Introduction:
1. Well, we’ve made it to the final chapter of Jonah. I know that I’ve been challenged the last 3 weeks & hope you have too. Let’s do what we have each week, review the basic outline of the book. You should remember it by now. Chapter 1— Jonah Running From God. Chapter 2— Jonah Running to God. Chapter 3— Jonah Running for God. And finally, where we are today, Chapter 4— Jonah Trying to Run God.
2. I want to begin this morning’s sermon by considering some thought provoking questions. Let me warn you in advance, some of these questions will make your brain work a little. They are taken from Dr. Greg Stock’s, The Book of Questions. I am asking these questions because. . .
Cell #1—
Sometimes we learn as much from asking the right questions, as we do from having the right answer.
1) "If you were to die this evening with no opportunity to communicate with anyone, what would you most regret not having told someone? Why haven’t you told them yet?"
2) "Your house, containing everything you own catches fire. After saving your loved ones & pets, you have time to safely make a final dash & save any one item. What would it be?"
3) "While parking late at night, you slightly scrape the side of a Porshe. You are certain no one else is aware of what happened. The damage is minor & would be covered by insurance. Would you leave a note?"
3. I read about a fellow who really did that-- except people were watching. As they looked on, he took out a piece of paper & wrote the following note. "A number of people around me think I’m leaving you a note that includes my name & address, but I am not." He carefully folded the paper, stuck it under the car’s windshield wiper, smiled at those watching, & drove away. 7
4. Let me tell you why I am beginning the sermon with questions this morning. It’s because. . .
Cell #2—
The book of Jonah doesn’t end with all the answers, it concludes with a question and it doesn’t provide the answer.
5. Let’s turn to God’s word before we go farther this morning. Read the fourth chapter of Jonah with me please.
Cell #3—
Jonah 4:1-11
1 But it greatly displeased Jonah and he became angry.
2 He prayed to the LORD and said, "Please LORD, was not this what I said while I was still in my own country? Therefore in order to forestall this I fled to Tarshish, for I knew that You are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, and one who relents concerning calamity.
3 "Therefore now, O LORD, please take my life from me, for death is better to me than life."
4 The LORD said, "Do you have good reason to be angry?"
5 Then Jonah went out from the city and sat east of it. There he made a shelter for himself and sat under it in the shade until he could see what would happen in the city.
6 So the LORD God appointed a plant and it grew up over Jonah to be a shade over his head to deliver him from his discomfort. And Jonah was extremely happy about the plant.
7 But God appointed a worm when dawn came the next day and it attacked the plant and it withered.
8 When the sun came up God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on Jonah’s head so that he became faint and begged with all his soul to die, saying, "Death is better to me than life."
9 Then God said to Jonah, "Do you have good reason to be angry about the plant?" And he said, "I have good reason to be angry, even to death."
10 Then the LORD said, "You had compassion on the plant for which you did not work and which you did not cause to grow, which came up overnight and perished overnight.
11 "Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know the difference between their right and left hand, as well as many animals?" (NAS updated)
Cell #4—
I. Have You Ever Felt Sorry For Yourself? 1-3
1. I know the answer to that question. For all the success Jonah had in Nineveh, he fell prey to the same thing. Chapter four opens with Jonah having his own personal pity party. He was feeling very sorry for himself.
Cell #5—
1) Jonah’s prayer begins with an, "I told you so statement."
2) He basically says, "I knew if you had an excuse to forgive these heathens you would."
2. His attitude, to put it bluntly, stinks. You and I can understand that, because occasionally our own attitudes get all out of sync. We begin feeling sorry for ourselves like Jonah did & then our attitude gets really bad. (Cell #5, 2) He basically says, "I knew if you had an excuse to forgive these heathens you would."
3. As if that’s not enough to show how lousy his attitude was, notice a few other facts about the way Jonah was acting.
Cell #6—
1) Jonah never demonstrates any real interest in the people of Nineveh. If God had destroyed the city, Jonah would have gone home a happy man.
2) Most pastors are frustrated at some point because people refuse to change. Here Jonah got frustrated because they did change.
4. To say that his attitude was all wrong would be very much on target. I think it’s safe to say he not only didn’t care for the people of Nineveh, he actively hated them. That point is made even more clear by the fact that (Cell #6, 2) Most pastors are frustrated at some point because people refuse to change. Here Jonah got frustrated because they did change.
5. His attitude was wrong, but there is a bit of silver lining to this cloud. He does one thing sort of right.
Cell #7—
1) At least instead of just complaining Jonah complained to God in prayer.
2) The selfishness of the prayer must be noted. The word, "I" or "my" is in the prayer no fewer than 9 times in the Hebrew.
6. Don’t get me wrong, this is not a good prayer, but at least Jonah was still talking to God. Over the years I’ve watched many people come to the point of disappointment with God and quit talking to Him completely. That’s one of the worst things to do. It’s always at least a little bit positive if you’re still talking. But in spite of the fact that Jonah was talking with God there was still a serious problem. Frankly, it’s a problem with many of the prayers people pray today as well. Cell #7, 2) The selfishness of the prayer must be noted. The word, "I" or "my" is in the prayer no fewer than 9 times in the Hebrew. When our prayers center around our own selfish whims, we are in trouble. Many today are guilty of selfish prayers.
TS Let me ask a second question. . .
