All right, if you want to turn to Jonah chapter 4 in your Bible, please. I've entitled this message, Doest Thou Well to be Angry? And we're going to see this question, God asked it of Jonah in chapter 4. But let's just read through this chapter, beginning at verse 1. It says there, in fact, I should read the last verse of chapter 3. Chapter 3, verse 10, and God saw their works and that they turned from their evil way and God repented of the evil that he had said he would do to them and he did it not. But it displeased Jonah exceedingly and he was very angry. And he prayed to the Lord and said, I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish, for I knew that Thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentance Thee of the evil. Therefore now, O Lord, take I beseech Thee my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live. Then said the Lord, doest thou well to be angry? That's the title of our message. Doest thou well to be angry? So Jonah went out of the city and sat on the east side of the city and there made him a booth. piled up some branches and got under the branches. And he sat under it in the shadow till he might see what would become of the city. And the Lord God prepared a gourd and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shadow over his head to deliver him from his grief. So Jonah was exceeding glad of the gourd. But God prepared a worm when the morning rose the next day, and it smote the gourd that it withered. And it came to pass, when the sun did arise, that God prepared a vehement east wind, and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah, that he fainted, and wished in himself to die. And he said, It is better for me to die than to live. And God said to Jonah, Doest thou well to be angry for the gourd? And he said, I do well to be angry, even unto death. Then said the Lord, Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for the which thou hast not labored, neither madest it to grow, which came up in a night and perished in night. And shouldst not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than six score, or a hundred and twenty thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand, and also much cattle? Whenever we read or hear God's word, we should always consider the authority of the one who speaks and the privilege that he would speak to us and realize that we cannot understand, we cannot believe or heed or continue in God's word without his grace. Let us therefore come to God at all times by the blood of Jesus and ask him to accomplish his saving work in us by his word. It says in Psalm 119, thinking along those lines, let thy mercies come also unto me, O Lord, even thy salvation according to thy word. So shall I have wherewith to answer him that reproacheth me, for I trust in thy word. And what reproaches us more than our own sinful heart? The title of this message is, Doest Thou Well to be Angry? The setting is all that came before in this little book of Jonah. The immediate context is Jonah's response to what God did in sparing the entire city of Nineveh from His judgment against them for their wickedness. But what God did displeased Jonah exceedingly and he was very angry, as we read in verse 1 of chapter 4. What did God do that so greatly displeased Jonah? Why was Jonah so angry with God? It was because God had mercy on that city of wicked Gentiles of Nineveh. One of the great lessons of the Book of Jonah is that God is a God of mercy, that He, in fact, delights to show mercy. The Book of Jonah records, probably from Jonah's own hand, how God taught Jonah that He is a God of mercy. And this is the treasure discovered to us as sinners by the Spirit of God throughout Scripture, that God is a God of mercy. And God taught Jonah to be merciful. But the lesson God taught him was hard-taught, because Jonah was hard-headed, as we all are by nature. For Jonah to write this book of his own attitudes and his own behavior in opposition to God's will and God's ways must have been very humbling for him. Think how humbling it would be to have to write the record of your own opposition to the goodness of God's own character and His will and word and works, especially when God's character and will and word and works were those especially unexpected and necessary for your own salvation. His grace, his heart of grace, and his mercy to sinners that moved him in wisdom to hold himself accountable, to satisfy his own truth and righteousness and justice on their behalf in the death of his son is that very thing that Jonah was opposing because he had grace towards these people. And so, the backdrop for Jonah's anger in chapter 4 is what God did in the last verse of chapter 3, when He did not bring on Nineveh the judgment He said that He would. Verse 10, God saw their works that they turned from their evil way, and God repented of the evil that He said that He would do to them, and He did it not. Note that in this place, God did not withhold his judgment from Nineveh because, he did not withhold his judgment from Nineveh because of their works. Rather, their works were because of their faith. And that faith, which