The Church of Eleven22 - Wk 2: God Help Me!

Episode Date: February 9, 2020

You are never too far gone to cry out to God. “I pray because I can't help myself. I pray because I'm helpless. I pray because the need flows out of me all the time, waking and sleeping. It doesn't change God. It changes me.” - C.S. Lewis

Everybody's looking good. If you got your Bibles, and I hope you do, we're going to be in Jonah again this week. Again, it's a very hard book to find. If you need to go to the table of contents, feel free to do that. There's no shame in that game. If you don't have a Bible, there's one in front of you. It's our gift to you. Or you can take your teaching notes, and the majority of the text is in there.

If you weren't here last week, we started a brand new series called Jonah. For the next four weeks or three weeks from now, we will be studying this book about God's relentless pursuit of his rebellious people through this reluctant missionary. And we talked last week about this idea that God comes to Jonah, the Word of the Lord, comes to Jonah, and tells him to go to Nineveh. It was the arch enemy of Israel, and he thinks, I'm not going there, because it's dangerous and I don't like those people, and so he heads in the exact opposite direction. Now, Nineveh is in modern-day Iraq.

That's where it is. And interestingly enough, this week, as I was getting ready for this message, actually, today, I got an email from a concerned dad in North Carolina that listens to the podcast. Now, I just need to warn you, I rarely, rarely, rarely, rarely return emails, okay? And this one popped up, and I read it, and it's just very nice words. We listened from North Carolina, heard me speak somewhere, love what you say, except week one of Jonah. So we've got this incredible rock star daughter. She's a sophomore at NC State.

She's studying to be a chemical engineer. She's got all these, like, super sweet internships lined up for the summer, and those, these are very important years for the rest of her days and the rest of her career and all of that. And then they say she loves Lord. She's very mission-minded. She leads these Bible studies all over the campus, and then she told us two weeks ago, I feel like God is calling me to go on a mission trip to the Middle East to take the gospel. And he said, I went into dad mode.

And I talked about, well, it cost a bunch of money and what difference could you really make. And it's dangerous. And what about the internships? And then he said, so Pastor Jobi, I kind of know what you're going to say. but what do you say? To which I replied, I have a 10-year-old daughter. I have a 10-year-old daughter. And it's easy for me to preach this, but when Reagan is 20,

if and when she comes to me and says, I think God is calling me to go to Nineveh, I'm afraid that I would be tempted to go into dad mode and say the kind of things that you are saying to your daughter. But as dangerous as it may be, there is nothing more dangerous to the modern Christian soul than the pursuit of comfort in the American dream. And so I told him, I'll make a deal with you.

I'll pray for you, and in 10 years I'll probably be asking you for some advice, but you know what I'm going to say. And then he emailed me back. First of all, he was amazed that I emailed him. And you should be. I'm not going to email you, so don't email him. He said, thanks. It won't be easy, but easy is.

not what we have signed up for. Amen. You see, last week we said when God calls you to Nineveh, there will always be a boat that's ready to take you to Tarshis. Whatever you do, please don't be the boat that takes somebody else away from God's calling their life. You see, I am thoroughly convinced that every single one of us at every single service, no matter when it is or where it is, that the sovereign king of the universe called you to be here right now to hear this message. And because God wants to do a work in your life. This is what he does to, this is what he does to Jonah.

That Jonah is on the run. Now we said we're going to pick it up in chapter two, and if I was in charge of chapters and verses, though I'm not, I would have backed chapter two up to 117, because that's where I think it really starts. It says, 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. If you run from God, you will not outrun him.

Trust me, it's better to just stop running than for the Lord to stop you from running. Last week we said that sometimes God uses people to accomplish tasks, like converting Nine of them. But oftentimes, God uses tasks to accomplish people. Now, there's something that I've learned as a preacher that's very important. That before God works on the message, he works on the message. he works on the messenger. This is why I spend so much time in the woods. Not to just figure out what I'm going to say to you every week,

but more importantly to figure out what God is saying to me. You see, again, Pastor Britt said this a few weeks ago, that you and I are not primarily tools in the hands of God. We are primarily sons and daughters in the family of God. And so before God uses Jonah for his own, purposes he works in the life of Jonah for his own salvation and that matters you see I don't want God to have to get my attention I want to just go ahead and volunteer it to him like I love that we're seeing this song I will make room for you I like that song our friends wrote it

they're up in Chicago I love it it's a great song I hope we sing it a lot but here's the reality either you will make room for God or God will make room for God. Room will be made for God. And whether you want to or not, he will do what he wants to do. It just goes way better when you volunteer the room and the submission to God's will versus the big fish have to swallow you up for room to be made because the sovereign king of the universe, he does not put it up to a vote.

