 beginning at verse one reading to verse three and then I'm going to give you a prolonged introduction and Get into the study Jonah chapter one beginning at verse one now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of amity saying arise Go to Nineveh that great city and cry out against it for their wickedness has come up before me But Jonah arose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish So he paid the fare and went down into it to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord Let me give you an introduction to the book of Jonah and then what we'll do is we'll develop this study and Look at some very basic things about it's only 17 verses And so we ought to be able to cover most of this tonight in a very Fairly casual, but factual way. Let me give you the background Jonah is a prophet Jonah lived around 760 before Christ and he was from a region called Zebulun Which is by the in the north by the Sea of Galilee according to 2nd Kings 1425 Jonah ministered as a prophet during the reign of a king named Jeroboam the second who was the king of Israel Jonah is often referred to as the reluctant prophet and That's because after his initial call he chose to flee rather than fulfill the commission God had given to him Now I immediately find this interesting especially when you compare it with the call of other Galileans When we're looking in the gospel of Matthew for example in chapter 2 verses 20 and verse 22 Those verses tell us that Peter James John and Andrew after receiving the call from the Lord immediately responded and answered But Jonah on the other hand Rejected the call and actually tried to escape from God Now in this book God has a message he has a message for an ancient and evil city called Nineveh Nineveh was the ancient capital city of Assyria Assyria is Ancient Iraq and it was the greatest city of its day When you look at the Bible you discover in Genesis chapter 10 verses 8 through 11 That this city was founded by a man by the name of Nimrod When you read concerning Nimrod you might find it interesting to know it and I'm not going to give you a study Concerning Nimrod, but it's interesting when you look at him that his name meant rebellion and So this city was actually founded by a man named rebellion in Genesis chapter 10 verses 8 through 11. It says Kush was the father of Nimrod who grew to be a mighty warrior on the earth He was a mighty hunter before the Lord That is why it is said like Nimrod a mighty hunter before the Lord And when you look at like Nimrod a mighty hunter The literal translation as I have seen it through commentators is like this like Nimrod a mighty hunter of men Before or against the Lord? That's what he was all about so the first centers of his kingdom were Babylon Eric Akkad and Colne in Shinar from that land he went to Assyria where he built Nineveh, so it's a very ancient city During the time of Jonah again 760 BC Nineveh had become a great city According to chapter 4 when we get there verse 11 it had a population of no less than a hundred and twenty thousand Now to you that may not mean much because obviously here we here in the United States have cities that number in the millions When you combine for example Chino Chino Hills you have over a hundred and twenty thousand people by itself Ontario's got like a hundred and eighty thousand people So we don't really think in terms of that being large But indeed it was because most of the cities in all would have been very small in population And and many would have really been called like villages So when you have a city of no less than a hundred and twenty thousand that really in ancient times was an immense an immense city It took three days to walk around this city if you include walking through what would be called the suburbs And if you began to go into the center of the city, it was a full day's journey It was an extremely wicked nation It was known for extreme cruelties when you look into some history related to to Assyria and all There are certain things that I gleaned so I can give you instances of this from some of the The chronicles of its kings from the histories of its kings and there are comments that they wrote that were discovered That have been preserved and these are things that were written by some of their kings for example there was a King named Asher Nasser Paul and He wrote he wrote I stormed the mountain peaks and took them in the midst of the mighty mountain I slaughtered them with their blood. I died the mountain red like wool the heads of their warriors I cut off and I formed them into a pillar over against their wall their young men and their maidens I burned in the fire He wrote concerning the capture of a leader He wrote concerning this I flayed him his skin. I spread upon the wall of the city He spoke of mutilating bodies of live captives stacking their corpses in piles That was Asher Nasser Paul Shaman Esser Boasted the second boasted of his cruelties after campaign. He said a pyramid of heads I reared in front of his city their youths and their maidens. I burnt up in flames Then you have Sennacherib. I cut their throats like lambs. I cut off their precious lives as one cuts a string Like the many waters of a storm. I made the contents of their gullets and entrails run down upon the wide earth their hands I cut off Then you have Asher Bonapal He was describing the treatment of a captured leader. He said I pierced his chin with my keen hand dagger Through his jaw I passed a rope put a dog chain upon him and made him occupy a kennel He later boasted of hanging Egyptian corpses on stakes and stripped off their skins and covered the city walls with them These were nice guys No wonder the prophet Naim Wrote concerning Nineveh in Naim chapter 3 verse 1 woe to the city of blood Full of lies full of plunder never without victims He said in chapter 3 verse 19 nothing can heal your wound your injury is fatal Everyone who hears the news about you claps his hands at your fall for who has not