Open the Bible

Colin Smith: A lady came up to me after the service just a couple of weeks ago, and she was somewhat distressed. She is a new Christian, and she has been praying for her husband. She says, "I've shared the gospel with him, and he doesn't believe yet. Am I doing something wrong?"

Steve Hiller: Welcome to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith. And Colin, I have to ask, how did you answer that?

Colin Smith: Well, I certainly tried to assure her, "No, you're not doing anything wrong." I loved her faith, though. She had this expectancy that as she spoke the truth, the change was going to come immediately. What she had not grasped was that God's word is like living seed, and sometimes we put it into the ground, and though occasionally we find it comes and it gives an immediate harvest, sometimes some time passes and we have to be very patient.

Steve Hiller: And the great thing is, because it's not dependent upon us to bring someone to salvation, that can give us a hope that we wouldn't necessarily have otherwise.

Colin Smith: Yeah, that's right. I love the verse that says, "Paul planted, Apollos watered, but it is God who makes things grow." So, our job is to communicate the truth. It's not to fret over the result. We have to be faithful in what we say, and then we have to be very prayerful in looking to God to do what he alone is able to do.

Steve Hiller: Our message today is along those lines. And if you can, I hope you'll open your Bible to Jonah chapter 3 as we continue a message entitled, Resign God's Work. Here is Pastor Colin.

Colin Smith: Our Lord Jesus Christ referred several times to the story of Jonah and to the ministry of Jonah in the New Testament. Of course, anytime the New Testament speaks about an Old Testament story, it's very important for understanding.

I want to put together two references that the Lord Jesus made to Jonah. The first is in Luke chapter 11 and verse 29 and 30. You know this verse, perhaps. Jesus said, "This is a wicked generation. It asks for a miraculous sign, but none will be given to it except the sign of Jonah. For as Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites," Jesus said, "so also the Son of Man will be a sign to this generation." Now, I want you to hear these words of Jesus. Jesus said, "Jonah was a sign." The man was a sign to the Ninevites.

In what sense was the man a sign to the Ninevites? Some people say simply the fact that he went there and that he preached the word was a sign. Well, no, I think from the words of Jesus that there's something more. Because if you look at Matthew chapter 12, verses 39 and 40, again Jesus is speaking about Jonah. He says, "A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a miraculous sign, but none will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah." So, he is now talking about what the sign of the prophet Jonah is, and here is how he continues. Our Lord says, "For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth."

So, you put Luke 11 and Matthew 12 together. Jesus says Jonah, the man himself, was a sign. In Matthew, he says here is what the sign was: the sign was that Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish. So, if the man was a sign, and if the sign was that he was three days and three nights in the belly of the fish, I conclude from that that he must have told them that he was three days and three nights in the belly of the fish, and therefore that they knew his story. If that is indeed the case, I think there are some wonderful applications for us.

Jonah must have preached with great passion, must he not? "Forty more days and Nineveh will be destroyed. And I know what I'm talking about. Let me tell you what happened to me. I have loved and served this God of the Bible I'm telling you about all my life. But when he called me to come here to this city, I did not want to come. I thought I could disobey him and get away with it. I got on a boat, and I went to Tarshish, and God sent a storm.

The crew knew what they were doing. They tried to row me to safety, but they couldn't hold their ship against God's wind. God's judgment came on me, and I felt sure that I was finished, gone. I told the crew, 'You've got to throw me overboard.' They didn't want to do it, but it soon became clear that they had no choice. So, I cried out to God in repentance. I hit the water. I felt sure that moments later I would be drowned and facing the eternal judgment of God. But the God whose judgment I deserved saved me. That's why I'm here today, and I now have to tell you that your wickedness has come up before him as my wickedness came up before him, and in forty more days Nineveh will be destroyed." And the king says, "Ah, but if God had mercy on Jonah, maybe he'll have compassion on me."