is not of ourselves, but is the gift of God, is what produced those works. God saw their heart. He saw their faith. They believed in their hearts. Therefore, the first thing we must understand about faith is that it is God's work in us, and the second thing is that faith is a heart matter. The people of God are His people in their hearts, not outwardly only. Heart faith is compared to inward circumcision in Scripture. And true circumcision, by God's own word, is not outward in our flesh, but it is inward in our hearts. See Romans chapter 2, verse 28 and 29. For example, when the Lord saved Lydia in Acts 16, He opened her heart to attend to the things spoken of by Paul concerning Christ. It says there in verse 14, whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended to the things which were spoken of Paul. So see in that that God opened her heart. And note this also about faith and works. Scripture says that what we talk about, what we say, our words, reveal what we think and what we believe. What we say reveals what is going on on the inside of us. It says in Matthew chapter 12, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh. Therefore, all those whom the Lord saves believe in their heart. and they say so in their communication with God in prayer and with others in their conversation. Romans chapter 10 verse 9 says it this way, If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. God's people confess to be true what God has said in his word concerning Christ and him crucified. They are persuaded of those things in their mind and in their conscience. They therefore answer with Christ They answer with Christ, that is, Christ is their answer, when their conscience is pressed by sin. They know that Christ is their only answer, and that if he has not and does not answer every accusation of God's own law and in judgment for them, then they have no answer. And this is faith in the heart. With their mouths they therefore confess that this is so. This is God's work in us. He persuades us that we are sinners, that we have no answer, but Christ, who is Himself our answer. Because He answered, God's justice with Himself in righteousness, and is Himself our answer in conscience and in judgment, the one and only answer God provided and accepts, and so is His answer. We answer God in full because Christ is our answer. Our sins are blotted out, and we are righteous by God's accounting for Christ's righteousness. But we must go on. Now, in Jonah chapter 3 and verse 10, it says that God saw the works of the Ninevites. The Lord always sees. He sees everything. But He especially sees and looks upon His own work, and it is to that that He draws our attention here. Upon completing creation, if you remember, it says in Genesis chapter 1, the last verse, that God saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good. God is known by His works. We are known by our works. About God's works, we can say this, if God did not tell us that He did it, and if He did not tell us that what He did was very good, then we would not know His work, and we would not know His goodness by His work, and we would have no certain basis for knowing that it was good, because God hadn't told us. He therefore directs us to His own works, to make Himself known, and to make known to us what is truly good. Proverbs 20, verse 11 says, Even a child is known by his doings, whether his work be pure, and whether it be right. Jesus said this, There is none good but one, and that is God. Matthew 19, verse 17. After all, it was God's work that sent Jonah to preach to Nineveh. It was God that raised Jonah from the depths out of the belly of that great fish. It was God's work that produced this faith in the Ninevites and turned them from their idolatry and their violence to seek mercy from Him only. They even kept themselves from food and water while they devoted themselves to this task of seeking God's mercy. It is always God's work that saves us from the first to the last because as Jonah said in chapter 2 verse 9, salvation is of the Lord. This is the big message of Jonah. It is that salvation is entirely of the Lord and it is all accomplished by Jesus Christ and Him crucified who died for our sins, was buried, to put sin to death and out of God's book of accounting he blotted out our sins and he rose again to prove our justification by his death. That's the gospel. That's the way God works to save us. Now, there's this phrase in Matthew chapter 12 that Jesus used when he spoke about this book of Jonah. We can see that this little book is, we can see what this little book is all about because of what Jesus said about it. We can see what it is about if we just consider what Christ said. He concluded that a greater than Jonah is here. Thus he spoke of himself. When the Pharisees in Matthew chapter 12 took issue with Christ because he allowed his disciples to go into the field and pluck and eat the grain on the Sabbath day, Jesus taught those Pharisees that he was greater than that day, that Sabbath day. And he reminded them how David and his men ate the showbread that was given by God only for the priest to eat. Jesus