God’s mercy is far greater and more scandalous than we often want it to be. Jonah knew God’s character but did not share His heart, and the book ends by asking whether we will rejoice when undeserving people receive compassion. Jesus is greater than Jonah in every way: where Jonah ran from sinners, Jesus came for them, died for them, and rose again, giving the ultimate sign that He is the Son of God.

Automatically Generated Transcript

[00:00:00] Well, I just want to welcome you to our Easter Sunday service today. For those of you who haven’t met before, my name is Kieran Gibson, and the last few weeks I’ve been preaching through the book of Jonah. Jonah has four chapters in it, and today we’re actually up to the fourth and final chapter of Jonah. And I’m excited to share this chapter with you to reflect back on what has happened and also connect it to the story of Jesus and his resurrection on this Easter Sunday service. And before we get into the book of Jonah, I just want to welcome you to Salisbury here today. And I hope that you feel welcome here, whether you come to church every Sunday or whether this is the first service you’ve been to in a while, you are welcome here.

[00:00:42] If you’re a Christian or you’re a non-Christian here to find out more about Jesus, you’re welcome here. Whether you take the Bible as truth or you’re skeptical of what it means and where it comes from, you’re welcome here. And I hope by the end of this talk today, you’ll have a better picture of who God is, what his character is, and what Jesus has done that we celebrate here today at Easter Sunday. So if you’d like to bow your heads, I’m just going to commit this service and this moment to the Lord in prayer. Would you pray with me? Heavenly Father, we’re here today because we’re curious about what you have done for us through Jesus on the cross. And we thank you that you are a God who has so much love for us that you sent your only son to die in our place.

[00:01:32] I pray that today as we look at the book of Jonah, you’d help reveal to us your character and help us to understand the great lengths that you go to to save your people. Would this moment be your moment to speak to us? We pray these things in your name. Amen. All right, so I thought I’d give you a quick recap of Jonah’s chapter 1, 2, and 3 before we get into chapter 4, which is actually a bit of a reflection on what has happened throughout this entire book. So I’ll do my best to summarize each chapter and then we will get into chapter 4. So Jonah chapter 1, the book begins with God giving Jonah his prophet and instruction. He says, Jonah, I want you to get up and to go, go to the city of Nineveh and speak out against it because their wickedness has come up before me.

[00:02:21] And something that we talked about in the previous weeks is that the city of Nineveh is not a nice place. In fact, the city of Nineveh is a terrible place filled with terrible people. If you think about Nazi Germany in World War II, that is comparable to the city of Nineveh. Most people at this point in time in history, they not only know who the ancient Assyrians are when Nineveh is their capital city. They also know people who have been killed, who have been tortured, who have been raped and negatively impacted by this city of Nineveh and the people within it. So Jonah begins with this instruction to Jonah, go and speak out to this city. And how does Jonah respond to this instruction? he says, no thank you, I’ve got a better idea, I’m going to run away. And so in Jonah chapter 1

[00:03:12] he flees, he runs in the complete opposite direction. He gets in a boat, goes on a ship to Tarshish, the furthest place you could go away from the city of Nineveh, and he meets a bunch of pagan sailors that are taking him to this faraway place. But God has a plan for Jonah and it’s not to go to Tarshish. So while he is running away from his assignment, a great storm follows this boat. And the sailors are very concerned because this storm is going to be the destruction of everyone on this ship, including Jonah. And they soon realize that the only way for this storm to cease is to throw Jonah overboard. And they know this because Jonah tells him. So they listen, they try to save him at first, but then they throw him overboard and immediately the storm ceases

[00:04:03] and the waves stop crashing and it’s silent. And the sailors, they cry out to God, realizing that he is real. Jonah chapter two then begins where a fish swallows Jonah and for three days and for three nights, Jonah lives in the belly of this fish. I think most people have heard of this. We think about the book of Jonah. We think about fish and whales. And in this period of time, Jonah is praying to God. And at first we think that this fish is going to be judgment for Jonah, the final destruction of him for running away. But instead the fish is actually what saves Jonah. After he’s thrown overboard, the fish saves him, uber eats, takes him back to the shore of Nineveh and spits him out. And then chapter 3 begins where Jonah is instructed by God a second time