felt your endless cruelty so a Syria its capital city Nineveh had a terrible reputation an evil reputation It was horribly evil and yet in spite of this incredible evil God desires to deliver them from impending judgment When you look at the book of Jonah, what is its message? Let me give you some things to see again laying its context so that as I read through it You'll get a grasp of it a better grasp One of the things you see the first thing you see the message of the book is that God loves the whole world God loves the whole world not just a single person and not just a single nation He loves the world John 3 16 God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life First lesson we can glean from this is God loves the whole world You see Israel was to reveal the love of God to the world as The elect covenantal nation of God Isaiah 49 3 Reads he said to me you are my servant. Oh Israel in whom I will be glorified Paul and 1st Timothy 2 3 and 4 said it like this This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior who will have all men to be saved and To come unto the knowledge of the truth God loves the world and would have all men to be saved So this book serves to remind Israel of its missionary purpose Secondly the book reveals that God will have his way because after all he is the Lord of all the earth Israel has been unfaithful Unfaithful in his mission yet. God still wants his message to be delivered and He made sure his message of salvation is delivered even as we'll see in chapter 2 verse 9 Where Jonah says salvation is of the Lord A third thing we see is the response of the Gentiles Because the response of the Gentiles serves as a rebuke to sinful Israel You see the response of the pagan sailors serves as a contrast with Jonah's hostility These these people were concerned with a Jewish prophet But he wasn't concerned with a great city And his hatred for the Ninevites prejudiced him against preaching repentance for salvation You know, there are people even today in the church Who would not have any problem whatsoever Hearing that somebody that they don't like died and went to hell They still have that kind of mentality somebody offended somebody hurt them somebody did something wrong to them And they're almost reading the obituaries waiting just to see that name in it So they can rejoice And that was unfortunately the heart of Jonah And a fourth thing before we get into the actual study of the book a fourth thing Is Jonah is a symbol to Israel of the nation's disobedience to God and indifference Jonah was disobedient to God He fled When God said to go And when he's taken into that great fish It's a picture of God's displeasure with the nation of Israel But when he repents it represents God's desire to forgive and to restore and to use for his glory That's what we're going to see as we begin this study of the book of Jonah verse one Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of amity the word of the Lord The word of the Lord came Is a phrase that reveals Jonah to be a prophet He was to speak to the people the mind of God As it says in Deuteronomy 18 18 and we'll put my words in his mouth and he will tell them everything I command him Or aim is three seven Surely the Lord God does nothing unless he reveals his secret to the servants his servants the prophets So when it says the word of the Lord came it's another way of saying Jonah was a prophet God's word came to him so that he might speak forth the message of God to the people that he intended God intended to communicate to And so God intended to use him to preach God's message And as a prophet Jonah is under the orders orders and he and he ordinarily would have obeyed immediately Because that's what prophets do But he got his orders And when he got his orders, well, he didn't he didn't respond. Well, here are your orders arise go to ninova that great city cry out against it For their wickedness has come up before me So God gives them orders you're to go to ninova now ninova was located 550 miles to the north and the east of Of samaria it was on the tigress river If Jonah rises up and walks there, it's going to take him about a month So it's a month's journey to go from israel that area of israel All the way up to the northeast Into this place and he's going to bring a message notice the message you are to preach against the city And when it says you're to preach against the city, this is a message of impending judgment You are to pronounce its doom God is about to destroy For their wickedness Now according to chapter three verse eight, it's an evil city filled with violence Again in the book of neyam in chapter three verses three and four as neyam was describing ninova He spoke of it as having charging cavalry flashing swords glittering spears Many casualties piles of dead bodies without number of people stumbling over corpses All because of the wanton lust of a harlot Alluring the mistress of sorceries who enslaved nations by her prostitution and people by her witchcraft They hated ninova And god was looking down from heaven if you will And god saw it. It's not that god ignores. It's not that god doesn't see there have been times when when i have said, oh lord It seems as if your eyes are closed to this Don't you see God's eyes are not closed to it God's eyes were not closed in but god does have patience But what are the things we need to know about god's patience is god's patience has its limits You may be an immensely patient person You may be one of those people that seems unperturbed and unruffled under any circumstances But eventually your your patience gets to its limit You might find this interesting i'm I've grown to become a a pretty non-reactive person So my kids my kids Often don't know when something's bothering me They just because i don't tell them I don't act as if it is i'm actually if it's really bothering me i take it to the lord And and that's what i'm doing or if there's a concern of some sort I kind of keep it to myself. So