He will do what he wants with who he wants, when he wants for his own glory and your own good. Now here's the thing. If God just delivers us, but he never disciples or disciplines us, then how would we ever grow? See, God is not a helicopter dad. He's not.

He loves us too much. Look, some of you work with people and they grew up under helicopter parents, right? And let's be honest, they're awful people. They don't know how to endure anything because they were never forced to endure anything. And our father loves us too much to just pluck us out of our rebellion,

but he sticks him in the belly of a well for three days and three nights because he loves him enough to open up his eyes. And you see, the gospel of Jesus Christ not only justifies us but sanctifies us and God would love us enough to grow us into maturity. It's not until Jonah is willing to lay down his life that he's really ready to be used by God. Look, the reality is when confronted with the gospel, you can be full of yourself or you can deny yourself. Those are your options.

And the gospel calls us to lay down our life. We've been asking this question for over a year now. Is he the one thing that drives everything, or is it still about you and your agenda? Church of 1122, if you're running, it is time to stop running. God appoints the fish to swallow him up. Chapter 2, verse 1, then. Then Jonah prayed to the Lord His God from the belly of the fish. Let me ask you this.

Is prayer for you a last resort or a first response? because the reality is, is there are no atheists in the belly of a whale. Everybody all of a sudden gets religious when the building's on fire. You understand? And what's crazy to me, though, is that we serve the kind of patient God that says, no matter what you're going through, no matter what your burdens are, no matter how heavy this thing feels, why don't you just bring that to me? I mean, if you take the parables of Jesus at face value about prayer, it's a bit astounding.

Like Jesus says, when you pray, I want you to knock on the door and knock on the door and knock on the door and keep knocking and don't you stop knocking. And it would be like there's a man who's asleep on the floor with his whole family. That's how they slept in the first century. He's asleep on the floor in the first century. And his neighbor comes to his house and he says, hey, I got a visitor in hospitality with super important then and he says I don't have any bread for my visitors so it's going to be it's going to be shameful for me in our community and so this neighbor knocks on the door and says hey man when you get up and give me some bread and the guy from the inside is like man shut up leave me alone you'll wake everybody up

what's wrong with you it's very loose translation but that's what he says and then he says and the brother knocks and knocks and knocks and knocks to the point where he awakens the slothful neighbor and against his own will just because he's so aggravated he gets the bread and he brings it to the guy Now the point of the parable is not that God is aggravated and asleep with the angels up in heaven and if you just aggravate him to death, he'll give you one. That's not what it is. It's if you can convince an evil, selfish neighbor to answer your request, how much more does our good, good father want to give good gifts to his kids? And so he says, come on, ask me again, and ask me again, and ask me again.

This is a foreign concept to every dad in the room. in my house if the words ask me again come out of my mouth it is not a positive conversation it's more like ask me again that's how it goes and yet god is so patient he says keep on knocking bring it to me you see god would love jonah enough to stick him in the belly of a fish for three days and three nights because it's god's kindness that leads us to repentance and this is what jonah does He repents. And the reality is, is you cannot truly repent and defend. Those two things are mutually exclusive.

And what you will not see in Jonah's prayer is in no place do you see excuses for his behavior, though he has many. God, you don't need me. God, if I go to Nineveh, either they all convert and they deserve hell, or they kill me. And nowhere does he try to justify himself. But in this place of utter darkness, he just cries out to God. Now, in your notes, we put an extra page

with a spot there for you to write out a prayer. How about you not wait until you are in the proverbial belly of the fish, but how about you right now begin to cry out to God and make your request known to him? This would be a great thing, by the way, to share in your disciple group this week. And so Jonah, then 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. This is a common theme throughout the scripture,

that God often uses our greatest setbacks to be set-ups for what God has called us to do. You see, the reality is if dependence on God is the most important reality in our lives, then it would be God's kindness that he would put us in a place to strip away everything else that we depended on so that he and he alone would be in our focus that we would depend on him. You see, it's all through the scriptures. Second Corinthians chapter one, Paul says this, for we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the afflictions we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength

that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received a sentence of death, but that was to make us rely not on ourselves, but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. on him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. How many have heard the phrase, God will never give you more than you can handle?

