Well, I'm going to come up here behind the big pulpit, not for the reason that you might think. When I get in a big church like this and my knees start shaking, it's good to be behind a big pulpit and nobody sees that. I met my wife in Bible college and I tried to explain to her how shy I was after we got married and got into the ministry. I don't think she really believed me. I'm naturally introverted and quite shy. in my makeup and until we were on deputation and we were in a church in Illinois and a guy I hadn't seen since probably junior high, high school, we used to play basketball together regularly and He was the only guy in the church that had met me before. The pastor had never met me. He was the only guy in the church. And so he was given the responsibility of introducing. And that always is awkward, especially if you don't know the person that you're introducing. And so they said, Jeff, why don't you introduce Brother Ben as he comes tonight? And so he introduced and talked about how we were together in youth group and how we used to play basketball together. And then he concluded his introduction by saying, and I am really looking forward to Brother Ben coming to preach because I cannot believe God called him to be a preacher. And my wife was kind of like, wow, he really was shy when he was younger. But God gives grace. You've probably heard the statement, God does not call those who are qualified, he qualifies those that he calls and I am a living testimony of that that God gives grace every day and so I feel quite a bit more comfortable behind a big pulpit where nobody sees my knees knocking and we'll get along just great this evening. It is a great joy to be with you this evening it is a privilege to be able to open God's Word and to be able to share that with you especially my passion which is missions and I believe it is God's passion as well. The last time I read through the Bible I made a personal challenge to myself that I was going to see if I could find missions. I had read books that say you find missions in the Old Testament and you find missions in the New Testament and even books that I read that said the Bible is a missionary book and I thought to myself well if the Bible is a missionary book I should find missions in every book of the Bible and so I took that challenge and About six months later, it was very evident that I had found missions in every single book of the Bible. It is everywhere. It is God's heartbeat. Some people think that missions changed or began in the New Testament. No, right from the very beginning, God had a plan. And the first command in the Bible was to Adam and Eve, be fruitful, multiply, and fill up the earth. God has a plan. He describes it again in Revelation, he said, I want to call out from every kindred, tongue, people and nation on earth, people that are red and yellow and black and white to praise and glorify me and serve me forever. And that's God's program, it's missions. and most churches like your church each year they have a missions emphasis month not because that's the only month we should be emphasizing missions but to remind us that missions is God's heartbeat that go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature is a command for every single person in this room it's a responsibility for all of us it is called the Great Commission because it is a commission given by God to each and every one of us. And what a privilege it is to be here during your Missions Emphasis Month to preach from God's word and to remind you and encourage you in this responsibility that God has given to each and every one of us. We are privileged to serve the Lord in Cameroon. You are privileged, I hope you realize you're privileged, to serve the Lord right here in Tampa, in this area. And I hope that tonight's message might be a challenge to all of us in ways that we can become more active, more involved, maybe even more obedient in this great commission, this heartbeat, this passion of God in our world today. I'm going to ask you to turn in your Bible as we continue. to a book of the Bible where we find the missionary to ISIS. If you would turn your Bibles to the book of Jonah, all right? The book of Jonah. You say, wait a minute, ISIS, that is a new creation. That is just recently developed. And by the way, they are really getting beat back there in northern Iraq and Syria. Of course, ISIS stands for Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. I want us to keep that in mind. Not long ago, just a matter of weeks ago, we kept hearing in the news, Mosul, Mosul, Mosul, there's this big struggle in Mosul. And just recently, the Iraqi army was able to drive ISIS out of Mosul that they have held for more than a year. They've held for months and months. The Iraqi army was able to drive them out of Mosul across the Tigris River. Directly opposite Mosul today today Directly opposite Mosul on the other side of the Tigris River. You will find the ancient ruins of Nineveh That is where they are located right there. So if you were to go to Nineveh today You would be in some very hot territory. You would be in the area claimed by by the caliphate of Isis. Now I want you to keep that in mind as we read the first three verses of the book of Jonah. Please