Here's what I want to draw from that by way of application for us. It is a wonderful principle: God will use whatever he has been doing in your life as a means of reaching others, of advancing the gospel. This is an amazing truth. But in his grace and in his mercy, he will find ways to use even your past failures, your traumas, your shame, the desperate moments of your life, the pain of your experience, and in some way God will take that and he will find a way to use it for reaching others and for the advance of the gospel.

Sinclair Ferguson, who wrote a wonderful book on Jonah, says this, and it has been a quotation that has helped me so much over the years. I hope it will be a special one for you. He said this: "The jewels of spiritual service are always quarried in the depths of spiritual experience." I love that. The jewels of spiritual service—those who are most useful to Jesus Christ, those shining jewels are quarried by God in the depths of spiritual experience. Whatever God takes you through, it will not be meaningless. It will not be without purpose. In his redeeming love, he will find some way to use the jewel that is quarried in the depths of your experience for the reaching of others and for the advance of his great and eternal work in the lives of people.

So, how does this great change come to a city? There's God's word; he sent his word to change the city. Secondly, he used his man. He can use his man, he can use his woman, but he works through people, and he works through what he is doing in our lives as a means of communicating his marvelous truth into the lives of other people. And here is the third thing, and it's very important: God chose his moment to change the city.

Now, I think we have to say that what happened in Nineveh was unusual and it was remarkable, and that the kind of transformation with a whole wicked, violent city turning to God in faith and repentance and in prayer and in hope, this is a remarkable and an unusual thing. But it really did happen. It was God's time for the great city of Nineveh.

Now, here is a very practical application for us in thinking about God's time. A lady came up to me after the service just a couple of weeks ago, and she was somewhat distressed. She is a new Christian. She has been praying for her husband. And she says, "I've shared the gospel with him, and he doesn't believe yet." And she said, "Am I doing something wrong?"

Now, I wanted to encourage her. I want to encourage anyone who thinks, "I've been sharing the gospel, and someone I love has not yet come to Christ. I must be doing something wrong." No. We are responsible for sharing God's truth, and God wonderfully uses his people. But God determines his time. We can pray for that, but we do not control God's time.

There are pastors and there are missionaries who labor for years among people who are highly resistant to the gospel. They bring the message. They extend themselves. They are quarried in the depths of spiritual experience, but sometimes they may see very few people converted. The marvelous thing about God's moment is that you never know what God is going to do next.

I have no idea whose life God may touch in a special way in this congregation this weekend. Not one of us knows which person that we've been praying for for years will be touched, changed, and transformed this week, this month, this year. God's moment. You never know what God is going to do next. You never know when he's going to step in and change a person's life. Who in all the world could have predicted this kind of response from, of all places, the city of Nineveh, whose particular wickedness had come up before God?

Now, of course, some folks hearing that may say, "Ah, well, this is marvelous. All we need to do then is just sit back and wait for God to do things in his moment and in his own time." No. Remember this distinction: revival is God's gift, evangelism is God's command.

Steve Hiller: We are going to have to pause right here, but we will continue this message, Resign God's Work, in just a moment. This is Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith. And if you ever miss a broadcast in our series, "How to Avoid a God-Centered Life," based on the life of Jonah, come and visit our website, openthebible.org.

Open the Bible is a listener-supported program, and as you give a gift of any amount this month, we want to send you a copy of Martin Lloyd-Jones's book, *Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Its Cure*. Colin, what is this book about?

Colin Smith: Well, it's not about depression in the clinical sense that we use that word today. When Lloyd-Jones speaks about spiritual depression, he's speaking about all of the experiences of darkness, discouragement, doubt, that come to a Christian believer at some point in our journey of faith. And it is a marvelous book. Steve, this has got to be one of the top three books, I think, in all the books that I have. Over the years, I have gone back to this again and again and again, and I will continue to do so.

He just works through chapter after chapter the various experiences of difficulty that we all encounter as Christian believers, and then he gives to us practical ways forward from the scripture of being able to find our way through these harder passages of life. So, for example, his chapter on "Where Is Your Faith?" is just one of my favorites. That's in the story of the storm on the lake where Jesus asks this question of the disciples, "Where is your faith?" And Lloyd-Jones makes the point that faith doesn't just kick in automatically. It's not like a thermostat. You actually have to apply it to the difficulties of the situation that you're in right now. That has been so helpful to me, and that's just one little snippet of so many that run throughout this wonderful book.

