Shared Values

OK, let’s talk about the elephant in the room. Yes, I got a long-overdue haircut and had my beard hacked off, too.

Annette told me we were going to see a friend of hers yesterday. I didn’t know her name was Delilah.

In case you didn’t already know it, I LOVED my big beard. With every inch that it grew, I think it looked more glorious.

But even though I found a few friends — mostly other men — who agreed that it was a righteous beard and that it looked awesome on me, I don’t live with those people.

And the people I live with were unanimous in their dislike for the beard. And they weren’t afraid to be vocal about their dissatisfaction with the way I looked.

So, even though I figured the big beard covered up more of the ugly, I gave in. I told Annette I’d get rid of the beard after I’d returned from Las Vegas.

So, yesterday, we hopped into the car, headed over to 5-Star Cuts near Chesapeake Square, and got me groomed by a lady who calls herself Luci Blades. I don’t know how she got that name, but believe me when I say I was very still while she cut my hair.

When I sat down in the barber’s chair, Luci asked me what I wanted her to do. I described how to cut my hair, and then she asked about the beard. “Cut it all off,” I said.

She stopped and said, “Seriously?” And then she looked at Annette, who said, “He’s not ready to cut it all off yet. Just cut it shorter and clean it up.”

And this is the result.

And I tell you all of this, not just because I want you to tell me how good I look now, but ALSO because I want you to see the lesson about shared values.

Annette, for example, values having a husband who doesn’t look like a vagrant. And while I’ve never figured there was much risk of appearing on the cover of GQ magazine, I DO value having a happy wife. So, I agreed to go to the groomer.

And as she sat there, waiting for me to go under the blades, it seems that Annette realized that I love having a beard and that she ALSO values having a happy husband. So, she compromised on the idea of cutting it all off.

Either that, or when she began to see my face exposed, she remembered how ugly I am and decided to save the world from having to look at me completely unmasked.

But setting aside that possibility, what I want you to remember as we continue our study today in the Book of Jonah is the idea of shared priorities and shared values as a sign of love and affection.

We’re going to pick up in verse 2 of chapter 4 today, but before we read today’s verses, let me remind you how we got to this point in our study.

God had called His prophet Jonah to leave his home in the Northern Kingdom of Israel and go to Nineveh, a capital city of the Assyrian Empire, which was one of Israel’s greatest enemies.

In Nineveh, Jonah was to proclaim a message warning of God’s impending judgment for the Ninevites’ brutality and violence against their enemies.

But Jonah didn’t want to go to Nineveh. He just wanted God to destroy the Ninevites. So, he tried to flee from God’s presence, boarding a ship bound for Tarshish, which was just as far as he could get from Nineveh in the opposite direction.

But God, who’s sovereign over every part of Jonah’s story — just as He’s sovereign over our lives today — sent a storm that threatened to sink the ship.

Then, when their prayers to their pagan gods had no effect on the sudden storm, the sailors drew lots to determine who was to blame for their predicament. And God made the lot fall to Jonah.

And, in a last-ditch effort to save themselves, the sailors took Jonah’s advice and threw him into the sea, which immediately became calm.

God then sent a great sea creature to swallow Jonah. And Jonah spent three days and nights inside the belly of that fish, composing a psalm of praise and thanksgiving for God’s deliverance.

Finally, the fish vomited Jonah onto dry land, and the prophet obeyed God and head\ed to Nineveh. There, he preached what might have been one of the worst evangelistic messages of all time.

But God used even that poor message to bring the Ninevites to repentance. And because they’d repented, God turned from His anger and relented from His plan to bring judgment on them.

Which brings us to where we left off last week: “But it greatly displeased Jonah and he became angry.” In a moment, we’ll see just how angry Jonah was. But first, I want to give him credit for going to the Lord with his frustrations.

Listen, I don’t think God’s up there in heaven looking for opportunities to be offended. Considering the shape of our world, He wouldn’t have to look for long. In fact, I think God’s in heaven right now looking for opportunities to show His GRACE and mercy.