[00:04:56] to go to Nineveh and speak out against them. And this time Jonah obeys. He does what I would consider as the bare minimum. He preaches to Nineveh a five-word in Hebrew sermon that says in 40 days you will be overturned. And to Jonah’s shock, the Ninevites don’t kill him and not believe him. They listen. And it says in chapter 3 that the Ninevites believed God and they repented and changed from their ways. And for a period of time they walk around the city in sackcloth, sitting in ashes, feeling extremely guilty for what they have done and praying to God that he would spare them. And in their repentance God sees them and actually spares them. And so that is where we’re at today. And now we start chapter 4. The title of this talk is The Father’s Love. And we’re going to be

[00:05:48] looking at what happens after Nineveh repents and Jonah grapples with this. Okay, so verse 10 in chapter 3 finish with this. When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he’s talking about Nineveh, he relented and did not bring on them the destruction that he had threatened. And chapter 4 begins like this. But to Jonah, this seemed very wrong and he became angry. He prayed to the Lord, isn’t this what I said, Lord, when I was still at home? That is what I tried to forestall by fleeing to Tarshish. I knew that you were a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love. A God who relents from sending calamity. I’ve been itching to get to this verse all month as we go through the series because finally it’s made clear to us Jonah’s motivations as to why he

[00:06:49] didn’t go to Nineveh. When I first heard of the book of Jonah and the story, I just assumed Jonah was afraid of going to Nineveh because they would kill him. But Jonah’s not afraid of failing, delivering his prophecy. Actually, Jonah was afraid of succeeding. He was afraid of telling the Ninevites that they need to repent and that they just might do it and be spared. You see, Jonah views the Ninevites as Nazi Germanies and he is essentially a Jew going into Nazi Germany, giving them a chance to repent and to be saved. Jonah doesn’t think they deserve that. Jonah thinks what they deserve is death. He’s correct, but he knows that God’s character is one that is merciful to us. And when we repent and we

[00:07:38] change our verdict towards him, he intervenes and saves us. And in this shocking plot twist of chapter four, we see that Jonah’s motivations is actually driven by him not wanting to save the Ninevites. Verse three, Jonah is being very dramatic from this point onwards. And he says to the Lord, take away my life for it is better for me to die than to live. And this is easy for us to believe because we saw in chapter one, when Jonah was on the ship running away, he said to the sailors, throw me overboard. Let me die. He’s actually doing that selfishly because he doesn’t want to be given the opportunity to go to Nineveh and give them the chance to repent. And now that they have repented and God is sparing them, he longs to die. And it’s extremely dramatic and he’s extremely upset.

[00:08:40] And the Lord replies to him, he says, is it right for you to be angry? Do you do well to be angry? And the Lord is challenging him. Why is it that you’re so upset by this? Why is it that you cannot stand the fact that these Ninevites have been saved after they have repented and turned to me, turned away from the evil ways? So verse five, Jonah has gone out and sat down at a place east of the city. There he made himself a shelter, sat in his shade and waited. He wanted to see what would happen to the city. So this brings me to my first point of this talk. And that is, it’s possible to know God’s character, but not share his heart. It’s possible to know who God is, even believe that it’s a good thing, but struggle internally yourself to actually share those feelings of love and of

[00:09:44] mercy and of forgiveness. And Jonah makes this clear to us as he says, God, I knew that you are God of mercy, willing to repent from your wrath against them. And by repent, I mean change his verdict if they, if they repent. But that’s not what I want for them. I don’t want them to be spared. And so it’s making clear to us that Jonah can know God’s character, but not share his heart and want the same things that God wants. I think we often talk about this as head knowledge versus heart knowledge. The idea of knowing things in your head logically, but struggling to really live them out and believe them. I think an example of that for me, many times in my life I’ve like decided to be very health conscious and to start a diet. And I logically think, okay, I’ve been eating way too

[00:10:38] much. I put on a bit of weight. I should stop eating all this ice cream and these donuts. And so I start this diet with the head knowledge that it’s the right thing to do. But then a few days later, there’s this delicious bowl of ice cream put before me. And in my heart, I change my ways and I eat it anyway. And there’s this wrestle between what I logically know is true and actually where my heart is at in this moment. And I think that the book of Jonah is actually wanting us to wrestle with God’s character and the way that he extends mercy to others. The Ninevites are extreme examples of sinners that don’t deserve anything. They deserve death and destruction. Jonah knows this. Yet when he sees them be saved, he is just extremely frustrated and annoyed because

