Success, Despite Ourselves

Jonah 3:1-10 - Success, Despite of yourself Doug Partin - The Christian Church - Oct 4, 2020 Jonah had every right to be pleased with himself. Hearing his message, Nineveh repented, God relented and an entire city was saved from the wrath of God. Now tell me the truth, if you spent a day walking through Albuquerque preaching the judgment of God (instead of shopping), wouldn't you be pleased with yourself if the entire city repented of their sins and became known for its righteousness instead of it being one of the most dangerous cities in America? How ever you want to look at it, Jonah's mission was wildly successful. It was the kind of outreach event of which books are written to inspire others who long for the same sort of success. Was it the result of Jonah's passion, his leadership, his character, his talent, his methods, or his experience that made this outreach event so successful? No. Had the success of this endeavor been dependent upon Jonah, it would have been a complete failure. Jonah was a self-centered servant who half-heartedly slouched his way across a city he despised, but He was faithful to the word of the Lord. He did not add to it, nor take away from it. Fortunately for him, it was a rather direct and short message (only five Hebrew words). In English it takes eight words: "Yet forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown." Given what we know about Jonah, he was probably hoping that God would end up destroying them, which is exactly what the Ninevites believed He would do. It is interesting that the Hebrew word translated "overthow" is also used to describe things that are "changed." This same word was used to describe the staff of Moses that was "turned" or "changed" into a serpent (Ex. 7:15); and how the Nile river was "turned" into blood (Ex. 7:17). But the kind of change that Jonah's message implied was the same kind that the Lord brought about in Sodom and Gomorrah. What happened to them was also described by this same word, they were "changed," that is "overthrown," we might say destroyed. (Deut. 19:23). But what if God had Jonah use this particular word because He was anticipating a different kind of change? This same word was used by Samuel when prophesying that Saul would join with a group of prophets returning from worshiping God. Samuel said, "Then the Spirit of the Lord will come upon you mightily, and you shall prophesy with them and be changed into another man." (1 Sam. 10:6). Yes, this same word was used of the kind of change this is brought about by God's Spirit when it is present in a person's life. Just a thought to consider. The message that Jonah preached went viral. It quickly spread from one person to the next. It was very contagious. A term we've heard a lot about recently with the spread of COVID-19. A number of years ago, we held an evangelism conference at our church. In one of the breakout sessions we used a book called, "Contagious Christianity." In it, Bill Hybels and Mark Mittelberg said that the gospel message can become "contagious" if we discover our own "style" of communicating about Christ. If we build spiritually significant relationships through which to communicate. If in those relationships we direct conversations toward matters of faith. If in those conversations we intentionally share our own story of coming to faith. And if we prepare ourselves by memorizing several gospel illustrations that we can also share in those conversations, and learn to lead a person to pray the "sinner's prayer." Jonah did none of these sorts of things. He just kept to his five words of impending, destructive, change. The word of the Lord that Jonah preached was spread from the bottom up. Jonah did not go to the King, but to the people in the streets. We're told that it took three days to walk across the city. So, it was a pretty large place, and it doesn't seem that Jonah went down every lane, but across the city, casting the seed of God's Word along the way. Jesus told a parable about different kinds of soils that represented different kinds of circumstances in people's lives that either made them "good" or "poor" soil for receiving the gospel. It seems that the people in Nineveh were primarily good soil. The sort of person Jesus said "hears the word and understands it." (Mt. 13:23). Thereby producing 100, 60, or 30 fold ... Like a virus, the word of the Lord is no respecter of persons. Everyone who encounters it risks being infected, and if that person is in leadership, and we are talking about the word of the Lord and not a virus, they can have a huge impact on those who follow them if they are obedient to it. Nearly all of the conversion stories in the book of Acts indicate that when the head of a household became a believer, so did all those who were a part of that household. And a household back then included not only the family, but the servants and slaves. We are not told how all of these leaders went about influencing their own households; that is, how they shared their new faith with them, only that they did. In Nineveh, the word of the Lord quickly made its way to the King, who immediately responded to it by declaring a national fast, not only for the people, but for every beast as well. I'll admit that this seems like an odd thing to do, rather extreme, but it does show just how seriously the King took the word of the Lord. There was no separation between nation and faith. And, the most amazing thing of all, was that everyone in Nineveh obeyed. They all believed that the Lord would keep His word if they didn't repent, they would be destroyed. In other words, if they didn't change, their city would be changed. As we learned earlier in this study of Jonah, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And fear is a primary motivator for change. Our judicial system is based upon it. If an undesired behavior is punished, people who want to avoid that punishment will, hopefully, avoid the offending behavior. Of course, a lot of people don't consider the consequences, or don't believe they will get caught, or don't believe the courts will really enact the punishments, and so they continue to choose poorly. And a great many of them end up being punished. But, biblically speaking, having the threat of punishment replaced with the hope of mercy if one