Whose are you
Notes
Transcript
Handout
And they said to one another, “Come, let us cast lots, that we may know on whose account this evil has come upon us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah. Then they said to him, “Tell us on whose account this evil has come upon us. What is your occupation? And where do you come from? What is your country? And of what people are you?” And he said to them, “I am a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.” Then the men were exceedingly afraid and said to him, “What is this that you have done!” For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them.
INTRODUCTION
I have wanted to be many things over the years. I wanted to be a professional ball player, more specifically I wanted to be Deion Sanders. I wanted to be an entertainer, an author, and many things in between.
No matter what I was trying to find my identity in, something always came along to test that.
Nowhere is this more true than my desire to be a cowboy.
Not a Dallas Cowboy, but a western movie cowboy.
They were always so laid back, and so calm, cool and collected. They could handle any problem with ease and at the end of the day they set everything right, always winning the girl, and doing it with the strength of ten men.
I wanted to be a cowboy, but something came along to test that.
Years ago my mother had us over to her house for lunch. And she swears that she told me, and I quote, “we are gonna do cowboy stuff after we eat.”
I didn’t get the memo, or I just didn’t remember, either one of those could be true, but however it happened, I was not prepared.
It was the middle of summer and I was dressed like someone who lived on the beach.
Sandals, shorts, a Hawaiian shirt. The exact opposite of how cowboys dress.
I found out during lunch that the cowboy stuff she planned on having us do was castrating bulls.
What?!? I had never seen this in any cowboy movies!
But this was my chance, and I had no intention of letting John Wayne, and Clint Eastwood. So I asked what I needed to do. I was told to hold their back legs down while they were castrated and cleaned. I think we were two bulls in, when I let down my heroes and realized I was no cowboy.
One of the legs got away from me, the bull stepped on my foot, remember I am wearing sandals, and he kicked me so hard in the thigh that I limped for the next year.
I wanted to be a cowboy, but something came along to test that.
I had an idealized version of who I thought I was, and my false identity was revealed.
But we so often want to determine our own identity.
Elevating idealized versions of who we think we are and want to be.
But God’s word tells us that our true identity can only be found as we turn away from who we want to be, and turn toward him and who he has called us to be.
Richard Lints says in his book Identity and Idolatry,
The irony of identity is that by looking away from ourselves we are more likely to discover our identity.
Richard Lints
But boy it is hard to look away from ourselves. That’s what sin does, causes us to think too much of ourselves or too little of ourselves. It doesn’t matter, it just wants us focused on ourself, so that we cannot focus on God. But in his kindness he will throw storms at us to wake us from our spiritual sleep.
How is that kindness? Because it leads us to repentance.
Our true identity shines brightest in the storms of life, revealing who we are and who we belong to.
TRANSITION
And they said to one another, “Come, let us cast lots, that we may know on whose account this evil has come upon us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah. Then they said to him, “Tell us on whose account this evil has come upon us. What is your occupation? And where do you come from? What is your country? And of what people are you?”
Once they learn that Jonah is the cause of the storm they began to ask him questions.
What is your occupation or mission?
From where do you come? What is your country?
Who are your people?
These are all identity questions. You don’t get a great view of identity by just asking who are you? So you must ask more specific questions. Because each person’s identity has layers.
Who are your people shows that we do not only define ourselves as individuals, but also by the community with which we identify most closely. Like your family, racial group, or political party.
We do not become who we are in a vaccum, but through viewing ourselves in the context of close relationships.
Where do you come from points to the place in which we most feel at home, where we feel like we belong.
And what is your mission gets at our meaning in life.
This changes from person to person, and from generation to generation.
For example; my great great grandfather’s mission was wanting to give his family a good life.
This was also my father’s mission, but what that meant for each of them was dramatically different.
For my great great grandfather this meant leaving Germany, the only home he had ever known for the freedom that awaited his family in America.
Giving his family a good life meant stepping into struggle and pain for those who would benefit after him. If you were to ask him who his people were and where he came from, he would have talked about the beautiful German culture he grew up in.
My father on the other hand thought giving his family a good life meant giving his children the things that he never had. This meant shielding his children from struggle where he was able, and protecting them to be happy and free from worry for as long as he could.
