The Prophet with a Listening Problem
Jonah 1: 1 – 3; Jonah (Part One)
Sunday Morning, June 5, 2005
Introduction: Wouldn’t It Be Great to Hear From the Lord?
Wouldn’t It Be Great to Hear From the Lord? I mean, really, didn’t you ever think that the disciples had it easy? After all, they had Jesus right there with them to tell them exactly what he wanted them to do. There was no “putting out fleeces” or trying to discern the will of the Lord in those days, just the son of God himself to let you in on the secret.
Or maybe we’ve been a little envious of Moses, the leader to whom God spoke face to face, as a man speaks to his friend…
Or we think of the prophets with their personal, direct line to God…
Even Jonah, because Jonah, whatever else you might say about him, did hear from the Lord. And in verse one,
(1) The Message is Received.
The word of the LORD came to Jonah son of Amittai: (Jonah 1:1 NIV)
In other words, God spoke, and Jonah heard the word of the LORD.
And what an amazing thing, to speak with God; to hear his voice; to know his will. But the truth is, God loves to speak to his people.
In Genesis, chapter one, when God first made humanity in his own image to reflect his likeness, and breathed into their nostrils the breath of life, the very first thing he did was to speak to them, communicating his will and purpose for their lives. Genesis 1, verse 29;
God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground." (Genesis 1:29 NIV)
And scripture, from that day on is the record of God’s revelation of himself. Scripture, from that day on is the record of God speaking to his people; first, to Adam and Eve, then to Cain, to Noah, to Abraham. Isaac and Jacob. Later on, to and through Moses and the prophets. In fact, the writer to the Hebrews tells us,
Going through a long line of prophets, God has been addressing our ancestors in different ways for centuries. Recently he spoke to us directly through his Son. By his Son, God created the world in the beginning, and it will all belong to the Son at the end. This Son perfectly mirrors God, and is stamped with God’s nature. He holds everything together by what he says—powerful words! (Hebrews 1: 1 – 2, The Message)
As Francis Schaeffer once wrote, “he is there and he is not silent,” nor has he ever been so.
No, God loves to speak to his people.
If only we had the same privilege…
But, of course, we do. (a) God still speaks. He speaks through his son, and we have that message, written down by those who heard and confirmed by the Holy Spirit “both by signs and wonders and by various miracles and by gifts [distributed] according to His own will.” To put it simply, we have the Bible.
But we also have the Holy Spirit. He is the “Spirit of truth” who “lives with you and…in you” and “will guide you into all truth” (John 14: 17; 16: 13). And he is the Counselor, who “will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you” (John 14: 26). So,
…we have the word of the prophets made more certain… (2 Peter 1:19 NIV)
And furthermore, (b) God still speaks with clarity.
Listen again to his word to Jonah.
"Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me." (Jonah 1:2 NIV)
Now, I ask you, could anything be more straightforward?
"Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me." (Jonah 1:2 NIV)
Sounds simple, right? So, the problem isn’t that Jonah didn’t hear and it’s not that Jonah didn’t understand. The problem is, Jonah did hear and he did understand. Jonah just didn’t like what he heard and undedrstood. So, while (1) the message is received by Jonah, loud and clear, still,
(2) The Message is Rejected.
In verse 3,
…Jonah ran away from the LORD and headed for Tarshish. He went down to Joppa, where he found a ship bound for that port. After paying the fare, he went aboard and sailed for Tarshish to flee from the LORD. (Jonah 1:3 NIV)
Now a little geography lesson here: Nineveh was a city in what is now northern Iraq. Tarshish, as far as we can tell, was a city in southern Spain, more or less at the farthest extremity of the known world in its day. So Jonah was not in any sense headed for Nineveh. It’s not like God told him to fly and he took the train. It’s more like God said, “I want you to go to New York,” and Jonah replied, “Sorry, God, Honolulu is much nicer this time of year.”
In all fairness, of course, we should be aware of the fact that Nineveh was definitely not one of your more desirable tourist destinations. Through the prophet Nahum, God said of the city,
Woe to the city of blood, full of lies, full of plunder, never without victims! {2} The crack of whips, the clatter of wheels, galloping horses and jolting chariots! {3} Charging cavalry, flashing swords and glittering spears! Many casualties, piles of dead, bodies without number, people stumbling over the corpses-- {4} all because of the wanton lust of a harlot, alluring, the mistress of sorceries, who enslaved nations by her prostitution and peoples by her witchcraft. (Nahum 3:1-4 NIV)
So in modern terms, it’s more like Jonah was an American being told by God,
"Go to the great city of Baghdad and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me."