they really don't know When something's going on that they should be concerned about so not that long ago We had a barbeque during the summer. We had a barbeque And i happened to be a meat eater carnivore and i was eating And as i was eating i swallowed and when i swallowed the food didn't go all the way down Yeah, so i was sitting down And i can't breathe And i'm just sitting there So i think hmm You're gonna die Because breathing is a fundamental to life And choki's not good So i get some water nobody nobody notices i get some water i start to drink it It won't go down Because the food is blocking the water so i can't flush my throat So i stand up And i start walking And i'm looking around to see who's going to save me I have a son-in-law who's trained To take care of people in emergencies And my son david So my son-in-law looks at me because i'm walking very slowly i'm not saying anything i'm not reacting And my son-in-law says Are you okay? And my son davids Sees that i i'm going like this And He's joking But you wouldn't know So he runs Graves me and starts trying to dislodge with that heimlich maneuver He doesn't know how to do it But my son-in-law does So he jumps off the couch comes running into the kitchen Puts his fist into my chest lifts me off my feet presses me Presses me again and finally the food's dislodged They didn't know there was anything wrong Because i don't react I'm not i'm not a quick reactor If somebody does something that is really bothersome to me You probably won't even know it for a while until i tell you you know That's probably as far as you need to go you need to stop now because you're crossing a line and i do it like that I don't get all red faced. You know what? I don't play that, you know Because i learned a long time ago That you need to have reserve right and and god is reserved He's very patient But you may think That you are okay with god And you stay in sin and and and you think he must be okay. He hasn't done anything about it yet When the lord is just Showing his patience to us the lord is not slow in keeping his promise as some understand slowness He is patient with you not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance So what gives us the impression that he's all right with us is really god's long suffering with us And he was suffering long with ninova But it had reached the top It's time It's over It's time to deal with it And he's sending a prophet And he says you tell them Destruction is coming Destruction is coming So Jonah verse three arose to flee to tarshish from the presence of the lord He went down to japa found a ship going to tarshish So he paid the fare went down into it to go with them to tarshish from the presence of the lord Jonah i want you to go to tarshish. No I'm going to go in the opposite direction I'm going to leave and i'm actually going to go in a direction. You didn't ask me to go He was motivated by his hatred for asyria and his misplaced nationalism Now the thing is jonah's not afraid of the difficulty of preaching to them But he was afraid and you'll see this when we get to the end in chapter four. You'll see this. It's very clear there He wasn't afraid of the difficulty and listen preaching can be difficult Especially when you're preaching to a group of people like these ninovites these assyrians who are bloodthirsty monstrous savages But that is not what he was concerned about what he was concerned about is that they would listen to the message and get saved That's what he was concerned about You're asking me to go preach to isis Contemporary they need to burn Jonah Jonah I don't want to go there. So what's he do it goes in the opposite direction It's kind of like this. It's It's that attitude only people I love can be saved My mom had a Silly sense of humor if you knew or you would know that People say David you got your humor from your mom In some ways. Yeah, I I did my mom was very quick-witted And she would make you laugh. She'd say things to make you laugh just to make you laugh So she said, yeah, I was preaching to somebody sharing the gospel with them And and they refused to hear it. So I said go to hell That was my mom But she'd do that just just to bug me mama, you know, you can't be telling people that Come on But that was my mom. She would say things like that. But but there are people who actually Actually feel that way. You don't receive the lord here Go to hell And but the fact is that's a literal place And so it's really like only those people I love can get saved the rest I don't really need with me forget about it Somebody said this because Jonah was sorry that god was so kind He would rather not preach Yes, would rather die Than that the grace of god Which was to be the peculiar privilege of the people of israel Should be communicated to the Gentiles also Who had neither the word of god nor the laws of moses nor the worship of god nor prophets nor anything else But rather strove against god and his word and his people He didn't want To go and give this message to these people. So what did he do? It says he he fled from the presence of the lord the word presence speaks really of faith literally It represents Jonah's relationship with god when he's fleeing from the presence It represents his relationship with god and that would include his relationship with god as a prophet When he speaks of presence genesis chapter three verse eight says it like this They heard the sound of the lord god walking in the garden in the cool of the day and adam and his wife Hit themselves from the presence of the lord Among the trees of the gardens. So he was hiding from his relationship with god and forsaking his position As a prophet he was renouncing his calling. He was saying i'm Literally i'm making a choice if you will to backslide I'm out of here. I'm not going you want me to go to the east. I'm going to the west now He goes to japa It says he went down to japa japa is to see see uh seaport We go we we've been there many times. It's it's 