As a result, when real struggle presented itself, and it always does, my siblings and I were lost and sought happiness and freedom from worry in all the wrong places. So my mission, as a father, of giving my family a good life looks much differently from his.
If you were to ask my dad who his people were, he would say mechanics, because that is the community with which he most closely identifies.
And if you were to ask him where he is from, he would tell you Texas, even though a few generations prior his great grandfather was a full blooded german.
You see, we do not develop our identities in a vacuum but in the context of community and close relationships.
Quick side note.
On the walls of this building we have what we call our rhythms of grace. These are all ancient practices that help us be with Jesus, become like Jesus and do what Jesus did.
One of the rhythms that can be employed to help us here is fellowship.
We were made for community. Our God is a triune God. Father, son and Holy Spirit. He has always existed in perfect community with himself. Our God is love, and real love cannot exist without relationship in community. Neither can we.
So, be in fellowship here. Today we have unearth the Garden, which will teach us a bit more about this church, but it will also provide an opportunity for fellowship.
We also have fellowship at the table the third Sunday of every month. It is where we want to share a meal with one another, slowing down to catch up with God.
And beginning in March we will have vine groups at the church on Wednesday nights, yet another opportunity for fellowship.
Our mission of making disciples and modeling the gospel only happens in fellowship.
Side note complete.
Hopefully the illustration within my family helps you see how incredibly complex people’s lives can be even if they share the same country, state, town, or even DNA. There is a lot that factors in to our identity.
And the younger generations have even more factors influencing the way they view identity.
What David Kinnaman says,
They are exposed to and access more philosophies and ideas about life—and can get them at a faster pace—than any generation in history. They are a “pinch of this, pinch of that” generation, always willing to try a little of anything.
David Kinnaman; Gabe Lyons
This means as we witness, or engage with nonChristians and attempt to point them to Jesus, we have to do the hard work of understanding them and approaching them, based on what they really think, not what we assume about them.
These pagan sailors are asking Jonah in a well rounded way, “what is your identity?”
And it is important to note that they are not asking how Jonah expressed himself, as we in the western culture so often tend to look at identity. But rather they were interested in the god Jonah worshipped.
In their culture and context people’s identities were linked closely to the gods they worshipped.
To which we might say, our context and culture is much different. But is it?
As a Christian culture, we don’t believe that there are multiple gods at work in the world. We don’t believe in a god of money, or power, or beauty, etc.
But surely we can all agree that financial profit can become an object of worship.
And we also can become enslaved to sexuality and body image to the point that it controls the way we think about everything else.
In this way, we are not much different.
Our identities are attached to our gods, or the things that we worship.
Tim Keller says it like this;
Everyone must say that “I am significant because of this.”
But whatever that is, we turn it into an object of worship that we derive our identity from.
By asking Jonah, who are you, they were more pointedly asking him, whose are you?
Everyone’s identity has layers, And look what Jonah answers first?
And he said to them, “I am a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.”
Even though race was the last question they ask, it is the first thing that Jonah answers. While his faith in God is second.
When a Bible book is this short it is worth deeply considering why the words are arranged in the way that they are. And we can take away from this that Jonah’s ethnicity is more deep and fundamental to his identity, than his faith in God.
This begins to explain why Jonah has been running from God’s call.
He found his identity it in his people more than in his God.
And when loyalty to his people appeared to be in conflict with loyalty to the Word of God, he chose what was closest to his heart.
Again, remember that this book is intended to be a mirror to help us see ourselves.
When we choose to be loyal to something over the Word of God, it is because our identity has layers and we are elevating some element of our life over God.
It doesn’t mean that we don’t believe God’s Word, only that it has not gone deep enough in our heart as whatever the other thing is. Does that make sense?
This is why professing Christians can be racists, greedy materialists, addicted to pleasure and beauty, or filled with anxiety and prone to overwork. All this comes because it is not Christ’s love, but the world’s power, approval, and comfort that develop their identity instead.
This is just what Jonah is doing. Looking at himself too much, seeking the wrong things to develop his identity. And as a result he is blind to his flaws.
We must be aware of our flaws, we must be willing to talk about our flaws so that we do not elevate ourselves. When we become blind to our own flaws, we will greatly elevate the flaws of others, making us hostile to those who are not like us.
Just like Jonah. He’s dehumanizing those who are different than him, and excluding them from the mercy of God, even though God wants them to know him.
