God Gets The Last Word
Tom Shrader concludes his series on Jonah by examining chapter 4, where Jonah becomes angry that God spared Nineveh after their repentance. Through God's object lesson with a plant, worm, and scorching wind, Shrader explores themes of pride, comfort, and God's compassion. He emphasizes that God is the main character of Jonah's story, demonstrating His sovereignty and mercy throughout, and challenges believers to examine their own hearts for pride and anger while trusting in God's perfect will.
“Pride is a complete anti God state of mind - pride is where I elevate myself and demote God.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Jonah (2004)
Recorded: 2004 at Cannon Beach Conference Center
Duration: 1 hr 4 min
Themes: pride, anger, compassion, mercy, sovereignty, repentance, comfort, humility, struggling with pride, dealing with anger, questioning gods decisions, comfortable christian, mature believer, pastor, bible study leader, frustrated with others
Scripture: Jonah 4, Jonah 1:4, Jonah 1:17, Jonah 2:10, Jonah 3:4, Proverbs 24:17, Romans 12:17, 1 Timothy 1:15, Ecclesiastes 5:10, Job 38
Theological Themes: divine sovereignty, gods will, biblical narrative, old testament, grace, divine mercy, providence, sanctification
Full Transcript
Well, good morning. It's great to see you and to have you here, though unfortunately I have to say goodbye. That's kind of yucky. I know some of you have to get back—you have kids starting school. School started for us August 12th. I mean, school's been in session quite a while, and I told Susan I've been gone since the beginning of August and we go back tomorrow morning.
You know, normally vacation for me is that time when we get away and just kind of relax, and then I get energized and can't wait to go home. For whatever reason I'm not all that excited about going back tomorrow, and it's hot, so we'll see. Hopefully I'll see you again sometime.
I would echo all of those thanks to the musicians, to Evan and his team. It's just—you have no idea. I used to do this a lot. I had one year when we did service on Sunday night, and so I wouldn't miss Sunday nights, but I did about 27 gigs that year out of town. That's a lot. That's every other week traveling.
You see so many different things, and one of the things that you don't really realize until you do it over and over again is what an extraordinary difference the worship team and the music makes. It sets the tone for everything, and it's a magnificent privilege to be able to be here and to be with you guys and your team and all your little quirks. It's a quirky little group, this group. One of them—and I don't want to mention his name—Clark travels with his own espresso machine. You've got serious issues at that point in your life. But guys, thank you very much. It was really a pleasure to work with you.
Working with Special People
And John, it's always great to be with John and to watch John. When Johnny gets on this platform something special happens, and it's fun to watch him and listen to him. Don't make fun of Johnny. It's funny—Joe, we were at lunch the other day and John was talking about his three-year-old grandson Snap. They call him Snap because every time he comes in the house, he breaks something.
Snap is a big boy. He's my size. He's three. But Snap has a little bit of a stutter, and Johnny's dad has a little stutter and some of the family, and so it's really great to get around the family table at Thanksgiving and hear him say "rubber baby buggy bumper." It just kills the day. Instead of playing games, we just say hello. You're all right with that, John? They think at this point I've offended you.
Johnny's a very special guy, and as he mentioned, we go way back. And then again, Jana, thank you. I'm not sure I want to come back now that I've thought this through. I'll let you know. You send me some dates, and I'll let you know if I'm available. My agent will talk to you.
So Jana is—but we've really—Susan and Jana are very special, and it's fun. You know, it happens in time everybody has in their life, but it's fun for me to watch it because it just seems like Susan and Jana have one of those relationships where the minute they say hello, they pick right up where the last sentence was even though it might have been a year or a year and a half ago. So it's really fun, and it's great to be here.
The Special Nature of the Northwest
This is a magnificent place. I've learned to love it up here. The people in the Northwest—and I'm just going to sound weird—but you're just different in that these people just stay here and live here. I'm in Phoenix where you can almost say to anybody, "Where are you from?" and they'll say Milwaukee or Orange County. They'll say all sorts of different things, but up here everybody, it seems, even if you go away, you come back. There is something very special up here, and it's pretty neat. Cannon Beach is just a terrific place, and to have the conference center in the center of it is just a special treat.
It's funny. I talk to people all the time and they'll say, "Where do you like to go?" because they know I'm a vacation aficionado. I really do vacation. I think it's very important. And I keep saying Cannon Beach, Cannon Beach, Cannon Beach. I can't get anybody to come up here because it is a little bit of a distance. But we brought some people with us this time and they went back and they say, "We're going to bring some friends up to Cannon Beach. This is incredible." So it's really a privilege for us to be here.
Finishing Our Study of Jonah
Open your Bibles as we wind this down to Jonah chapter 4. Susan and Jana were giving me just a smidgen of grief last night, saying, "What verse were you in?" So I take that—you all thought it was probably one of the greatest messages you'd ever heard. They've never seen—and they stopped me. Marty stopped and said, "Please tell people not to order any more tapes. We have never sold as many tapes of a message." Now I'm teasing about that, but I understand what they're saying. But you knew what we were doing. We were finishing up from the morning, and we're in a time crunch. We only get six sessions to go through this and it probably needs a little bit more attention than that. So anyway, I think we're doing a good job getting our way through this.
Oh, Jonah's an interesting guy, and you remember there's a little bit of Jonah in all of us. Jonah has this call in his life. That's what we're talking about. We're finishing up the idea that God is a God of the second chance and that all of us have a call. We're all missionaries. We're called to share the gospel, the good news.