35 miles or so from where he had been And he boards a ship and he goes off to tarshish Which would have been around a 2,500 mile journey by ship Tarshish is modern is modern spain So he's going to the southern tip of modern spain is where he's fleeing to Well Verse four the lord sent out a great wind on the sea It was a mighty tempest on the sea so that the ship was about to be broken up The mariners were afraid every man cried out to his god through the cargo That was in the ship into the sea to lighten the load But jonah had gone down into the lowest parts of the ship Had lain down and was fast asleep So the captain came to him and said to him What do you mean sleeper arise call on your god perhaps your god will consider us so that we may not perish They said to one another come let us cast lots that we may know For whose cause this trouble has come upon us. They cast lots a lot fell on jonah They said to him please tell us for what causes this trouble upon us. What is your occupation? And where do you come from? What is your country? And of what people are you he said to them? I'm a hebrew I fear the lord doesn't appear that way at the moment does it? I fear the lord the god of heaven who made the sea and the dry land Um, here you go. Here's something practical. It's not that easy to run from god It's not that easy to run from god There are people in this room who understand exactly what I mean because you've tried to Well, I'll just get away. I just leave. I won't go to church I'll run from god And god says oh dog gone it. I'm only in the church I'm nowhere else They run from god God has given them a call and has said this is what you're to do And they say it doesn't fit my agenda. It doesn't fit my preference. It doesn't fit my life It doesn't fit in With what I want to do and what you're telling me to do Is something I will not do So instead of doing what you're telling me to do I'm going to do what I want to do Anybody in here running from god right now There are some who are Every time you have a group as large as this there are people running from god. There's no doubt. There's no doubt That's just a law of average. It's not like i'm a prophet. They'll say to the lord off to my right. I feel a No, it's just a law of averages Anytime people grab gather together. There are some people who say that's me Because god spoke to your heart god told you what to do. He told you and you know it You know it You do this Some people jump from church to church to church running from god Running from god they stay there until they're convicted When they get convicted they run to another church So people say are you still going? Well, I was going there, but you know they so i'm going over here So they have the appearance of really walking with god because they go to church But in reality, they're just running from place to place because when the holy spirit has his laser beam and he puts it on them through conviction Man they're jumping trying to get out of the way kind of like the matrix, you know My dad only spanked me a couple times in my whole life Part of the reason why is because he didn't want to kill me and the other reason was because He would laugh When he tried to spank me Because as a little boy I would jump All over the place When he would grab me by the hand and say it's time to get your spanking I would jump and I would dodge and I would move and I would try to run And he'd start laughing he always said And he'd say just don't do it again and I I learned how to dodge my father's punishment, but i've never been able to dodge gods chastening Because you can't run from him You know the psalmist asks the question it's found in psalm 139 verses 7 through 12. Where can I go from your spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens you're there If I make my bed in the depths you are there If I rise on the wings of the dawn if I settle on the far side of the sea even there your hand will guide me Your right hand will hold me fast If I say surely the darkness will hide me the light becomes night around me Even the darkness will not be dark to you the night will shine like the day for darkness is as light To you you can't run from god Best thing to do is give up Best thing to do is trust him and do what he says And so what happens he decides he's going to go to spain going to the coast and he's going to just body serve Well, the lord sent this great wind on the sea There was a mighty tempest on the sea so that the ship was about to be broken up The sailors the mariners are afraid Every man cries out to his god through the cargo that was in the ship into the sea to lighten the load Jonah had gone down into the lowest parts of the ship had lain down and was fast asleep And so he's trying to hide in his rebellion. He's completely dull to the things of the lord So the sailors on the other hand are lightening the ship's load because they want to save every person on board But Jonah, where is he? Well, the bible just told us he was asleep Now some suppose that he had gone to sleep before the storm actually hit and wasn't aware of it But others believed that he was simply settled in his decision and wasn't concerned He had what would be called a careless self-assuredness Because he had become callous. He was hard as a rock against the conviction of the spirit But he failed to realize something he failed to realize that god could reach him wherever he was Included on a boat going off to spain But in his rebellion he had become completely dull to the lord. That's what happens by the way and we know this When we are in sin You become callous Callous to the things of god You at one time had a tender heart. You at one time had had a spirit that responded quickly The lord would whisper and you would hear him. You wanted to serve god Something happened And you got disappointed in one form or another And you got hardened And it started out Not as hard as it ended up But it does slowly dull to the point of insensitivity Whereas at one