said that David and his men did not sin in eating that bread. Jesus also reminded the Pharisees how the priests in the Old Testament were commanded by God to offer up two lambs every Sabbath day, and so he used those examples from scripture to draw the great conclusion of the book of Jonah. He said these things to silence the accusation of the Pharisees against himself and his disciples. In Matthew 12, verse 6, Jesus said, I say to you that in this place there is one greater than the temple. This is the ultimate lesson of scripture. When we read the book of God, we must look for Christ in it. When we find Him to be the message, then we have heard. Christ must have the preeminence in all things. Jesus said in Matthew 12, verse 41, the men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation and shall condemn it because they repented at the preaching of Jonah and behold, a greater than Jonah is here. The Queen of the South shall rise up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it, for she came from the uttermost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon. And behold, a greater than Solomon is here. That is the message of Scripture, the One who is greater than all, because He is God's only begotten Son, the Christ of God, the Savior, who is the Lord, who saves His people from their sins. Now here we have Jonah's anger in chapter four of Jonah, verse two. It says there that, I'm sorry, chapter four, verse one, it displeased Jonah exceedingly and he was very angry. It's a striking thing. There are several things to observe in this final chapter. First, we see what God does. Second, what we know of God by his work and by Jonah's own confession of who God is. And third, we see Jonah's reaction to the Lord's works and His ways. And fourth, how, that is what matter, God stoops to speak to Jonah and to us. And fifth, how God graciously brings circumstances to comfort and instruct and correct His servants and us. Because He did so with Jonah with the gourd and the worm and the east wind and so on. First, consider God's work is evident throughout this book. First, God's work is evident throughout this book. He sent Jonah to preach to these wicked Gentiles in chapter one, verse one and two. Jonah rebelled and would not go. He fled from the presence of the Lord by taking his ship at Joppa to go to Tarshish. The Lord sent a great storm on the sea. The ship was near to break in apart. Jonah slept when he was disobedient while he ran from the presence of the Lord. That's amazing. The captains and the mariners on the ship had to wake him out of his sleep. They questioned him. Under examination, he told them. whose he was and why the Lord had sent the storm, for his own disobedience. And Jonah instructed them that to be saved from perishing, they must throw him overboard into the sea, into the flood of God's judgment. They resisted, but finally relented in submission and pleaded that the Lord would not hold them guilty for Jonah's death when they cast him into the sea. They knew it was the Lord who required Jonah to die for them. And God prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah. He spent three days and nights in the fish's belly. It was while Jonah was in the depths, inside the belly of that fish, that he cried to the Lord. In his prayer, he spoke of God's affliction upon his own soul under the flood of God's wrath. And while under God's judgment, Jonah confessed his own trust in God. Think of that. expressing in judgment his trust in God. That's exactly what the Lord Jesus Christ did on the cross. He trusted God while he was under God's judgment. While under God's judgment, he looked again towards God's holy temple. And under the hand of God's affliction, Jonah remembered the Lord. In his prayer, Jonah told how God had heard and therefore answered his prayer when he was made to remember, I'm sorry, when he was made to remember and God caused him to cry to the Lord. Jonah denounced all confidence in the false and imagined gods in which men put their trust and he pledged thanksgiving to the Lord and pledged to fulfill his vows to the Lord in his prayer. Jonah concluded his prayer by stating the lesson he learned in those depths. the lesson of all of scripture and that lesson that we must learn that salvation is of the Lord. Now having taught Jonah of his saving grace and having given the one sign by which God saves sinners, the Lord then spoke to the fish to vomit Jonah out onto the dry land. Then God sent his word to Jonah again the second time in chapter 3 in verse 1. And then, as one who was dead, buried, and raised from death to life again, Jonah went to Nineveh to preach what God had told him to preach. The people of Nineveh heard the message, they believed the Lord, they clothed themselves in sackcloth, they did not eat or drink anything, and they turned from the violence of their ways and cried mightily to God and cast themselves on the mercy of God to save them from the destruction they knew they deserved. Now this is the context. How did God act when they believed and turned? He turned himself from the evil he said that he would do to them, and that