Why It's Called Good News
It's called good news because in a world that thinks it can find meaning and purpose apart from Christ, in a world that's searching all over that will do desperate things—just north of us is a place called Sedona, or as my dad says, Sedona. In Sedona is one of the four or five places in the world where you have a harmonic convergence where vortexes come together, and at certain times in the calendar year—
But it isn't even that it happens like every Olympic year or something. Your yin and your yang will line up there perfectly and you go up there, and it's pretty whacked. I mean, these are nutty, goofy people by and large who have serious issues who are trying to find answers.
Let me emphasize this as we close from last night: people are asking legitimate questions like who am I and why am I here? Where am I going? Those are legitimate questions, and they deserve legitimate answers. The only legitimate true answer is the answer that you have here.
Boy, don't underestimate this book and the power of this book. Let it say everything that it says. Don't make it say more than it wants to say. You don't need to take license with it. It's okay to say "I don't know." It's okay to be in conversations and say "I'm not really sure." It's okay in these conversations to say "Here's what God says."
Virtually every situation that you'll face in life, you'll either find direct answers here, or you'll find principles upon which you can find the answers to those questions. So it's a blessing of God to have this book.
God is the Main Character
Jonah has been called—you know this, we've been through it. But I want to emphasize again: the main character we're really going to see now is God. Let me take you through it one last time.
In Jonah chapter 1 verse 4, the Lord hurled a great wind in the sea. Jonah says "pick me up, throw me in," and in verse 17 of chapter 1, the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah. In chapter 2 verse 10, the Lord commanded the fish to vomit Jonah to dry land. God's in absolute control here.
The Timeless God in a Changing World
Evan said something as he was leading us in worship that made me think of the timelessness of God and how fast life is changing. It is amazing to me how many of you have come up and said "What was that book you talked about the first day?" It was *Life 2.0* was the name of that. You read that and I'm not even sure what it all means. I have a feeling that I'm at the point of my life that it didn't get a matter of a whole boatload to me, but it's going to matter to other people. Things are changing all the time.
For our 20th wedding anniversary, I had a bunch of frequent flyer miles from America West, so I just got their map out and said "Where's the furthest place I can go for the minimum miles?" It was Anchorage. So we spent our 20th anniversary in Anchorage.
As we were flying up to Anchorage, we were in the air somewhere—honestly, I'm not making this up—somewhere over where we are right now, my parents were in the air. You have to know them because they won't get on a plane. We haven't been able to get them on a plane since. My parents were on a plane going to Europe, and my brother was on a plane going to a conference in Florida.
It's a very different world, changing very quickly. Something really small happened on this platform: Johnny had a website. Johnny's got a website, we got a website, we're communicating. It's an amazing world with things changing literally instantaneously and events around us happening so quickly that they have profound impact. Yet in the middle of this, there is a timeless, unchanging God.
That's what we get in Jonah. Don't get sidetracked with Jonah's magnificent story, but what's important: the main character is God. It's a great picture, this book, of His judgment. But more than anything in Jonah, we see God's mercy and God's grace and God's love, especially for His people.
Jonah's Simple Message Brings Revival
Here's what's happened: Jonah finally goes to Nineveh. He preaches that very simple eight-word message. He tells them that indeed God is going to move and that God indeed will destroy the city. Chapter 3 verse 4: "Yet forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown." It's simple—we might even say too simple. But there's the message.
What happens? The king on down—most powerful man arguably in the world at this point—and his people in the largest city, the great city (Jonah mentions it two, three, four times), this great city, these people repent. As far as we can tell, this revival is essentially universal in the city.
Jonah's Shocking Response
Now here's Jonah. Jonah ran from God. Now He finally gives up. He's in the belly of the fish, he finally prays, he obeys, he goes, he preaches, God moves radically. You've got to think at this point Jonah's pretty excited, huh?
Look at chapter 4 verse 1: "But it greatly displeased Jonah and he became angry." What in the world is wrong with you, Jonah? He's angry. Why is he angry?
Well, let me give you what I think are a couple of reasons. Number one: he hates these Ninevites. He can't stand these Ninevites. They were enemies of his. It would be in our context like God saying to you and me "Go to al-Qaeda and preach," and Osama bin Laden gets converted, and Jonah's hacked off because he doesn't like these guys.
In fact, that's what he says there in verse 2. See it: "He prayed to the Lord, '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.'" I know what You are like, God. I knew this is the kind of thing You do. I can't stand these people, God, and You go ahead and save them anyway.
Proverbs chapter 24 verse 17: "Do not rejoice when your enemy falls." Romans chapter 12 verse 17: "Never pay back evil for evil to anyone. Respect what is right in the sight of all men. If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men. Never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, 'Vengeance is Mine, and I will repay,' says the Lord. 'But if your enemy is hungry, feed him, and if he is thirsty, give him a drink; for in so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.' Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good."
And Jonah...
Jonah's Anger and the Root of Pride
Here's the second thing I think that angers Jonah. He looks a little bit foolish here because he said here's what's going to happen. Again, you got it in chapter 3 verse 4. His message was "40 days and Nineveh will be overthrown," and now it isn't. God responds and He spares Nineveh. Now Jonah looks perhaps a little bit like a fool. All of a sudden now his pride is in the way - "you're making me look so bad."
