God’s Worm

Read Jonah 4.

Jonah Chapter 1 - We learned 3 things… We cannot hide from God, Disobedience always has consequences, God is often gracious despite our failures.

Jonah Chapter 2 - We studied Jonah’s prayer and how we can learn to pray more effectively

Jonah Chapter 3 - Jonah obey’s God’s command to go and the greatest revival known to man happens. We studied the King’s response and how we too need to Allow God to be on the throne of our lives. We need to humble ourselves and submit to what He wants us to do.

When looking at the book of Jonah as a whole we see an interesting pattern.

Chapter 1:

God issues a command but Jonah tries to flee from God

The Sailors get saved despite Jonah’s disobedience

Chapter 2:

Jonah interacts with God through praying scripture - He recognizes God’s goodness and salvation

Chapter 3:

God issues a command and Jonah obeys

However, it would seem instead of preaching throughout the city he may have only preached one day Jonah 3:4. Perhaps if we want to be gracious, it only took one day and the whole city was saved.

Chapter 4:

We will see Jonah once again praying and interacting with God.

The book of Jonah isn’t so much about the big fish or even the salvation of the Ninevites, although both are important… ITS ABOUT GOD’S RELENTLESS PURSUIT OF JONAH.

Have you ever been so angry that even when God does something incredible you cannot see it or don’t want to see it?

This is where we will begin with Jonah Chapter 4.

Jonah’s Prayer

Chapter 4:

Just like in Chapter 2, Jonah once again interacts with God praying scripture. Jonah 4:2

Jonah 4:2 (NASB95)

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.

Compare with

Exodus 34:6–7 (NASB95)

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;

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.”

Continuing with Jonah’s prayer…

Jonah 4:3–4 (NASB95)

“Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for death is better to me than life.” The Lord said, “Do you have good reason to be angry?”

When we pray we may be praying scripture, but we are not inline with the heart of God. James reminds us, when we pray we are to be praying, but without selfishness.

James 4:3 (NASB95)

You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures.

Jonah did what God wanted him to do… he preached and people got saved, but he didn’t agree or like what God did.

Throughout the book we see missed opportunities by Jonah.

Chapter 1 with the ships crew… Jonah could have confessed and been a witness to the crew, maybe even suggesting they turn back so he could be obedient to God’s call. Instead his suggestion was to throw him overboard. He would had rather died than take the message of God to the Ninevites.

Chapter 4 we see again, Jonah wanted to die rather than see the Ninevites come to salvation.

Have you ever been in this situation?

Maybe you were given the opportunity to share the gospel with someone, but you were afraid

Maybe you knew you needed to say something and stand up for truth, but were more concerned about maintaining your relationships with your coworkers or friends.

Maybe you see God’s goodness in someone else’s life and instead of rejoicing with them we become angry?

I can think of times in my life, especially when I was a missionary, where I would get jealous over other missionaries successes in ministry. Instead of rejoicing with them, I would be complaining to God and pouting… “what about me?” So just like being a Jonah, my idea of success was not so much about God getting the glory, but about me getting my way. And in this case so people could say look at how good Ben is doing.

It’s clear, Jonah knew God’s word.

This is the mindset He should have responded with, while being in awe and wonder at God’s mercy on such a vile and evil people. Ezek 18:23; Ezek 18:32.

Ezekiel 18:23 (NASB95)

“Do I have any pleasure in the death of the wicked,” declares the Lord God, “rather than that he should turn from his ways and live?

Ezekiel 18:32 (NASB95)

“For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone who dies,” declares the Lord God. “Therefore, repent and live.”

Fireworks?

Jonah 4:5 (NASB95)

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.

Jonah still in anger and hoping God would not listen to the kings words in Jonah 3:9, went and waited. His desire was for a possible fireworks show of these evil people.

Jonah 3:9 (NASB95)

“Who knows, God may turn and relent and withdraw His burning anger so that we will not perish.”

God’s Response

I love God’s response to Jonah. Like I mentioned earlier, we see throughout the book God consistently pursuing Jonah and encouraging him into a right response.

CHECK THIS OUT!

Way back in Chapter 1 God used appointments if you will with Jonah to get Jonah’s attention. Jonah 1:4 Jonah 1:17.

Jonah 1:4 (NASB95)

The Lord hurled a great wind on the sea and there was a great storm on the sea so that the ship was about to break up.

Jonah 1:17 (NASB95)

And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the stomach of the fish three days and three nights.

Then in Chapter 4 the Appointments continue.

Jonah 4:6–9 (NASB95)

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.

But God appointed a worm when dawn came the next day and it attacked the plant and it withered.

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.”

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.”

God in His sovereignty appointed and controlled nature to get Jonah to see truth.

The Sovereignty of God simply means, God has the right to rule over his creation, and how he exercises that power.

The winds and waves obeyed His command, the fish obeyed His command, the plant obeyed His command, the little worm (the title of my sermon) obeyed His command, and lastly the sun and wind all obeyed His command.

God in His love for Jonah was trying to get ahold of Jonah’s heart and would continued to pursue him until he listened.

The Final Lesson

Jonah 4:10–11 (NASB95)

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.

“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?”

We don’t hear about Jonah after this event other than Christ referring to him in Matthew, but I would hope that Jonah finally learned what God was teaching him. Perhaps this is why he wrote the story of himself in this way so we can learn from his mistakes.

Application:

What is it that we can take away from the book of Jonah?

As believers, if we were honest with ourselves, we are just like Jonah. We get angry with God when…

Whenever we think we deserve something from God and we find him guilty for not giving it to us.

Whenever we think someone else to be unworthy, and we are angry with God for giving them blessings they don’t deserve.

Whenever God takes away some blessing from us, which we think He had no right to remove. a pet, our health, our money, our job, a loved one, our dreams, our plans

Let me suggest this to you… We cannot experience growth without hardship.

Many of you know I coached football for many years… in football and any sport for that matter, the athletes who want to be the best work hard on drills, they lift weights, they win some games and they lose some games. But it is the hardships of all these things that makes the athlete as long as he/she is willing to grow and learn from their hardships.

Paul writes this in Romans 5:3-4

Romans 5:3–4 (NASB95)

And not only this, but we also exult (rejoice) in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope;

Hebrews 12:6 tells us God will discipline those whom He loves

Hebrews 12:6 (NASB95)

For those whom the Lord loves He disciplines, And He scourges every son whom He receives.”

Hebrews 12:10b–11 (NASB95)

but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may share His holiness. All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.

Final Thoughts… if there is one thing you can take away from the life of Jonah it is this…

God is more interested in your character than your comfort.

Each time Jonah ran or complained, God disciplined him… this was not because God is a bully, but because God loved Jonah.

Just like a loving parent disciplines their child for the sake of growth and learning, so God disciplines you and I for our growth.

If we are experiencing hardships in our lives, let us learn from them and develop into being conformed to the image of Christ.

God loves us so much He wrote this through the apostle Paul.

Philippians 1:6 (NASB95)

For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.

Our prayer should be in times of trial “Thank you Jesus, for developing me into the man/woman you want me to be.”