Craig Groeschel Botches the Story of Jonah

Jonah’s Gospel Punchline and the Sign of Christ

If you have your bible flip on over to the book of jonah the book of jonah. I'm going to point out the punchline of this uh great book by the way. And there's a gospel punchline in here and i want to teach this text a little bit here point out the the clear symbols in the text the the illusions the types that point us to christ and his resurrection.

And then and then you know and then kind of point out the punchline here in preparation for our sermon review today. So craig rochelle in the past i've reviewed sermons of his and what i've noticed is is that he's not particularly innovative as a as a megachurch pastor.

In fact the this the sermons i hear him preach oftentimes are the same types of sermons that i heard when i was growing up a very legalistic almost clueless when it comes to the fact that christians need to hear the gospel and you know it just complete confusion of long gospel seems to be a standard thing with craig rochelle.

But uh let me let me point something out here from the book of jonah and it's going to take me a little bit to read through this. So work with me here. We're all familiar with the story of jonah and the whale.

That's what that's how it's taught to kids although the text itself says big fish. Now i'm not going to give you all of the background story to this. I'm going to let craig rochelle do that in his sermon because he actually does a decent job of at least explaining why the israelites of jonah's day did not like in that's like like an understatement.

Um why there was such animosity towards um the people in nineveh. And so you know i'll let craig explain that to you. But let me let me look at this text here. Jonah chapter one verse one. Now the word of the lord came to jonah the son of amittai saying arise go to nineveh that great city and call out against it for the evil that has come before me.

But jonah rose to flee to tarshis from the presence of the lord. And he went to joppa and found a ship going to tarshis. So he paid the fare and went down into it to go with them to tarshish away from the presence of the lord.

But the lord yahweh hurled a great wind upon the sea and there was a mighty tempest on the sea so that the ship threatened to break up. Then the mariners were afraid and each cried out to his god and they hurled the cargo that was in the ship into the sea to lighten it for them.

But jonah had gone down into the inner part of the ship and had laid down and was fast asleep. So the captain came and said to him what do you mean you sleeper arise and call out to your god. Perhaps the god will give a thought to us that we may not perish.

Okay. Pause. Right here. Okay so here's the scenario. God the word of the lord comes to jonah go and speak out against nineveh. And the question is why is jonah running. Okay. And so the way this hand this text often gets mishandled and mangled is that jonah is somehow the reluctant prophet.

Okay now on some level that's true but there's a very specific reason why jonah doesn't want to go to nineveh. Okay and the fact that the ninevites are like these cruel cruel war criminals i mean what they're get what they're guilty of is just absolutely beyond the pale.

As far as i mean seriously if the ninevites were a lot around today they would be brought up on war crimes. I mean that's how brutal and terrible they were in uh in in battle and the things that they did to towns and cities that they conquered.

It's unspeakable the torture that they uh that they went to. But see that doesn't exactly explain it either. It's not just that. Well they're bad people. That's not the issue. There's a there's actually a gospel reason why jonah doesn't want to go.

And it's in the punchline of the story. So i'm telling you that here so that you can remember this as the story unfolds. Now notice here that god at this point sends a tempest and the fact that jonah is asleep inside of the the ship jonah knows what's going on.

He knows what's going down. And god at this point is you know is disciplining. And you'll notice that the raging tempest and all this kind of stuff is a result of his rebellion and sin. Okay so in his as we read this there is actually a you know a sacrifice of atonement to calm the wrath of god theme in here that you can tie directly to christ.

But also when we get to the story of the big fish there is a death and resurrection type and shadow here that jesus picks up and uses for himself in his own ministry. Uh and so let me let me read here.

Okay so uh verse seven. So they said to one another come let us cast lots that we may know on whose account this evil has come upon us. So they cast lots and the lot fell on jonah. Surprise surprise. So then they said to him tell us on whose account this evil has come upon us.

What is your occupation. Where do you come from. What is your country. And of what people are you. And he said to them i am a hebrew and i fear the lord the god of heaven who made the sea and the dry land.

