Dial In with Jonny Ardavanis - Jonah 4: The Heart of God

Episode Date: July 14, 2022

In Jonah chapter 4, Jonah responds with great anger after witnessing the extension of God’s great mercy.In this chapter, God will ask probing question and provide parables to expose Jonah‘s heart that is far from the character of God that he confesses and confirms. What we will see in this chapter is that God is rich in mercy, compassionate, slow to anger, abounding in lovingkindness and is eager to save the lost. Watch VideosVisit the Website Follow on InstagramFollow on Twitter

Hey guys, my name is Johnny Artavanis and this is Dial In. In this episode, we cover the fourth and final chapter of the short book of Jonah. This chapter is often neglected, but it contains the climax of this very important book. Let's dial in. Good stories typically have good endings. There is a narrative arc, there's conflict, climax, and some sort of resolution. That's the way stories typically go. But the ending of Jonah is not what you would expect.

It's assuredly not the type of story that would attract publishers or producers today. It's an amazing story with a very disappointing ending, yet here it is in scripture. Think back with me. God had commanded Jonah to go to Nineveh, the most brutal, violent, and idolatrous nation on earth. In order to jog your memory of their atrocities, the British Museum can give us an idea through the Assyrian literature and art that they have on display. The Ninevites used to build pyramids out of severed heads of their enemies. They would burn cities to the ground.

One writer says that they would fill the lands with death and devastation. Entire countries were filled with corpses. The rivers were clogged with the dead bones of their enemies, and the Ninevites would cut down opposing warriors like weeds. This is Assyria, and Nineveh was the capital city, the seat of this evil culture, and the people of Israel hated Nineveh with all their heart. But after hearing Jonah's preaching, it says in chapter 3 that the people repented. They changed. They were broken over their sin. Can you imagine? The worst of the worst, not just acknowledging that there is a

higher power in the universe, but being absolutely broken and humbled over their sin before the one true God. If you've grown up in the church, you're likely familiar with chapter one of this story, and then chapter two, of course, inside the fish's stomach. Chapter three is less widely known, but even more so here in chapter four. The climax of the book of Jonah is the book's most neglected chapter. The prophetic book of Jonah holds only one sentence of actual prophecy, yet the real story is about the prophet. And here's how the story ends. In chapter 3, verse 10, it says the people repented and God turned from his wrath towards them. This was a preacher's dream to be used by God to bring about so much change and repentance. Many thousands have given

their life to be used by God in such a miraculous and meaningful way. But how does Jonah respond to his success? Well, in our modern context, Jonah would have returned home and been pursued by publishers for his new book launching next month entitled Powerful Preaching to Pagans by Jonah, son of Amittai. Or maybe it was called The Greatest Revival and Movement of God Ever by Jonah, prophet of Israel. But how does Jonah respond in our story? We see how he responds in Jonah chapter 4 verses 1 and 2. It says, This greatly displeased Jonah? Well, the fact that God had extended his mercy towards the Ninevites.

The men of God most mightily used in Scripture are always reduced to mere mortals, God had extended his mercy towards the Ninevites. The men of God most mightily used in scripture are always reduced to mere mortals by the transparent inclusion of their sin. And that's what we're going to see here in Jonah chapter 4. Abraham lied, Jonah runs, David kills, Elijah doubted, Noah got drunk, Moses disobeyed. Peter denies. And what we will see here in this chapter is that Jonah's heart is not aligned with God's. He's proud. He's selfish. And he's opposed to the very character of God that he confirms and confesses. This is an enormous letdown. You would never anticipate that a servant of God would be found angry that his mission was successful and that God had extended mercy.