follow along as I read out loud. Now the word of the Lord came unto Jonah, the son of Amittai, saying, Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry against it, for their wickedness is come up before me. But Jonah rose up to flee unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. and went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish, so he paid the fare thereof and went down into it to go with them unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord." Let's pray together. Father, as we continue in the service this evening, we pray, Lord, that your word and the example, the very poor example and testimony of this missionary to northern Iraq would be a great challenge to each and every one of us. Lord, that your Holy Spirit would drive home the lesson and the challenge that you want each of us to take this evening. And may we respond at the end of this message with the answer of yes. In whatever area you challenge us with, Lord, may we say yes to your Holy Spirit's leading and to your word, the Bible. We ask this in Jesus' precious name, amen. The prophet Nahum describes the people of Nineveh, the prophet Nahum in the Bible. And as I list the descriptions that he gives, I want you to think about ISIS in 2017. Would you do that? The Bible describes the people of Nineveh as evil enemies of God. Nahum describes them as exploiters of the weak and helpless. And when a terrorist straps bombs on a little girl or a woman, as was done just again this last week in northern Cameroon, and sends them into a marketplace or a mosque or some other busy place and detonates and blows them up, those are people who are exploiters of the weak and helpless. Nahum described the Ninevites as exceptionally cruel in war. We know that ISIS will not only take Christians and cut their heads off and videotape it and put it on the internet, but we also know that their own soldiers, when they are not bold enough and aggressive enough in the battle or if they retreat, they are sometimes taken and drowned or boiled in oil. Sounds very much like Nahum's description of the people Nineveh. They are worshipers of false gods, they're womanizers, they're involved in witchcraft. These are the descriptions that Nahum gives of Nineveh. And so when God came to Jonah and he says, Jonah arise and go, and that's our challenge tonight, arise and go. May we add the plural form ye to the end because that's our theme this month. Arise and go ye. May that be our challenge this evening. When God came to Jonah and said, Arise and go to Nineveh, Jonah said, No. No way. I know those people in Nineveh. I know the great wickedness that you're talking about, God, and I don't want to go. Now, we give Jonah a hard time, but what if God commanded you to arise and go to Isis and preach against their wickedness? What would your answer be? We know Jonah's answer, all right? He said no. And we know that today there are many excuses that people will give when it comes to foreign missions, not just ISIS, but missions in general. Recently, I was reading a book and there was a survey of 5,000 Christian university and college students, Christian university and college students. These were all evangelical Christians. And they asked them, what are the, main hindrances that might prevent you from being a missionary. And these are the first three excuses. There were many excuses listed but the three major ones like 30 percent and 40 percent area. The first one was I don't think I'm spiritual enough to be a missionary. That was the first excuse. Well as I just said God doesn't call those who are spiritual enough. He calls those who are surrendered and willing to obey his great commission. And remember that commission has been given to all of us in this room. It's not just given to foreign missionaries it's given to all of us. Go ye into all the world. That's your command as well as mine. And so to say I'm not spiritual enough or to think that missionaries are super spiritual or or invincible spiritually, invincible to temptation, and that is very, very wrong, let me tell you, tonight, alright? Missionaries are made out of the same dirt as every single person in this room. We're all made out of the same stuff. And yet, that is an excuse that many people make. I'm not spiritual enough to be a missionary. The second greatest excuse was, I don't think I could learn a new language. As you can tell, I struggle with English still, all right? God gives you grace to do what he's called you to do. And if God's called you to a foreign country, he will enable you to communicate the gospel to those people. And the third excuse was, I don't want to do deputation. That was the third excuse. I don't want to travel all over the country and beg churches for money is how the survey responded. I don't think missionaries go around begging. I guess maybe some do. Basically, I just like to share what God's called me to do. And if people want to invest in that and get on board with that and partner with that, praise the Lord, let's do it. Like I said, that's not the Sinclair's work you saw in Cameroon. That's God's work. And those who want to get on board with what God is doing in Cameroon, praise the Lord that we get excited about that. All right. But those are excuses, and