Then the men were exceedingly afraid and said to him what is this that you have done. For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the lord because he had told them. So then they said to him what shall we do to you that the sea may quiet down for us.

For the sea grew more and more tempestuous. He said to them pick me up and hurl me into the sea and then the sea will be quiet will quiet down for you. For i know it it is because of me that this great tempest has come upon you.

Nevertheless the men rode hard to get back to dry land but they could not. For the sea grew more and more tempestuous against them. Therefore they called out to yahweh oh yahweh let us not perish for this man's life and lay not on us innocent blood for you.

Oh yahweh have done as it pleased you. So they picked up jonah and hurled him into the sea and the sea ceased from its raging. And the men feared yahweh exceedingly. And they offered a sacrifice to yahweh and made vows.

I'm going to stop right here. Amazing story. And the human sacrifice elements even though the shadow here is really kind of foggy to see you can see the shadow of the of the human sacrifice of christ.

And in a very similar way um god's raging and wrath against our sin okay is quieted because of the sacrifice of christ for our sins. You can preach the gospel from this text so clearly. And the this text has a gospel punchline here.

So i mean this this is not these types and shadows here of the of christ's crucifixion to propitiate the wrath of god. Notice that god's wrath is propitiated by the sacrifice of jonah by throwing him into the sea.

Also you'll notice that their prayer that god would not hold them accountable. I think i personally think that there's a tie-in that you can even pull into there regarding pilot and washing his hands of the crucifixion there i there's.

You can clearly preach the the crucifixion and christ death for our sins from this text. Okay then it continues. And the lord appointed a great fish to swallow up jonah and jonah was in the belly of the fish for three days and three nights.

Um just so you know jesus uses this exact exact you know miracle if you would uh in matthew chapter 16 where he says an evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign but no sign will be given to it except for the sign of jonah.

Okay so jesus's own death and resurrection is likened to the sign of jonah. So this idea that somehow you know this that jonah's story ties to christ. That's not something i invented and it's not something the church invented.

That's actually jesus himself makes that point. Uh in matthew chapter 16 that where he considers jonah's quote death and resurrection three days in the belly of a great fish. You know in a sense he was dead for three days and then rose again.

You see that you see the idea here. That idea doesn't come from me. That's jesus's own thing. And he says that that is a sign. So again what did jesus say. An evil adulterous generation seeks for a sign but no sign will be given to it except the sign of jonah.

Okay. So jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. Jonah prayed to the lord his god from the belly of the fish saying i called out to the lord out of my distress. And he answered me out of the belly of shale.

I cried. And you heard my voice. For you cast me into the deep into the heart of the seas. And the flood surrounded me. All your waves and your billows passed over me. Then i said i am driven away from your sight.

Yet i shall again look upon your holy temple. The waters closed in over me to take my life. The deep surrounded me. Weeds were wrapped about my head at the roots of the mountains. I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me forever.

Yet you brought up my life from the pit. Oh lord my god. When my life was fainting away i remembered the lord. And my prayer came to you into your holy temple. Those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love.

But i with the voice of thanksgiving will sacrifice to you what i have vowed i will pay. Salvation belongs to the lord. Salvation belongs to the lord. So the story of jonah is intimately wrapped up in the whole salvation propitiation of the wrath of god.

Um a sacrifice to propitiate and salvation belongs. So you got death resurrection. It's all there right there in the text. Okay now i'm not going to tease all the elements out here but i'm just trying to point out the anchor points for it all.

Now. Chapter 2 verse 10. The lord spoke to the fish and it vomited jonah out onto the dry land. Now this is the that's the verse that all the kids like to hear in sunday school and everyone goes okay.

But again the story doesn't end there. And you don't stop the story here yet so many people when they teach this text they stop it right here. The story continues. And like i said it has a gospel punchline.

Then the word of the lord came to jonah the second time saying arise go to nineveh that great city and call out against it the message that i tell you. So jonah rose went to nineveh according to the word of the lord.