I do not know many of you at all, but I can tell you your besetting sin - your besetting sin is pride. It may manifest itself in a variety of different ways. You may be just a chronic gossip, but the reason you gossip is to spread bad things around other people to tear them down to make yourself look better. You may be involved in sex outside of marriage, but the lure of that and the attractiveness of that is to somehow make yourself feel good oftentimes. It's for the guy - it's the idea that I still have that virile nature and I can still be attractive to a woman. Or gals that might say, "I deserve something better than this and I still have worth. I still look attractive. I can still attract a guy." It's pride that's at the core of this.
C. S. Lewis defines pride this way. This is an incredible definition: pride is a complete anti-God state of mind. Pride is where I elevate myself and demote God. C. S. Lewis in Mere Christianity has a great little line - at least it captured my attention. He writes this: "It was through pride that Lucifer became the devil." It would take me 48 paragraphs to make that point that he makes in a phrase - that makes me sick. Here's what he says: here was Lucifer, and because of his pride, this shining star becomes the devil. It's our besetting sin.
Pride Disguised as Low Self-Esteem
Even when we talk about low self-esteem, we're really talking about pride because we're disappointed either in our own performance where we think we should have done better, or we're disappointed that other people don't see what great talent and worth and wealth that we have.
If pride is the ultimate vice - hang with me now - then humility is the ultimate virtue. I guarantee you, I've been around a lot, I will guarantee you in your church the number one obstacle to growth within the church is most often the pride of the senior pastor. Most often in a family it's the pride of the mom or the dad. In a business it's the pride of the owner.
You can accomplish great things, Ronald Reagan said, if you don't care who gets the credit. But we do, don't we?
The Struggle for Recognition
I remember sitting with a guy and we're going through this thing and we're taking him down and he doesn't get it. He doesn't get it, he doesn't get it, he doesn't get it. I've spent hours and hours and hours and weeks and weeks and weeks, months and months and months, years and years and years with him. Finally, all of a sudden he gets this. We're sitting in a meeting. There's about a dozen of us and we're going around the room, and this guy spits out exactly what I said. Everybody in the room stops. It's as though the oxygen were sucked out of the air and they said, "This is incredible. This is profound. This is life-changing."
You know what my emotion was at that moment? I wanted to stand up and say, "This guy's dumb as a post. He couldn't have figured that out in a million years. That's my idea. That's my thought." It was very helpful to be there because all of a sudden it was like a mirror that helped me said, "Look at Tom, you don't have this thing even close to being licked."
You can accomplish extraordinary things if you don't care who gets the credit. But we do care who gets the credit. And we should care who gets the credit - not us, but God, because we can't do anything apart from Him.
God Gets the Glory
Really I do - I'm not kidding you about that picture back there. I look at that picture, those people looking down on me all the time, and I know a little bit about their history. By the way, she, in light of the comments I made last night, I want you to understand that she was a great saxophonist. So you need to understand that there's a linkage here between Stonecroft Ministries. And I looked at the great things that God did, and all the time you're around these people, you know what they keep saying? "God is good. God is merciful. God is great. God did this. God did this." So Jonah's a little bit hurt on that account.
Jonah's Lost Perspective
I think there's another reason that Jonah's so angry. He's lost sight of his own spiritual condition. He's so busy saying, "They're so awful. Those Ninevites are so terrible," when he forgets who he is.
I one time was trying to make the point that we're all sinners. We're all lost. We're all separated. We're all equal in our sin. A guy came up afterwards and he said, "You know the difference between you, Tom Schrader, and Adolf Hitler?" And I said, "No, I don't." And he said, "One little mustache." See, his point was there really wasn't any difference naturally in our hearts, and Jonah's forgotten that.
All of a sudden Jonah's looked down on these other people. "They don't get it. They're stupid." Let me tell you something about serving: you'll never serve with the right heart. You'll never serve someone that you're looking down on. People have great worth, and we're here to serve. Minister literally means to serve. We're here to serve.
Paul's Journey in Humility
Apostle Paul - look at this progress. You listen and read the Apostle Paul, you see a progression in his thought and His view of himself. He started by being a confident persecutor of the church, and then he was converted. So at that point he had to acknowledge his sin. He said then, you know what, a little bit later, "I'm the least of the Apostles." At the end of his life, he said, "I'm the least of the Saints."
First Timothy 1:15: "It's a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am the foremost of all." Paul says, "I want to make the statement. I want to make sure you understand it," and the problem won't be with you, will be with me explaining it. There's a sense in which the holiest we should feel is at the point of
The Growing Sensitivity of Faith
There's a sense in which the holiest we feel, the closest to God we feel, is at the point of conversion. From that point on, God is gradually revealing to us His holiness and our sinfulness. Our sense of our holiness as compared to a holy God begins to make us feel as though we're more and more sinful. We feel we're further and further away from Him. It's as though there's a sensitivity in us as the Holy Spirit begins to invade our heart.
There's a great story, and I believe it's J. Vernon McGee that tells it. He tells the story of delivering his message on Sunday, and it's Monday, his day off, when he gets a call from a little old lady in the church. She's ninety-some years old and she said, "Pastor, I need to come and I need to see you right now." He said, "Well, you know, Monday's my day off," but she said, "I have sinned grievously. I need to come and see you now."
So he says, "All right, come on over." Well, all the time he's thinking, "What in the world could she do? She's 90. What did she do?" He's playing this in his mind, running down all this litany of things. She comes in and she's distraught and she just looks awful. He said, "Are you okay?" And she said, "I'm not okay at all. I didn't sleep all night. I've sinned."
He said, "Well, what did you do?" And she said, "Well, remember I was in church yesterday?" And he said yes. "Remember when I was leaving I stopped and I talked to you?" And he said yes. "Remember I said to you that the sermon was really a good sermon?" And he said yes. And she said, "Well it wasn't."