Steve Hiller: Well, we want to send you a copy of this book, *Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Its Cure*, as our way of saying thank you for your financial support. You can give online at openthebible.org or when you call 1-877-OPEN-365. That's openthebible.org or 1-877-673-6365. Let's get back to the message. Again, here is Pastor Colin.

Remember this distinction: revival is God's gift, evangelism is God's command. So, we do not sit back and wait for God's moment. What we do is we follow Jonah's example. We face up to our fears, our shame, our self-interest, and our unbelief, and we bring the word of God to the best of our ability. And we pray that in his mercy, he will move in the hearts of some who right now are very resistant to his word.

Now, one more thing on the moment, and I think it's very important for us. Some people question whether there ever was a true revival in Nineveh. And the reason that they question it is that later generations returned to evil ways. That's a matter of historical record. So, if later generations returned to evil ways, could this great turning to God that is spoken of here in Jonah actually really have happened? That's the question that is raised and sometimes debated.

So, I want us to think about this matter of the moment. We know that Jonah lived in the time of Jeroboam II. We know that from 2 Kings that we looked at a couple of weeks ago. And so Jonah's visit to Nineveh would have happened somewhere between around 780 years before the Lord Jesus and 755 years before the birth of Christ. Somewhere between 780 and 755.

And what the book of Jonah tells us—and we are glad to accept it from the book of Jonah—is that God moved at that time to gather thousands of Assyrian people into saving faith in himself. Jonah chapter 4, verse 11 speaks about 120,000 people who could not tell their right hand from their left. Hard to know what that means. It could mean that 120,000 was the population of the city and that they were morally confused, didn't know their right hand from their left.

It could mean, and I think this is more likely, that the city had 120,000 young children who didn't know their right from their left—young children—and that therefore the population of the city was very, very much larger at that time. Either way, we are talking about a major, significant city in the time and a movement of God in a revival that brought thousands of people in that generation from that city, known previously and subsequently for its great wickedness, into saving faith in himself.

By the way, if God had compassion on a city of 120,000 people or perhaps more, what must be the compassion of God on our city of 9.5 million people in the greater Chicago area? 9.5 million people.

Now, what happened after the time of Jonah? Well, here is the story. One generation later, or perhaps two, depending on where the date falls and how you regard a generation, in the year 722 BC, the northern kingdom of Israel was invaded, overrun, and the ten tribes in the northern kingdom were scattered to the four corners of the earth. And who invaded the northern kingdom in the year 722 BC? It was the Assyrians. So, that tells you what was happening in subsequent generations in Nineveh, one of their major cities.

And a century later, a century after the time of Jonah, in the year 612 BC, Nineveh itself was destroyed. That is what the prophecy in Nahum chapter 3 that we looked at the other week is all about. God's judgment came on the city that returned to its wickedness in a subsequent generation.

Now, here is what I conclude from that. In heaven, you can expect to see thousands of Assyrian people brought by God's redeeming love to saving faith in himself through the ministry of Jonah. It was God's moment for an ingathering of a vast number of people of that city at that time. I suspect that you will meet relatively few Assyrian people who were alive one hundred years later. It was God's moment. An extraordinary moment in history for a particular gracious ingathering of many people in that great city.

Here is my last application this morning. What will the future hold for this great city of Chicago? I have no idea. I do not know. None of us does. What is the future of the church of Jesus Christ in this great country of America fifty years from now? What will be the state of the church in this country if Christ has not come? I do not know. Nobody does.

All we can do, folks, is offer all that we are and all that we have and all that we can for the advance of the gospel in this generation. We cannot live on the legacy of what past generations have done for Christ. We cannot live in the hope of what future generations might do for Christ. Our calling is to do all that we can do for Christ in our time.