Sounds awesome, doesn't it? It's just not true. At all. In fact, the point of the scripture is you can't handle this life that you have been given. God gives you this command, be perfect as I am perfect, be holy as I am holy, can't handle that. And all of us have been through things where we say, I can't handle it. That is the point. Self-righteousness is when you look at God and say, forget you, God, I can handle this on my own.

The Apostle Paul says, God sent us things that were beyond our capability to handle on our own. And the reason that he did it is so that we would trust and rely on him alone. That God will give you more than you can handle so that you realize that it is, time for you to hand it all to him and him through you can do everything that he has called you to do. That his divine power has given us everything we need to accomplish everything he has called us to. It's not only in the New Testament, it's all over the Old Testament. The King David in Psalm 34, when he is in a place of great distress, he is facing death, he's been captured by another king and he says this in Psalm 34, 4, I sought the Lord and he answered me and delivered

me from all my fears. Those who look to him are radiant and their faces shall never be ashamed. This poor man cried and the Lord heard him and saved him out of his troubles. The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him and deliver him. Let that one land on you a little bit, church. The angels, the messengers, the warriors of the Lord encamps around those, not those who think God will never give me more than I can handle so I can handle this, but those who understand, without him, I can't handle anything. Then God sends in the supernatural his messengers to encamp around those who fear him and delivers them, oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. Jonah says

From the belly of the fish I cried out And the Lord answered me Kind of makes you wonder Why would God answer Jonah Because I'm telling you I love the parent Whitsom I told you so

I do man Thank God that he is a perfect Heavenly Father and not a reflection of my imperfections as of a father You see why in the world would he answer our prayer in our distress, he's slow to anger. He's slow to anger. One of the things you've got to pay attention to in the scripture is that God is moved

to anger, but the essence of who God is is love. That God is not wrath and God is not anger. God is love and he is slow to anger. And that God knows what he's doing. That God sent the storm for this very purpose. so that Jonah would be brought to the place where he would realize that God and God alone is more than enough. And the Bible says that God's mercies endure forever. Aren't you glad that he is so patient?

Aren't you glad that he's so patient? I'm telling you, man, I am not patient. I don't know why you laugh. I hurt my feelings, man. How are you just going to laugh at me like that? Okay, fine. I am not a patient human being. I try, I know it's a fruit of the spirit, but there's a blockage in there somewhere between the root in the gospel and the fruit that exhibits.

And I'm telling you, nothing brings out my impatience more than coaching little league sports around our city. My impatience has been shown put on display over and over. And I told you about the time, I was coaching t-ball, and I look over at my third baseman. And he was a really good athlete, and I look over, and he's laying on the infield, scooping up. a scoop of infield dirt with his hat. What are you doing? It drives me crazy. We're on the flag football field.

My son's the quarterback and this big kid, not like athletic big either, in flag football, runs over him one day, and you're supposed to touch. It's not like a sport. You understand what I'm saying? It's kind of like soccer. And so, but you get to use your hands because you're American.

so just runs over it. And that the guy doesn't throw a flag where at UNF, the refs all of, I don't know, 19 years old. And I scream at him, what are you doing? And then he looked at me and the guy literally says out loud, with his mouth, I wasn't watching. And I said, you have one job. Then from the other sidelines, we see you, Pastor Jobie. I was like, you shut up too, all right, I ain't patient with you either. I mean, I get frustrated with everything all the time.

It's not good. This is confession. I'm not saying that's okay. And so, like, when I tell you, if you, then this will happen to you, and then that happens to you, and then you cry out, I need help. My instinct is not patience. My instinct is, you idiot. And aren't you glad? Aren't you glad that God does not coach our universe like I have coached our little league teams around the city?

I mean, because I don't know about you, but in my world, man, I continue to struggle with the same things over and over and over. And God's patient abounds in my life. That he is so patient and he is a good, good father in his mercies and His mercies and His mercies. endure forever, and he shows such mercy and grace and patience to me. And so he cries out, and God hears him. And another reason that he hears and answers his prayer is because he's not surprised. He is not surprised. You see, last week we said, A.W. Tozer says, the most important thing about you is what you think about when you think about God, and oftentimes we think God is disappointed in us. God can never be disappointed in you. And the reason that he can

never be disappointed is because disappointment has to do with surprise. The reason you're disappointed in somebody is you expected one thing and you experienced another thing. God has never had an unmet expectation in you because he could see all the days of your life before they were ever formed and knowing all of your sins and all of your mistakes and all of your false promises to him and the 19 times you would recommit your life to Christ and the promises that you would make and I promise I'll He saw all of that from the very beginning to the very end, and then he still decided to choose you, pay for you, and adopt you. To say that God is disappointed in you would be to say that he made a poor decision when he chose to save you.