It is becoming exceedingly apparent that Jonah, is in desperate need of the very mercy of God that he finds so troubling.
We get a view of this In Matthew 26:33-35
Peter answered him, “Though they all fall away because of you, I will never fall away.” Jesus said to him, “Truly, I tell you, this very night, before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times.” Peter said to him, “Even if I must die with you, I will not deny you!” And all the disciples said the same.
And then again a few verses later in Matt 26:69-75
Now Peter was sitting outside in the courtyard. And a servant girl came up to him and said, “You also were with Jesus the Galilean.” But he denied it before them all, saying, “I do not know what you mean.” And when he went out to the entrance, another servant girl saw him, and she said to the bystanders, “This man was with Jesus of Nazareth.” And again he denied it with an oath: “I do not know the man.” After a little while the bystanders came up and said to Peter, “Certainly you too are one of them, for your accent betrays you.” Then he began to invoke a curse on himself and to swear, “I do not know the man.” And immediately the rooster crowed. And Peter remembered the saying of Jesus, “Before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times.” And he went out and wept bitterly.
How could Peter stand before Jesus and make such a bold claim, and then deny him in front of this servant girl?
God’s Word is teaching us.
It is because his identity was found in his own courageousness, not in Jesus.
And as a result, what happened to him as soon as his courage was tested?
It failed him. He was not who he thought he was. And God in his kindness revealed this false identity, so that he might repent.
Any identity based on our own achievements and our own performance will always be an insecure one. We will always feel exposed, and like we never quite measure up. It is the sinister way that sin works, by constantly accusing us, and then making us mad at God for the very thing he has been trying to reveal to us since the beginning of the Bible.
In 1 John 2:1-2
My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.
The apostle John wants us to know that we are free from sin. But he also wants us to stop condemning ourselves when we fall into it. And we will fall into it. But it does not get to accuse us, confuse us and abuse us anymore. We are in Christ Jesus.
There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
We get to experience freedom from sin in Christ. He is the propitiation for our sins. Which means that he is the appeasement for the wrath of God, the payment that removes condemnation forever. So if you believe in Christ you never have to fear the voice of condemnation.
The devil is a lie! Do not believe his lies. Speak the truth to yourself so that you might grow in your identity in Christ.
When you believe you are condemned, preach the gospel to yourself that you are forgiven and washed clean by God in Christ.
When you feel entrapped by darkness and accused by the enemy, preach the gospel to yourself that God has made you more than a conqueror in Christ.
When you believe your right standing before God is based on your performance, preach the gospel to yourself that Jesus has taken all that you have idealized, all that you cannot live up to, all that we try to find our identity in besides him, and has defeated it for you and freed you from its power at the cross.
It is only when we look away from ourselves that we find our true identity.
It is only under the power of God’s grace that our identity can be changed from sinner to saint. From self righteous and unclean to justified and redeemed. If you believe in your heart and confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, you will find your true identity in Christ.
LET’S PRAY
Our father, you are so good. You are so beautiful. You are so merciful. Thank you so much for your word. Sanctify us in the truth. Your word is the truth.
So many of us are trying to live up to something we were not called to be. And I do not want to steer any in here away from big dreams. We serve a big God who answers big dreams, but we shouldn’t derive our identity from those dreams, only from you. We live in a society that values performance, so sometimes we get caught up in our performance and forget who we actually are, children of the most high God.
I feel compelled to share that Jesus did not come and die for the me who is performing my best each day.
No Jesus came and died for the me that I did things in my past that make me sick to my stomach.
Jesus died for the me who couldn’t look himself in the mirror. Jesus died for ugliest version of me, that I might be free to not find my identity in my sin and shame, but in the one who loved me and gave himself up for me. I just want to take a moment and let us all sit with that. There are so many noisy places in the world. So many places where we have to perform and be our best self. This ain’t that place.
I just want to give us a few minutes of silence and reflection before moving into our response songs. And I want to do it by employing the ancient practice of breath prayers.
I want you to breathe in, and silently say “I’m no longer a slave to fear.”
And I want you to breathe out, and silently say “I am a child of God.”
Again, breathe in, “I’m no longer a slave to fear.”
And breathe out, “I am a child of God.”
I want to give you a minute to do that silently.