is what angered Jonah. I'll read it again in Jonah 4, verse 1. It displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry. And he prayed to the Lord and said, I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before to Tarshish, for I knew that thou art a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil. Now understand this, considering what Jonah said, be very concerned with yourself if you are displeased exceedingly with God's ways and God's works, because He only does wondrous things. In Psalm 72 it says, Blessed be the Lord God, the God of Israel, who only doeth wondrous things. The Lord is righteous in all His ways, and holy in all His works. Therefore we must be very concerned if, like Jonah, we are exceedingly displeased and very angry at God and His works. Jesus thanked His Father, if you remember, in Matthew chapter 11, for hiding the gospel from the wise and prudent, those who were wise and prudent in their own eyes, And he prayed that God would not reveal the gospel to them, but he would reveal it to babes, the sinful and foolish, in their own eyes, because it seemed good in the Father's sight. You see, it is only because it seems good to the Lord that he sent his Son to reconcile us to himself in the death of his Son and to give us all things with him. Now if that's what is what seemed good to the Lord, isn't the Lord gracious and merciful and slow to anger and great in kindness and turns from the evil he said he would do? So to oppose God is to oppose righteousness and justice and holiness. To oppose God's salvation in Christ is to oppose our own mercies and our own salvation. And that is clear from Jonah chapter 4 and so many other places in scripture. So let us bow before God, who alone can and does do good in saving those sinners perishing for their sins, and he does so for Christ's sake, according to his will and to his word. It is the Father's will to bless all of his people for Christ's sake, because that honors his Son. And the Father honors His Son. And the Son honors His Father. And the Father and the Son honor God's Word and the Holy Spirit. We sinners honor God in believing His Word and we believe His Word concerning Christ and consider Him alone in all of our salvation, to be all-sufficient. And so be very concerned if we oppose God in our heart because our salvation is from Him. And second, we know by what is said in chapter four of God, we know these things of God by his work and by Jonah's confession. Notice here in chapter four in verse two, he prayed to the Lord and he said, I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before Tartarus for I knew that, here's the confession, thou art a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and of great kindness and repentest thee of the evil. Even the confession of an angry prophet glorifies God. Isn't it amazing that from the lips of this disobedient prophet, this man who was so exceedingly displeased with the Lord and very angry because he spared Nineveh, that even from this man's lips he justified God for his glorious goodness because he saved these sinful people. Though Jonah is angry with God, he speaks of God's glory. God acted according to his character. He is a gracious God. He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and he turns himself from the evil he said he would bring on sinners. Can you think of another time when God turned himself? Remember the greatest time of all? God's word to Adam was this, in the day that you eat, you shall surely die. And yet, listen to what Jesus spoke in a great reversal. He said, I am the resurrection and the life. He that believeth on me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. That's the greatest reversal, isn't it? Is this not a complete reversal? But it is a reversal at the cost of God's dear Son. God said that because we sinned, we would die. But now we believe and have His promise that we shall never die. It is all of God's doing. and it was His eternal purpose. It is all because of Christ's redeeming work, and it is all made known to us in the preaching of the gospel by the Spirit of God. This is the reversal of grace, arising only from the heart of God, all by His wisdom alone, and according to His perfect righteousness, when He bore the full cost of our redemption at the price of the obedience of His Son in blood. That's what we know of God's work, and that's what we know by Jonah's confession. Third, Jonah's reaction to the Lord's works and his ways. Scripture shows us both the character of God and the character of man. Some claim that when Paul spoke in Romans chapter 7, he spoke of his experience before his conversion. Remember, Romans chapter 7 is all about how the apostle Paul said, The good that I would, I do not, but the evil which I would not, that I do. I know that in me, that is in my flesh, there is no good thing." Remember that? So some people say, well that was Paul speaking of his experience before his conversion. But note here in Jonah, in this place, in chapter 4, that Jonah thought and acted against God's will after he confessed salvation is of the Lord. This confirms to us that believers