Those are the kinds of things we say all the time. We're walking out and we say, "Oh, that was great! That was great!" We just throw those things around. But this lady had walked so long with the Savior and her heart was so in tune to what was right and to lying that she couldn't even handle that. That's an amazing thing.
The Sensitivity of Our Conscience
In our old house that we moved out of, we decided to put in an alarm. We had a lot of big doors on the back—big Arcadia doors. We had one, two, three, four, five of them—five sets in the back, and there's two that come into the family room. So the alarm guy said, "We got to do something with this." I said, "All right." He said, "I'm afraid that they could bust this window and come in." I said, "All right."
So he said, "We're going to put a mat under the carpet, and if somebody steps on it when the alarm's on, then the alarm will go off." I said, "All right." He said, "How sensitive do you want the mat?" I don't know what you're talking about. He said, "Well, we can get it so sensitive that you can drop a piece of paper on there and it'll go off, or we can desensitize it so much that you can walk around and stomp on it and it'll never go off. How sensitive do you want it?" I said, "Well, somewhere in between those two would be a good place. I mean, I don't want it going off every five minutes, and yet I want to be able to catch the guy."
It was a great illustration to me of what our conscience can be like. It can be so insensitive that I can stomp on it and be engaged in all sorts of sin and it never triggers. Or it can be so sensitive that I can say to you that sermon I said was good when it wasn't. It's really getting a grasp of who we really are.
Jonah's Chronic Problem
Jonah seems to miss it. He's displeased. There seems to be a chronic problem with this boy, doesn't there? Therefore he says in verse 3, "Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for death is better to me than life." You've seen this movie before. "I want to die. I'm ready to die. Let me die."
One of the authors suggests one of the things that's wrong with Jonah at this point is that he's really pooped. He's tired physically, mentally, psychologically, even spiritually. The guy writes, "Every drop is drained out of him." That was true of Elijah. Elijah had been busy, and I mean busy. He'd withstood the prophets of Baal way up at Mount Carmel. He'd been before the public. Although Elijah loved the spectacle and he loved the dramatic, it drained him for a while. So when this man heard Jezebel was after him, he simply took off to a far country and he said, "I'd like to die."
The Importance of Rest
See, that's what I mean about rest. You really do need it. I probably get in trouble here, but I try to frequently point out to the staff at church: Jesus died for the church, we don't have to. Jesus died for this, we don't have to kill ourselves here. I understand the balance and I understand you need to work hard, and I got all that figured out. But you know what? I really do think that you and I are here to enjoy life as well, and there needs to be a time of rest.
You need to know—and this may sound odd to come at the end of a time that maybe has been a restful time for you—you need to know that when you're tired and you're weary physically, emotionally, psychologically, spiritually, it's not a great time to make a whole boatload of decisions. Jonah's there and he says, "You know what, it's better for me to die now."
God's Patient Question
In chapter 4, and again it's been that great mercy that's come—God has been very gracious and very merciful and very patient—in chapter 4 verse 4, the Lord asks a great question. He says this: "Do you have good reason to be angry?"
I don't know if you saw the movie Seabiscuit, but there's a great scene in there. There's the little jockey Red Pollard, and Red Pollard's riding one of these first races and he's got the best horse. But all of a sudden there's another guy, and the trainer had said to him—did you see the movie?—the trainer said to him, "Hold the horse back. Wait to make the move in the turn. We're going to have plenty of horse. Stay four or five lengths away. We got plenty of horse, but don't make a move early." But as he's up on the backstretch, one of the other horses comes up and the guy hits him. Remember, the other jockey hits him, and he hits him back.
He hits him back and he starts this battle and they're going back and forth and back and forth. So all of a sudden Seabiscuit makes this move and this horse makes this move and there they are going around the turn. Well, they get ready to come to home and Seabiscuit doesn't have anything left. He's blown the race and the trainers mad and they're angry at him and the owner says to Red Pollard. He said Red, "Why are you so angry?"
The Power of Questions
That's a great question. I meet a lot of people who are angry. Some are just angry where they're throwing stuff, but some of them have that subtle anger. That passive-aggressive anger that chip on the shoulder. There's always something wrong. There's always something and you look and you look and you look and they'll talk about different things in their life. But the real question is why are you so angry?
Questions are really powerful things. There's a point in the book of Job where Job has had it and Job is ready to ask God a thing or two and God says to Job in Job chapter 38, "Okay, Job. I'll answer your question. But let me ask you a question or two if I could."
Let me read you some of those questions that God asked Job: "Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell me if you know so much. Do you know how its dimensions were determined? Who did the surveying? What supports the foundations? Who laid its cornerstone as the morning stars sang together and the angels shouted for joy? Who defined the boundaries of the sea as it burst from the womb? Have you ever commanded the morning to appear and caused the dawn to rise in the east? Have you ever told the daylight to spread to the ends of the earth and to bring an end to night's wickedness? Have you explored the springs from which the seas come? Have you walked about and explored their depths? Do you know where the gates of death are located? Have you seen the gates of utter gloom? Do you realize the extent of the earth? Tell me about it if you know. Where does the light come from? Where does the darkness go? Can you take it home? Do you know how to get there? Because of course, you know all this for you were born before it was all created and you're so very experienced. Have you visited the treasuries of snow? Have you seen where the hail is made or stored? Who created a channel for torrent rains? Who laid out the path for the lightning? Who makes the rain fall on barren land in a desert where no one lives? Who sends the rain that satisfies the parched ground and makes the tender grass spring up? Does the rain have a father? Where does dew come from? Can you make lightning appear and cause it to strike as you directed? Who gives intuition and instinct? Who is wise enough to count all the clouds?"