God doesn't make bad decisions. He loves you. He wants to hear from you. Jonah cries out of the belly of shield, literally hell, I cried. And you have heard my voice. Church, I want you to pay attention to this. No matter how far you run, no matter how far you run, no matter how deep in the pit of despair your life is, you are never too far gone to cry out to God.

You see, Isaiah 591 says the Lord's arms are not too short to save. and a lot of us think, well, you don't know what I've done. I mean, I get, like church people can get saved, but you don't understand my path and my addiction and my betrayal and the things that I have done. And the Word of God says, God doesn't have like the T-Rex arms. That's what we think. We feel like we get too far, and he's like,

I want to get them, but I just can't get them. So I have to bite their head off. That's all I have left. That is not the picture of God in the scriptures. This means you can never be too far gone. Your divorce and your arrest and your sin and your mistake and your betrayal and your addiction and your insecurity, they don't get the last word. That Jesus gets the last word when he says, it is finished. There is no place in all of the cosmos that you can run where God can't chase you down.

This is the essence of the prodigal son. that he was at rock bottom in his life and God used that rock bottom to be the foundation where the Bible says he would come to his senses and that he would repent, he would change direction, and he would come home. And the father, seeing his son from a long way off, ran to him to meet him exactly where he is.

The religious people didn't have a category for it, but God relentlessly pursues his children. He will never, ever, ever give up on you no matter what. Even Jonah, this reluctant missionary. Verse three, he says, for you cast me into the deep, into the heart of the sea, and the flood surrounded me, and your waves and billows passed over me. Notice who the subject is here, you God, that you cast me into the deep. We talked about it last week, but oftentimes,

God sends storms to wake us up. And the crazy one is, even self-inflicted pain is under the sovereign control of an everlasting father. So what do you do? What do you do when you feel like this? What do you do when you look at your circumstances,

you look at your situation, even if you got into it? Or maybe it was somebody else's decision that put you here. what do you do when it feels like the flood is surrounding you the waves and the billows are passing over you? What do you do when you're in over your head?

Well, the Bible's pretty clear and simple here. You cry out to God. This is the essence of the dad in Mark chapter 9 when he's got a sick son and he just doesn't know what to do anymore. And so by faith he hears that Jesus and his disciples are hanging around in this area, he hears about these miracles. The Bible says that he's exhausted all of his resources and trying to get help for his boy medically

and seeing all the avenues he could possibly pursue for his kid. And in desperation, he goes to Jesus and he can't find Jesus. Jesus is up on the mountain of Transfiguration with Peter James and John. And so he bumps into the disciples and he's like, all right, this is close.

And he goes to the disciples in Mark 9, and it's like, all right, can you all heal? Can you in the name of Jesus heal my kid? When Jesus shows up, they're in this argument. The disciples, instead of focusing on the needs of this boy, they get into a doctrinal conversation with the Pharisees because the church has changed. Jesus has this incredible counter with his dad. And the dad's like, hey, man, you're my only hope. I brought my boy to the disciples.

they couldn't do it. Can you? He says, if you can, will you heal my boy? Jesus says, if I can, all things are possible for the one who believes. All things are possible for the one who believes. And the dad's response is, I believe, help me overcome my unbelief. You see this? That the dad's prayer is not a prayer bathed in faith. The dad's prayer is, the dad's prayer is, you know, and the dad's prayer is, is I don't know where else to go. I don't know what else to do. I've tried everything else in my life. And the pain that I'm experiencing with the pain of my son,

there is something wrong with him that's trying to kill us, is what he says. And all I know to do is to bring the little itsy-bitsy, little bit of faith that I have that maybe you can do something. All I know to do is bring it to you. Listen, when you look at your circumstances like this dad look to his circumstances or like when Jonah looks at his circumstances, and he thinks this is out of control, and I don't know what to do, and I'm overwhelmed,

what do you do? You do what the dad does. You just come to Jesus with whatever you got. Because, by the way, any faith that you might have in him is a gift from God. You didn't muster that up on your own. And Jonah, in utter desperation, just cries out to God. The dad says, I believe, help me overcome my unbelief.

and Jonah cries out to God. You see, the belly of the whale is uncomfortable. It's confining. You don't get to determine when you get out. And think about this. I don't know what the swim lessons were like in Jerusalem back in the day. I'm imagining Jonah isn't the greatest swimmer of all time. But even if he is and somehow he were to work his way out of the belly of the whale,

he's still just in the bottom of the ocean. It ain't getting better. He does not see a way out of this. And in his desperation, he cries out. Now we're tempted to look at our circumstances and say, is God punishing me? And the answer is not if you're in Christ. Because Christ has already sustained

the full wrath of God. John chapter 9 makes this very clear. In John chapter 9, there's a blind man crying out for help and the disciples are confused about the justice of God. And so they asked Jesus, hey, Jesus is this man born blind. Who's getting punished? He getting punished? His parents getting punished.