have both a sinful nature and a holy nature. Therefore, we ought to watch and pray always that we enter not into temptation. As Jesus said to his disciples in Matthew 26, 41, watch and pray that you enter not into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. Never presume that you will not deny Christ like Peter, or commit some grievous sin like David, or doubt like Thomas. Remember Psalm 94? It says in verse 17, Unless the Lord had been my help, my soul had almost dwelt in silence. When I said, My foot slippeth, thy mercy, O Lord, held me up. In the multitude of my thoughts within me, thy comforts delight my soul. And so he writes, the apostle Paul writes in 1 Corinthians chapter 10 to the Corinthians, he said, let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall. And he also wrote in Galatians 6.1, if a man be overtaken in a fault, you which are spiritual, restore such a one in the spirit of meekness, considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. And so Jonah's sin, and Paul's confession, and Peter's denial, and David's sin, and Thomas' doubt all give us no excuse for presumption to sin against light. When we sin, we sin against greater light than even they had. Here is a principle I have seen in myself. See if you find it to be in yourself. It is easier for me to call and trust God to save me after I sin than when I am tempted before I sin. It is harder to trust and call on Christ to deliver us before we sin than it is to call on Him to forgive us after we sin. Our flesh will make every excuse why we can commit sin, but our guilty conscience will quickly seek forgiveness by the weight of that sin that has freshly come upon us. Let us ever pray, therefore, and watch and cry to our Savior that He would keep us from falling, to present us faultless in the presence of His glory with exceeding joy. And so we have, in those few thoughts there, what I was trying to say about Jonah's reaction here. And the other thing we want to see here is that God's will is always done. God's will is to save his people from their sins. Do you doubt it? John 10, chapter 10, verse 17 and 18, Jesus said God's, the Father's commandment to him was to lay down his life for the sheep. In Hebrews chapter 10 and so many other places, the will of God was for Christ to offer himself for our sins. Though Jonah refused, though he ran away, though the mariners rode hard against the storm, though Nineveh would bring God's judgments upon themselves, though Jonah wanted God to judge Nineveh, and though he waited for God's judgments to fall upon Nineveh, yet The Lord sent the storm. The Lord required Jonah to be thrown overboard. The Lord sent the great fish. The Lord drew those words from Jonah and gave him those words in the belly of the fish to pray. And the Lord preached to Nineveh by Jonah, and the Lord turned the people of Nineveh, and the Lord withheld his judgments. You see, God's will is always done, even against the sinful desires of wicked men and believing men. The other thing we learn here is that our obedience is because God sends his word to us. In chapter 3, verse 1, it says this, the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time. All of our obedience is because the word of the Lord comes to us the second time and the first time. And every time we turn and believe and obey, it is because the Lord sent His word. The word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time. And here's something else we see in this book. We cry when the Lord saves us. When the Lord saves us and turns us to himself, then we cry. Our cry is God's turning, God's enabling, and all because of God-given faith. The Ninevites cried mightily to God because they knew the certainty of His word, and they knew their condemnation was deserved and fair and certain, and they knew also that only the Lord could save them, just as those mariners were made to know on that storm-tossed sea, that only the Lord can save them from drowning in that sea. They knew they had sinned against the God of creation and the God of glory, and they knew that only He who is our Judge can be our Savior. And therefore, in Psalm 34, 17, it says, the righteous cry. God does that. God causes us to cry. When Jonah went his own way, he did not call on the Lord. He did not call when he fled to Tarshish. He slept while he was going his own way. He did not call on the Lord when the storm threatened his life and the lives of the mariners. But when the Lord sent the fish to swallow him, then he cried mightily. And so only when God turns us to himself do we cry. And so it was with the Ninevites. They cried when they were persuaded of God's judgment against them, and they were given this hope to trust the Lord of creation and salvation, the One who made me must save me. Now I want to consider, last of all, this thought when Jonah is asked by God this question, Doest thou well to be angry? In verse 3 of Jonah chapter 4. God asks him, doest thou well to be angry? He asked him twice, remember? Verse 3, it says, therefore now, O Lord, take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than live. Then said the Lord, doest thou well to be angry? And in verse nine also, and God said to Jonah, doest thou well to be angry? He was an angry man. Now to understand Jonah here, I want to consider Elijah when he was in a similar state of self-pity. Let's look at 1 Kings chapter 19. 