What God Does When We Final - SUNDAY MORNING SERMON with Pastor Jeff Shipley

For those of you that have grown up in church, Jonah chapter 1 is going to seem like the same old thing you've always heard. I want you to look at it from a new paradigm or a new perspective, through a new paradigm.

I want you to see yourself not as Jonah. I don't want to see yourself as Nineveh. I want to see yourself as you are right here, right now, and then ask yourself this question, what does God do and how does He react when you fail?

How many of you were blood-sucking, godless, heathen pigs sometime this week? The rest of you are liars, okay? That's the only two ways it's going to be. Man, have you ever been in that place where you start praying but you feel so guilty about all your failures you don't even feel like you need to pray because God ain't going to listen to you anyways because you're a big, fat, stupid loser?

Well, guys, join every single individual found in Scripture, save Jesus Christ Himself. Every single other individual in there had those moments and Jonah is no different. Let's read Jonah chapter 1, verses 1 through 3, Jonah chapter 1, verses 1 through 3, and then we'll get from there.

The word of the Lord came to Jonah, the son of Amittai, get up, go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it because their wickedness has confronted me. However, Jonah got up to flee to Tarsus from the Lord's presence.

He went down to Joppa, found a ship going to Tarsus, Spain. He paid the fare and went down to it to go with them to Spain from the Lord's presence. Guys, you know how God reacts to our failures? The same way.

The Call of God Remains the Same

Now, watch this. Have you ever seen a kid get in trouble and the first thing they do is go, well, Josiah did it too, you know? I used to smack my kids for that because I said you speak for yourself and yourself only.

You're not allowed to speak for someone else. But guys, I want to do that today a little bit. If you are a complete failure as a Christian, I want you just to take a look at the colleagues you have in your camp with you, like a guy named David, Paul, Peter.

Oh my gosh, we spent three months talking about how much of a loser he was, right? Jonah is no exception. And you know what's really cool about that? Is that this is what happens when we fail. God stays the same.

His call stays the same. His grace stays the same. His standards stay the same. You see, God is holy and there is no middle ground for God. I know a lot of preachers today don't talk about sin anymore, but I'm here to tell you God still hates sin and He's not going to punish sin.

Listen to me. He's going to destroy sin and anything it touches, anything it touches. Guys, you better wake up and listen to this. So the first thing you need to understand today is that the call of God remains the same.

Look at this passage here. It says in verse two, get up, go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it. You know what I want other than a drummer? Andrew, where are you? Andrew, brother Andrew, I should say.

I want two smoke machines. Huh? I want two smoke machines right here and then I want a mechanical lift so that as I come up out of the floor, the smoke, because see, that will get people to come here more.

Church, when did it become the strategy of the church to be different from God that we are supposed to go out there and not get them to come in here? If you're here today and you're here looking for a children's program, don't come here.

We got the best one in the city, but I don't want you. I don't want you. If you're here looking for a good youth ministry, I don't want you. I want warriors of the living God who are not afraid to get out in the community that ain't wearing polo shirts and who speak maybe 18 different languages and tell them about Jesus Christ.

It's our job, the call of God, that has remained the same from Abraham, Noah, Adam up until this point is to get off our lazy, apathetic where-ins, get outside of this building and be the church instead of inviting people here to have church.

Because you can't have church. There's no such thing. You can only be God's church.

And listen to me. We are failing.

One of you folks came to me a couple of months ago and said, Pastor, we got a lot of visitors, but they don't come back. Why is that? You know what my answer was? I don't know, son. Why don't you tell me?

What was their name? Well, I don't know. Let me give you just a second why the irony of your statement kicks you in your own rear end. Why don't you know? Well, I didn't talk to them. That's not the problem, guys, with the church.

I know a lot of churches say, well, we need to make them feel welcome. I'm here to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ against sin. I'm not here to make you feel welcome. But here's the bigger question.

How did they get from out there and here? By you guys. Who's the preacher in this place? If you are a born-again believer in the Son of God and have the blood of Jesus Christ imputed to you for your righteousness, you are a preacher of the kingdom of God.

And if you're not doing that, you're failing. But here's the good news. The call still remains the same. It's disgusting. Three hundred pastors in one setting. We taught a thousand pastors. This little church did.

Had a thousand pastors. And two of them could tell me the difference between grace and mercy. You see, we've forgotten our calling. We've gotten so busy trying to seek people to build and fill our pews that we forgot that we're supposed to go out there and let the Holy Spirit fill them.