And Jesus makes it very clear that is not how it works in the new covenant. That is not how God works. But this man is going through what he is going through for the glory of God. And oftentimes as Christians, we put more faith in our circumstances than our sovereign Savior. here. We think that somehow God is punishing us because it's not going the way we wanted it to go, and little do we know what God is doing is he is providing for us because he's a good, good father. Then I said, I am driven away from your sight, yet I shall look, I shall again look upon your holy temple. My opinion, this is the moment of salvation for Jonah.

This is the moment where Jonah finally surrenders his life. life to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. It says, then I said, I am driven away from your sight. I think he's talking about physically, geographically, the temple, the presence of the Lord is over here in Jerusalem, and I'm in a fish going on the, I'm going in another direction. And there is nothing that I can do to get myself back there, but all I can do is this, yet I shall again look upon your holy temple. the Holy Temple was the presence of God. He's not saying I can do anything about my salvation. All I can do is look to you for my salvation.

By the way, this phrase, Look upon your Holy Temple is the same phrase that Jesus talks about in John chapter 3 when he's trying to explain to Nicodemus what salvation is. And Nicodemus was a Pharisee, rooted in the Old Testament. And so he points Nicodemus back to when Moses was with the Israelites and everybody was snake-bitten. and they wake up one day and they're all snakebitten

and they've got poison on the inside of their veins and they're like, what do we do? And you can't be cured from the outside. Ointment ain't going to do it, push-ups, good eating, that's not going to do it. That they had poison running through their veins. And God tells Moses to make a bronze snake and hold it up on a pole

and anybody that would look to that would be saved. And then Jesus in John chapter 3 with Nicodemus says, I'm like that. That every single one of us have poison running through our veins, and it's called sin. And there's nothing you can do from the outside end. What it requires is for you to fix your eyes on me and trust that when I died on the cross, that counted for you, and then you will be saved. This is what Jonah is alluding to.

You see, when you read the Old Testament as a post-resurrection Christian, it's like watching the sixth sense for the second time. it changes everything because you can't watch it the second time right at first you're like what is happening here but when you know that I see dead people because they're dead then the second time you're like I get it so everything in the whole book points to one person

and his name is Jesus I think this is the place of surrender for Jonah which is the same thing true of us the book of Hebrews chapter 12 will say it this way therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, and by the way, the great cloud of witnesses that they're talking about here is for some, everything went awesome, and they put their faith in Jesus. For some, they push back armies, they shut the mouth of lions, that God gave back children from the dead, and for others they were sawn into, that they were fed to the lions. And yet all of them put their faith, not in their circumstances, but in their sovereign

king. Therefore, since we are surrounded by faithful men and women like that, so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and sin which cling so closely and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. Every single one of us are running. You're either running towards the prize that God has laid out for us, or in rebellion, we are running from the call of God in our lives. And you know what determines the direction that you run? It determines where you set your eyes. He says, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfector of our faith. You see, if you want to change direction, you've got to change your focus. And I think in this moment, this is where Jonah changes his focus to look to

the presence of God and then his life changes direction. This is what it means to be saved by grace through faith. And as a result of that, you repent and you change direction. Remember in the book of Matthew, the apostle Peter's in the boat. It's nighttime. They're rowing across the Sea of Galilee. They look up and Jesus walking on the water. And you know, Peter's going to say stuff.

He always says stuff. They're all freaking out and think it's a ghost. They say, Jesus, if that's really you, tell me to come out there with you on the water. And the reason, by the way, is because Peter didn't consider himself a Christian. He was a follower of Jesus. You know what followers do? They follow the leader. So if the leader can walk on water and I put my faith in the leader, then I should be able to follow the leader on water.