1 Kings chapter 19. The setting there is that Elijah had just offered on that altar, remember, he had piled up the stones, he had laid the wood on the altar, he had laid the sacrifice on the wood, he had dug a trench around the altar, he had filled, I think, seven barrels of water and poured it out on the sacrifice and on the wood and on the stones and it was running in the ditch. And God answered by fire. And the people said, the Lord, he is God. And now we're in the next chapter, the very next chapter, 1 Kings chapter 19. And Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done and with all how he had slain all the prophets with the sword. Then Jezebel, this wicked woman, sent a messenger unto Elijah saying, so let the gods do to me and more also if I make not thy life as the life of one of them by tomorrow about this time. So she threatened to kill Elijah just like he had slain the prophets of Baal. Verse three. And when he saw that, when Elijah saw that, he arose and he went for his life. And he came to Beersheba, which belongeth to Judah, and left his servant there. But he himself went a day's journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a juniper tree. And he requested, notice the similarity to Jonah, he requested for himself that he might die. And he said, it is enough. Now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am not better than my father's. And as he lay and slept under a juniper tree, behold, then an angel touched him and said to him, Arise and eat. And he looked, and behold, there was a cake baking on the coals, and a cruise of water at his head. And he did eat and drink, and laid him down again. And the angel of the Lord came again the second time, and touched him, and said, Arise and eat, because the journey is too great for thee. And he arose, and did eat and drink, and he went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights unto Horeb, the mount of God. And he came thither to a cave, and lodged there. And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, and said to him, Listen, what doest thou hear, Elijah? He said, I have been very jealous for the Lord God of hosts. For the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword. And I, even I, only am left, and they seek my life to take it away. And he said, go forth and stand upon the mount before the Lord. And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains and break in pieces the rocks before the Lord. But the Lord was not in the wind, and after the wind, an earthquake. But the Lord was not in the earthquake, and after the earthquake, a fire. But the Lord was not in the fire, and after the fire, a still small voice. And it was so, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his mantle, and he went out and stood in the entering of the cave. And, behold, there came a voice to him and said, What doest thou hear, Elijah? And he said, I have been very jealous for the Lord God of hosts, because the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword. And I, even I only, am left, and they seek my life to take it away. And the Lord said to him, go, return on thy way to the wilderness of Damascus, and when thou comest, anoint Hazael to be king of Syria. Now, I want you to look down at verse 18. The Lord said this. And yet I have left me seven thousand in Israel, all the knees of which have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth which hath not kissed him." Now look at Romans chapter 11. The explanation is given in Romans 11 of the meaning of these words, and it's given in the context of the nation of Israel again. In Romans 11, verse 1, the Apostle Paul says, I say then, hath God cast away his people, meaning the nation of Israel? God forbid, no, for I also am an Israelite of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew. You see, God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew. What ye not, or don't you know, what the scriptures sayeth of Elijah, how he maketh intercession to God against Israel, saying, Lord, they have killed thy prophets, and dig down thine altars, and I am left alone, and they seek my life. But what saith the answer of God to him? I have reserved to myself 7,000 men who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal." Verse 5, here's the lesson. Even so then, at this present time also, there is a remnant according to the election of grace. And if by grace, then is it no more of works, otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace, otherwise work is no more work. Now, considering the explanation of Elijah in this conclusion of Romans chapter 11 drawn by the Apostle Paul, these prophets, Elijah there and Jonah here in Jonah chapter 4, both made intercession to God against a sinful people. Elijah made intercession to God against Israel. Jonah made intercession to God against Nineveh. But God returns an answer of His own purpose in both