And it’s not so much that we might object to the people of Baghdad hearing such a message. Most Americans would probably be thrilled if God would send a message of judgment to the Iraqis, it’s just, who wants to be the one to take it? A mission like that could get a person tortured. A mission like that could get a person killed. Worse still, a mission like that could bring the grace of God to the enemy, they might hear and believe, and then we’d have to accept that the enemy is our brother (we ought to anyway).
This was Jonah’s true fear. In chapter four, verses 2 and 3,
He prayed to the LORD, "O LORD, is this not what I said when I was still at home? That is why I was so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. {3} Now, O LORD, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live." (Jonah 4:2-3 NIV)
Essentially, Jonah was saying then, “Lord, we hate the people of Nineveh and the people of Nineveh hate us. Why mess up a good thing? Why don’t you just destroy them and get it over with? Why should I have to step outside my comfort zone to take them your word?” And it sounds so selfish. It sounds so contrary to the very essence of the gospel. How could a prophet who heard the word of the LORD be so callous and insensitive?
But I wonder, how do we feel about our enemies? Do we love them? Do we pray for them? Jesus said;
“You have heard that it was said, ’Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ {44} But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, {45} that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” (Matthew 5:43-45 NIV)
We hear, don’t we? Be honest! And we understand, don’t we?
“Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, {45} that you may be sons of your Father in heaven.”
That’s every bit as clear as the word of the Lord to Jonah, but when was the last time we obeyed. As one writer on this chapter has said,
We have enemies today. Do we pray for them? I have prayed that Osama bin Laden be captured, but I can’t say I’ve prayed that he repent and turn to Christ. I need to.
And so do we. The message has been received, but have we listened and obeyed, or have we rejected it because it’s not what we feel like doing.
And what about some of the other places where the Scriptures speak to the hard places in our hearts? Colossians 3;
Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. (Colossians 3:13 NIV)
We hear. We understand. Do we obey? What about 1st John 4?
This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. {11} Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. (1 John 4:10-11 NIV)
Or even the passage that we looked at a few weeks back;
Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another--and all the more as you see the Day approaching. (Hebrews 10:25 NIV)
Maybe we shouldn’t be too quick to point fingers at a prophet with a listening problem. It could be that we have some listening problems of our own.
Conclusion: Reluctant Prophets
After all, in Christ, we now have an anointing. We are prophets, anointed to confess Christ Jesus, to proclaim the gospel of the kingdom to the world. Jesus himself has called us saying,
"All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."
There it is, the word of the LORD. “…go and make disciples of all nations…” And we hear it, don’t we? And we understand it, don’t we? But what have we done about it? How have we reached out to the lost, not in Mali or the Dominican Republic, but right here in Brooten?
Dr. Robert Leroe writes, “In Jewish synagogues on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, a passage from [the story of Jonah] is read, and the congregation responds with the words: “We are Jonah.” This book is about us; it’s like a mirror, which means we may not like what we see. We are Jonah in our disobedience, in our insensitivity to others, in our dissatisfaction at how God works, in our selfishness.”
I believe that’s true. But like Jonah, we must learn to obey God, even when the command of God speaks to the hard places in our hearts.
In the classic novel, Moby Dick, Herman Melville puts a sermon into the mouth of a pastor in a mariner’s chapel. He says,
But what is this lesson that the book of Jonah teaches? Shipmates, it is a…lesson to us all as sinful men…it is a lesson to us all, because it is a story of the sin, hard-heartedness, suddenly awakened fears, the swift punishment, repentance, prayers, and finally the deliverance and joy of Jonah. As with all sinners among men, the sin of this son of Amittai was in his wilful disobedience of the command of God - never mind now what that command was, or how conveyed - which he found a hard command. But all the things that God would have us do are hard for us to do - remember that - and hence, he oftener commands us than endeavors to persuade. And if we obey God, we must disobey ourselves; and it is in this disobeying ourselves, wherein the hardness of obeying God consists.
I believe that’s true. But like Jonah, we must learn to obey God, even when the command of God speaks to the hard places in our hearts. Even when obeying God means disobeying ourselves. We may be reluctant prophets—prophets with listening problems—but we are called to be prophets; to hear, to speak and to obey the voice of the LORD.