Now nineveh was an exceedingly great city. Three days journey in breath. Jonah began to go into the city going a day's journey. And he called out yet 40 days and nineveh shall be overthrown. This is the message that god gave him to preach and the people of nineveh believed god.

That's the amazing part when you understand. And i'll let like i said i'll let craig rochelle do the backstory here when you understand who these people were and what they have done jonah shows up in a foreign pagan city and he preaches really the basically the penalty for your sin.

Yet 40 days in nineveh shall be overthrown. The people of nineveh believed. They believed. And see. This is the best part. The people of nineveh believed god. They believed. And you know what god did.

He forgave them. Jesus himself says that the people of nineveh will rise up on the last day and they will condemn those who didn't believe jesus. Why. Because now nineveh nineveh these pagan gentile war criminals torturers they repented at the preaching of the prophet.

Israel didn't repent of the preaching of the prophets that god sent them. But nineveh did. And so they like you and like me are declared righteous by faith and trust in the one true god who forgives sins.

Because as jonah said salvation belongs to the lord. So they believed. They then called for a fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest of them to the least of them. Now the word reached the king of nineveh and he rose from his throne removed his robe covered himself with sackcloth and he sat in ashes.

And he issued a proclamation published through nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles. Let neither man nor beast herd nor flock taste anything. Let them not feed or drink water. But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth and let them call out mightily to god.

Let everyone turn from his evil ways and from the violence that is in his hands. Who knows god may turn and relent and turn from his fierce anger so that we may not perish. When god saw what they had done how they had turned from their evil way god relented of the disaster that he had said that he would do to them and he did not do it.

Now this is the reason chapter 4 verse 1 reveals the reason why jonah didn't want to go to nineveh. But it displeased jonah exceedingly. And he was angry and he prayed to the lord and said oh lord is this not what i said when i was yet in my own country.

That is why i made haste to flee to tarshish. For i knew that you are a gracious god and you are merciful and you are slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and relenting from disaster. That's the reason why he fled.

You see it's not exactly that he was quote a reluctant prophet that he just had an obedience problem. The reason why according to jonah from his own mouth the reason why he fled to tarshish was because he knew that god is gracious and that he's merciful.

And he's slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and relenting from disaster. Jonah wanted nineveh to be judged and for god to destroy them. He wanted them to face the wrath of god because that is exactly what they deserved.

And he's right that is what they deserved. But see the gospel hook here. You and i deserve that too. You and me both. We have sinned grievously against god. We don't deserve his good blessings. We don't even deserve to be breathing his air.

And see this is all about salvation and grace. Think about it. God forgave nineveh. This would be like god forgiving hitler. It would be like god forgiving the nazis. That's how scandalous this is. And that is the reason why jonah didn't want to go.

And if you preach this text without this punchline you miss the whole point. The reason why he didn't want to go is because he didn't want them forgiven. He didn't want them to repent and to be forgiven and for god to relent.

But what good news it is that god relented. What great news it is that god forgave and was merciful even to the people of nineveh. Because then i know he can be forgiving to a sinner. The likes of me and the likes of you turn repent.

It's not long before god overthrows you and you face the wrath of god. But turn repent and believe for salvation belongs to the lord. He is kind merciful gracious slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and resent and relenting from disaster especially the disaster of hell.

That's the whole point of this text. That's the punchline. And when you leave that punchline out or you don't even have it in view when you preach the front part of jonah you end up turning this into a law passage and a law text.

And jonah is just riddled with nothing but mercy grace forgiveness of sins death and resurrection. It's all right there in god's wrath being propitiated and it points us to christ all right. So the reason i brought all that up well is in preparation for our sermon review today and we are up on our second break.

And if you'd like to email me regarding anything you've heard on this edition or any previous editions of fighting for the faith you can do so. My email address talkbackatfightingforthefaith .com. Or you can ask to be my friend on facebook.

It's facebook .com forward slash pirate christian. Or you follow me on twitter. My name there at pirate christian when we get back. Sermon review from craig rochelle from the book of jonah. See how he stands up.