That's what that means. And so Jesus is like, come on. and Peter the Bible says gets out of the boat everybody else is freaking out Peter's walking on the water then the Bible says that he shifts his eyes off of the author the perfector of his faith

and he puts his eyes on the wind and the waves and he begins to sink and the good news of the gospel is the Bible says Jesus immediately reaches out his hand. Peter says, Lord save me. And just like God's reply

to Jonah here, Jesus replies with great mercy. Great mercy. He didn't go, I told you. Won't you just stay fixed on me? Then this won't happen. That's not what he does. Immediately he reaches out his hand and he pulls him out and then he says this, oh, you of little faith. Oh, you

of little faith. By the way, in that moment, this is just my two sentence. You know what Peter was doubting? Peter wasn't doubting Jesus. Peter was doubting himself. Because Jesus wasn't sinking. Jesus was doing just fine on the water.

Peter didn't look and would be like, oh no, Jesus, you're going to drown. He gets super self-focused. He goes, oh, no, I'm going to drown. But if Jesus is the one that called you out onto the water, then Jesus will sustain you while you're out on the water. And if Jesus is the one that calls you to Nineveh, then Jesus will be the one that sustains you in Nineveh. And Paul says in 1st Corinthians 1,

and even if you die in your obedience to God, I got really good news. He's already been delivered from death, therefore he can deliver you and I from death, so were you afraid of? God is so patient, so patient with us. Verse 5, and the waters closed in over me to take my life. The deep surrounded me.

weeds were wrapped around my head at the roots of the mountain and I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me forever. I know there's a bunch of folks that walk in our church this weekend and these are the words that describe the way you feel right now. You feel like the waters of your circumstances are closing in over you to take your life. you feel like the deep by the way in the old testament the deep the ocean it represented chaos and disorder

and you feel like there's chaos and disorder and it is surrounding you and that weeds are wrapped around your head and that the bars are closed upon me forever you see proverb 1312 says this it says hope deferred makes the heart sick Hope deferred makes the heart sick. And I'll tell you what hope deferred means. Hope is when you look at your circumstances and you begin to feel hopeless and helpless. And what am I going to do? And in these moments, what begins to happen is the sea and the waters, much like Peter,

and like Jonah, the sea and the waters and the seaweed and the circumstances and the bills and the loneliness and the addiction. and the sin and the divorce, they just keep getting bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger in your life. And the God of the universe, from your perspective, seems to be getting smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller. And what do you do? What do you do when the sin just seems to like wrap around your head? And what do you do when the addiction is dragging you deeper and deeper and deeper?

and what do you do when that lost loved one ain't coming back? And what do you do when somebody that you love or it's you, you get the phone call from the doctor that you're sick? What do you do when you're just looking at the bank account and you're looking at the bills and there's a big gap there and you feel hopeless? What Jonah teaches us is this, is that if you put your hopes in your circumstances,

you will always be let down. hope comes in the person of Jesus and if the tomb is empty that means anything is possible and so he cries out he says yet you brought me you brought up my life from the pit oh lord my god when my life was fainting away i remembered you and my prayer came to you into your holy temple so not only are you never too far gone not only is your sin never bigger than the grace of God on the cross. Not only are you never too far gone, but also in this life, it is never too late. See the thief on the cross.

He's got nothing to offer the Lord except his life. And one of the thieves on the cross, who I'm sure all the religious people said, it's too late for you and you are too far gone. Jesus has a different message. The Thief on the Cross says, would you remember me when you go before your father in heaven? And Jesus says, truly, truly, I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise. Do you know when the best time to cry out to an eternal God is today? Because it's never, ever, ever too late.

And then one of the most important verses in all of the Book of Jonah. It's right in the middle. There's 23 verses in front of it and I think 24 behind it. It is the central verse. It says, Those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of step-by's love. I don't know what that means. The NIV says it this way, and it makes more sense to me.

Those who pay regard to vain idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs. You see, essentially, what Jonah is saying is this. This world will always fail you. And if you put your trust and faith in the little G. God, of this world. If you put your faith, even in the good gifts of God, and you treat a good thing like a God thing, that's a bad thing, because God will not be a means to your own idolatry. And when you put your faith in your finances, it'll let you down.

And when you put your faith in relationships, they will let you down. And when you put your faith in your comfort, I promise you, it makes you promises it can never, ever keep. And when it lets you down, it will be deathly silent. those who pay regard to vain idols, the things of this world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life. Those who worship those things forfeit the grace that could be theirs. They forsake their hope of steadfast love. Verse 9, but I, with the voice of Thanksgiving, will sacrifice to you.