[00:11:32] they don’t deserve it. Well, guess what? None of us deserve to be saved. All of us are broken and sinful. And it’s very nice to be the recipient of mercy yourself, but much harder to see other people receive mercy when you don’t think that they deserve it. Now, I thought I would lighten the context a little bit here with some memes. For people over the age of perhaps 40, memes are just jokes about things that little kids and big kids share with one another. Some memes take the form of different contexts. And these memes are SpongeBob. So, on the left, we’ve got Nineveh believes a prophecy. And then there’s this meme of like, oh, I’m just going to storm out of the room. And so that’s Jonah just ditching as soon as Nineveh believes the prophecy. And then on the right, in this meme,

[00:12:26] Squidward is watching SpongeBob and Patrick have a lot of fun. And he’s actually feeling a little bit jealous and upset by that. And as we go into chapter four, this is essentially the perspective that Jonah has on the city as he sits and watches them repent and be spared. And he’s actually very upset watching on. All right, so let’s continue with chapter four. Verse six, then the Lord God provided a leafy plant and made it grow up over Jonah to give shade for his head to ease his discomfort. And Jonah was very happy about the plant. But at dawn the next day, God provided a worm which chewed the plant so that it withered. Okay, let me act this out a little bit, not interpretively, but just physically. Let’s put Nineveh here, Jonah here. Actually, we’ll put him

[00:13:19] up here. He’s gone and left the city and he’s just watching on like this. And his prophecy said, 40 days and you’ll be overturned. Within this 40 days window, they have repented and changed their ways. And God has decided to spare them. And he’s just saying, okay, well, maybe in 40 days they’re going to mess up and unrepent. And then God will smush them with some big meteor and I will have box office tickets to see the city that I hate be destroyed. And so he’s just sitting here waiting. He’s mad, but waiting. And while he’s waiting, God is like, okay, let me entertain you a little bit. Let’s put a plant to grow up and shelter you and give your box office tickets some shade so that you can sit here, watch the city in comfort. And then verse seven, at dawn the next day, God provided a

[00:14:13] worm which chewed the plants that it withered. Okay, so first of all, this part is weird. So if you’re like, what is going on? Why is there a plant? Why is there a worm? There’s a point to this. And I want to see if I can explain it and the metaphor that God is actually using to speak to Jonah’s heart. But first, let’s finish the story here. Verse eight, when the sun rose, God provided a scorching east wind and the sun blazed on Jonah’s head so that he grew faint. He wanted to die. And he said, it would be better for me to die than to live. Verse nine, but God said to Jonah, is it right for you to be angry about the plant? And he said, it is right. I’m so angry. I wish I was dead. Okay, so what’s going on? Well, the plant here is a metaphor for Nineveh. And the issue right now

[00:15:11] is that Jonah does not think Nineveh deserves to be saved, wants them to be destroyed. God, he cares about Nineveh. He doesn’t want to see them be destroyed. And if they were to be destroyed, God would be really upset. So God thinks to himself, okay, maybe if I give Jonah a lesson through this plant, he can learn to love and care for this plant. That when the plant withers away and is destroyed, he can realize what it’s like to lose something that you love and that you care about. And when you love and care for a plant, how less significant is that than a city full of people? And this is the lesson that God is trying to teach Jonah in this moment. So God is drawing this comparison between Jonah and the plant and God and his people.

[00:16:02] And interestingly, Jonah is waiting for a natural disaster to strike and take out Nineveh. And God sends a natural disaster on his plant and then he’s upset by that. And so God has a sense of humor and is trying to speak to Jonah to help him understand his heart from a heart knowledge point of view. Okay, so verse 10. So when he says these people who can’t tell their right hand from their left, that’s talking about children and a couple adults. And then he’s even saying, and there’s a bunch of animals as well. Can I even convince you on the cattle, the animals, that these are worth saving and something that I should be upset by if I have to destroy them. And actually, this here is the ending of Jonah. The ending isn’t chapter 3 where Nineveh repents and is saved.