And God asked these questions for like two chapters, questions like that. And then He says, "What did you want Job? What were you going to ask?" And Job says, "You know what? I'm going to pass on that because I'm not sure I want to ask those questions." Those questions are really powerful questions, aren't they? You're angry. Why are you angry? It manifests itself in so many different ways.
Jonah's Retreat: Flee, Plea, Shout, Pout
Then Jonah went out from the city and sat east of it. Now Jonah is now up on the hillside overlooking the city and there he made a shelter for himself and sat under it in the shade until he could see what would happen in the city.
Here you go if you want to summarize the book of Jonah in four words, it goes like this: flee, plea, shout, pout. We're at the pout stage now. He's done his fleeing, he's done his pleading, done his shouting. And now he's pouting. He goes out and he sits on the hill. He overlooks the entire city and he's there for one reason. He wants to see what's going to happen. He's anxious to see what's going to take place because in his heart he's saying you know what, these Ninevites are not going to be really converted. This is a foxhole conversion. This is just somebody or group of people saying I'm going to pretend that I'm converted, but I'm not really converted.
He makes a couple of tragic errors here. All of a sudden Jonah quits. It strikes me that Jonah had that message and he delivered it and he could have stayed and he could have been an integral part of their development. He could have taught them. He could have been their great teacher, but he quits and he retreats. He puts together a little shelter. And then he does what is absolutely fatal to the Christian life: he becomes a spectator. He's going to watch.
Christianity Is Not a Spectator Sport
This is not a spectator sport that we're in here. It's dirty and it's messy, isn't it? Sharing Christ with people and then even when they're born again, just like in the family.
I remember vaguely when our daughter Sarah was born. And I remember because I'd never, you know, if that stuff came up on the Discovery Channel, I'm flipping. I'm not into the birth thing. And all of a sudden I remember a couple of things that night. I remember how fast she left the womb and it was like this is not, you know, you have the pictures that it's going to be like classical music and this quiet moment and this beautiful thing. The image I got was of a bowling ball coming back out of that chute. That's what it looked like to me. I was struck by how fast she came out of that womb and then I was struck by how messy it was. Messy, yucky. I wanted to kind of say, you know, hey clean it all up and "you want to cut the cord?" Oh gosh, no. You know, no, I don't want to be around this dirty.
That's a great imagery for spiritual birth and growth and development. It's kind of yucky to watch sometimes. There's great joy in it, but it's sloppy, isn't it? It's hard dealing with other people and other Christians. I'm going to tell you why. I'm going to give you a little tip right here that is one of the most helpful things and it took me a while to figure this out. I'd be sitting in my office and somebody would say "I want to come and talk to you about the church" and I'd say fine. And they'd come in and they'd say
Everyone is going to look at an incident, a problem, a situation through their own giftedness. So if you're a teacher, your answer to everything is do another lesson. If you're a mercy guy, your answer to everything is love one another more. If you're a service person, you're frustrated because you're out there serving, but no one else is. If you're an organized guy, an administrative guy, you look at everything and you say we just need a structure. We just need a plan. Put the bases in the right place.
See, we're always going to look at things through our giftedness. That's why we need this thing called a body. Because we come together and we each have a part of God's solution, but not all of it. Now the body comes together. I can't sit on the side and watch this.
God Appoints a Plant
Then the Lord—and this is a key moment, something happens here in verse 6 and it only happens this time in this entire book—so the Lord appointed a plant and it grew up over Jonah to be His shade over his head to deliver him from his discomfort. And look at this sentence: and Jonah was extremely happy about the plant.
Now I remind you, God first hurls the storm and then He appoints the fish and then there's the plant and then there's the worm. Look at it. We're still there. We got it all in front of us here in chapter 4 verse 6. You can even circle it because you're going to see the same phrase three times: God appointed a plant, God appointed a worm, God appointed a scorching east wind. God's appointing all these things. God's the one at work here.
And finally, finally Jonah is happy. Now why is he happy? I think it's because he's finally comfortable.
The Danger of Comfort
I mentioned Larry right before, and one of the things that Larry did—not a lot of people know it—is he wrote poems. There's a young man who I think you'll hear from musically. His name is Justin Unger and he's Larry's grandson. Justin was 23 now and Justin does his own material, and people are struck when he does these songs of the great depth that flows from the heart of a 23 year old, the great insights.
Well, what not many people know is what Justin has done is taken all Larry's poems and put him to music. So Larry writes some very elaborate poems, but he also writes these whimsical little rhymes. Here's one of them: "A comfortable home, a comfortable wife, comfortable children, a comfortable life. A comfortable church with comfortable pews, a comfortable pastor with comfortable views. A comfortable soul in comfort to dwell, a comfortable road to uncomfortable hell."
I like comfort, man. This speaks right to me. This is the pot calling the kettle. This is all of the things I'm telling you. I like comfort, but Jonah has elevated—it seems to me—comfort to where it becomes the driving force in his life. He's very happy.
Jonah's First Moment of Happiness
One author writes this: "This is remarkable that Jonah was very happy. It's the first time in the story that Jonah has been happy about anything." The first thing we read about in the story was God's commission to him to preach to Nineveh. He didn't like that. Then there was a storm. He didn't like that. He didn't like the great fish, even though it was a means of saving him from certain death. Apparently he had not been happy even with the second commission. He'd not been happy with the repentance of Nineveh. Nothing pleased him.