Cell #8—
II. Have You Ever Been Mad at God? 4-9
1. When you look at Jonah he seems to be mad at the world. His anger was even directed toward God. God is big enough to handle our anger and while Jonah isn’t the only person in scripture to be mad at God, it’s certainly not the most healthy attitude. Jonah was mad at God because He was merciful.
Cell #9—
1) How could Jonah, of all people, forget God’s mercy so quickly?
2) He should have died when he was thrown into the sea, but he survived.
3) He should have died in the fish’s belly, but he survived.
4) He shouldn’t have got another chance to serve God, but he did.
2. Yet, when you read the passage Jonah acted like he thought he was in the right & God was wrong. He even argued with God. God didn’t argue, but He got ready to teach Jonah a lesson. Jonah was focused on the wrong things. Which leads me to an observation.
Cell #10—
When we’re mad at God it’s a pretty good sign that we have lost our perspective and are focused on the wrong things.
3. Let’s take a bit closer look at how God helped Jonah regain his perspective. God took Jonah’s anger in stride, and He never quit loving Him, but that doesn’t mean He went easy on Jonah. He did not. He allowed Jonah to set himself up for a fall. After he finished preaching, Jonah went outside of Nineveh, and built himself a little booth to watch what he hoped would be the fireworks of Nineveh going up in flames. Nineveh didn’t go up in flames, but that doesn’t mean things didn’t heat up.
Cell #11—
The average daily maximum temperature in the area around Nineveh is about 1100.
4. Jonah was sweating and miserable as he sat watching the city. God appointed a miraculous plant to grow so that Jonah would have a little shade from the blistering desert heat. Ironically, the only time we’re ever told Jonah was happy is the day he was resting under his little shade tree waiting for Nineveh to be toasted.
Cell #12—
1) Jonah probably had two reasons for being happy.
2) First, the shade offered him some protection from the horrible heat.
3) Second, he probably thought the miracle bush meant God had fixed him a private reviewing stand to let him watch Nineveh go up in smoke.
5. What Jonah didn’t know was that God also appointed a worm to destroy the plant which He had made grow so rapidly.
TS Jonah was wrong. God hadn’t accepted his warped viewpoint. He was about to teach Jonah a lesson he would never forget. God wasn’t being cruel, He was demonstrating some tough love.
Cell #13—
III. Has God Ever Taught You a Tough Lesson? 10-11
1. I suspect I know the answer to that question. All of have times when we need to learn a particularly difficult lesson. If we are willing to really listen, God helps us work through life’s tough lessons too.
2. We can learn some great lessons from others, without having to personally go through every experience ourselves. Prejudice and hatred were rampant in those days, and if we are honest they’re common today. Common or not, they should have no place in our lives, but that doesn’t mean they’re never there.
3. Jonah was about to learn a big lesson that wasn’t going to be easy to swallow. In fact, we’re not even sure he got it, because the book ends without telling us if he finally understood.
Cell #14—
The point of the book was to teach Jonah and those who would read the book later about God’s love. We are to love those God loves and to share the grace we have experienced with those who haven’t experienced it yet.
4. It’s very easy to figure out what part of Jonah’s problem was. One of the big reasons he wasn’t happy was that. . .
Cell #15—
1) Jonah was selfish. If we are honest, all of us are selfish too.
2) To ignore what’s going on in the larger world, & become obsessed with only what’s happening in our own small corner of the world demonstrates that we are selfish.
3) If we are honest, all of us understand what it is to lose our perspective & major on things that don’t matter and minor on things that matter.
5. I relate far better than I want. Being selfish comes naturally to us all. It’s very easy to figure out what part of Jonah’s problem. . . he was selfish. (Cell #15 2) To ignore what’s going on in the larger world and becomes obsessed with what’s happening in our own small corner of the world demonstrates that we are selfish. It was one of the big reasons Jonah wasn’t happy. He was too focused on himself. (Cell #15 3) If we are honest, all of us understand what it is to lose our perspective and major on things that don’t matter and minor on things that matter. That’s part of the selfishness we constantly fight.
Conclusion:
1. I was fascinated when I read the research a number of years in Dennis Waitley’s, Empires of the Mind. Waitley reported that although there are approximately 450,000 words in the English language, about 80% of our conversations use only about 400 words. The most common words in the English language are. . . "I," "Me," "My," and "Mine."
2. The book of Jonah teaches us that it’s time to quit thinking so much about ourselves and what we want and to focus more on the needs of those outside the church that God has called us to reach.
Cell #16—
Perhaps the final question meant for us to answer when we read Jonah is. . .
"Do I see a little Jonah in myself?"
2. It’s time to quit focusing on ourselves and begin to focus more on God and others. Let’s pray.
1) Billy K. Smith, Frank S. Page, The New American Commentary: Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, (Nashville, TN: Broadman Press) 1995.
2) James Montomery Boice, The Minor Prophets, (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications) 1983.
3) Clifton Allen, The Broadman Commentary: Volume 7, (Nashville, TN: Broadman Press) 1972.
4) James Limburg, Interpretation: Hosea - Micah, (Atlanta, GA: John Knox Press) 1988.
5) Elizabeth Achtemeier, New International Biblical Commentary: Minor Prophets 1, (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers Inc.) 1996.
6) Cyril Spaude, People’s Bible Commentary: Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, (St. Louis, MO: Concordia Publishing) 1994.
7) Charles Swindol, The Tale of the Tardy Oxcart,