You cannot lead someone to Jesus. You cannot do it. Only the Holy Spirit does. John 6 says, no one comes to the Father unless I draw them. What we need to do is be the candlestick that Jesus is held up in and then let Him do the work.

But instead, we're so busy trying to get folks in. That ain't our job. Our job is to get up and go out. Now here, look what else it says. Preach. You're supposed to preach. But look what it's supposed to say.

It says, get up. Get up. Go and preach. Smile. Jesus loves you. God bless you. God loves you right where you're at. No, He doesn't. He doesn't like right where you're at. You know why? He sent His Son to die a horrific death to get you out of right where you're at.

You're a totally depraved, sinful human being. And then without the blood of Christ, you're going straight to hell. It says, preach against them. Well, Brother Jeff, your preaching sometimes offends my family when they come here.

Guys, it ain't my preaching that offends them. It's called the conviction of the Holy Spirit found in the Word of God. Because this ain't Jeff Shipley talking. Trust me. I'm quoting from a little thing we call the inspired, absolute, inerrant Word of God.

And if you feel conviction, you have two choices this morning. You can try to blame everybody else or you can submit and repent. Well, Brother Jeff, God's forgiven me. Have you repented? Nope. Well, then He ain't forgiven you.

Forgiveness does not come unless you repent. Jesus didn't start His ministry by saying, hey, feel good about yourselves. The kingdom of God is at hand. He got up and said, hey, people, you need to repent.

Right here, right now. You know what stays the same? The message and the call of Almighty God. You are a sinful, lost people, but I, Jehovah Jireh, will provide a way. Number two, it's not just the call of God that stays the same.

The Hearts of Man and God Stay the Same

It's two hearts that stay the same. The heart of man, but thank God, the heart of God. Man constantly fails. This morning, can I ask you a question? Why are you here? Why are you here? Because it's Sunday?

Because your parents made you come? Because you finally got tired of your wife nagging you to come to church so that her social status could go up a little bit? And women, a lot of times that you want your men to come to church, it really has very little to do with the holiness of Almighty God other than your social standing with other women.

Is that too much truth for you? I'm sorry. I feel bad now. Never mind. That's gas. Do you pursue the holiness of Almighty God? What stays the same? The heart of man. Brother Jeff, I need to get back in church because my marriage is a shamble.

Hey, ding-dong, do you really think showing up an hour every Sunday is going to fix your marriage or is your repentance from your arrogant self-centeredness going to fix your marriage? Well, I'm supposed to be the head of the household.

Well, then quit smoking weed and go get a job. That might really be a good thing to do. Why don't you act like the head of the household instead of trying to demand it? What stays the same? Here's what stays the same.

The heart of man. Guys, we are totally depraved. Church, try to wrap your head around this, please, for just a second. The street-walking, crack-smoking whore on Jackson Avenue is no worse than any of us in this room.

Wrap your head around that. You 1980s Bill Gothard Christians need to grow up past the maturity and sanctification of a one-year-old. Okay? We're no better. I just have been saved. I have the grace of Almighty God, but even with that grace, there is no meritorious work that I can achieve, even in the grace of God, that brings me one step closer to the salvation of God.

For once I am saved, it's not once saved, always saved. It's those who come unto me, I will in no wise cast them away. The total depravity of my heart and of Jonah's heart, praise God, does not change the grace of God's heart.

That's what stays the same. Look at this with me for a second. Just look at this. Look at rebellion. How many of you are in total rebellion against God? Yeah, well, Pastor, I walked down the aisle when I was...

Yay! You walked down the aisle. Find me that scripture. But anyways, it says right here, God said, right here, God said, get up and go! Get up and go! And Jonah said, no. Now notice that word at the beginning of verse 3.

Notice that word. Some of your Bibles may translate it but, but Holman translates it however. We were talking with a young couple who were stressing because their children are rebellious. And they came to me and they said, you have five kids that are perfect.

And I went, kid and perfect will never be synonymous. I don't care who raised them. They're stupid. They're selfish. They're just kids. They're dumb. Oh no, man. Your sons are so... Your daughter is so...

How do you think they got that way? Do you really think there's a gene? Really? Ask Joe! Because I didn't carry that gene, okay? And Gwen married me, so that tells you what kind of character she had, right?

Little insecure, wanted to date the bad boy mentality. She had daddy issues too. That's why she dated me. Insecurity and codependency. How do you think it got that way? Well, here's how it got that way.

I fought very hard against one thing. I never spanked my children for spilling milk. Ever. I never spanked them for being stupid kids. But you know what I beat their brains out for? Rebellion. If I said, this is what I used to tell them, I expect your heart to stop beating and you drop dead at my feet.

