Running To Win

Dr. Erwin W. Lutzer: Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. Jonah finally obeyed God, but took no joy in the revival following his preaching in Nineveh. His self-focus kept him from seeing the big picture. Instead, he sat down, asking God that he might die. Pity party indeed. Stay with us.

Dave McAllister: From the Moody Church in Chicago, this is Running to Win with Dr. Erwin Lutzer, whose clear teaching helps us make it across the finish line. Pastor Lutzer, so far Jonah has died to self-will, self-reliance, and self-interest. What's up today for our troubled prophet?

Dr. Erwin W. Lutzer: Well, Dave, first of all, I think that all of us who read the book of Jonah have to see ourselves in his story. We all tend to want to disobey God, to go our own way. God brings us back, and then what does Jonah have to experience? All of the various ways in which God disciplined him. At the end now, he has to die to self-justification. He has to be willing to accept God's will, no matter how unpleasant.

Now, before I speak, I want to ask you a question. When you think of holiness, what comes to mind? At the end of this message, I'm going to be explaining two mistakes that Christians often make when it comes to the topic of holiness. For now, let us listen, but then at the end, I'm going to be giving you a resource that I think will be a great blessing in your pursuit of God.

Death to self-justification. If there's any trait about fallen human nature, it is the tendency for us to protect ourselves, to justify ourselves, to dig deep walls behind which we hide, to make sure that no one ever sees us as we are, to prevent God and others from revealing to us what we are really like until we begin to even believe our own lies.

Enter Jonah, chapter 4. Chapter 4 of the book of Jonah, the last in a series of messages entitled, "Brokenness: How God Gets Us to Say Yes." At the end of the message, I'll tell you whether or not God ever got Jonah to say yes.

We read in verse 1, "But it displeased Jonah exceedingly and he was angry." What happened? Something terrible happened. He preached to the city of Nineveh and the Ninevites repented. Awful. The Hebrew text is actually more vivid: "But it was evil to Jonah, a very great evil, and it burned to him." He was really, really mad.

Now, isn't it interesting that God was compassionate and Jonah was angry? The pagans ended up fearing God; Jonah ends up hating God. Even the sailors feared the Lord. The Ninevites repented and God relented regarding the destruction of the city of Nineveh as God had warned. And lo and behold, here is Jonah, who is angry at that kind of compassion. That's maybe why he didn't tell them what they could do to prevent the overthrow. He just simply said, "Nineveh shall be overthrown." Thankfully, we discover that it was a conditional warning.

I mentioned that Jonah at this point tells us exactly why he is fleeing. He says in verse 2, "And he prayed to the Lord and said, 'O Lord, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? This is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish, for I knew that you were a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and relenting from disaster. Therefore, now, O Lord, please take my life from me.'"

These words, which are based on one of the Psalms, are always sung and said in honor to God—that God is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. I mean, that's what we sing about, that's what we talk about, is the wonderful compassion of God, and we adore Him for that. Jonah is indicting God for that. He is saying this in derision, that you are compassionate.

I've mentioned to you earlier that I think what we have here is a case of what I call full-blown narcissism. Narcissus was a young man, the son of the river god in ancient mythology, and he was in love with himself. When he saw a reflection of himself—in those days they didn't have mirrors—so when he saw a reflection of himself in a pool of clear water, he so fell in love with himself that he could never love anyone else.

How do you identify a narcissist? Because it's possible that one is listening today. We all have various degrees of narcissism, and if you live with someone like that or if the narcissist happens to be sitting in your chair today, I can tell you about yourself. Narcissists interpret all events through the filter of themselves. They will always say to themselves for everything that comes, "How does this make me look? And how does this make me feel?" And that's all that matters.

I remember the illustration that I love to give. True stories because narcissists exist all over the place. A wife who was beaten by her husband, a Christian woman, phones a friend who is also a Christian but who is very narcissistic. Catch the picture. Here's a wife who's just sustained a beating. She needs to tell somebody. And so she phones her narcissistic friend and says, "My husband just beat me up." Because what this dear woman, God bless her, is looking for is some compassion, some feeling.