Picture the scene with me. The people of Nineveh had heard Jonah's preaching. In 40 days, their entire city would be overthrown. They understood what we covered in our previous episode, that their sin was great, their time was short, and their judgment was sure. They lived those remaining 40 days in prayerful contrition, hoping that God maybe, just maybe, would turn from his anger towards their great wickedness. But on the contrary, let's visit Jonah. He would have preached his message and there is no inclusion

in the text that he stayed and discipled the people and helped them grow in their understanding and love for God. Rather, the idea here is that Jonah went up to a hill outside the city and for the next 40 days, while the people prayed for mercy, Jonah sat there and prayed for God's wrath. Jonah sat there and each and every morning, he would look out at the city and pray to God. Do it. Do it. Pour out your anger. Pour out your wrath. They're wicked. They deserve your swift judgment. Do not delay. Day 35.

Do it. Day 36. Do it, God. Day 39. Do it, God. They're wicked. Day 40. No judgment.

Just mercy from God. but much anger from Jonah. Jonah resents the very mercy that saved him. The irony here is thick. The pagan people are repentant and broken, but Jonah is furious and frustrated and fuming over the thought that God had extended mercy. But why is Jonah angry? Well, for two main reasons. Jonah is angry for Jonah's sake. The criteria for a prophet was clear in Deuteronomy 18. They were deemed to be true prophets if their prophecies came to pass. And if God turned in his anger towards Nineveh, then the very words that Jonah had proclaimed would be inaccurate. Jonah didn't preach and say, unless you do this, this, and that, you will be overthrown. He simply pronounced judgment. It was

sure. It was final. Now, with God turning from his wrath, Jonah's reputation was on the line. This once popular prophet would have been accused of being a false prophet. So Jonah's angry. He is more concerned about his own name than God's name. But as Sinclair Ferguson notes, God is far more concerned about the salvation of the lost than he is the preservation of the reputation of those who are already saved. So Jonah is angry for Jonah's sake. But secondly here, Jonah is angry for Israel's sake. Jonah's issue is that he knew that the Assyrians would likely be the ones who would destroy Israel in the future. God had already told the people of Israel that Assyria would be the rod of God's anger towards them for their continued disobedience. Jonah is concerned for the Jewish people.

This would be like knowing that there was a terrorist group of people that were going to destroy your family and your nation in 25 years and then being used by God to preserve them so that they would actually be able to carry out the destruction in the future. Jonah believes that the people of God deserve mercy, but that the Ninevites deserve wrath. So in his anger, Jonah is going to bring God before the bar of his justice and proclaim him guilty in his own mind. In this next verse, Jonah is going to tell God exactly why he is mad. And in his anger, he will declare one of the most profound confessions of God's character in all of

scripture. Ironically, this great confession of God's character is proclaimed by someone who doesn't possess an ounce of the character he confirms is true of God. He has been the recipient of what he is about to declare, but he is seething mad when those same realities are extended to others. Listen to verse three. Jonah says, for I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abundant in loving kindness and one who relents concerning calamity. Jonah says, me. After all, I'm me. Jonah was restored by God's grace, but he doesn't want God to restore anyone else. Jonah's confession with his lips is less important to him than the conformity of his life to the confession he makes. Let's examine this verse closely. It's so rich in truth about God as Lewis Johnson says that this verse is the John 3 16 of

the Old Testament Jonah proclaims that God is number one here gracious indeed this is the great theme of this small book God is gracious and merciful if anyone ever told you that the Old Testament is a book of judgment and wrath and the New Testament is a book of God's love and grace, they have likely never studied the book of Jonah. Our immutable, which means changeless God, is a God who is merciful and gracious. He is eager to save the lost. He delights in exercising mercy. But Jonah says not only is God gracious, he's also compassionate because God has great pity on those who are pitiful. He isn't aloof. He isn't indifferent. He isn't apathetic towards the plight of sinners.