And as we’ll see this week and the next couple of weeks, even though Jonah gave God every reason to strike him dead right there on the outskirts of Nineveh — even though we’ll see Jonah essentially rebuking God for His goodness — God responds with compassion and grace. Because that’s who He is.

And because that’s who He wanted Jonah to be.

Let’s read today’s verses together, and then we’ll talk about Jonah’s prayer, about God’s response, and about this week’s spiritual growth indicator from the Book of Jonah.

Jonah 4:2–4 NASB95

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?”

Now, you’ll recall that when everybody else was praying aboard the storm-tossed ship, Jonah was sleeping. In the psalm he composed while in the belly of the great fish, he says he’d finally prayed to the Lord while he was in the water and felt he was about to drown.

So, Jonah’s prayer in the belly of the fish was thanksgiving for the fact that God had saved his life while he was in the water.

And one of the things we can see from the two prayers — the one in chapter 2 and the one here in chapter 4 — is that Jonah has a problem with selfishness.

We never hear him pray for the Ninevites, who were subject to God’s judgment. We never hear him pray for the sailors whom he’d put at risk by involving them in his disobedience.

Although we see Jonah commendably thanking the Lord for the prayers He’d answered while Jonah was in the Mediterranean Sea, there’s selfishness — or at least self-preservation — at the heart of every prayer this prophet of God prays in this book.

He prays for his own life to be spared while he’s in the water. In the belly of the great fish, he prays a song of thanksgiving that God had rescued him. And here, on the outskirts of Nineveh, he prays a prayer of complaint when things didn’t go the way he wanted them to go.

And, just in case we missed the self-centeredness of Jonah to this point, notice how often this prayer in chapter 4 includes the words “I” or “my.” Eight times in my translation. Nine times in the original Hebrew.

Jonah’s chapter-two prayer highlights the goodness of God. But his chapter-four prayer highlights his own self-regard.

But once again, we have to give Jonah credit. He’s the most likely person to have written this account, and to his credit, he didn’t hold back in his transparency.

We see Jonah here with all his selfishness, all his arrogance, all his petulance before the maker of heaven and earth.

He could’ve whitewashed the whole last chapter of this book. But he allowed the Holy Spirit to lead him and to use even his poor behavior and attitude as an object lesson for Israel and for us.

And so, Jonah begins his prayer with those words that ALWAYS signal the onset of a bad attitude: “I told you so.”

Well, that’s not what he says exactly, but it’s a reasonable interpretation: “Lord, was this not what I said while I was still in my own country?” LOOK WHAT’S HAPPENING! I told you it would be this way.

In fact, the English translation actually glosses over Jonah’s petulant tone to a degree. Where it’s translated, “what I said” in verse 2, the Hebrew actually reads “my word.”

And that points us all the way back to the very first verse of this book, which tells us “The word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai.”

So, we could almost picture Jonah saying, “Lord, I’ve heard YOUR word. Now, I want you to hear MINE. I knew that if the Ninevites repented, You would relent from bringing judgment upon them. So, I tried to go to Tarshish to keep that from happening.”

And Jonah knew how God would respond to the Ninevites’ repentance, because he knew his Old Testament history.

That’s where the description of God at the end of verse 2 comes from.

When Jonah says, “I knew that You are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, and one who relents concerning calamity,” he’s quoting from Exodus 34:6-7.

Exodus 34:6–7 NASB95

6 Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth; 7 who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin; yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished, visiting the iniquity of fathers on the children and on the grandchildren to the third and fourth generations.”

Now. what’s going on in this passage is that Moses has asked to see God’s glory. And God allows the prophet to see a portion of His glory, describing the glory of His compassion, grace, justice, mercy, faithfulness, patience, and forgiveness as He passes by.

But in the greater context, Moses is receiving the second set of tablets with the 10 commandments after having smashed the first set in anger over his people’s disobedience and faithlessness when they made and worshiped a golden calf.

God was very angry over their sin against Him, and He’d threatened to withdraw His presence from them and make them enter the Promised Land without Him.

But Moses had interceded for them and begged God not to leave them, reminding God of His goodness and of the special relationship God had with the people of Israel.