I know that sounds weird, doesn't it? I demanded absolute obedience. Guys, rebellion is the father of all sin. What do you think started all this mess? What did Satan do against God? Well, he had pride, yeah.

Which is the seedbed of rebellion. Guys, rebellion is what you have to discipline for. Well, Brother Jeff, I don't agree with that. But okay, it's job security for me. It really is. You keep raising your children according to Oprah Winfrey.

You keep needing another government-sponsored... Oh, this drives me crazy. These big stars come on TV and they have these little 30-second government commercials. Hey, you need to eat dinner with your children every night.

Really? You got to use my tax dollars to tell these idiots this?

You know why this is a problem? Because the church is sitting down and God's saying, getting up. We're preaching something other than the gospel that God said to do. I didn't know how to raise kids, so you know what I did?

I got the Word of God and I wrote down every verse that had to do with being a father, a mother, a kid, or parents. I think I said that twice, but you get my meaning. I didn't graduate high school, Joe.

But those things... Guys, listen to me. The heart of man is desperately wicked. The heart of a child is worse because they're wicked and they stink. And they're irritating. You've got to discipline it.

But now notice this. Notice the grace of God in the heart of God. Did God get surprised when Jonah did this? Go that way, boy. Right. Do you think God said, Oh, I picked the wrong one. Messed up here.

Do you really think He did that? So now watch this. By implication of that understanding by the predeterminate sovereign counsel of Almighty God, God chose to pick a guy He knew that would fail. He chose to pick a guy that He knew that would rebel.

You know what that just did? That opened the floodgates of, Hey, all ye, come. That ain't a joke. God said, I know you're a big fat stupid loser, but here's what's really cool. Through you being a big fat stupid loser and then finally learning to obey in that sanctification process, my name's going to be glorified because they're going to go, Well, I didn't think He would be the one to do that.

You see, it gives God greater glory. But when you act like a pious jerk and everything's okay, God can't get no glory. Brother Jeff, I'm really not understanding what you're saying. Okay. Anywhere, church, USA, Sunday morning.

Hey, how are you doing, Vicki? Oh, I'm doing great. How are you? Oh, well, good. God bless you. Or, I think I got cancer. Or my daughter's smoking weed. Or, I'm not doing real good. I haven't picked up my Bible in three weeks.

See, God can get glorified through that. But if you're perfect all the time, Pastor, here's the one that drops me off the wall. Pastor, I need prayer, but I don't want you to tell anybody. Then why are you telling me?

Oh, well, you're the pastor. So I got to bat phone to God? The same Spirit of God is in me. The same Spirit of God is in you. And that little thing that, what was it? Who was it, Kierkegaard or Kant or Nietzsche that said, Confess your faults one to another that you may feel better about yourself?

Oh, no, it was the Holy Word of God that said, Confess your faults not to a priest, a pastor, to each other, that you may be healed. You want to get better in your spiritual life? Have a little bit of accountability.

Have someone look at you and go, Why didn't you read? Why didn't you read? Have the heart of man come face to face with the heart of God. In the heart of God, He has given us His Son, but He has also given us the church to hold us accountable to keep us all moving in the right direction.

But we can't do that. You see, the heart of God stays the same, church. Stop coming up with a different plan because it ain't going to work. And what's really scary and more important, it's not God's plan.

Guys, we need to stay focused. Next thing, why did he go left or right? Spain, Mediterranean, Java. Yeah, it'd be one of the four. Why did he go to Spain rather than go to Nineveh? Okay, well, let's talk about that for a second.

Jonah’s Rebellion and the Sin of Partiality

Number one, who was Nineveh? Remember, Wednesday night people, who's Nineveh? Capital of, thank you, Jeff, Assyria. I want to tell you how much I appreciate studying 20 hours a week on biblical history and A, B, P, G.

Instead of A, B, C, D, just remember A, B, P, G. Assyria, Babylon, Persia, and Greece. Those are the empires in succession of who came in order, okay? All right, now watch this. They were the capital of the Assyrian Empire.

You see, what they would do is they would gather their huge army together, and when they felt like taking something over, they would go and surround the city. If the Sindhi did not surrender immediately, if they had to shoot one arrow, if you made me sweat getting here, here's what we're going to do.

We're going to take you over anyways, then we're going to grab all your families, and we're going to grab all the parents, and we're going to sit them outside the wall. Then we're going to take all of your children, and while you watch, we're going to skin them alive so you can hear it.