But here at last Jonah's happy. Why? The answer is obvious. Jonah was pleased at last—after all the compassion of God and other people—God was now doing something for Jonah. Selfish, of course, and petty. Absolutely. The vine was trifle compared to the conversion of the entire city.
The Endless Cycle of Wanting More
You need to watch out and I need to watch out in this comfort because this is a cycle you'll get on that has no end to it. Solomon writes this in the book of Ecclesiastes: "Whoever loves money"—Ecclesiastes 5:10—"whoever loves money will never be satisfied with money, nor he who loves abundance will be satisfied with their income. It's all vanity. When things increase, those who consume them increase. Those who consume them increase, so what advantage is it to their owners except to look on it?"
There was a survey done years ago—and I've seen variations of it since—it was done in Orange County and they asked people, "How much money would you need to make to be happy?" They broke them down in economic groups. Those who were making $40,000 a year said it was $50,000. Those who were making $50,000 said it was $60,000. Those that were making $60,000 said $75,000. Those that were making $75,000 said $90,000. Those making $90,000 said $110,000. Those making $110,000 said $125,000. Those making $125,000 said $150,000.
Haven't you experienced that in your own life? I have. I don't do it anymore, but we used to help people move periodically. You'd go in and you'd be in—you just moved all their worldly possessions in this house—and then usually the wife or the husband would say, "Let's go get some Diet Coke and some pizza and celebrate," and we'd sit around.
And here's what the couple would say. The couple would say, "Thank you so much to our friends and family here. This is so special to us. God has been so good. God has been so gracious. God has moved beyond anything we ever dreamed. God provided us this magnificent place. This is—"
All we ever need, and two years later, they're calling you to say, can you help us move? They're never moving down. They're all moving on up to the east side. It never ends, does it? It never stops, does it? If that's how life is measured, I'm telling you I speak from experience here—I want to be comfortable, but I learned a long time ago you're never going to get there.
I'll tell you a story, and this can sound... I'm never going to see you again, so I guess it doesn't matter. We had a guy about three years ago. We were going to San Diego. My parents were in town and I was going over there to speak at a secular gig, and a guy who we knew a little bit said, "I'd like to fly you over there." I said, "That'd be great," and he said, "I've got a little jet." I said, "Oh wow," because it falls in line with my basic principle: it's better to know someone who owns a jet than to own a jet. That's my basic principle of life. So he says, "I want to pick you up and we're going to fly you to San Diego."
I don't know if you have ever flown on a private jet, but it's a very heady experience. When our kids... we've done it a couple times, and the girls always say, "I feel like the president," because it's very... well, this was a little jet. It wasn't a very big jet, but it was a pretty good jet to us. We got my mom and my dad on board, and we're playing cards and having coffee. I mean, we thought we were really, really, really something.
The Problem with Never Having Enough
We land and I said to him, "Thank you so much. You are so gracious. This is such a great gift. Here's the rest of my schedule for my life—be near." We're walking off, and I'm telling you this is absolutely true story. We land and I'm thinking this is incredible. I would never think any more than that. I'd never need any more than this.
We taxi and park and stop, and right next to us is this huge jet. This is a jet where the guy is flying his family around the world for like a few weeks, for like a summer break. I swear, though I can't prove it because our jet's parked right next to it, that when I looked back with all sorts of envy and pride about our jet, I saw his jet kind of go like this on our jet. I'm not sure that it's true, but I think that's what I saw.
That's amazing. That's my point—it doesn't end. That guy's got a problem, and that guy's got a problem, and that guy's got a problem, and then ultimately you're the Sultan of Brunei and you fly your jet in a circle. There's no end to this stuff.
So you're saying all my life is about all of this stuff, and it's nice and it's great and you love it and I love it. I don't feel a lot of guilt in this area—God gives you great blessings. We were somewhere, I can't remember who we were talking to the other day. We were having lunch and people said, "We're so spoiled," and I said, "You know what? That word's got some baggage to it, doesn't it? You know a better word? We're so blessed." God's given us so much, and to those that He's given so much, He expects much. He expects us to be content in Him, and then He adds all these blessings around us.
Learning Contentment from Joni Eareckson Tada
Joni Eareckson Tada was on Larry King about a month ago. I don't know if you saw it—great interview. Larry's got no box to put Joni Eareckson Tada in. He's got no way of deciphering this. Larry is an agnostic, but he's a Jew—he's a Jewish agnostic. He doesn't know... if you watch every time Billy Graham's on there, he will say to Billy, "Are you afraid to die?" He's had more people give him Bibles, more people share with him. I know from talking to MacArthur that when John was on, John gave him... Larry has a MacArthur study Bible that one of his staff guys... they get their stuff all around.
So he's trying to unpack Joni and figure out... they show Joni painting now. I can't draw. Joni's got that brush—they said it takes about nine months to a year to paint a picture. Larry's trying to get her to say that she feels sorry for herself, and she said, "You know what? I go to the hospital and I see these people so much worse off than I am, and I think how can I help them? How can I serve them? How can I—here's the word—minister to them?"
We can get like Jonah and get angry, never really unpack it, and then we're happy generally because things are going the way we want them to go. We're comfortable.
God's Lessons Through Comfort and Discomfort
God appointed this plant and gives him this great comfort. Verse 7: "Then God appointed a worm, and dawn came the next day. It attacked the plant and it withered." Verse 8: "And it came about when the sun came up that God appointed a scorching east wind. Jonah protected himself from the west wind, never dreaming it had come there from the east. The sun beat down on Jonah's head so he became faint, and he begged with all his soul to die. Death is better to me than life."