And so, BECAUSE He is compassionate and gracious — BECAUSE He is faithful and patient and forgiving — God relented.

He blessed the people with His presence for the rest of their time in the wilderness and then, later, as the next generation entered the land of Canaan.

Given all that as context, the fact that Jonah quotes from this passage in his prayer at the beginning of chapter 4 makes clear what we’ve suspected all along: that Jonah didn’t WANT God to relent from His plan to destroy Nineveh.

He didn’t WANT the Ninevites to repent, and he didn’t WANT God to be gracious to them, which is what the lesson of that passage in Exodus had taught him — that God’s response to repentance is gracious compassion and forgiveness.

But, in the case of the Ninevites, at least, Jonah seems to think that God’s relenting represents a weakness on God’s part.

Jonah wanted God to be someone He is not. Which is pretty much the same thing WE sometimes want.

We want a god who affirms our sinful choices, rather than affirming His own righteousness. We want a god who’s gracious and forgiving when it comes to our own sins, but one who’s quick to punish those who sin against US.

But we don’t get to fit God into our own little box. We don’t get to make God into OUR image. That isn’t how it works.

HE made us in HIS image — to demonstrate HIS character throughout the world. And so, our compassion should be like HIS compassion. Our grace should be a reflection of HIS grace. We should be forgiving as HE is forgiving.

WE should love the way He loves.

Which leads us to this week’s spiritual growth indicator from the Book of Jonah: “A life that’s growing spiritually strives to love as God loves.” [Mark Yarbrough, Jonah: Beyond the Tale of a Whale, (Nashville: B&H Academic, 2020), 144.]

God wanted Jonah to have the same value and priority for compassion and love that HE has. God wanted Jonah to value forgiveness and grace, not just as blessings HE’D experienced, but as blessings available to ALL who turn to God in repentance and faith.

God wanted Jonah to value the lives of others the same way he valued his own life. He wanted Jonah to value the salvation of others just as he valued his own salvation. He wants the same thing from every person who follows Jesus in faith.

And I think Jonah eventually got to that point or he’d never have written such a transparent account of his disobedience and disrespect toward God.

But he wasn’t there yet.

And so, he tells God essentially that he’d rather be dead than to see the Ninevites forgiven. Just take my life from me, he says to God.

Just two chapters earlier, Jonah prayed for God to spare his life. Now, he says he wants to die. What does this tell us about the human heart and its emotions?

We’re reminded here that our emotions are transient, and our hearts are fickle. And so, “follow your heart” is probably the very worst advice we can give another person.

Jonah had followed his heart to a ship bound for Tarshish, instead of going to Nineveh, as God had commanded. He’d followed his heart right into the Mediterranean Sea when he’d told the sailors to throw him overboard.

He’d followed his heart in the indifferent and perfunctory nature of his message to the Ninevites. And now that he hadn’t gotten his way, he’s following his heart by asking God to kill him.

Indeed, every time we see Jonah following his heart in this account, he winds up miserable. What Jonah NEEDS to do is to follow GOD’S heart — to value what God values, to want what God wants.

Folks, I’m going to let you in on the true secret to happiness this morning. The secret to happiness isn’t following your OWN heart. The secret to happiness is to be going after GOD’S heart.

I think that’s what Scripture means when it tells us that King David was “a man after God’s own heart.”

We know from the story of David’s life that he didn’t always SHARE God’s heart, because we know he sinned greatly against the Lord.

But when David sinned, he repented and turned back to God. And he chased AFTER God’s heart. He tried to get himself back into the center of God’s will. He strove to value what God values, to show compassion as God shows compassion, to love the way God loves.

None of those things made his problems disappear. Indeed, the consequences of David’s sins would haunt him the rest of his life. And they’d have a significant destabilizing effect on the nation of Israel.

But David didn’t let his circumstances detract from his love for and trust in God.

Do you want to be truly happy in your life here on earth? Do you want to be completely content? Then, align your heart with the heart of God. Chase after God’s heart. Make His priorities your priorities and his values your values.

This is what Jesus was talking about when He said to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. When you do that, everything else just falls into place.