there are all kinds of excuses. Maybe those are not the excuses that you might give. I remember one guy saying he could never be a missionary because he has to have a hot shower every day, and he knows that missionaries in Cameroon go without electricity and other issues sometimes, and so he said, I could never be a missionary. I have to have a hot shower every day. I don't know what your excuse is. I know when God called me to preach, And I began to argue with God and tell him I was too shy and all the other excuses that there was no way I could preach. I remember my excuses. I don't know what yours are. I don't even know what Jonah's were. But I do know that Jonah said, no, I'm not going. And I deliberately slowed down when I read a phrase in verse 3. It's there two times in verse 3. The Bible says that when Jonah fled, from the commission that God had given to him. The Bible says he fled from the presence of the Lord two times. He wasn't just fleeing to Tarshish. Jonah was fleeing from the presence of the Lord. And I want to say something very clearly tonight. I've already said God has given all of us the Great Commission. All of us in this room are commanded to go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. If we refuse, if we make excuses and we reject and we flee from that commission, that personal responsibility, the Bible teaches in this verse we are actually fleeing from the presence and the power and the blessing of God in our life. To flee from God's program, which is missions in the world today, is to flee from the very presence and power of God. Please, tonight, please, when God says, go ye, don't say no like Jonah said. Say, God, I don't know how you're going to do this, but submit yourself and say, yes, I will obey. I will go. Well, in chapter 1, verse 4, the Bible says, but the Lord sent out a great wind into the sea. And we don't have time to get into all the details. You know the story. Most of you know the story very well. God sent this wind, which brought a great storm. And those sailors in that ship feared for their lives. They told Jonah to start praying to his gods and seek. deliverance. They needed salvation. They were afraid that they were going down right there. And Jonah knew where that wind came from. He knew it wasn't an accident and he knew it wasn't by the gods. He knew the one true God and he knew God was the one that sent, as it says in this verse, God sent that wind to remind him that God had a plan and God had a commission and he was going the wrong way. Well, he told those guys, listen, if you want this storm to end, you're going to have to throw me overboard because I am the reason. And they struggled. They didn't want to do it. They fought for all they were worth, but finally they gave in and they threw him overboard. And then the Bible says in verse seven, I believe it is. It says that God sent a great fish, 17, excuse me. Now the Lord God had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah. Now God did not send a great wind and God did not send great fish tonight. He sent a missionary from Cameroon to remind you, arise and go ye. Go ye. Don't run from the presence of the Lord. Don't run from God's program in this world today. Just obey. Say yes. Don't say no. Well, let's continue on. Look now at chapter 3. That fish that God prepared basically gave Jonah a free ride a submarine ride, if you will, back to the coast under the Mediterranean Sea. The Bible says he spit Jonah out on the shore there, and here comes the word of the Lord again to Jonah after all that struggling, fighting, and arguing with God. Chapter 3, Jonah 3, verse 1, And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, saying, Arise, go ye unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee. So chapter 1, we saw number one God said go. And now in chapter three we see almost word for word the same commandment. And so if you're keeping an outline point number one is the same as point number one. God said go. All right. I don't preach a message with similar points very often but this message has point one and point two are exactly the same. God said go. And thankfully, verse 2, Jonah goes this time, or verse 3 there, chapter 3. Jonah arose and he went. He was not very joyful about it, as we later read, and he certainly did not obey immediately. He didn't even obey completely. We teach our children in our home that true obedience is when we obey immediately, completely, and joyfully. Jonah did not obey immediately. He did not obey completely. The Bible says every time you see God describing Nineveh, he describes it as the great city. It was huge. The Bible says it would take three days to walk across Nineveh. I used to think it was three days trip to Nineveh until I looked at a map and I saw it was like plus 500 miles from Israel to Nineveh. And then I realized, oh, the city, the city of Nineveh is so great. It takes three days to walk across. And Jonah didn't even make it to the palace. He walked in and he said, hey, if you people don't repent in 40 days, Nineveh is going to be destroyed. And he left. That's not a very thorough job. by anybody's definition. But he went in and he preached his little few verse message and then the Bible says he went up on a hill by Nineveh and