What I have vowed, I will pay. I need you to see this, that this is very. very personal to Jonah. This is very personal to Jonah. He says, I, 10 times in eight verses. He says, my seven times in eight verses. Not my salvation is because of my heritage. Not my salvation is because I worked in the temple. But what he is saying is, my salvation is, this is personal between me and God. And he says, but I, with the voice of Thanksgiving, will sacrifice to you, what I have vowed, I will pay, and then see these words, salvation belongs to the Lord. You see, salvation is not about circumstances. Notice.

Physically speaking, he has not been delivered or saved yet. He just went from drowning to the belly of the well. I don't know that's an upgrade. Okay? It's just a longer death. And he does it. It's not a if you get me out of this one. It's not a, all right, If you can save me, then I'll change. That's not surrender. That's let's make a deal. Right now, before anything has changed in his life, while the seaweed is still wrapped around his head,

he's there for three days and three nights with nothing but him in darkness, cramped, not smelling great. He says this, salvation belongs to the Lord, because it's in this moment that Jonah begins to realize that salvation has not. nothing to do with your circumstances. Salvation means you get God. And that for him is what salvation is.

You see, Jesus and Matthew 12 wants us to know that the Savior of Jonah ain't a fish. The Savior of Jonah is the sovereign king of the universe, and his name is Jesus. Then verse 10, and the Lord spoke to the fish. And again, man, two for two, the fish does what God says. Please don't be outfaced by a fish. And the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah out upon the dry land.

The only thing worse than puking is being puked. Okay? So please make room for him to do what he wants. Or he will make room for him to do what he wants. You see, here's the point. You are never too far gone to cry out to God. You are never too far gone. It is not too late to cry out to God.

And what you saw as punishment and what you saw as nothing but pain, I'm not saying it wasn't painful. Whether it came through self-inflicted wounds or somebody else sending against you in your life, that the sovereign king of the universe can use that very pain to be the provision in your life to take you to the exact place that God wants you so you can understand how much he loves you. C.S. Lewis says this about prayer. I pray because I can't help myself. I pray because I am helpless. I pray because the need flows out of me all the time, waking and sleeping, it doesn't change God. It changes me. Jonah's prayer in the belly of the fish did not change him circumstances. It changed him in light of his sovereign Savior. And so, look, man, this is going to be a little bit

clunky the way we're going to end because we're going to do kind of a two responses. So hang with me here. I know that some of you have walked in here and you feel like the waves are overtaking you. And maybe for the first time in your entire life you have heard that God does give you more than you can handle. And you're in a place right now in your life and you feel like this is more than I can handle. The pain that I'm walking through right now with the loss of a loved one is more than I can handle. The pain of infertility is more than I can handle. That I've got a broken relationship with somebody that I dearly loved. And now, when I hear their name or see their face, all I feel is pain and bitterness, and this is more than I can handle. Or some of you are looking at your life

and you're thinking, the pain that I'm in is a result of my own decision. It's a consequence of my own sin. And I'm stuck forever. What am I going to do? Or you look at your prodigal son, your prodigal daughter, and it eats at your soul. You have these hopes and dreams, and you brought that little boy, that little girl home from the hospital, and you want to negotiate with God. God, what are you doing? I did what you said. I did what my church told me to do.

I raised them in the church, and now they're off fleeing towards Tarshish. And you feel like this is more than I can handle. or it's an addiction and you've made 10,000 promises and you go to meetings and you do all of that stuff and you just feel like it's more than I can handle and if you're honest, you feel like Jonah feels.

Maybe not physically, but you feel like there's that seaweed over your head. You feel like the waves are crashing in on top of you and you know right now I'm not talking to somebody else, I'm talking to you. The loneliness is just overwhelming. And you know the right things to say.

You come to church all the time. You show up and you're like, Jesus is enough. But alone in your apartment, they don't feel like that. Are your kids sick? And you're right where that dad is. In Mark chapter 9, I believe, God, I believe, but you're going to have to help me overcome my unbelief. Maybe that's where you are.

What do you do? You cry out to God. And I'm going to ask you at all of our locations to do something incredibly brave. I told you last week, one of Jonah's biggest problems is nowhere in the book of Jonah do you see his friends show up to help him, not to this point.

In one of the ways that God provides for his children is through his church. And brothers and sisters, you don't have to do this alone. And so we're going to pray. And I want to pray for you. And again, I'm not talking about the person that you hopes hears this message one day. I'm talking about you.

