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Hello my “Walking with Jesus ” friends,
Have you ever stood in a place which has a very long history, where many significant events have occurred over the centuries, maybe even the millennia? Israel has many of those places and today, I invite us to spend some time in one of them. Today it’s a southern suburb of Tel-Aviv known as Jaffa. In the Bible it was called Joppa. Join me, for there are important lessons to be learned in this ancient city.
In the days of kings David and Solomon you may recall great construction projects, including the Temple of God and the Palace of the Forest of Lebanon (2 Chron. 9:20) in Jerusalem, and even there was a fleet of trading ships that was built. These were very complex projects and required some materials not available near Jerusalem. Special timbers were needed in great quantity and king Hiram of Tyre formed an alliance with both kings David and Solomon and agreed to supply Lebanese timbers for these great projects in Israel. 2 Chronicles 2 says “King Hiram of Tyre sent word to Solomon…we will cut all the logs from Lebanon that you need and will float them as rafts by sea down to Joppa. You can then take them up to Jerusalem.” This occurred around 970bc. Tyre is today the seventh largest city in modern Lebanon.
About 1000 years later, the Apostle Peter was in this same seaside town of Joppa, staying at the home of a man named ‘Simon the Tanner’ (Acts 9:42,43) when suddenly some men showed up searching for Peter and saying they had traveled from the great city of Caesarea.
They were sent by Roman Centurion Cornelius, and they insisted Peter return with them to meet with Cornelius. Centurion Cornelius was a God worshiper and wanted to know about the famous Jesus. Dr. Luke records this remarkable event for us in Acts 10 and friends, you may know this historic moment became a major turning point for the spread of the Gospel around the world. As Roman Centurion Cornelius, and those gathered in his home, heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ, as explained by Peter, one of Jesus’ disciples and close friends, the Holy Spirit came upon these Gentiles, and for the first time non-Jews were born again and drawn into the family of God, ‘the Church’ as Jesus has called us.
In between those two major events in Joppa, something else happened which I’d like us to focus on for a couple of days. It was in about the year 770bc. Jeroboam II was king of the northern nation of Israel, and Uzziah, whom we met yesterday, was king of the southern nation of Judah. Yesterday I explained how God frequently raised up specific men or women to speak His prophetic words of warning to the kings and God’s people, especially if they were drifting away from God. These prophets of Israel had already included Elijah and Elisha in the previous years, and then God raised up another prophet named Jonah.
If you visit the seaside town of Jaffa today there is a life size sculpture of a whale in the city square, because of the famous story of the prophet Jonah, who boarded a ship in this Joppa port, as he attempted to run away from God, and both the message and the mission God had entrusted to Jonah. Let’s dig into this famous story a bit, for there are important lessons for you and me today.
This great fish story is actually about all we know of Jonah, for he appears only once in 2 Kings 14:25 in a passing reference that he had given a prophetic word from God to king Jeroboam II. While many people scoff at Jonah’s story, Jesus referred to Jonah and the importance of his experience with this great fish, as a key part of Jesus’ message of warning to the crowds who doubted Jesus’ true identity and His mission of redemption for a sinful world. (Luke 11:29-32)
Jonah’s story is only four short chapters, and is tucked in between the prophecies of Obadiah and Micah in the section of your Bible which has many of the Prophet messages recorded for us. Jonah received a clear but frightening message from God. “Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before Me.” (Jonah 1:2) Nineveh was a prominent city in its day, perhaps one of the largest cities of the world. It was soon to become the capital of the entire Empire of Assyria, the dominant force in the world in Jonah’s time. As you can see by this map of that era, this would have been an overland trip by foot of several hundred miles for Jonah, first north from Joppa and then east to Nineveh, along the Tigris river. It would have been a rugged, very long journey, perhaps taking several weeks. Today Nineveh is the common name for about 1/2 of the city of Mosul, Iraq.