He is moved with compassion when people suffer. Jonah then says that God is slow to anger because God is patient. What a prayer this is. What a mighty statement this is by a man who is so rebellious. Here is Jonah, who is so quick to anger, professing the reality that God is slow to anger, slow to wrath, slow to pour out his judgment. Maybe there are people in your life that have a short fuse. Potentially that's you, but that's not God. He is patient. He is slow in bringing about his justice because he gives sinners time to repent. And lastly, Jonah says, you are abounding in loving kindness. This is

God's chesed love. It's a very special word in the Hebrew language. It refers to God's covenantal kindness and love towards those who are undeserving. God's has said love is his patient, intentional, personal, constant, undeserved, and unending love. And God is abounding in that love, overflowing. God is not only love, but the scripture says he is love because he is abounding in loving kindness. What a profound declaration from a rebellious and sinful man. Jonah makes this great proclamation of God's amazing grace and matchless mercy, and yet his heart has not been changed by the grace or mercy that he professes. God has been soft, kind, and compassionate to him, but Jonah is hard and hateful towards the Ninevites. The question is, how does God respond to this runaway, rebellious prophet?

Does he strike him dead? No. God acts in accordance with the character Jonah had just confessed. God asked Jonah a question. Now, before we get to God's question in verse 4, it's worth noting that this is the way God responds to his wayward creatures often throughout the scripture. And the questions that God asks are not because he is looking for answers, but because he is trying to teach and instruct through the questions he brings. For example, when Adam and Eve fall into sin, it is God who comes with his questions.

Where are you? Who told you that you were naked, Adam? Have you eaten of the tree I commanded you not to eat from? What have you done? All of these questions are designed to stir us up. When Elijah was running from Jezebel and he hid, God comes to him and asks, What are you doing here, Elijah? When Job questions God, God questions Job.

Who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge? I will question you and you shall answer. This is a theme throughout scripture. Questions are asked by God and are used as a means of examination in order that the one being addressed would look and consider their own heart. In that same manner, God in chapter 4 is going to pose three probing questions to Jonah, and those questions function as the climax of this book. In verse 4, the Lord says, Jonah, do you have a good reason to be angry? There's no answer to this question in the book because there is no good reason for Jonah

to be angry. The answer is so obvious. Jonah's heart should have been pricked by the probing question God asked, yet he still wants the city destroyed. God says, Jonah, think with me. They repented at my voice. You didn't repent until I had you swallowed by a great fish. What unfolds in the remaining verses is a drama, a drama in which God is going to provide a plant, a worm, and a wind in order to teach Jonah a lesson about the heart of God. He uses probing questions and parables to turn the lights on in Jonah's mind so that he might begin to grasp the character of God and the nonconformity of his own life to that character. So in verse 5,

it says, then Jonah went out from the city and sat east of it. There he made a shelter for himself and sat under it in the shade until he could see what would happen in that city. Now here's what Jonah does. He makes for himself a little booth, kind of like the one that the Israelites constructed when they were wandering in the desert. Since the landscape of Nineveh in modern-day northern Iraq was hot and arid, there was very little shade to protect Jonah from the scorching sun. So Jonah constructs himself a little oasis, a private retreat, a resort, if you will,

where he can watch over the city and see if God does actually bring down his wrath upon the sinful city of Nineveh. Now watch this. Verse 6 reads, So the Lord God appointed a plant, and it grew up over Jonah to be a shade over his head, to deliver him from his discomfort. And Jonah was extremely happy about the plant. Picture this with me. This isn't some rare plant that Jonah coincidentally sits next to. This is a miracle. God has caused a plant to grow overnight that would protect Jonah from the heat of the sun and shield him from its scorching rays. In Hebrew, it says that the vine that grows actually saves him. But what does it save Jonah from? From his discomfort, from the Listen to the irony here.

How does Jonah respond? He is elated. He is exceedingly happy. He's rejoicing like a bride walking down the aisle. Jonah is overjoyed at the presence of the plant to protect him from the sun. But verse seven says, but God appointed a worm when dawn came the next day and it attacked the plant and it withered. When the sun came up, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on Jonah's head so that he became faint and begged with all of his soul to die, saying,

Death is better to me than life. So listen here. The God who had provided a great plant is now going to provide a small worm to gnaw away at Jonah's shade-giving plant. And then what we are to read is that the Lord turns up the heat, so to speak, by providing or appointing, it says in the NASB, a scorching east wind. Now, the significance of this wind is lost on many of us who live in a westernized, air-conditioned environment.

