Pt. 2, An Object Lesson For A Pouting Preacher
Notes
Transcript
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
So, this morning we looked at the Waiting, and the Watchcare out of verses 5 and 6, tonight, we will look at the remainder of this chapter and conclude our study of the Life of Jonah, I don’t know what ya’ll think, but this chapter has been a doozy!
I hope that the study has been both a challenge and a blessing to you!
This morning, we look at the Waiting and the Watchcare, tonight we will look at the Worm and the Wind, and the Word…
Let’s go ahead and dive into the rest of this chapter...
III-THE WORM AND THE WIND
III-THE WORM AND THE WIND
7 But God prepared a worm when the morning rose the next day, and it smote the gourd that it withered.
8 And it came to pass, when the sun did arise, that God prepared a vehement east wind; and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah, that he fainted, and wished in himself to die, and said, It is better for me to die than to live.
God has been trying to get Jonah’s attention. Thus far, the Lord has been very gentle with him.
Jonah has not paid any attention to the Lord, so now the Lord will cease the gentle approach and will smite Jonah with the rod. It will not only sting, but will burn and Jonah will desire to die.
Jonah is going to have to learn the hard way like so many other people.
Oh, how much trouble could we eliminate from our life if we would just listen to God’s gentle pleadings concerning our indifference. Because we get stubborn sometimes, we have to be knocked down before we will listen to the Lord.
For one day, Jonah enjoys the wonderful shade of the gourd plant, but because he treated his blessings so poorly, he lost them.
You can’t win when you are out of the will of God, with the wrong attitude, and the wrong spirit!
As I mentioned this morning, the goodness of God is to lead to repentance. When it doesn’t bring repentance, God has a way of sending His worms in our life. Jonah did not use his blessings properly. God sent worms and he lost his blessings. Jonah was not grateful for the shade, so the Lord took the shade away. God still sends worms today!
Someone wrote, “The word for ‘worm’ implies something small. God uses both the great fish and the insignificant worm equally as instruments of His purpose.”
God prepared the worm for the purpose of teaching Jonah to trust fully and completely on the Lord. God had planned this trial for Jonah’s life.
When we rebel against the will of God; He will have planned trails for our lives as well.
The Hebrew word for worm here is the same word that is used in Psalm 22 when speaking of Calvary...
6 But I am a worm, and no man; A reproach of men, and despised of the people.
You know what that Hebrew word for “worm” means? It means scarlet or crimson red!
The scarlet, crimson red speaks of blood. What a picture of Calvary ya’ll!
This worm destroyed Jonah’s comfort, and my friend, it’ll get us out of our comfort also!
I mentioned this morning how God had disrupted everything Jonah thought he knew about Him, and how our selfishness will keep us from being Christian or serving God, well, I’m going to tell you tonight that the solution to our comfort being a hindrance is Christ! Christ disrupts things, especially those things that keep us out of the will of God.
When we love things more than we love God He will send a worm to eat away and destroy that for which we are attached to!
If you use God’s blessings for self-glory or self-advancement, look out for the worms! If you misuse your blessings to keep you out of church or serving the Lord, look out for the worms! If you are ungrateful for God’s blessings, don’t be surprised if He takes them away.
God worked through the night using the worm and he worked during the day using the wind.
God specifically sent a powerful east wind; not to comfort the prophet, but to correct the prophet and chasten the prophet.
The word “vehement” means “burning, cutting, dry, scorching, sand laden wind” called by the Arabs a sirocco.
It is nothing like our winds. It is a deadly wind which sends birds and other animals for shelter. These hot, oppressive, dust-laden winds blow in from the desert or some other heated region. They can raise the temperature as much as 20 degrees and can last from three to seven days. If you get caught out in them, it can be fatal if you are unprepared.
Jonah was even more miserable during the second day of his rebellion.
The longer we are away from the Lord and the further we get from the Lord the more miserable we will be. *When we are in rebellion against God He will send worms and winds of adversity into our lives.*
*Jonah faced storms, angry sailors, raging seas, a great fish, the hot sun, and a powerful east wind.*
God used all these to correct His child.
Warren Wiersbe writes, “As He had done in the depths of the sea, God was reminding Jonah of what it was like to be lost, helpless, hopeless, and miserable.” God will do the same in our lives if we are not obedient to His word and will for our lives.
The result of a prepared worm and a powerful wind is seen in the last part of verse 8.
Jonah prayed to die because he saw pain as the evidence of God’s lack of concern. God let him live (the blessing of UNANSWERED prayer) to teach him that pain was often a sign of His presence and concern.