he looked down over the city and he sat there and he waited to see probably he was hoping fire and brimstone would come down and destroy Nineveh. We need to obey God immediately completely and joyfully. Well thankfully even that missionary that God sent to Nineveh, his message was heard and the message began to spread and it did reach the palace. The message did, not the missionary, but the message from the missionary reached the palace and the king and his people began to repent of their sin. The Bible says in chapter 3 verse 5 that God saw their faith. And by the way, The gospel hasn't changed, all right? The gospel has not changed. The only way you're gonna have your sins forgiven is to put your faith in Jehovah Jesus. Now, they didn't know the name Jesus yet, but they did know the name Jehovah. We see it over and over again in this book. And the Bible tells us that if we are going to have salvation today or at any time in history, someone is going to have to repent and believe in Jehovah Jesus, the Lord Jesus Christ. If you're here tonight and you've never done that, I know it's a Sunday night and it's probably all church members and church folk, but listen, I'm an evangelist, I'm a missionary, all right? I love to preach the gospel. And if there's someone here tonight and you've never repented and put your faith in Jesus Christ, I wanna remind you tonight, that is the only way you can be saved. You cannot be saved by your good works or your effort. If there was any way you could save yourself, listen to me very carefully, Jesus would have never come to this world. But you cannot save yourself. The Bible says, no matter how hard you and I try, we fall short of the glory of God. We are all sinners. And the wages of sin is death. It's been that way again from the very beginning. In the Garden of Eden, God said to Adam and Eve, If you eat the fruit of that tree, you will die. The wages of sin is death. I know many churches have come out with their own opinions and said, well, if you get baptized, that can wash away sin, or if you do some good works, that can reduce your sin debt, but that's not what the Bible teaches. The Bible teaches there's only one penalty, and that penalty is death, and that is why Jesus came. Jesus came to die in your place, to die for your sin. As the spotless Lamb of God, He died on that cross and He said, it is finished. There is no more work. It is finished. The price for your sin has been paid. Repent. and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. And the Bible says you will be saved. Well, that's what these people did. The Bible says God saw their faith, chapter 3, verse 5. God saw their repentance, chapter 3, verse 8. And God saw their works, chapter 3, verse 10. And so we read in that verse 10 of chapter 3, the last verse of Jonah chapter 3, the Bible says and God saw their works that they turned from the evil way and God repented of the evil that he said that he would do unto them and he did it not. Now most missionaries would rejoice and be thrilled of all these tens of thousands who have repented and believed in Jehovah Jesus. But not Jonah, unfortunately, all right? We're gonna discuss that in just a moment. But let me give you the third point of our message tonight. Number one, God said go. Number two, God said go. And number three, God spared the Ninevites. God spared the Ninevites. I believe there are people all over this world that God desires to spare. And he's commanded us, sitting in this room, to go ye with that good news. 2 Peter 3, verse 9 says, The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness, but is longsuffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. Aren't you glad God was longsuffering with you? Well, God is longsuffering with this world. and he's commanded you as a child of God to go ye to arise and go with that good news to those who have still not yet repented and believed in him. Look at the last two verses of the book of Jonah with me Jonah chapter 4 verses 10 and 11 we see God's heartbeat and the terrible Attitude that Jonah has but let's look at it Jonah chapter 4 verse 10 then said the Lord thou hast had pity on the gourd For the wits thou has not labored neither made us did grow which came up in a night and perished in the night Let me pause right there again I assume you know the story as Jonah was sitting up there on that hillside waiting for fire and brimstone to fall down on those wicked Ninevites those people that we would describe as Isis today and God in his mercy allowed a gourd to grow up and in a night the gourd and the leaf was so big that it covered Jonah. And he was happy he was grateful for that leaf but then a worm came and the sun came and the gourd died. Jonah was mad and angry with God. So angry he basically said, God just take my life. I knew you were going to do this. I knew you were a merciful God. I knew if I came up here and I preached the truth, I knew in your mercy you would save these wicked people. What kind of a missionary is that? But that was his attitude. And God points out here, and by the way, I want to believe, I can't prove it, but I do believe Jonah, by inspiration of God, wrote this book, and so I believe Jonah finally, somewhere along the line, got his heart right with God