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Okay we're back our number two of fighting for the faith sermon review time. Like i said we're going to be listening to a craig rochelle sermon regarding jonah. But let me do this the right way. All right.

Here we go. The good the bad and well the ugly. We review it all. Here at fighting for the faith we're an equal opportunity sermon reviewing service. Today's sermon comes to us via life church dot tv.

Craig rochelle presiding. The name of the sermon is entitled. Well jonah. Now as you listen to this sermon on jonah ask yourself a couple of questions. Well like this is craig rochelle rightly handling this text.

Does he have any clue regarding what the punch line is for this um text. And the reason i ask is because as you listen to this um it may become patently obvious that he's completely missed the gospel which is so clear in jonah when you just read it in context and you let the text speak for itself.

By the way this is the reason why exegeting passages is a wise thing to do. And any pastor before launching into a sermon on a particular biblical text it behooves him to have read the whole work. For instance it'd be silly to start an entire sermon series on like the book of isaiah.

If your pastor has never read isaiah or has only read chapter one these certain pieces kind of fit together there. Anyway you get what i'm saying. So just ask yourself. Does he even realize what's in chapter four.

Because what's in chapter four makes all of chapter one make sense. When you get to chapter you get what i'm saying anyway. So let's uh kill the music. And without any further ado here is craig rochelle.

And his sermon entitled jonah today to all of our campuses we're so glad.

That you're with us. Let's pull out our bibles together. Open them to the book of jonah. It's a bit difficult to find so if you want to go to your table of contents you can do that. That's not cheating or a little hint.

It is between obadiah and micah or my bibles on page 901. Don't know if that'll help you or not. But uh anyways there how many of you basically know the story of jonah. You pretty much know the story of jonah.

A lot of people do story of a guy who doesn't do what god wants him to do. Uh god puts him in the belly of a big whale. He lights a candle. The whale throws him up on shore. And he gets to be a real boy for the rest of his life.

Okay. No that's pinocchio. He's kind of muddled up. Well what we're going to do is we're going to look at a story that a lot of people consider to be kind of a kid's story that you hear about in sunday school.

But the truth is the story of this reluctant prophet. Jonah really will speak into all of our lives if we listen to the spirit of god. So let's start today. In jonah chapter one verses one through three it will set the context for us.

Here's what scripture says. The bible says the word of the lord came to jonah the son of amitai. And this is what god said. God said go to the great city of nineveh and preach against it because this wickedness has come up before me.

In verse three though we see jonah's unfortunate response. Scripture says what help me out all of our campuses the bible says. But jonah did what. Jonah ran away from the lord and he headed for tarshis.

He went down to joppa where he found a ship bound for the port and after paying the fare he went aboard and sailed for tarshis to do what he sailed for tarshis to to flee from the lord. He was a man on the run.

Let's look at some of the of the words. If you're taking notes first of all jonah he's called by many as the reluctant prophet. He was a prophet of god that often did what was right. But in this particular story we're going to find that he did not obey god at all.

His name. If you're taking notes it actually means dove. So he was called the dove or the peaceful one who ended up disobeying god and is now known as the reluctant prophet. Next word in your notes is the word amitai or amitai and that is his father.

He was the son of amitai. Amitai actually means truth which is a great name for a prophet to be the son of truth. Uh nineveh was the the city that he was commanded to go and preach to. Nineveh was the capital of assyria and nineveh was israel's absolute foremost worst enemy.

Israel hated the. You'll see why. As we go on into our study let's look at verse one again. And as we do as we start to look at this story i believe that god may show you what he's shown me that i we all have a little bit of jonah in us.

Jonah 1 1 says this help me out. The bible says the what say it aloud the the word of the lord. One more time all the campuses you guys can do better. The what the word of the lord came to jonah the son of amitai.

Good news is that the word of the lord will come to you today. God is a god who loves to speak. Whenever god created he said let there be. And there was he created with the spoken word. John 1 1 says in the beginning was the word and the word was with god and the word was god and the word became flesh and dwelt among us.

God is a god. God created adam and eve because he wanted to love and kick. Now that's a weird point. The.