time when people would speak to you about the lord, you would say oh, I know him And then eventually what happens is I just don't talk about him anymore Jonah became insensitive hardened and there he is in the boat. He's completely dull But what happens according to verse six is a pagan sea captain has to call this prophet to prayer And he says perhaps the true god, that's the literal translation Perhaps the true god will consider will assist us and perhaps he will be kind to us So while men are in danger God's man Is asleep Today there is a whole nation called the united states That is asleep guys and it's in danger That the nation's in danger We're in danger slowly, but surely There is a Concerted effort. No not a conspiracy. I'm not a conspiracy person who believes in conspiracies You know, I'm just not human wrangling and Human effort can't achieve that end People can unite against the lord and the bible says that god simply laughs He holds them in derision It's like a bunch of ants looking at you saying i'm going to knock you down. I don't think so well Is a stronger opponent than the political system And the wave that we are experiencing right now of anti christ sentiment That is not generated by simple human will That is a satanic attack That is the enemy of our souls We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers There is an orchestrated effort To remove every vestige of god and faith In this nation And it's going on right now, but the church is like that proverbial frog in the kettle of water And all of us know this that you can take a frog and you can put him in water And he'll sit there And you can turn on a flame a burner very very low And because the frog doesn't have the capacity to notice degree changes It can't You can't notice he will boil the death And the church has been called a frog in the kettle Because We and this sounds condemnatory. I'm not condemning anybody. I'm speaking I'm just speaking about it, right? So please don't think oh you're picking on me. I'm not But maybe the holy spirit's telling you something What we do Is we do watch a philosophy of antichrist hatred That is in it's it's in various forms You name all the cults and it's in them It's antichrist from the benign type cult that says oh we do worship Jesus We just call ourselves by this name Mormon or Jehovah's Witness or Christian science to the Anti god atheist movement and everything in between You see the thing is guys keep this in mind. This is an important point. Keep this in mind People say oh, there's so many religions in the world. That's not true. There are two There are two gods and satans That's it satans has a variety of forms Via Islam buddhism You name it Everyone denying who christ is That's satanic And when we as a nation have Have even prayer in in school board meetings attacked Wake up Because the attack is here It's in our colleges every college student here knows that Every college student here who hasn't gone to a christian college knows that Because you have I've had professors Who had actually opened the class? I remember one on my social psychology class The professor said and Cal Poly Pomona How many of you Are christians born again evangelical christians. How many in this class are Three or four of our hands went up It this is the first day of class I feel sorry for you Because you trust in that little black book To tell you how life is And that was my opening From this professor who's getting paid by tax dollars To undermine the faith of the only thing That can keep This nation From being destroyed, which is christian faith It's christian faith Right now. Did you know that in england they're kicking out missionaries? Christian missionaries are being kicked out of england many calvary chapel pastors who have been there doing missions work in england Are being kicked out right now Well islam is taken over the one thing That can change and save that safeguard that nation Is being kicked out of that nation the faith of christ That's what's going on right now. Do you think that came through parliament? Do you think that the men in parliament the women in parliament just decided we don't need jesus christ That's the tenet That spirit is not a full lord of course, and it's not simply a human spirit Now that may sound ridiculous to you But it's true That's what's going on That's what's going on and there is a battle going on right now That is huge And christians We need thank god you're here. We need to be in the word of god Do you have friends that are that should be here not because oh, I need a crowd No, do you have friends who need to be here? Invite them They need the word of god churches shut down on sunday super bowl sunday because men don't show up Because they're watching the game That's what's happening here and That's a major problem In Ephesians 5 13 and 14 it says this everything exposed by the light becomes visible For it is light that makes everything visible This is why it is said wake up. Oh sleeper Rise from the dead And christ will shine on you Wake up Well in verse 7 they said to one another come let us cast lots that we may know For whose cause this trouble has come upon us and cast lots and the lot fell on Jonah Now casting lots was an ancient way of determining an answer to a question in this case god used it It's kind of like throwing dice or something like that It's just it's the casting of the lot in this in this case god used this to show them About Jonah now they believed that this storm was a direct response to sin by an angry god They thought that they were being punished because someone else's sin And that's why they brought this up. And so when they cast the lot and somehow The way that they did it it was the disclose that it was Jonah. And so what do they do verse 8 they said to him Please tell us for whose causes this trouble upon us What's your occupation and where do you come from? What is your country? What people are you? They wanted him to openly confess his guilt for