So what does she get? "Oh, really? Is that what happened? Well, you know, you guys are sure a lot worse than my husband and me. We have our own fights too, but you know, he's never beaten me. You know, so really, we are better than you in terms of our relationship." Thank you so very much for the compassion that I was looking for.

What we're going to see is traits of that in Jonah. So God has this problem on His hands, and this entire chapter is just between God and Jonah. So God tries therapy. God says, "Jonah..." You'll notice that the Lord says to him in verse 4, "Do you well to be angry?" Is it good that you're angry? God wants to get to the root of it. He wants to help Jonah reflect back his feelings as good counselors are, to try to get to the bottom of the matter.

And Jonah won't cooperate. He doesn't stay for the session. He walks away. He stomps out of the city and sat to the east of the city and made a booth for himself there and sat under the shade till he could see what will become of the city. Now remember that the king of Nineveh is sitting in an ash heap hoping that God will spare the city. Jonah is sitting here in his booth that he built for himself hoping that God will destroy the city.

While God is compassionate, Jonah is full of hate and he refuses to see the world God's way. He's got this death wish: "I'd rather die than see what You're doing. I'd rather die than see these Ninevites repent and not be judged." What a man. So what God decides to do is to give Jonah an object lesson. What the Lord does is He says, "I'm going to give you a lesson in comforts and so forth, and then I'm going to give you some lessons in compassion." That's the direction that the text takes from here.

You'll notice that the Lord first of all appoints something. Four times the word "appointed" occurs in the book of Jonah. First of all, it says that God appointed a fish—that's in chapter 1. But here in succession, there are three other appointments that God makes, and let's look at them.

You'll notice it says in verse 6, "Now the Lord God appointed a plant and made it come up over Jonah, that it might be a shade over his head to save him from his discomfort. So Jonah was exceedingly glad about the plant." Can you ever get a narcissist to be happy about something? Yes, if they are particularly blessed and you add to their comfort, they will be quite joyful and work it into their day. So that's what Jonah was doing here.

Notice what God does. God appoints comfort for Jonah. Here's a plant that grows up in a night as we learn in a few verses. It grows up just very, very quickly in one night. Obviously, it was a miracle, a plant like that growing in the midst of the desert. And a plant growing up that quickly, and probably what is known as the castor plant which has great foliage and beautiful leaves that are as big as the palm of your hand, and this plant grows up and it encases his shelter. You can just see Jonah enjoying it because at last in the midst of this hot climate God has given him an air conditioner. So he's very, very happy about the plant.

Well, that's not all that God appoints. You'll notice it says now in verse 7, "But when the dawn came up the next day, God appointed a worm." God said to this little worm, "Little worm, here you are. Do you see that plant over there? I want you to saw it down, work at it all night, but get the thing sawed down because I'm appointing you to bug Jonah." So God talks to this little worm and the little worm comes and he begins to work on this plant, and by morning he has it down.

God appoints our comforts. God also appoints our disappointments and our losses, and Jonah is supposed to learn that lesson. So the little worm comes along and by morning the plant is down, and soon the sun is going to rise and it's going to become very, very hot. And Jonah is going to become very, very angry. Just as he was exceedingly glad for the plant, he is going to become very, very angry because he's going to have a death wish in just a verse or two again, saying, "I want to die. Just get me out of this. I would rather die than deal with a God whom I can't change and whose will I oppose."

Well, it's going to turn out that this plant was really his god, meant more to him than the will of God. It's amazing what happens when you take away people's air conditioners. My wife and I live in a condo complex where you either have heat, as you do during the winter, or you can have cold air, air conditioning, during the summer. But the whole apparatus has to be changed over a day or two, so they try to find a good time in perhaps near the end of April and then another time in the fall when they make this change.