http://www.christianityoasis.com/Keyword/BibleMaps.htm
The message from God shocked Jonah. Either Jonah had totally misunderstood what God had said or God was planning to do something so radical, so illogical, so far beyond reasonable that it caused Jonah to run the opposite direction from God’s instructions. Now before we throw stones, let’s be honest friends. When was the last time you felt a conviction or leading from God that you should do or say something, but you resisted, maybe you even refused? As we look around our broken world, do we sometimes think it’s time for God’s judgement? But what if God has a different plan, motivated by His outrageous love and compassion for people, millions of people who live in blind slavery to the dark kingdom? (2 Cor. 4:4)
Nineveh was famous world wide as perhaps the most wicked, immoral city in the world in Jonah’s day. The Assyrian army was almost beyond description in their viciousness as they invaded and destroyed cities and towns in their sweep of conquering vast regions of the world. In Jonah’s heart and mind Nineveh deserved an outpouring of God’s wrath similar to what God had done to Sodom and Gomorrah (Gen. 19). But the tone of God’s message to Jonah was not one of certain calamity but rather God’s use of the word “preach” suggested God might consider mercy rather than extermination. Jonah knew God’s great desire, from the beginning of time, has always been that sinful people would turn… away from their evil, turn to God in humble repentance, and be delivered by God from their sinful bondage.
Jonah’s concern was not for his life, even though it was possible he, a Jewish prophet, might simply be killed as soon as he opened his mouth in Nineveh. Jonah’s greater concern was that if he did go and preach about God in that horrible city of Nineveh, the people might actually believe him, turn away from their wicked ways, repent, and turn to God. And if they did that, then God might NOT destroy them with His wrath, but God might actually pardon them, receive their worship, and maybe even bless them!
Oh my, that was beyond outrageous. It was not justice, it would not be fair! Wouldn’t it be better if Nineveh never heard of the God of Israel and His love? Then they would die in their wickedness! And wouldn’t that be more fair then for Nineveh to be given a chance to repent and change, and come to know Jonah’s great, loving and holy God? That’s what I believe Jonah was thinking as he went to Joppa looking for a ship to take him the opposite direction from Nineveh. How similar might you or I have been if we had been in his sandals?
Now pause a moment friends. As you watch the evening news, or read the newspapers in your city or listen to community gossip, what have you been thinking God should do around our world in these days? More specifically, what seems appropriate justice from God for all the evil and even the apathy or opposition toward God, God’s Truth, even God’s people where you live? How long has it been since you’ve considered this powerful statement Peter wrote, perhaps as he reflected on that day he went from Joppa to Cornelius’ house? “The LORD is not slow in keeping His promise, as some understand slowness. Instead He is patient, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” (2 Peter 3:9) What might be deep in God’s heart for the people of your city, today, my “Walking with Jesus” friends?
Could I invite us all to read Jonah chapters 1 & 2 today. Now don’t get hung up on how big the fish must have been, or how enough oxygen could be in the belly of that fish to sustain Jonah for three days, or how terrifying it must have been for Jonah to be thrown overboard and swallowed alive by a huge fish? You see my friends, as we read God’s Word we have to decided… is it all true, just as it is written and has been passed down to you and me over the centuries, unchanged?
Is God miraculous enough that whether it’s opening a roadway in the Red Sea for 1 million escaping Hebrew slaves and their animals or it’s feeding those 1 million people for 40 years with Manna from heaven or it’s the walls of Jericho falling down with only a shout or it’s the sun stopping still in the sky for a full day so Joshua could keep fighting. . .or ANY of the miracles of God in the Bible… is God Omnipotent, powerful enough that He can do them just as they are recorded for us?
Read those first two chapters, perhaps more than once, and let the Holy Spirit of God speak His truth to you about what God was doing in the storm? What was God doing in Jonah’s moment to declare who he was and WHO his God was / in the sudden calming of the storm / in God’s provision of a giant fish? Then look around your world… do you see evidence of God showing His mighty power AND His patience with an immoral, wicked world?
Then look at Jonah’s reflections and prayer in chapter two. What is the Holy Spirit saying to you and me today, 2700 years after this event, in the modern context of our sinful world?
Finally, let’s look back over our life journeys my friends.
WHEN has God shown up with His protection, His provision, His help in our storms?
WHAT has God done to meet our needs, answer our desperation, and show us His full understanding of our need?
HOW has God shown His great love for us?
And what has been our response to Him?
I urge you to spend some time with Jesus right now, as you reflect, and thank Him, reaffirming your total trust in His Lordship over your life!
This weekend, we’ll see how this Jonah story ends, and what important lessons God has for us in 2020.
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Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.
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Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)
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