cases. His purpose is to save his own. those he foreknew by his eternal purpose of grace, that it would not be of works, a purpose that sets forth the unspeakable riches of Christ in the gospel and all to the glory of God, so that we who believe by grace, as it says in Acts 18.27, must fall on our faces and confess this, it is all of grace from first to last and salvation is of the Lord. It is because he is merciful and gracious and slow to anger and exceeding great kindness to us in Christ. This is the lesson of scripture and history. And that is the lesson, don't you know, of our own lives in particular. how we must learn, as Elijah and Jonah and Paul did, that we owe our eternal salvation in body and soul to Christ and to Him crucified. This is the truth of God. This is all of our salvation. And this should be all of our confidence and hope. This should be not only all of our confidence, but all of our worship and our only message. It is Christ and Him crucified. Remember the Lord asked Adam, where art thou? In Genesis 3, 9. And he asked Elijah, what doest thou hear, Elijah? And here he asked Jonah, doest thou well to be angry? Where are you, Adam? Where are you? Why are you here, Elijah? Do you well to be angry, Jonah? It was in a still, small voice. And God asks each one of us, in our conscience, to answer his questions, so that in our answer we might act in faith, considering our own wrong, just like Jonah's attitude, and considering his right, considering also only Christ, God's doing, for our acceptance and favor, and then live in the light and in the submission to God's good way and all by his word. 1 John 1 says this, If we say that we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth. But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanses us from all sin. He's not only talking about cleansing us before God in heaven, He's talking about in our conscience. When we walk in the light, the light of the gospel, the light of God's word to us, spoken from his word in our conscience concerning Christ and concerning ourselves. If we say, Excuse me, in 1 John 1, verse 8, if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. This is a dynamic of walking by faith. God speaks to us in the small voice of his word applied to our conscience. Questions are a powerful way to check our conscience. We might ask our children, what are you doing my son? Are you doing well to think this way? Are you doing well to hold that motive? Are you doing well to speak so? Are you doing well to do this thing? Consider God's condescension that He would come to you and me at the very moment of our temptation, and even as Jonah After we sin, when he said that he was very angry, for example, and God greatly condescends in grace and mercy to arrest us with his still, small voice in our conscience by bringing his word of truth into our darkness, in our willfulness, in the pursuit of our own way, and he speaks not by the wind that ripped the rocks apart, not in the earthquake and not in the fire, but God speaks with his still, small voice in our conscience by the application of the truth of his word in our circumstances of our life. We are made in the image of God, therefore we have a conscience, and it is a voice of right and wrong. It is to act against our conscience is sin. In Romans 14, verse 22, it says this. Notice how God's interest is in our personal interaction with Him in our heart. The Apostle Paul asked this question. Hast thou faith? Have it to thyself before God. Don't go about parading yourself as a Christian before others. Do you have faith? Have it to yourself before God. Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that thing which he alloweth. In other words, if you don't condemn yourself in the thing that you allow, that means your conscience is not speaking against it. And he goes on in Romans chapter 14 verse 23, and he that doubteth is damned if he eats. In other words, if he does something, doubting it. Because he eateth not of faith for whatsoever is not of faith is sin. And so. To live and walk with God, we live with his word continually applied to our conscience. Walking by faith is living in the awareness that we are in the presence of God. Are you right in your attitude? Are you right to think so highly of yourself? Are you right to do this? Is your self-serving motive right? Do you believe you can eat what was offered to idols? Are you right to do so if it causes your brother to wound his conscience by following your example? Think of doing things that would not hurt you, but would cause someone, for example, like your children to sin. You wouldn't do it, would you? God is in the room of your conscience. His voice is our conscience with His word, and it must be our guide. Therefore, let us confess that we did, like Jonah, hold the very attitude or motive that he asked us in that question of our conscience. Why are you angry? Confess that we do not do right in our attitude, and ask him for grace to turn us again to the Lord our God, confessing our sin and coming again to him, knowing he can only receive us for Christ's sake. And therefore, come ourselves, considering