Then we're going to stake them and put them on poles on the road leading into the city. Then we're going to kill you. So now you decide. Do you want to be John Wayne in the Alamo, or do you want to go ahead and just give it up?

And most people just gave it up, right? Because there were no Rambos back then, okay? And so everybody hated Nineveh, but you know why Jonah hated Nineveh? It wasn't because of that. You know why he hated them?

Because they were not Jewish. You know what? Here's the problem with the church. We get so focused on all this garbage that doesn't matter. How many of you people did not grow up Baptist in here? Stop.

Keep your hands up. Look around. Do you know in most Baptist churches, you could not be a member of this church unless you were re-baptized into the Baptist church? Do you realize that? Really? Well, yeah, John the Baptist started this church.

No! 1609 in Holland. That's the first Baptist. Do you know that most churches practice closed communion? You know what that is? Some of you guys know what closed... Here's what closed communion is. Unless you are a member of this church, you can't take communion here because we don't know what your life is really like.

I always ask those pastors, so you know what everyone in your church membership is like. Oh, yeah. Really? Because two of them are in my office for counseling every week. Didn't Paul say, let each man examine himself?

It is not my responsibility to get you to a place where you should take communion. That's your responsibility. My job is to preach you the truth. What you choose to do with it is up to you. We're holding each other accountable.

But we don't hold each other accountable because of our failures or where we come from. God is not punishing us or wanting us to live in our failures. He's wanting us to get to a place where we actually do something about them.

So he gave us the church. Ladies and gentlemen, if you have failed, that's one thing. But your failure to do something about your failure, that's another thing. And it has nothing to do with where you come from or what you look like or what you've done.

How many of you people have ever stolen a car in here besides me? How many of y 'all have ever beat someone into unconsciousness? How many of you ever done drugs? How many of y 'all have ever raped a woman?

How many of y 'all have ever molested a child? You know what's really horrible? Because I'm in the same boat as those people. Oh, no, Pastor. They're a lot worse than you. The divisions that we keep using to segregate who and what we are is one of the greatest weaknesses and yet the most powerful tool Satan has to try to bring the church down.

There is one church. It's existed since the breath of Adam. I'll do you a little dispensationalist. Hold on. Since the breath of Adam, it was implemented at Pentecost, and there is no defining entry except for the blood of Jesus Christ.

I don't care whether you're Methodist, Black, Puerto Rican, Presbyterian. You are a totally depraved human that is in need of the blood of Jesus Christ. Last thing and I'm done. Man's condition and God's heart stays the same.

The Pursuit of God, Imputation, and the Prodigal Son

You know what else stays the same? The pursuit of God and the change that happens when he catches you. Look at verse 9 for a second. Watch this. For those of you that aren't familiar with this, God says, get up, go preach Nineveh.

Jonah says, no, I'm getting on a boat and I'm going to Tarsus. It was about 2 ,000 miles away. It was all the way across the Mediterranean on the Iberian Peninsula. Well, as he gets out into the thing, God sends a wind.

Big storm's happening. Anyways, the ship's rocking back and forth and dogs are sleeping with cats. It's total pandemonium, total chaos, right? And so they're out there and the men go, hey, we need to pray to our gods.

And so everybody starts going. I remember that movie, The Mummy, where the guy has all the different religion things. He's like, shalom, and nothing's working. That's what all those guys are doing. They're all praying to their false gods to get them out of the storm, right?

Where's Jonah, church? If there isn't a metaphor for the church right down in America, I don't know what is. In the chaos of everything that's going on, where was Jonah? He's going to sleep, church. He's going to sleep.

Well, I invited someone to come to Jesus. You're such a loser. So he's down at the bottom of the boat asleep. The captain of the boat goes down there, and once again, the irony is too thick to miss, and says, get up.

The same word God used in verse 1. He's going, get up, get up. Aren't you afraid that we're going to die? Pray to your God. Maybe your God's going to work. Jonah goes, yeah, this whole thing's happening because of me.

What? You knew that? Yeah, I knew that. You see, even in sin, Jonah knew that God was still going to provide. Now, you're talking about taking something for granted. You're talking about familiarity breeds contempt.

Jonah had walked with God so long that even in his rebellion, he knew God's grace wouldn't fail. So he can go to sleep. So he goes and takes a nap. They say, get up, pray to your God. He says, it is my God.

I serve. Look here, look at verse 9. He doesn't put any two bones about it. He answers them, I'm a Hebrew. I worship Yahweh, the God of the heavens who made the sea and dry land. Well, didn't He make the animals too?