They don't change it into air conditioning until probably somewhere around the end of April, the beginning of May. But one April two or three years ago, it became about 85 degrees before April was over. You should just see how angry some of these pleasant and wonderful people became. I mean, some of them swore, some of them cursed, some of them threatened the administration because they didn't have their air conditioning.

These are nice people who open doors for you and who'll help you carry in groceries if you need it. And you're saying, is all this stuff coming from people who are so nice? No wonder the little girl prayed, "Oh God, make all bad people good, and please make the good people nice." Isn't that a great prayer?

Now, if you'd gone to these people and said, "Hey, by the way, did you know that 25,000 children died today because of malnutrition?" which is approximately the number that die every day because of that. Would that have mattered? "I don't care about whether or not the kids die, get me an air conditioner! I can't stand it!"

Have you ever noticed that God not only appoints our comforts, but he also appoints our discomforts and our disappointments? And the very thing that was bringing Jonah happiness is the very thing that God takes away, because what God wants to do is to get at the heart of this guy. The reason for these appointments is God is saying, "Jonah, I am putting a mirror here so that you can see yourself. And I want to take this mirror and shove it right up to your face so that you can see what's in your heart."

God's not through with him. We know that Jonah's going to have a bad day with this plant that has withered now, thanks to this little worm. And so God is saying, "Oh, Jonah, huh? So you think you're hot? Wow, guess what." Verse 8, "When the sun arose, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on the head of Jonah so that he was faint." And once again, he asked that he might die. "It is better for me to die than to live." God had this wind come like a kiln.

Now you know that Nineveh is actually not too far from Baghdad. As a matter of fact, when you're looking on the map and you often see that there have been flashpoints of resistance in Mosul. Directly across the Tigris River from that city is Nineveh. That's where it is. And our son-in-law, who survived a summer in Baghdad, said that there was one day when it got nearly 140 degrees. And the people, by the way, couldn't understand how the American soldiers were able to manage it with all of their equipment. Well, that's understandable. I wonder too how they managed with all of their equipment. So this is the area now, and God sends this scorching east wind to Jonah and says, "Well, Jonah, how do you like that?"

So God appoints our comforts, He appoints our disappointments, our losses, and He also appoints our trials. And Jonah's not handling this trial very well. Could I say parenthetically and theologically, you'll notice that all are equally appointed by God. Do we have comforts today? You believe that God gives us comforts. We have comforts as human beings—in friendships, in love, in opportunity, in clothes and houses and all of the things that we enjoy, and those comforts are God-given. They are appointed by God.

But so are our losses appointed by God. Our disappointments, those things that we cannot control that just happen, situations over which we have absolutely no control, that God brings into our life probably for the same reason that He brought these things into the life of Jonah. And then God appoints also those scorching east winds when we are almost about to die and to see what is in our hearts, because it's only these events that really show what's in there. It's not all the niceties, all the pleasantries when everything is going well; it's how do you handle adversity?

But each are equally appointed by God. I'm sure that Jonah was very angry with the worm. I am sure that he had some very choice words for the wind. But actually, no use getting angry at the worm, no use getting angry at the wind, because the worm and the wind are both sent by God. It's God that stands behind these events.

So God again begins a questioning. He picks up the therapy and says, "I wonder if you're willing to listen to my question now." So you'll notice there in verse 9, God continues the dialogue. But God said to Jonah, "Do you well to be angry for the plant?" And this time he answered God. The first time God asked the question, it was, "Do you have a right to be angry because the Ninevites repent?" Jonah didn't answer that question. But God says to him now, "Do you do well to be angry for the plant?" And without even skipping a beat, he said, "Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die."

Now just think for a moment what it is that Jonah is really saying. He's saying, "I have a right to the comforts that God gives me. I have a right to my air conditioner. I have a right to be comfortable and not to be in this heat. But I am denying the compassion of God that brings me those comforts. I am denying the right of other people to experience that compassion. I deny the rights of the Ninevites' eternal comfort. I would rather see them burn in hell than to have me burn under the sunlight here in a temporary way without a good booth and without a plant and with a scorching east wind."