We got to close in a few minutes. What's missing from Jonah's life? There's a whole bunch of things probably, but you know what jumps off the page at me? There is absolutely no sense of thanksgiving. There's no sense of thanksgiving at all.
The Missing Element of Gratitude
I'm just like you. I did not today wake up and say, "God, thank you that I woke up. God, thank you that I have an opportunity to be able to take Your word and in some way—and I know inadequate—to begin to present it." Somebody asked me last night, "Is it much of a vacation for you when you get to teach two times a day?" I am telling you, I am stunned that God lets me do this, because I am painfully aware of my inadequacies. I really am.
I had a guy—true story—he came to me. He said, "You are one of the top 25 Christian leaders in Phoenix." I said, "Really?" He said, "Yes." I said, "Well, thanks." He said, "What amazes me is you have none of the qualities I associate with leadership." I said, "Really? Is that true?" And he said, "Yes."
I said well, what I said was you're not very articulate. You stutter and stammer and you mix things up. I digress here, but I had a lady one time who came up after church. She said I cannot come to your lessons anymore, and I thought man, because in the old days I've mellowed a lot, but in the old days I was kind of in your face and aggressive, and I'm mellowed a lot. And I thought man what did I say to offend her and I said to her, what did I do? And she says I can't come here because you dangle participles. And I said to her what's a participle? I don't know, but I'm dangling them all over the place. Kind of like the fat under your arm lady, but I didn't say that, just a thought. I didn't say it.
But he said you're not very articulate and you stutter and you stammer, and I said well, that's true. And he said you don't have a burning intellect. You're smart enough, but you can tell that you're not an intellectual and I said yeah, I know that. And he said and you have no stage presence. You're really not a you're a very unimpressive physical presence. And I said wow, I know that too, and I said anything else? And he said no, and I said why am I a leader then? And he said there's such a vacuum for leadership that it just sucked you right into it.
The Difference Between Human Impressiveness and God's Work
Now I have a huge point here. There are guys and I watch them and I see them on TV and I watch them and they're perfectly clothed and their ties in place and their coats there and they're tall and they're dark and they're handsome and they speak with His voice as though you would think God was speaking through them. And they're amazingly bright and they don't dangle participles and they speak in a way where they never say ah and when they're done and they leave the room, here's what I hear all the time: Isn't he great? Isn't he something?
When I'm done, everybody goes God is good. God is really good. He's got nothing and I don't, you don't have to rush up and say oh yes, you do. No, I'm okay with that. That's what it is. That's that privilege God lets you do this. God saved you and He puts you in this place.
I'll tell you another thing: when He's done, He's done. We had all this we're trying to figure out at church right now. One of the subtle things is what happens if you get hit by a truck? Number one, my health insurance will kick in. Number two, I'll probably die. What do we do here at the church? Who knows?
It seems to me that oftentimes God uses people more than He uses institutions. It's remarkable to me. I come back to it for the third time that those guys could start this and this could continue. This is very unusual. It's very strange.
Jonah's Death Wish and God's Sovereignty
And he says I want to die, I'm done. And he seems to forget it again, let me just remind you because we got like four minutes here. Let me remind you of this: good stories about God. And God's in control.
Because I could see where somebody could say how could God destroy that plant? Well, why did He put it there in the first place? We get this all the time because it's clear from Scripture that God chooses people. Oh, didn't He choose my aunt? You know what, wrong question. Why did He choose you? He's the sovereign God.
And then God said to Jonah, "Do you have a good reason to be angry about the plant?" And he said, "I have good reason to be angry, even unto death." And the Lord said, "You had compassion on the plant for which you did not work, what you did not cause to grow, which came up overnight and perished overnight."
The Heart of the Issue
She's an angry guy and now the circumstances are out of control and now that anger burns. But we never get to the heart of the issue here. It's like all of a sudden you're sitting there one day and you're tying your shoe and the shoelace breaks and you explode. And they're saying how can he get so mad over a broken shoelace? And he's so angry and his heart's not right and something's desperately wrong.
And God saying to him listen, do you see it Jonah? You didn't do anything here. This baby just grew. I caused it to grow, you were blessed. Why are you so angry? Don't you understand that I'll have mercy on whom I have mercy and compassion on whom I'll have compassion?
God's Work in Our Pain
Susan and I were, well last night, it's just I and I, it sounds like I'm pandering here. I'm telling I have fallen in love with Cannon Beach and I just love to walk in the city and blow. I love to go down there, we go down there at night about 10 o'clock when all this is done and just kind of walk. And the grocery store doesn't close till 11 so you can get a little cup of something and walk around. And we were talking.
We were saying to one another we meet so many people and some of you who are going through such excruciating pain and hardship in your life. And it sounds so trite to say hang in there. It's not hanging there just to hang in there. It's hanging there because God's at work in your life.
That's what we see in church. We did and we were saying to one another it's amazing because we haven't hardly any of that in five, six, seven years. And so there's a side of me that says duck because it's coming. Well, you know what, God just does what He's going to do. And all He wants me to do is obey. And I don't even need to have to figure it all out.
We're a young lady, I got a call, young lady in our church, cool gal. Her husband had a procedure done that would prevent him from being able to bear children again, right? And then one day they came into church and said we're pregnant. And about three months into it, I got a call. And she said I went to the doctor and the doctor said there is absolutely no chance that this baby can live, this baby can't live. There's about the third time we've been through this in the last six months. And the doctors are all saying to her you need to abort this baby. And she said well, I'm not doing that and I watched her.