Are you overwhelmed? You feel like the bars are closing in? You feel like the seaweed is wrapped around. Do you feel like the waves are on top of you and you're going deeper and deeper and deeper into whatever it is? That you wake up every day and you're depressed. And in your theological categories of the Christianity you grew up in,

you didn't even think that it was supposed to be a category for you, except you just can't talk yourself out of it, Theologically. Is that you? Then there's one response. You cry out to your Heavenly Father. But the good news of the gift of his church is you don't have to do that alone. So we're going to pray at all of our campuses. I'm going to ask you to bow your head. And if you would say that is you, if you would say, here I am, and I feel hopeless, and I feel helpless, and I feel like my heart is sick, because hope deferred makes the heart sick. If that's you right where you are, I pray that have the courage. Would you just stand up? Right where you are. Would you stand up? Would you say,

God, here I am. I am hurting and my circumstances are overwhelming. And all I know to do right now, come on, I'm talking to you, stand up. And all I know to do right now is to cry out to you because you're the only one that is sovereign over these circumstances. Now, if you're sitting around these folks that are standing up because they're all over the place, would you just, just reach your hand out, grab them on the elbow, grab them on the shoulder. And can we just do what Jonah does? Can we just cry out to God?

Our good and gracious, Heavenly Father, God, we confess to you that you're still in charge of the storms. And God, though we don't understand it, and though this may not be the script that we would write for ourselves, God, we trust that you can deliver us, not just from this storm, God, but you can deliver us from fear and you can deliver us into faith. God, I pray for these men and women.

God, I pray for the men and Baker and union that are standing. God, I pray for the men and women and the students at all of our locations. God, I pray for the men and women listening and podcasts that are standing right now, saying, I feel helpless and hopeless. And, God, I thank you, I thank you, that we don't have to be hopeless because our hope is in the person and work of Jesus Christ. And that God, that there is more to this life than just living and breathing. There is more to this life than the years that we have here.

And that any pain that we are walking through now, it's not meaningless, but you are working in it for our own good. And you are working in it for your glory. And so, God, we confess that. Lord, whether you redeem us and save us and spit us out on dry land or, God, we carry this burden, Lord Way, we understand that we cast all our burdens on you. God, I pray for the prayer life of 1122, and I pray that our prayer life would move from complaining to you to shifting our burden onto you, because you said cast all your anxieties upon you because you care for us. And God, we pray, we pray in the powerful name of Jesus.

That at that name, that demons flee, that eyes are open, that hearts are here, that hearts are healed, that sickness is cured. God, that faith is restored. We put our faith and we put our hope, we put our trust in you. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen. Now round two, if you will keep your heads bowed and your eyes closed. Maybe, eternally speaking, you feel hopeless and you feel helpless because you have never gotten to the place in your life where you said salvation belongs to the Lord. either you've never thought about salvation before or you thought salvation was up to your own activity. And today, for the very first time, you realize that spiritually speaking you are in the deep, that spiritually speaking you were in the belly of the will.

You are in shield separated from God. And today, for the very first time in your life, you are ready to turn your eyes to Jesus, to trust that when he died on the cross that somehow that counted for you. and that for you, this would be the day that you would confess salvation belongs to the Lord. And so if that's you, right where you are, I want you to just confess that to him in whatever words you want to use. And if you would say today, I admit it, I'm a sinner that needs a Savior. And today, I believe that somehow when Christ died on the cross, that counted for me. And in this moment, you're ready to confess him as Lord.

I would just invite you to raise your hand and say, Father, here I am. is not a hand in the air that saves you is Christ, finish work on the cross that does. Our good and gracious Heavenly Father, God, we love you and we thank you that salvation is in your house. God, I thank you that just like you relentlessly pursued Jonah and chased them down, God, that you have chased down these sons and daughters of yours this very day. And God, I thank you that salvation belongs to you and you alone. And God, I thank you that there is no disappointment because you knew exactly what you were getting

when you purchased and adopted these, your sons and daughters. And we pray this all in Jesus' name. Amen. Church, would you please stand? The gospel demands a response. The gospel demands a response. We're going to sing. We're going to bring.

And if you've ever prayed before in your life in church, now's the time. We're going to pray. and we make a big deal about this here at 1122. It's why we make space down here for you. And so whether you feel like here in the belly of a well or if you're on top of the highest mountain, won't you come?

Would you come and kneel before your God and your maker who through Jesus Christ is your heavenly father? And he says, want you bringing it at me? Come on, knock. Come on, seek. Come on find. Why don't you keep asking and asking and asking? So let us sing, let us bring, and let us pray.

Let's respond.