Happiness and contentment can’t help but follow when you’re in the center of God’s will. But when you’re outside of it — as Jonah was — you’ll never find those things, at least not consistently or enduringly.

I think Jonah finally learned all of this. But right now, he’s still angry. He’s frustrated with God. He’s pouting, and he’s working himself up to a full-on tantrum.

And just as we’re expecting God to pull out his great big paddle and turn Jonah across his knee, we see God doing what God does: showing compassion and mercy and grace.

Look, if Jonah had spoken to any of us the way he spoke to God here, the best he could’ve expected from us would be for us to turn our backs and walk away.

But God was still pursuing Jonah. So, instead of the anger and rebuke we might expect, God responds with gentle compassion.

“Do you have good reason to be angry?” One translation puts it this way: “Are you right to be angry?”

In other words, Jonah, consider your actions and your attitudes. Maybe you need a rest. Maybe a time out? Do you need some more alone time inside the whale?

God had withdrawn His judgment against the Ninevites when they repented, responding instead with compassionate forgiveness. And this had enraged Jonah, who responded by essentially mocking God’s character.

And yet, in this book that’s filled with irony, the irony here is that Jonah doesn’t even seem to realize that the same compassion and grace God showed the Ninevites was what he’d been showing Jonah the whole time.

This week, I want to encourage you to take some time to examine your values and your priorities. Do they align with the values and priorities of God?

Take some time to consider what you’re chasing in your pursuit of happiness and contentment. Is it for the kingdom of God? Think about whether your life reflects a striving after the fickle whims of your own heart or the eternally faithful heart of God.

Let’s be people who show that we love God by sharing HIS heart, HIS priorities, HIS values. Let’s be people who love the way that God loves by loving even the people who call the good that we do evil, the people who’ve shown over and over again that they don’t deserve our love.

When we love others that way, we will be loving them the same way God loves them, the same way God loves US.

Now, today is Lord’s Supper Sunday. This observance is important to the fellowship of the church. It brings us together in a unique way and reminds us that we belong to one another in Christ Jesus.

It reminds us of the love He has for us and the love we’re called to have for one another.

Jesus commanded us to observe the Lord’s Supper as an act of obedience to Him, as a way of proclaiming that we who follow Him in faith belong to Him, and as a way of reminding us what He did for us.

The Lord’s Supper reminds us that our hope for salvation rests entirely on the sacrifice He made for us and in our place at the cross. It reminds us that our life is in Him.

And the fact that we share bread from one loaf reminds us that we are, together, the one body of Christ. It reminds us that we’re called to unity of faith, unity of purpose, and unity of love.

It reminds us that, just as He gave up the glory He had in heaven, we who’ve followed Him in faith are called to give up any claims we might think we have to our own lives as we follow Him.

Finally, it reminds us that, as we’ve been given the testimony of the Holy Spirit within us, we are to share OUR testimony of salvation by grace through faith. We’re not to be lukewarm Christians, but people who are on fire for the Lord.

If you’re a baptized believer walking in obedience to Christ, I’d like to invite you to join us today as we celebrate the Lord’s Supper.

Now, this sacred meal dates all the way back to when Jesus shared it with His disciples at the Last Supper on the night before He was crucified.

The conditions during the Last Supper were different than the conditions we have here today. But the significance was the same as it is today.

Jesus told His disciples that the bread represented His body, which would be broken for our transgressions.

Let us pray.

Matthew 26:26 NASB95

26 While they were eating, Jesus took some bread, and after a blessing, He broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is My body.”

As Jesus suffered and died on that cross, his blood poured out with His life. This was always God’s plan to reconcile mankind to Himself.

“In [Jesus] we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us.”

Let us pray.

Matthew 26:27–28 NASB95

27 And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you; 28 for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins.

Take and drink.

“Now, as often as we eat this bread and drink the cup, we proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.”

Maranatha! Lord, come!

Here at Liberty Spring, we have a tradition following our commemoration of the Lord’s Supper.

Please gather around in a circle, and let us sing together “Blest Be the Tie that Binds.”