She's a quiet gal. She's tall, and again, I know by my standard everybody's tall. But she's a tall, very distinguished-looking lady, and she did not talk to a lot of people although all the music team and a lot of the church knew what was going on. But not everybody. And I would watch the people run up to her and say, "What do you do? Are you excited?" And I would watch as she would so gracefully just say, "You know, we're doing July and yeah, we're looking forward to it."
She and her husband, this is kind of cool, met at a young Calvinist convention. So they were into the sovereignty of God thing. And I watched him and I watched him and I watched them accept the sovereignty of God because God's going to do whatever He's going to do. She went into labor and the baby was stillborn.
See, you thought maybe there's going to be a happy ending there, didn't you? There was a happy ending there. God was glorified in the midst of this process because these two people were obedient. You don't know what your life's going to bring. You don't know. You know this: God either causes it or allows it. He's looking for you to respond, and respond in one way, and that's obedience.
God's Final Question to Jonah
Here's verse 10, and we are verse 11, and we're done. And God asked this question: "Should I not have had compassion on Nineveh the great city in which there are 120,000 persons who don't know the difference between their right hand and their left hand, as well as many animals?"
Now who doesn't know their right hand from their left hand other than those that graduated from Oregon State? But who doesn't know? I don't know, I'm picking, I'm just making it up. I don't know, it's a cheap joke. I use UCLA, SC, whatever you like, doesn't matter. I'm stabbing, I don't know. But who doesn't know the right hand from their left? A baby, a kid.
And God says He doesn't even mess around to debate the postponement of judgment for the adults. "Would you have me wipe out these kids and the animals?" And now this book is done.
The Book's Ending and Jonah's Understanding
There's no ending. There's no "glory to God and grace and peace and mercy to all of you who hung around long enough to read the four chapters." There's a question, and we're done.
The question is ultimately, I think, did Jonah get this? And let me tell you what I think. I think he did, and I'll tell you why. And if you differ with this, that's fine. You don't even need to tell me that you differ with it. It doesn't matter. You're fine, I'm fine, we're all fine. It's a great place. We love each other.
I think Jonah got it for two reasons. Number one, Jonah wrote the book, and he gave God the last word. And Jonah doesn't do anything here to try to mask what he was really all about.
It's a great story, isn't it? And I will tell you that the presentation that I just gave you in those six lessons, it's just a flyover. Some of you have come up to me with enormous questions and practical applications. It's a great book. All the scriptures are like this. I encourage you to spend some time and work it through and see the glory of God and the majesty of God.
Living Out the Lessons of Jonah
Remember that God is in control and nothing comes in your life that God doesn't cause or allow. And that God's the God of a second chance. And then He's given you a mission just like Jonah to go into the world to be salt and light in the midst of this world. And then when you sin, it affects those around you.
And it's a good thing to ask sometimes when you're lethargic in this spiritual life, "Why are you sleeping?" It's a good thing to ask, "How could you have done this thing?" It's a good thing to examine your life, not for the purpose of tearing yourself down, but to build yourself back up so that God can use you His way, His time, His place.
Grateful Reflections on Community
Hey, we really haven't, and it is not just a perfunctory thing, I mean this, we have really enjoyed being with you these last few days. It's been an honor and a treat for us, and hopefully for you, to just get away and maybe be reminded of God and who He is and His glory and His power and His majesty and His might.
One of the things that we've seen this weekend that I'd never seen before is how many of you are here as groups. These two young guys right here, the Biola shirt and the senior in high school, they're here with grandma. And there was a group here last night, and some of them left this morning. It was a mom and dad with their five kids, and one flies from Boston and one drives from Boise. And they come every year at Labor Day, and then to see a whole other group of you. It's cool. It's cool to be with you. It's a great legacy that God's given you.
Maybe you're here and you're all alone. That's okay. You still got a family. You're part of the family of God, knit together through the Holy Spirit.
The Deeper Bond of Faith
In many ways you're closer. Haven't you discovered that you're closer with ultimate strangers? You can be sitting on a plane, on a taxi, on a runway, on a tarmac and have a more intimate conversation with a total stranger than you've had with some of your family members that you've been with for 30 years. Why? Because you share something more significant than a chain of DNA. You share the Holy Spirit.
We're all part of this family. We've got one day, and I think not too long from now, we're going to be in heaven. How great that's going to be! Till then, among many things of praise and worship and all that goes with it, we pray the Lord would put in our heart a passion to share His truth with all that God brings into our life.
Let's pray together. Father, thank You for this word. Thank You for old Jonah here and what he's done to help teach us about who we are. God, remind us that there's a little bit of Jonah in all of us, and sometimes a whole boatload of Jonah in us. God, thank You, as we've said over and over again this morning, for this place, these people, for Evan, his team, for John, for Marty, for all of it. These are people who are not suffering and sacrificing for You. They're doing the work You've given them, using the gifts You've given them for Your glory. Thanks for the people that are here. I pray for safe travel. I pray that...
As we depart this place in an hour, let it be done in an orderly fashion so that this fun continues. Let this not be a mountaintop experience where we leave and before we even get down to Route 26, we're already arguing and fighting. God, let this be something that changes our life.
Maybe a decade from now we'll point back to Labor Day weekend 2004 and say that You used it to change our heart and our minds and our life. God, that's our prayer. We pray it to You this morning in Jesus' name. Amen.