4-15
A. Jonah gets into a boat bound for Tarshish and he is on his way out of his obligations and responsibilities to God.
B. However, when we are disobedient, God does not leave us alone so that we can enjoy it. God will discipline us.
C. (Heb 12:10 NIV) Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness.(Heb 12:11 NIV) No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.
D. God cares so much that he disciplines us. This is what is happening to Jonah. The Lord sends a great storm.
E. Sometimes the Lord brings these things upon us so that we will stop our defiance and run back to Him. He always accepts us with open arms.
F. Vs. 5- How can Jonah be sleeping?
1. One thought is that he is so unconcerned about his fellow passengers, his disobedience, and the overall situation. He is so apathetic that he can sleep soundly in the bottom of the boat.
2. Jonah has been a man of God and this is not easily overcome. I believe that he has been so distressed, so upset, so anxious, that he has no strength left in his body or in his mind. Depression. He is a defeated man.
G. Jonah thought that he would get away for it all, but his problems start to get worse. He refused to obey and it has lead to depression and now there is this storm.
H. He comes up on the deck and it is determined that it is his fault. They are a superstitious group, but they are correct.
I. Vs. 8-10- What has Jonah told them? Very little. All he has said is that he wants to get away from His God. This is what happens to a person out fellowship with God. We do not talk about him; we do not mention Him, because the very thought of Him does not bring comfort, only heartache and defeat.
J. What does Jonah do? Does He call on His God and ask for forgiveness and vow to go to Nineveh. No way!
K. Just throw me into the sea. I am defeated and I refuse to obey, because obedience is worse than defeat. I want to die!!!
L. Jonah has become self-centered. He doesn’t care about others. He doesn’t care about himself. Slippery slope when we are defiant.
M. When we think about ourselves and our situation too much we have a sense of defeat all about us.
N. A church that is preoccupied with itself will be swamped by a feeling of helplessness. A church that has lost its love for the Lord and for doing the will of the Lord has a great sense of defeat.
O. The cure for defeatism is to see what God is doing in the world. The cure for defeatism is to obey the Lord. Why has this storm come? Why does the Lord want me to go to Nineveh? It might not be that bad.
P. The mark of a Christian is not defeat, but victory.
Q. To fulfill our mission, we must overcome our prejudices and must look outward beyond our interests and self-centered preoccupations.
3. Jonah is devoured. Vs. 17.
A. Those who refuse to obey those who continue in their defiance, one day will be devoured.
B. They will be devoured in this life.
1. Broken lives. Broken bodies. Broken relationships. Broken hearts.
2. Our life will be like a soap opera if we do not seek the Lord and obey his will.
C. They will be devoured in the life to come.
1. Hell- Where the worm does not die and fire does not go out.
2. (Heb 10:26 NIV) If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left,(Heb 10:27 NIV) but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.
D. They will be devoured, never to be spit out.
E. However, maybe you have been devoured in this life, but it doesn’t have to be that way in the life to come.
F. Come to Jesus Christ before it is too late. Obey His Word!
G. This section is difficult for many to believe. It is a silly miracle!
1. A great fish, the white shark of the Mediterranean Sea, can swallow a man with the greatest of ease because the whole body of a man has been found in the stomach of such a fish. (Not only that, the man was clad in a suit of armor!) In the stomach of another the entire body of a horse was discovered. And, in yet another case, the carcass of an entire buffalo (thrown overboard, probably because of disease or death) was found in a fish’s belly.
2. Dr. ’Gleason L. Archer, Jr., in his work Survey of the Old Testament points out that numerous cases have been reported in more recent times of men surviving the o,:-deal of being swallowed by a whale. In 1758 and again in 1771 a man was swallowed by a whale and vomited up shortly thereafter with only minor injuries.
H. However, Jesus mentions this miracle as a historical fact. He uses it as a symbol of his resurrection.
Conclusion:
A. There was a Christian lady that had to do a lot of traveling for her business; so naturally, she did a lot of flying. Flying made her extremely nervous, so she always took her Bible along with her to read since it helped relax her on the long flights. One time, she was sitting next to a man. When he saw her pull out her Bible, he gave a little chuckle, smirked and went back to what he was doing. After a while, he turned to her and asked, “You don’t really believe all that stuff in there, do you?” The lady replied, “Of course I do. It’s the Bible.” He said, “Well, what about the guy that was swallowed by the whale?” She replied, “Oh, Jonah. Yes, I believe that. It’s in the Bible.” He asked, “Well, how do you suppose he survived all that time inside the whale?” The lady said, “Well, I don’t really know. I guess when I get to heaven, I will ask him.” “What if he isn’t in heaven?” The man asked sarcastically. “Then you can ask him,” replied the lady.
B. Don’t be defiant, defeated and then devoured.