And remember this: that the whole world needs to be evangelized in every generation. There is no one born into the world knowing the gospel. The whole world therefore needs to be evangelized every generation, needs to be done afresh all over again. This is the only generation that we are able to reach and serve with the gospel of Jesus Christ—the generation that is living today, our time. So we dare not live in the future, we dare not live in the past. Our stewardship of the gospel is now.

And every generation will stand responsible and accountable before God for what we have done with the sacred trust of the gospel in our time, not what was before us and not what may come after us. So, how did God change a city in this extraordinary way that happened in Nineveh? Here is what we learn: he sent his word, he used his servant, and he chose his moment.

And so I've framed a simple prayer that I invite you to share with me. It just says, "Lord, send your word." We would pray that for our city. "Use your people." We would long for that. "And make this your moment for this city." Why should we not ask that of God? Will you join with me in that prayer? "Lord, send your word, use your people, make this your moment for this city, for Christ's sake."

Steve Hiller: That's a great reminder from Pastor Colin today and something to really wrap our brains around. This whole world needs to be evangelized in every generation. You're listening to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith and a message called, Resign God's Work in Light of Your Experience.

It's part of a larger series where we're taking a look at the story of Jonah. It's called, "How to Avoid a God-Centered Life." We're actually seeing how Jonah ran away from God, and as we look at Jonah's life, we can learn what not to do. And as we flip this title on its head, we can see how we pursue a God-centered life. If you're interested in a copy of this series, call us and ask about "How to Avoid a God-Centered Life." Our number is 1-877-OPEN-365. That's 1-877-673-6365. Or you'll find ordering information online at openthebible.org.

You know, Colin, I think today's message for many is a message of hope, knowing that God can use people who maybe have not always been obedient, like Jonah. We've run the other direction, we've had trials, we've had struggles, we've had failures, but God can still use us to win some and bring some to him.

Colin Smith: Yeah, and Jonah was useful because he had the word of God. And he didn't just have it in his hand, as it were, he had it in his heart. The word of God had done its work in his own life. I mean, he had experienced the judgment of God and he'd experienced the mercy of God. And so when he says, "Forty more days and Nineveh will be destroyed," he's able to speak out of the knowledge that God is merciful, and here these people discover God's mercy. It's marvelous.

And it just reminds me of the importance of using the word of God. You know, my pastor back in Scotland said to me years ago, "Steve, when someone comes to you in need, make sure you always read something from the Bible and always lead them to the Lord in prayer." That's been immensely helpful to me over the years. I may not have something terribly useful to say, but the word of God always has something useful to say.

And you can help people by bringing a really appropriate scripture that speaks to their situation and helps them to exercise faith and to know that there's a Savior who reaches out to them. Never underestimate what the word of God can do in a person's life. It's the best way to disciple someone. It's the best way to help someone. Is there a marriage in trouble? Let's help a couple by taking them into the word of God and let the word of God dwell richly in these folks' lives and see what it will do. If we really believe it brings life and refreshment and joy and that it transforms, then why not bring it into the lives of people? Look what it did in Nineveh.

Steve Hiller: Yeah, absolutely. And we want to help people get into the word of God. That's a reason that we've created a brand new podcast that just launched this year. It's not too late to start following along with "Hike Through the Bible." It's a one-year, 50-episode journey all the way through the Bible story, from Genesis to Revelation. It will help you open your Bible, understand it better, and love Jesus more.

If you want to find out more about the "Hike Through the Bible" podcast, you can visit our website, openthebible.org/hike, and you'll find the podcast both on YouTube and on any podcast platform you normally get your podcast. So I hope you'll check it out. "Hike Through the Bible." For Pastor Colin Smith, I'm Steve Hiller. Thanks for listening, and I hope you'll join us next time.

This program is a listener-supported production of Open the Bible.

Colin Smith: Jesus said, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God." God's word is the food that will nourish your soul. You need it every day. And Open the Bible Daily is a daily devotional that will open the word of God and lead you to Jesus. It's available for free on our website, openthebible.org. For more information, visit openthebible.org/daily. That's openthebible.org/daily.