whatever it is that he'd done Perhaps his occupation was the kind that would cause gods to be angry They wanted to know his city his nation his people that would help them to understand How to bring sentence upon him? It's interesting in verse 9 how he says i'm a Hebrew I fear the lord the god of heaven who made the sea in the dry land Now that wasn't evident at that moment that he feared god I I have been in that position where Though I was a believer in god my life wasn't showing it I've been in that position. Have you where I I just wasn't letting the light shine And and when I said i'm a believer in christ you could almost hear the gasp of you're kidding me you Because my life was not showing it And so the fact is he says this is what I am and there are times that your life doesn't Evidence what you really are but he's saying it I I fear god And he says there's the god this god that I worship is the god who controls the sea He's the god who controls everything He's the god of the sea as well as the dry land He's not a what would be called a regional or a tribal god during that day. They had tribal gods So their tribe their people had their god. He's saying no my god is the god of the entire earth So their question why have you done this first hand the men were exceedingly afraid? Why have you done this? The men knew that he fled from the presence of the lord because he had told them they said to him What shall we do to you that the sea may come for us? The sea is growing more tempestuous. He said pick me up throw me into the sea The sea will become calm for you. I know that this great tempest is because of me In other words kill me because I don't want to go to Nineveh Nevertheless the men rode hard to bring the ship to land but they could not Sea continued to grow more tempestuous against them. Therefore they cried out to the lord and said we pray Oh lord, please do not let us perish for this man's life Do not charge us with innocent blood for you. Oh lord have done as it pleased you So they picked up Jonah And threw him into the sea, you know, I can almost hear it one two three Then you hear him say Marco, you know And the sea seized from its raging Then the men feared the lord exceedingly offered a sacrifice to the lord made vows now The lord had prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights So a couple of things will close and we'll pick it up next time When they're asking you versus 10 and 11 why have you done this? In reality they're saying if you worship a god as great as this and why Why have you fled from him? You know what that is that's conviction from the world. Hey the god that you worship If he's true if you know, I'm not believer myself though I do have religion But when I've heard the Christians talk about the god that they worship He sounds like a pretty awesome god So if your god is everything I've heard him to be Why have you rejected him? It's a good question That's called conviction from the world You see they saw that his sin was affecting not just him. It was affecting them because that's what happens You see they were in danger because of him So we need to remember of this listen sin will always affect more than just you It always does Somebody says well, I'm just not in love with my wife anymore. I'm out of here. Every be everything will be okay. No your sin If there's sin involved in that And just casually saying I'm up and gone doesn't just affect you it affects everybody Sin always does it affects everybody. You never sin in a vacuum You see and so when they're saying what's going on here Jonas is listen There's the answer just pick me up throw me into the sea. It'll become calm Jonah obviously becomes sorry for them, but he's not sorry enough to go to Nineveh At the same time according to verses 13 through 15, they don't want to take a human life, especially the life of a prophet They don't want to be responsible for his death It's interesting that their care for him contrasts with his lack of care for them So they intensify their efforts. They try to to save themselves But eventually they have to let them go and when that happens verse 16 says the sea ceases And the result is the men fear the lord exceedingly You see god had done what their gods could not do He answered prayer still the storm Because false gods never can outperform god because they could never answer a prayer and they never can still a storm But verse 17 and obviously we'll close here. It says the lord had prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah so We'll get the picture Jonah goes down into the boat Jonah goes out to sea He's traveling in sea There's a great fish somewhere over here And all of this is going on While this great fish is slowly but surely Just making his way Towards Jonah picture that in your mind for a moment Just a god had prepared this fish And in a sense, I don't know what he did fish go. I don't know all I know is that fish on his way And there goes Jonah overboard Thank you Takes him in God anybody here ever gets swallowed by a fish that god had prepared for you you have been you just don't know it You just don't know it Trying to run from god and god prepares circumstances That you will intersect with And he'll say gotcha I got you That's the truth I have you Now what are you going to do You can't do anything We'll see what happens, but it's interesting as god breaks him God allows him to To go through this he becomes a songwriter And he begins Actually, there's a song found in chapter two that we'll see And what happens while he's in that fish for three days and three nights Is he repents Three days and three nights it would take me three seconds I'm sorry Can you imagine how obstinate He is think about it. How long would it take you Inside of this fish. How long would it take you? It would take me no time The minute I saw those lips open I'd say sorry But he stayed three days We'll look at that when we get back to this passage the next time to think about it Don't be obstinate