[00:17:28] That would be the Disney ending of Jonah. No, the ending is chapter 4 where Jonah is wrestling with God about God’s character and whether it’s right for people to receive his mercy. And the book of Jonah finishes with this question. We don’t even hear Jonah’s response to this. And so as Jonah finishes as a book, it’s actually inviting us to examine our own hearts. Because we don’t hear Jonah’s answer because God is wanting us to come to our own conclusion, to give our own answer. Do we understand logically he’s a God of mercy? Maybe. But do we also understand that his character to spare people is something that we should share? And when people are undeserving of being saved, we need to share God’s heart in celebrating that. So as we look back on the book of Jonah,

[00:18:42] actually every chapter has been a focus on someone being the recipient of God’s mercy. In chapter 1, it was the pagan sailors. The sailors that worshipped Zeus and Poseidon and Dagon and different pagan gods. And God actually uses Jonah running away in this ship to speak into their lives, to reveal himself to them and to save them. So in chapter 1, they end up receiving God’s mercy. Chapter 2, Jonah is swallowed by the fish. After running away, he was deserving of death. But God is not finished with him. He spares him and uses the fish to save him. And then gives him a second chance to speak to Nineveh. Chapter 2, the focus is on Jonah receiving God’s mercy. Chapter 3, this one’s obvious. Nineveh hears the prophecy from Jonah. They believe God. They repent. They end up being saved.

[00:19:38] And some of the most extreme examples that you can think of are people who end up being spared that don’t deserve it. And in chapter 3, Nineveh is the recipient of God’s mercy. But what about chapter 4? Who is chapter 4 focusing on? Well, it’s actually you. Because chapter 4 is challenging you as the reader, as the listener, to think about who God is and whether or not you understand his character, both from a logical point of view, but also from something deep within your heart. Do you understand that he is a God of mercy? And does that excite you or make you angry? So my second point today is the book of Jonah is about scandalous mercy in every chapter. The book of Jonah is about scandalous mercy in every chapter. All right. So what I want to do now is connect the book of Jonah to the story of Jesus

[00:20:47] and to take a moment to think about how Jonah relates to Easter Sunday and what we can learn from Jonah today. So the connection that I want to make here is actually looking at the words that Jesus uses in response to the Pharisees where he speaks about his own death and resurrection in reference to Jonah. So let’s look at Matthew chapter 12, verse 38. Then some of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law said to him, Teacher, we want to see a sign from you. Now, I’m actually guilty of this as well. When I was like seven or eight, and I kind of realized like, oh, I’ve been going to church my whole life. What if God isn’t actually real? And everyone else is just stupid. And I am actually just like in a cult or something. And I was like, God, if you’re real and you’re all powerful,

[00:21:45] make that thing over there just move a little bit. And I know you can do it. And if you do it, that’s going to be a sign. And then you’ve got this guy for life. And I sort of challenged God. And I was sort of watching it. Nothing happened. And I was like, oh, now what? And if only it was that easy. And interestingly, the Pharisees, they’re actually doing the same thing. But they have a much worse experience because Jesus has already been doing a bunch of signs. In his ministry on earth, he’s been doing miracles. He’s been saving people, healing them, making the blind see, and preaching perfectly from the Bible. All these signs actually point to him being the son of God. Yet these Pharisees and religious leaders, they don’t want Jesus to be the son of God. In fact, they’re asking this question out of malice.

[00:22:42] And Jesus sees their heart because they don’t really want a sign. They want a trap, something that they can use against Jesus. But this is what Jesus says in response to them. He answered, A wicked and adulterous generation asked for a sign, but none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the son of man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. So first of all, Jonah is marking his death Sorry, Jesus is marking his death and his resurrection With Jonah’s time in the belly of the fish And Jonah, as the fish swallowed him He thought that this fish would be the end of his life That he would have death as he gets swallowed by the fish And that he would be no more

[00:23:35] In the same way, when Jesus died on the cross People thought that that was going to be his death and his end. But in both cases, three days later, something changed. Jonah was spat out and given a chance to speak to Nineveh. And Jesus rose again. And Jesus is saying to them, the sign that I will give to you that proves that I am the Son of God, that I am the Messiah, and that I am who I say I am, is that I am going to go to the cross and die in your place. And I’m going to defeat death and rise again three days later. That is a much better sign than moving a speck of dust from a distance. That is a demonstration of his love dying in our place and his power to then rise again three days later. And he says to them, this will be my sign to you.