and recorded these words in submission to God for us. And look at what Jonah, in transparency and all candidness, says. Thou hast had pity on the gourd. God is saying to Jonah, you care more about the shade of this leaf than you do about the tens of thousands of souls in the city of Nineveh that I just spared. Look at the last verse, verse 11. And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern their right hand and their left hand? and also much cattle." God says, listen, I created the plants, I created the animals, and I created the people. And Jonah, you have more care for plants than you do for the souls of these little children and their parents in the city of Nineveh. What do you get excited about? What thrills your heart? What kind of hobbies and what kind of passions and what kind of emphasis characterize your life? Are they things like plants and animals, objects, things, temporal things? Or do you get excited about the souls of men and those things that are eternal? God said to Jonah, listen, I created it all. But I wanted to have mercy on these souls. Yes, they were wicked souls, but they have repented and they have believed in me. And that's what I care about, and that's where my heart is, and that's what excites me, and that's the passion of the heart of Almighty God. And I hope tonight, as we've been reminded by this very, very familiar passage of Scripture, and by this missionary that I described at the beginning, the missionary to ISIS, I hope that maybe we've looked at our own hearts. And we've looked at the command that God gave to Jonah. And I could echo that command tonight and say to each and every one of us as we round up, if you will, this Missions Emphasis Month. And may I say to you, arise. Pray for your missionaries. Partner with your missionaries in a genuine way, in a sincere way, in a passionate way. Pray for your missionaries this year like you've never prayed before. As I heard your pastor praying even for us in this service. Pray for the furtherance of the gospel. Pray for them to be filled with the spirit of God. Pray for fruit and multiplication of their fruit for your missionaries. Hillsdale Baptist Church arise and give. Give to missions like you've never given before. I noticed as I was coming in that your church practices faith, promise, giving. And I want to challenge you, if you've not given your commitment, by definition, faith, promise means that you give more this year than last year. If your commitment was $50 or $100 a week last year, The definition of faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. And if you saw God this last year provide what you committed last year, then by faith, I want to challenge you, arise and give more this year to missions for the furtherance of the gospel and that command to go ye with the good news around the world. And finally, as I close, may I challenge you not only with the theme of the Missions Conference, but God's specific command to Jonah, arise and go ye. The Great Commission is not just for missionaries. The Great Commission is for every single child of God. Every disciple of Jesus Christ is commanded to go. to go ye into all the world. That is your command. If you have not been obedient in that command, may I remind you tonight, arise and go with the good news. Go to work with the good news. Go to school with the good news. Go to the grocery store and the post office with the good news. Go to your neighbor with the good news. Go to your family with the good news. And go into all the world To Iraq and Cameroon and India and China and Togo and whatever other countries that you've been challenged with this month, arise and obey God and go with that good news. Not reluctantly as Jonah did, but please ask God to give you his passion and his heart to call out from every kindred, tongue, people, and nation, so that one day we will be around the throne, people from Cameroon and people from Tampa, worshiping, praising, and glorifying God and serving him forever. Let's all stand together. I'm gonna pray and turn it over to your pastor. As we stand together, Father in heaven, thank you for the reminder this evening to go ye." Lord, not everyone in this room can go to Cameroon as a missionary, although we are praying for those other five regional capitals that, Lord, you will raise up laborers and send them into the harvest field. Specifically, our burden is these other five regions. But Lord not everyone in this church can go to a foreign field realistically and practically speaking but there probably are young people middle aged maybe even older folks here that you are calling to whom much is given much will be required father and you have given us this command to go ye. So Lord I pray that if there are Men women boys girls here this evening have been touched by your Holy Spirit to say yes to your command to go to the foreign field I pray tonight they would submit to that. Maybe others have been challenged to pray and others have been challenged to give like never before. I pray Lord whatever it is your Holy Spirit is challenging us with this evening. May the answer of your people tonight be, yes, I will obey. I will go. Lord, please have your will and your way in our hearts and lives tonight. In Jesus' name I pray.