So you can see here that Jonah is in the midst of this dilemma and he does not get the lesson at this point that God is trying to teach him. So God goes on and he says, "Jonah, that's a lesson in comforts now. What I want to do is to give you a lesson in the whole business of compassion." So God picks it up in verse 10. And the Lord said to him, "You pity the plant for which you did not labor, did you deserve the plant? Did you create it?"

By the way, do we deserve our money? You say we earned it. Oh, really? Did you? Who gave you the ability, the brains, and the opportunities to be born where you were, to be gifted the way in which you are? You mean to say you have a right to this? Believe me, you and I have no rights to any of this. But you'll notice that the Lord says, "You have pity for the plant for which you did not labor, you did not make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night."

Now comes the really big question: "And should not I pity Nineveh?" My friend, all of us should pity Nineveh, and we should also pity the people who live next to us who don't know Jesus Christ as their Savior, and we should reach out to them.

And one of the ways in which we acquire a burden for others is to recognize God wants us to be holy people. That is to say, people who pursue Him. But there are two mistakes we often make. One is to think to ourselves, "I am going to pursue God by a life of absolute discipline." Now discipline is important, but on the other hand, you have those who say, "I'm going to let go and let God." How do we resolve that?

Very quickly, I'm holding in my hands a book entitled "The Pursuit of Holiness" by Jerry Bridges. I hope that you have a pen or pencil handy because this resource is going to help you to understand holiness and why it is that all of us must pursue it. Very quickly, here's what you do: go to rtwoffer.com. That's rtwoffer.com or pick up the phone and call us at 1-888-218-9337. Once again, right now, go to rtwoffer.com.

Dave McAllister: It's time now for another chance for you to ask Pastor Lutzer a question about the Bible or the Christian life. Pastor Lutzer, most Christians see heaven as the ideal place of rest and rejoicing. But one Running to Win listener is concerned that not all of heaven will be gladness and light. She asks, "What about painful memories in heaven?"

Dr. Erwin W. Lutzer: My friend, today I do think that in heaven those painful memories will vanish. The Bible says that God will wipe away all tears from their eyes. Those may be tears as a result of our own failures, when we think of the way in which we lived in light of all the opportunities that we had, we may experience some deep regret and God will wipe tears from our eyes. Maybe also we will be weeping when we think of those who are not in heaven whom we love, who will be lost forever. I could think that that also would produce tears.

But here's the point that's important: God will wipe away all tears. I don't think that means that God is going to go about with a handkerchief wiping the tears from our eyes. I think that means that God is going to give us His perspective. We're going to see things from His viewpoint. We will discover that once we look at it through His eyes, so to speak, and His prism, that all things are well. Justice has been done. The will of God has been accomplished in heaven and on earth, and the painful memories will all be gone. So don't worry about that. What we should worry about is living for God with all the energy and enthusiasm that we have until we see Him face to face.

Dave McAllister: What a day that will be. Thank you, Pastor Lutzer. If you'd like to hear your question answered, go to our website at rtwoffer.com and click on "Ask Pastor Lutzer" or call us at 1-888-218-9337. That's 1-888-218-9337.

You can write to us at Running to Win, 1635 North LaSalle Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois, 60614. Running to Win is all about helping you understand God's roadmap for your race of life.

After Jonah preached, he got angry and depressed. Then God sent a sequence of events to teach the wayward prophet some pointed object lessons. Next time on Running to Win, we'll meet a plant, a worm, and a scorching east wind. Pastor Lutzer will conclude his series on brokenness: how God gets us to say yes. As we turn again to Jonah chapter 4, we'll see God making sure that Jonah gets his point. Thanks for listening. For Pastor Erwin Lutzer, this is Dave McAllister. Running to Win is sponsored by the Moody Church.