only Christ, and not bringing our works, coming to Christ by His precious blood and by His perfect obedience, to God, expecting full acceptance because of Christ and not for our own selves. Trusting our Lord Jesus Christ in all of our coming, let us ask for grace to think in desire and speak and act as Christ in everything. Consider how God applies the blood of Jesus to our conscience to cleanse us from our sins, as we just read in 1 John 1. It is in our conscience that we have faith and walk with God, and it is by faith in Christ. Only in Christ may we freely confess our sins. That is why we must avail ourselves constantly of His Word. We must know His mind from His Word, and we can only know ourselves in light of His Word, and most importantly, We must continually live upon Christ as our cleansing and covering in His presence. This is an activity going on in our mind and conscience. Christ is God's own provision for us and God's own acceptance of us, and we therefore fully embrace Him and by Him know our God to be gracious and merciful, slow to anger, of great kindness, and who turns from the evil His law has pronounced upon us. And so walking by faith is walking in the light of God's thoughts from His Word, shining upon our own thoughts and our own motives. Remember Hebrews chapter 4, the Word of God is quick and powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow, and it is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Walking by faith is walking in the light of God shining his light from his word upon Christ as all of our salvation from the just consequences of our sin and as our satisfaction to God's justice and as our righteousness before God. We wouldn't know that if God didn't make his work known and didn't tell us that he did it and that it was very good. Faith is an inward action of the mind. In believing, we hold communion with God. In believing, the application of His word in our conscience humbles us. And while we are so humbled, it lifts us up again, causing us to flee to Christ, to hide in Christ, and rest in Christ, and find God's own comfort to us in Christ. And this walk of faith is living in sweet accord with God as we consider only Christ in all of our coming, wondering in ourselves how God can accept and bless me for his sake that God would be so gracious and merciful, slow to anger, great in kindness, and turning himself from the evil his own law pronounces by expending fully the wrath of his justice on the Lord Jesus Christ. Here are some concluding thoughts. Jonah knew before he fled from the Lord to go to Tarshish that God would find a way to be consistent to his name and to his ways and to his glory, the glory of his grace to those who heard his word concerning Christ. And ought not we ourselves expect to find mercy and grace and exceeding great kindness from God because these blessings are in Christ for sinners? Jonah knew that before. Shouldn't we know it? If we come to God by Christ's precious blood, according to His word, then He will receive us. We have His own word on it, and therefore, may, we, even we must, expect, in honor of His faithfulness and justice, He will deliver us from our sins. Ought not we also to bear this blessed news to perishing sinners, expecting that God, according to His word, His character, and His ways, His own person, will for Christ's sake save those that hear of Christ, and see in His word, and work, and His glory, in doing so that He did it for His Son's sake? There's many lessons we can learn from Jonah here. Doest thou well to be angry? Don't you find God's still small voice in your conscience to be that arresting word and that comforting word all in one? It's amazing how God's word both opens and heals us, isn't it? We'll try to conclude Jonah chapter four next time. Let's pray. Father, thank you for your word and your operations in our heart by your spirit through your word, especially as you direct us to the Lord Jesus Christ. And though it be painful to discover our own corruptions, our own opposition to your holy character and name and your law and all that you are and your goodness, that your law even serves to show the exceeding sinfulness of our sin, and our conscience bears witness to it. Yet you have, by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, from your word the gospel sprinkled our conscience, and we are clean, so that we now by faith can see in your wisdom By your justice, according to your righteousness and truth, you have in grace completely obliterated our sin in your sight and made us holy by the Lord Jesus Christ, by his one offering for us. his offering of himself to God for our sins. And so we trust, Lord, that you will accept us for his sake. In fact, we expect that you will accept us for his sake. Therefore, we have hope. Therefore, we have this assurance, this expectation of faith that you will give to us, not for our sakes, nor according as our sins deserve, though we do deserve them, But Lord, according to the grace that's in your heart, fulfilled in righteousness in the Lord Jesus Christ, our only hope, our Savior. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.