Jonah 4
Notes
Transcript
Intro:
Intro:
Jonah was spit up on shore...
He walked around the city and proclaimed the message that God has given him.
The people believed God and they turned from their evil ways, so God didn’t destroy them!
Now, we see Jonah with his attitude.
V.1
If they ended with Chapter , Jonah would’ve been the best prophet...
He taught one time and the whole nation turned from evil..
However, it’s included for a reason… God looks at the heart and weighs the motives of our hearts.
Chapter 4 reveals Jonah’s heart.
Jonah was angry that these violent people got saved… Angels rejoice over one person being saved, so you know they were partying, but Jonah.. Nah.. He’s furious.
V.2
Look at his reasoning...
I KNOW THAT YOU ARE
Gracious
Compassionate
Slow to Anger
Abounding in Faithful Love
One who relents
Jonah ran from Nineveh because he feared that God would forgive them.. Jonah feared that God would have some lame excuse to forgive these pagans…
Jonah wanted judgment upon these people.. Jonah wanted these people to die… But, God… Who is gracious gave them time...
Sometimes, we want judgment to be cast down upon our enemies… upon those who we dislike..
But God… might want to save those people instead..
If God saved your worst enemy, would you be okay with that?
Not that matters… But, how would you feel?
Since Jonah understands who God is… Do you?
He is gracious (he gives us what we don’t deserve)
He is compassionate (sympathy and concern for us)
Slow to anger (but he does get angry)
Loves faithfully.. not like your girlfriend in jr high..
He relents from wrath (not all the time, but there are times)
And the Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation.”
V. 3-4
Jeez… Jonah is acting like the dramatic teenager..
Ugh, they left me… I just want to die.. It’s crazy.
In 1 Kings 19:4, we see Elijah crying to God to take his life, because he failed his mission...
Here, we see Jonah wanting to die because he succeeded… Its insane!
Should you be angry that I’ve done good?
Sometimes, we can act like Jonah… We can be made at God, because he did something that we didn’t like.
He does something good and we hate it because that isn’t what we wanted.
Makes me think of our prayers… We pray for healing, but then someone dies.. is that not an answered prayer? But, not how you wanted it.
Is it right for us to be angry at God when he does something? No…
GOT.org “So, to answer the question directly, yes, it is wrong to be angry at God. Anger at God is a result of an inability or unwillingness to trust God even when we do not understand what He is doing. Anger at God is essentially telling God that He has done something wrong, which He never does. Does God understand when we are angry, frustrated, or disappointed with Him? Yes, He knows our hearts, and He knows how difficult and painful life in this world can be. Does that make it right to be angry with God? Absolutely not. Instead of being angry with God, we should pour out our hearts to Him in prayer, and trust that He is in control of His perfect plan.”
V.5-8
Should’ve stayed in the city and taught them about God..
But, instead, he left, sat, and watched what would happen.
Instead of teaching and praying with the people, he wanted to have his own way.
God gave Jonah a little shade to protect from the heat, but then God killed it..
Maybe God was reminding Jonah what it was like to be lost: hopeless, helpless, and miserable.
Jonah was experiencing a taste of hell as he sat and watched the city.
V.9-11
God is still speaking to Jonah and Jonah is still replying..
Picture of God’s grace and Him being slow to anger.
God used Jonah’s emotional reaction to the death of the plant as an object lesson to rebuke him… because he was more concerned about a plan than the destruction of 120,000 people who could not distinguish between their right and left
Speaking about them being immature and uninformed morally and spiritually.
Jonah had to learn that God has pity and compassion for lost sinners like the Ninevites, and His people need to have that same compassion forlost sinners.
Jonah brought a whole city to faith, but he didn’t love the people he was preaching to..
Conclusion:
God has the first word in Jonah 1 and He has the final word in Jonah 4
We don’t know what happened to Jonah...
We hope that his heart changed and he understood what God was doing.
Be Amazed 4. The Marvel of an Unanswered Question (Jonah 4:11)
Spurgeon said, “Let us hope that, during the rest of his life, he so lived as to rejoice in the sparing mercy of God.” After all, hadn’t Jonah himself been spared because of God’s mercy?
Warren Wiersbe said,
Be Amazed 4. The Marvel of an Unanswered Question (Jonah 4:11)
But the real issue isn’t how Jonah answered God’s question; the real issue is how you and I today are answering God’s question. Do we agree with God that people without Christ are lost? Like God, do we have compassion for those who are lost? How do we show this compassion? Do we have a concern for those in our great cities where there is so much sin and so little witness? Do we pray that the Gospel will go to people in every part of the world, and are we helping to send it there? Do we rejoice when sinners repent and trust the Savior?
All of those questions and more are wrapped up in what God asked Jonah.
We can’t answer for him, but we can answer for ourselves.
Let’s give God the right answer.