No, listen to what he's saying. He's going, no, I serve the only real God there is. He made this. He made it. What's the captain say? Then, verse 10, the men were even more afraid and said to him, what is it that you've done?

The men knew he was fleeing from the Lord's presence because he had told them. What is it you've done? Jonah said, he said, go right. I went left. Man, can you wooga wooga wooga? Somebody stole my Honda.

Can you do something? Because we're going to die here. Yeah, well, here's what you need to do. Throw me overboard. Everything will be alright. Just toss me overboard. The men are like, oh no. Remember, these are godless heathens.

They didn't want to do that. They had more morals. Now, watch this for a second. The Christian wouldn't go to Nineveh because he knew God would save the people that he hated that were not like him. He didn't want to go there.

We'll get to that next week. But now, here's these men. They're not Christians. Hey, Southern Baptist, white, Anglo-Saxon Americans that live in the South. These people don't know anything about that.

But they had more moral fortitude and a better moral compass than Jonah did because Jonah was like, throw me overboard. Man, we can't do that. That's murder. And they were afraid to do it. Jonah finally said, it's like this.

Either throw me overboard or we're all going to die. They said, okay. So, look at this. Watch this. It says right here, they rode harder to get back to dry land, but they couldn't. So they called out to the Lord.

Now, wait a minute. The heathen are now praying to God. How many sermons has Jonah preached? None. How many altar calls has he given? None. But see, when God's presence really shows up instead of being manufactured by smoke machines, music and emotion, it doesn't matter, man.

You could walk up to Nineveh, like in a few days Jonah's going to do and say, hey, you better repent because God's angry and the whole city repents. But we'll get to that next week too. But now watch this.

Look at here in verse 14. Please, Yahweh, don't let us perish because of this man's life and don't charge us with innocent blood. Let that sink in for a second. We're in this storm because of you. We're in this storm because you disobeyed this God who's now punishing us all, but we still don't want to kill you and we still consider your blood innocent.

There was another guy that walked around a city of antiquity about 2 ,000 years ago. And people hated his guts because instead of dressing right, talking right, and doing all the right socially accepted things, he sat down with prostitutes, he went to the drunkards, he went to the outcasts, the lepers, the sinners.

And this one guy made a statement. You'll find it in the gospels. They looked at Jesus Christ and they said, this guy cannot be anything great for this man sits down, speaks, and eats with sinners. Thank you, Jesus.

Thank you, Jesus. Because watch this. His innocent blood was imputed. What's imputation mean? Was credited to my account. Now watch this. Now just focus for a second. See, we all really get the whole idea that Adamic sin was imputed to all of us, meaning we are as guilty as if we were there.

But they didn't stop there. See, God's command of all man has fallen came with this caveat named Jesus Christ. Well, yes, but all your sin is going to be imputed upon the cross of Christ. How do I know that?

Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? God forsook him so he wouldn't have to forsake me. But he gets even better than that. You see, the most powerful part of the imputation of the atoning blood of Jesus Christ is this, is that the righteousness of Jesus Christ is imputed back to me.

When I stand before God, it is not my works of the flesh, nor being a pastor, nor of helping an old lady across the street. It is the righteousness of Jesus Christ Himself that God sees, because my sin has been removed to a place where I bear it no more.

This morning, do you comprehend that? You see, because you're here this morning, neither you are not a Christian, because some idiot long ago said for you to say this prayer, and you repeated some prayer at a youth camp, and you thought that changed you.

The sinner's prayer is not found in Scripture anywhere. Inviting Jesus Christ into your heart and be your Lord and Savior ain't in Scripture. Walking down the aisle is not in Scripture. You see, it's by faith you are saved.

In other words, have you come to a place where you put your faith in Christ? For not just your sin, but your life. Well, I want to give Jesus my sin, but I want to keep this. It don't work that way. It's either all or nothing.

Number two, if you have done that in faith, if you have done that in faith, let me ask you a question. Are you living like it, or are you asleep while the world goes in chaos? Are you here in a place this morning, listen to me, where you have forgotten a powerful, powerful imputation of the righteousness of Jesus Christ?

Do you walk around defeated by your failures? If you do, let me show you what you need to do. Let me show you what I told my sons to do after they got a whipping. I'd say, pick your head up. Pull your shoulders back.

Stop sniveling. You did wrong. You got licked. Now learn from it. Righteous man falls six times, but how many times does he get up? Seven. You failed. Welcome to the human race. Here's what stays the same.

God's invitation for you to give back up. God's grace to bring you back into the family of God. The prodigal son is always welcomed by the powerful blood of Jesus Christ.