We sit in offices and homes behind walls and then behind computer screens. But this wind, this Sirocco mention, would have been an appointment not only with great discomfort, but grave danger, if not death. But not only is there a scorching wind, it also says that there are the sun's searing rays. And what we will see is that these rays and winds are merely the instruments used by God to blow and melt away Jonah's hypocritical exterior. Jonah is throwing himself a pity party. Verse 8 says,

He begged with all of his soul to die, saying, Death is better to me than life. Think about this rebellious runaway, rogue prophet, whining, complaining, and fussing over what God had done. Jonah says, take my life. I can't handle your mercy. I can't handle this heat. I can't handle this wind. Kill me. How is God going to respond this time to this man that is so opposed to the will and heart of God? Well, God responds by asking him another question. Verse nine, then God said to Jonah, do you have good reason to be angry about the plant? And Jonah says, I have good reason to

be angry even to death. We are reaching both the climax and the conclusion of this book. God is asking Jonah, did you make that plant? Was it a gift to you or did you earn it? Did you tend this plant? Did you water, care for, provide for this plant? No, and yet you are tremendously mad about losing it. This plant came in one day, Jonah. You didn't create it.

You didn't take care of it or cultivate the dirt for it. It sprung up overnight. But Nineveh, Jonah, it's a great city for many years. I have made those people within it. I provide for them. I care for them. I've made them in my image. I love them. The whole book is rising towards this question. So do you do well to be angry, Jonah? Do you have a reason? Jonah, don't you understand? Mercy is for sinners, not for saints.

Jonah's response, angry, angry. I'm so angry I could die. Now watch this. This gentle yet stern instruction of God. These final two verses in Jonah are so important. Listen to God's response in verse 10 and 11. Then the Lord said, you had compassion on the plant for which you did not work and which you did not cause to grow, which came up overnight and perished overnight. Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than 120,000

persons who do not know the difference between the right and left hand, as well as many animals. God exposes Jonah. Jonah has more care for his own comfort, for his own things, for his own reputation than he does about those who do not know God. Jonah cares more for a temporal, inanimate plant than he does for created, eternal souls. God says there are 120,000 people there who don't know their right from their left. I take those to be children.

And God is drawing Jonah's attention to the hundreds of thousands within the city that are lost. Is there anything in your life that you're more concerned about than seeing unconverted, lost sinners reconciled to God? What a contrast there is between Jonah and his God. What a contrast between this prophet Jonah and the one who would come and say that he is the greater Jonah, namely Jesus Christ. The prophet Jonah was asking for fire from heaven,

but the greater Jonah has a heart of mercy. The prophet Jonah won't lift a finger to help the lost, but the greater Jonah offered his life to seek and to save the lost. The prophet Jonah doesn't remain in the city. He distances himself and prays that God would pour out his wrath. The greater Jonah looks out over the city and weeps because he has a profound compassion for sinners. The earthly Jonah is a selfish prophet who doesn't think beyond himself. The greater Jonah humbles himself and becomes obedient to the point of death. This earthly Jonah, this prophet Jonah seeks destruction, but the greater Jonah seeks reconciliation. The prophet Jonah thinks mercy is for saints.

The greater Jonah extends his mercy only to sinners. I need to ask you a question. Are you like Jonah? Do you care more for your job, for your car, for your pets and your hobbies, for your reputation, than you do about the lost? Do you confirm the creeds of God's character but resemble them little in your own life? Do your priorities reflect that you are passionate

about what God is passionate about, namely the salvation of lost sinners? Well, how does the story end? What happens to Jonah? We don't know. One commentator says the scripture leaves it open because it is up for the reader to decide how they must respond. We started this series by asking the question,

what is God like? Well, the story of Jonah tells us he is merciful, gracious, slow to anger, abounding in loving kindness, and he's eager to save the lost. Are you like that, God? One can only pray that God would continually conform us to this wondrous character. Stay dialed in.