Word of the lord's gonna come to you like it came to jonah. I'm not a prophet. Are you a prophet.

Something's screwy here on this. God is a speaking god. God created adam and eve because he wanted to love and to be loved. He wanted to speak. He spoke with adam and eve in the cool of the day in the garden.

He is a speaking god throughout history. God speaks in different ways. God has often spoken with the audible voice. God has often spoken through his prophets god. So apparently the the.

Word of the lord came to uh jonah somehow means that the word of the lord is going to come to you and god's word can come to you in many various different ways. That's not what this text is.

Teaching on this god is a speaking god. God created adam and eve because he wanted to love and to be loved. He wanted to speak. He spoke with adam and eve in the cool of the day in the garden. He is a speaking god throughout history.

God speaks in different ways. God has often spoken with the audible voice. God has often spoken through his prophets. God has spoken through circumstances. God has spoken through the voice of his holy spirit.

If you've never ever heard the voice of god you can and will. Today if you simply open up his word this is his word. It's described self described as living and active. It's sharper than any two-edged sword.

This is his word that pierces. It is truth that is living. It will transform. The word of the lord will come to you and god will speak to some of you a very specific word. His word will be to change something to move in a new direction to be obedient to what he says to you.

And you'll have a choice. You can do what god wants you to do and that is to be obedient to his word. Or you can do what jonah did and said i don't want.

To be obedient to you the word of the lord. Oh man talk about turning this into a moralistic teaching. Good night. So when the word of the lord comes to you can either be a tragedy like jonah or you can just obey.

That's not what this text is about. Notice. He's basically turned this into an all-law moralistic sermon on a text that if you just take the time to read it he'd realize. Oh wow there's a ton of gospel in here makes me wonder if he knows what the gospel is.

We continue.

I want to be obedient to you. The word of the lord will come to you. That's the good news. The challenging nude for many people is this. If you're taking notes when god's word comes to you he will often ask you to do some things that you don't want to do.

He'll often ask you to do some things that you don't want to do. And the reason we don't want to do them a lot of times is because we really like to believe that we know what's best. We like to try to convince ourselves that that we really know what is better.

For example all of our campuses. If you guys could help me out. What's best. Chocolate. Or vanilla. Vanilla or chocolate. How many of you say chocolate. Hands down chocolate. How many say vanilla vanilla.

All the way. Some of you voted twice. That is not fair at all. Okay. What is best. Well strawberry is best. Okay you know we whatever we like to think we know what's best. Sometimes someone in authority or someone with more knowledge will tell us what to do.

And we say i don't want to do that. I feel like i know what's best. My family and i we were in colorado for some uh some time off. And i took my three oldest girls. We went on a little hike and a lady came running up to us and said you guys have to leave here now.

And i'm like look we came here. This is a public place. Why. She's like you just have to leave here now. Get out of here now. And i'm like why. And she said because there is a bear up in that tree. Oh i see.

Okay and there was there was a little bitty black bear. A really cute little baby black bear. And she just said get out of here now. So guess what we did. Do you think we left. Actually no. I took my phone out that had a little camera on it got as close as we could taking pictures.

You know cute little bear. Look at a baby bear. Baby baby baby bear. And all this stuff. And she came up again. She said get out of here now. I'm like why. She's an innocent little baby bear. And she said whenever there's a baby bear close by there's usually a.

So we got out of there. Okay when i understood the context of the assignment i understood the reason behind it. Uh then we went home. This is true. And we got back to our little the place we were staying.

And guess what. We saw mama believe it or not mama was in our garbage can eating our leftovers from the night before. So there was big mama bear little baby bear. And we were goldilocks. And we got out of town.

I mean we just left. He gave freaked us out bears everywhere on vacation a lot of times we feel like we know what is best. And we don't want to obey when the word of the lord comes to us. This was the context of jonah.

And we see this.