[00:24:29] This will be your opportunity to realize that I am who I say I am. and that God is real, and that this sign points to his power over sin and over death. So, sub-point here, Jesus’ death and resurrection are the ultimate sign that he is the son of God. All right. The last verse in this conversation, verse 41, the men of Nineveh will stand, this is Jesus speaking to the Pharisees, and he says, the men of Nineveh will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now something greater than Jonah is here. This is a very, very big, intense insult to them because the Pharisees and the people who know the scriptures really well, they’re very familiar with the book of Jonah, and he is saying, you are worse than the Ninevites. Jonah went to them

[00:25:44] and spoke to them, and they repented and they changed their ways, and now you have a preacher, a prophet, who is so much greater than Jonah, standing in front of you, and you will not change your ways, and you’re going to be judged for this by the people of Nineveh. And I want to lean into this last comment here by Jesus, where he says, something greater than Jonah is here. Something greater than Jonah is here. What does he mean by that? Well, I want to go through some examples of what makes Jesus greater than Jonah. Jonah, he ran from sinners God gave him an assignment to go to Nineveh yet he ran away and this makes me emotional to talk about and reflect on who Jesus is and the sinners here that we’re talking about that’s you that’s me, that’s us and as Jonah runs away from these sinners Jesus is running towards them

[00:26:54] I can’t read my notes, I need windscreen wipers alright Luke 19.10 says for the son of man came to seek the lost he came here for you Jonah, he went to Nineveh and he preached reluctantly he was almost forced in a way but he still chose to do it he was Uber Eats delivered there but Jesus, he came and he preached willingly Jonah, he sat outside the city and he hoped and longed for the judgment and destruction of the city of Nineveh but Jesus he died on the cross saying forgive them they know not what they do and he hoped for the salvation of people Jonah, he sat outside the city angry telling God that he longed to die what did Jesus do outside the city? He wept Luke 19.41 says as he approached Jerusalem he saw the city and wept over it referring to Jesus Jonah, he was caught up in this plant and wanting to save it

[00:28:22] Jesus was caught up in a much bigger mission of saving the world and was willing to die himself to do that Jonah, he spent three days in the fish for his sin for his disobedience for him running away but Jesus spent three days in the tomb for our sin so that he could deal with it and conquer the grave so my last point in this whole series is that what Jonah is not highlights who Jesus is and as we look at the prophet of Jonah and all the things that he has done or hasn’t done it actually makes clear to us the perfect prophet and priest and son of God, Messiah that Jesus is and so today on Easter Sunday as we think about what happened 2,000 years ago in the story of Jesus in his death and in his resurrection I want us to think about the fact that Jesus is much greater than Jonah and that he he did this for us willingly

[00:29:39] and with a plan and as we finish this series I want to give you an opportunity to just take a moment and to reflect on what’s happened to reflect on where you’re at with God do you understand his character do you share his heart do you realise that Jesus came here for you do you realise that Jesus defeating the grave and rising again three days later is his ultimate sign that he is who he says he is that is why we celebrate Easter today because of Jesus and his conquering of death. So I want to thank you for this opportunity to speak through Jonah and go through it with me these last few weeks. And I’m just going to take a moment to pray and then I’m going to invite the band up and we’ll sing one last song together. So would you bow your heads and pray with me? Heavenly Father, we thank you so much for being a God of mercy.

[00:30:59] And sometimes it’s hard to see people receive that mercy that don’t deserve it. And it’s so easy to receive mercy ourselves, but much harder to see it extended to others. And I thank you that the story of Jonah teaches us about your character and the lengths that you go to save your people. And I pray that today, Lord, as we think about Jesus and his death on the cross and his resurrection in the tomb, we would realize that this is a sign that shows to us who you are, God, and the lengths that you go to save us. I pray that today people would reflect on where they’re at with you, that they would recognize that they need you, and that they would understand, Jesus, that you are the way, the truth, and the life. Thank you, Jesus, for being greater than Jonah and for so willingly and lovingly dying on the cross for us. We pray all these things in your name. Amen.