We are not above our Master (Matt. 10:24).
The Worms mean we will lose our comforts like Him Who left heaven, Who left Nazareth and Who had nowhere to lay His head (Lk. 9:58).
The wind means we will face trials like Him Who knew Satanic temptation (Matt. 4:1), hatred and slander (Matt. 10:25), inner turmoil (Matt. 26:38) and even abandonment (Jn. 6:66) by His friends.
As the old hymn says, “Must Jesus bear the cross alone—And all the world go free—No, there’s a cross for everyone—And there’s a cross for me.”
There’s much more to be said about the worm and the wind, but I must move on…Let’s look at:
IV-THE WORD
IV-THE WORD
9 And God said to Jonah, Doest thou well to be angry for the gourd? And he said, I do well to be angry, even unto death.
10 Then said the Lord, Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for the which thou hast not laboured, neither madest it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night:
11 And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?
After Jonah was overcome by heat, God spoke to him again, “Doest well to be angry for the gourd?” This time he answers the question which he ignored earlier (vs.4). The answer does not reflect any change in Jonah’s attitude. He says, “I do well to be angry, even unto death.”
These are Jonah’s last words in the book. Many times they are the same words of people today who take their lives by suicide. They are angry at life, at God, or someone else.
In an Old Testament sense, Jonah was like the unmerciful servant in the Lord’s parable. “O thou wicked servant,” his master said, “I forgave thee all that debt, because thou desiredst me: Shouldest not thou also have had compassion on thy fellowservant, even as I had pity on thee?” (Matthew 18:32–33) Jonah was also like the prodigal son’s elder brother. “As he came and drew nigh to the house, he heard musick and dancing.… And he was angry, and would not go in: therefore came his father out, and in treated him” (Luke 15:25–28).
Jonah’s anger reveals that he lost his focus and purpose as a prophet of God. He forgot that he was to glorify the Lord with his life. Christians make the same mistake today. God makes it clear that we are to bring honor and glory to the Lord with our life.
Jonah is concerned about a plant. The Lord is concerned about sinners in Nineveh.
Jonah desires mercy on something temporal and nonhuman: “God, please save the plant!”
God determines to give mercy to wretched, evil people.
Typically, people, even believers, tend to express more passion over the crash of a hard drive or the cracked screen of a cell phone than over the souls of people who are in jeopardy of the wrath of God.
Even larger things such as jobs, homes, they are all of this world! God desires for us to have larger concerns!
As we grow in anger over the loss of such temporary items, we drain emotional energy that should be fueling an urgent concern for people who have not experienced Christ’s forgiveness.
Being self-absorbed in worldly concerns, we can lose sight of the Lord’s mandate to reach the lost with the good news of the death and resurrection of Christ.
These problems were the cause of his rebellion at the beginning of the book and they were the cause of his fowl attitudes at the close of the book.
When you take a look at yourself, do you find you have the same problems and attitudes as Jonah? If so, repent, confess your sin, and dedicate your priorities to the Lord.
The sobering thought is: Jonah cared more for the gourd than souls of the Ninevites. He cared more about comfort than the destiny of thousands.
Are we sometimes guilty of the same attitudes?
God says, “Let’s look at your anger Jonah. Why are you so upset? A closer look will reveal the dumbness of your priorities.”
1. The gourd is a plant and Nineveh is a great city.
2. The plant was not the result of any labor on Jonah’s part, yet, Nineveh was part of God’s creation. The Ninevites were important to God.
3. The gourd is gone. Nineveh is an ancient city.
4. The gourd is without a soul. Nineveh has 120,000 souls that couldn’t discern from their right hand or left.
When our priorities are dumb and out of wack, we fail to focus on the right things in life. If you have inordinate affection for the trivial, you will not have much affection left for the important.
If you have great compassion for yourself, you will not have much compassion for others.
This was Jonah’s problem in Nineveh. God desired that Jonah be totally devoted to Him.
The Lord was basically asking, “Jonah, if you can fall in love with a plant, why can’t you care about the Ninevites?”
CONCLUSION
CONCLUSION
Do you see with the eyes of Jesus?
Do you love with the heart of Jesus?
Are you reaching out to the poor, the dirty, the wayward, and the sinner?
Are you sharing God’s truth with the down and out?
Are you witnessing to the up and out?
Do we believe that every person in this world is someone that God loves and that Jesus died for?
What are we doing about rescuing the perishing?
Has the Lord rebuked you because of your spiritual blindness?
Would you let Him correct your vision and ignite your passion