repents, is even more effective. But let's get back to Nineveh. Their response should make you wonder how they knew how to respond to the word of the Lord. First of all, they believed in God, not just in any ole god, but in Elohim. But given the message that Jonah preached, what would they have "believed" about God? That He was powerful, that He would use that power to destroy them, that He demanded change from their "wicked ways." And that if they obeyed, He would not destroy them. Whatever they believed, it resulted in obedience. What about the fasting and prayer? Fasting was not limited to Israel's worship. Fasting had made its way into nearly every culture of the ancient world as a sign of remorse and grief. It was also a way of reminding ourselves that we do not have to cave into the cravings of our appetites. That we can tell ourselves no in order to say yes to something better. Adding prayer to fasting seems to be an important thing to do as well, especially when we face a particularly obstinate problem. What the King called on the Ninevites to do reminds me of what Jesus said when he came down from the mount of transfiguration. He was greeted by the disciples who did not join him on the mountain with a man whose son was possessed of an evil spirit. They had tried to cast it out on their own and had failed. Jesus easily cast it out, then told the disciples, "It takes prayer and fasting." We could delve into the why this might be true, or we could, like the Ninevites, simply give it a try, and be obedient in what the word of the Lord says. They also turned from their wandering ways. While grace is God's domain, repentance is for us to do. We can change the way we think about things, and thereby change the way we do things. It may not be an easy thing to do, some of us don't like change, even when that change is good for us. But if we are going to follow Jesus, we have a lot of changes that lay before us. Many of us are already well along that road, and others are just getting started. We can't expect for all of us to be at the same point in our journey of following Jesus, but we will all do a lot of changing as we follow Him. You might expect believing, fasting, prayer, and repentance from someone who already knows about God's ways, but from strangers? Evidently, the people of Nineveh retained some knowledge about God, even though they had wandered very far away from Him and His ways. Unfortunately, we are not told how they knew what to do, only that they knew it, and that they did it. I was once told by a person who had not been, for a long time, in the teaching portion of our worship services. When asked why they had not been joining us, "I already know more than I do, and once I get to doing what I already know, then I'll come learn some more." I'll be honest, I didn't like their answer, but I understand it. God isn't interested in our accumulation of knowledge, but in our faithful obedience. What did God see when looking upon the Ninevites? He did not see "good intentions," or "justifications," or "defensiveness" or "reinterpretations." He saw obedience. He saw what they did in response to His Word. Faith has a way of making itself known in our behavior. If you believe a stove is hot, you won't put your hand on it. Their obedience, in the same way, evidenced their hope that God would relent from bringing upon them an unbearable calamity if they changed their ways. The success of outreach events is not dependent upon those who spread the word of the Lord. The success is dependent upon the faithful obedience of those who hear the word of the Lord. As I was taught growing up, "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink." But if that horse chooses to drink, it will be refreshed. The apostle Paul would say it another way. He told the believers in Rome, "Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of the Lord." (Rm. 10:17) But before he told them that, Paul asked, "... how will they hear, if no one proclaims?" Despite our less than perfect character, plans, attitudes, and demeanor; God has chosen to use us to proclaim His word to the lost. It is His perfect plan to use imperfect us. We are to faithfully share the word of the Lord. We don't have to be Bible experts, we don't even have to know how to defend it, nor do we have to dress it up to be acceptable. But we do have to faithfully share it. If you were only given the five words that Jonah received, what would you want to add to it? What would you want to take away from it? I once served as a youth director in a church whose denomination was trying to decide how they would respond to the cultural changes in regard to marriage, gender, social justice and diversity. Some changes were needed so they more closely reflected what the Bible reveals about such things, but there were many voices calling for changes that did not reflect God's Word. We had a visiting preacher for a mid-week service that I was asked to attend. He was going to address some of these issues. At one point in his sermon he picked up a large Bible. It was a really nice one. He read a controversial passage, then tore out that page and dropped it on the floor. He had my full attention. I couldn't believe he was tearing a page out of the Bible. Then he read another, and tore it out, and another, and another, and another. This went on until he finished reading the passages that were being reinterpreted. Then he closed the Bible and said, "Now that's a Bible that we can live with; But it's not the Bible that God gave to us." The bad news that we are not okay with God, and that we need to repent of our wicked ways or we will be punished. We may like to focus on the promise of forgiveness to all who do. We may like to focus on the transformed lives that result when we are filled by God's Spirit. But before we can move on to the good news, we must first face the bad news. And when you do, I hope that it moves you to be just as obedient as the people of Nineveh were, that you might be changed in the same way. And if you've already been changed, then I hope that you faithfully share God's word with those who need to change, before that other kind of change that God promised comes about. Prayer: Lord, help us faithfully proclaim your word to the people around us whom you love and have prepared to hear your word.