Actually take place in. Uh now remember that jonah himself stated exactly why he went to tarshish. Okay and here's what he said again. Jonah 4 -1. But it displeased jonah exceedingly. That is is that the ninovites repented and he prayed to the lord and said oh lord is this not what i said when i was yet in my country.

That is why i made haste to flee to tarshish for i knew that you are a gracious god and merciful slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and relenting from disaster. So you know apparently the word of the lord is now going to come to you like it came to jonah.

And you just need to obey and and not end up in the belly of a fish like jonah did. This is a cautionary tale. Now about obeying when the word of the lord comes to you. Unbelievable. He misses the.

Whole point the whole point is the gospel oxen we got out of town i mean we just left. He gave freaked us out. Bears everywhere on vacation a lot of times we feel like we know what is best and we don't want to obey when the word of the lord comes to us.

This was the context of jonah and we see this actually take place in uh verse two. Here is the command god says to him go to the great city of nineveh and do what god said i want you to preach against it because this wickedness has come up before me.

Now you might wonder well okay jonah's a prophet and that's what he does. Is he preaches god's word. So why didn't he just obey this very simple assignment. Well when you understand the history of nineveh or the assyrian empire you understand a little more why he hated.

Them now stop. Okay notice. Here he's going to explain his jonah's disobedience in light of his hatred of the ninevites. That is not a sufficient answer. That's partly true but the reason is is that he didn't want god to forgive him.

That's what jonah himself says. Then the history.

Of nineveh or the assyrian empire you understand a little more why he hated them. The assyrian empire of which nineveh was the capital city whenever it was rumored that the assyrians would be attacking somebody they were so brutal in the way they would handle the captives.

They would torture them and just be so destructive that occasionally when it was rumored that the assyrians were going to be attacking sometimes a whole town of people would just commit mass suicide because they would rather die that way than to experience what was coming.

That's how feared the assyrian empire was. And they were hated. Let me tell you a little bit about. You can read this in history books. This is what they would do. They would go in and they'd take over a city.

They'd kill all sorts of people. Then the surviving women they would rape before they would kill them. They would often even rape the little girls. They would torture some of the kids and then they would take the husbands who were prisoners of war.

The men they take them outside the city and they would skin them alive. Then once they were skinned they would actually bury them in the desert sand up to their necks. You can imagine the pain they would be in.

Then they would take their tongues and they would pull their tongues out and they would drive a stake through their tongues so that they would go crazy as they were dying of thirst in the middle of the desert.

And then all through the night they would make them listen to paris hilton cds just to right. There's a line about that last part. But the rest of it is all true. You can just you can you can start to imagine the horror of you got a stake driven through your tongue and and most people would go crazy before they died.

Then once they were dead they would behead them and they would take the heads of all the prisoners of war. And they would make a pyramid of heads outside the city to say to the rest of the world this was a city that we conquered.

Okay when you know that maybe you have a little more mercy for john. And when he said i don't want to go there. I hate these people. Uh that's not what he said. See jonah actually.

Explained in chapter four why he didn't want to go you don't seem to be aware of that little fact.

The prisoners of war and they would make a pyramid of heads outside the city to say to the rest of the world this was a city that we conquered. Okay when you know that maybe you have a little more mercy for john.

And when he said i don't want to go there i hate these people it could have been that he had a relative or a friend or someone who actually experienced that he despised them. God said i want you to do something.

And in his mind he had some legitimate reasons why he didn't want to obey god. Maybe you can relate the word of the lord will come to some of you. And you will hear specifically from god this is what i should do.

And in your mind you may think okay i understand. That's what you want me to do. But i don't want to do it. I don't want to have anything to do with it. Perhaps you can relate in different ways. Maybe someone has wronged you and hurt you or or hurt someone that you love.

And the word of the lord comes to you. And the word of the lord for you is to forgive them. To forgive as you have been forgiven. And you look and you go. I don't want to. They don't deserve it. I don't feel like forgiving them.

I know that's what god wants me to do. But i don't want to do it. I know a lot of you have have heard the teaching of the tithe.

The biblical tithe that the scripture is crystal clear. Uh his and him his teaching on the tithe is.