all right if y'all would if you have your bibles you can open to jonah chapter one i'm not going to do the second part like i said of last week's i'm going to start reading through jonah i think on wednesday nights so i titled this sermon you can run but you can't hide i'm going to start reading in jonah chapter one verse one 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 has come up before me. But Jonah rose up to flee unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord, and went down to Joppa, and he 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. But the Lord sent out a great wind into the sea, and there was a mighty tempest in the sea, so that the ship was like to be broken. Then the mariners were afraid and cried every man unto his God and cast forth the wares that were in the ship into the sea to lighten it of them. But Jonah was gone down into the sides of the ship, and he lay and was fast asleep. So the shipmaster came to him and said unto him, what meanest thou, O sleeper? Arise, call upon thy God. If so be, that God will think upon us that we perish not." Father God, Lord, I thank you, God, for your word that you preserved for us, God, I thank you for this opportunity tonight to preach your word, God, and I pray, Lord, that you would keep me from error, God, that you would allow me to give a message that would be edifying and glorifying to you, God, Lord, that we would have ears to hear. Father, I thank you, God, for these blessed folks that you've entrusted, Lord. And I just pray, God, that you would help me to be a pastor worthy to preach to them, God. Lord, I do pray for Mike. You would get him here safely, Lord. Keep him safe as he travels. It's in Jesus' name I pray. Amen. So Jonah was a prophet. We all know what a prophet is. Prophet of God, Jonah. He had a job to do. God used the prophets to bring his word to men. Oftentimes, the prophets served under kings, and God used them to direct the kings in their decisions. Jonah served under such a king. In 2 Kings 14, we read, in the 15th year of Amaziah, the son of Joash, king of Judah, Jeroboam, the son of Joash, king of Israel, began to reign in Samaria. and reigned 41 years. And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord. He departed not from all the sins of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin. He restored the coast of Israel from the entering of Hamath unto the sea of the plain, according to the word of the Lord God of Israel, which he spake by the hand of his servant Jonah, the son of Amittai, the prophet, which was of Gathipher. So Jonah served this king of Israel, Jeroboam, the son of Joash. It says that this king, Jeroboam, did evil in the sight of the Lord. He was guilty of the same sins that the first king, Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, was guilty of. That Jeroboam was the man that God gave the rule over the ten tribes of Israel when the kingdom was split after Solomon died. And what he did was to institute idolatry, because he was afraid that the Israelites would want to return to the kingdom of the house of David if they went to Jerusalem to worship. In first Kings 12 says, And Jeroboam said in his heart, Now shall the kingdom return to the house of David. If this people go up to do sacrifice in the house of the Lord at Jerusalem, then shall the heart of this people turn again unto their Lord, even unto Rehoboam, king of Judah. And they shall kill me and go again to Rehoboam, king of Judah. So Jeroboam, the son of Joash, it seems, followed in this sinful idolatry. When we read about the kings of Israel and Judah, we are often told that they walked after the sins of their fathers or something similar. There were good kings and there were bad kings, but they were all kings and God would still communicate with them through his prophets when he desired. Jonah delivered to Jeroboam the word of God and by it we were told he restored the coast of Israel. 2 Kings 14 says, So God's prophets, were important to the people of Israel to guide their kings, even those that the Bible did not praise for their good deeds. The prophets also were sent to warn those that were in danger of God's judgment, and sometimes God might send one of his prophets to another nation to warn them of coming judgment, as was the case with Jonah. God had commanded Jonah to go to Nineveh. He said, arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry against it, for their wickedness has come up before me. We know from this verse two things about Nineveh. It was a great city, and it was a wicked city. It was so wicked that their wickedness was getting special attention from God. When a city gets so wicked that God decides he needs to do something about it, you know it must be serious. We know how bad Sodom and Gomorrah were when God sent his angels to get Lot out of the city, and God rained fire and brimstone down on those people and utterly destroyed them. In Genesis 19 verse 24, it said, Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven. And he overthrew those cities and all the plain and all the inhabitants of the cities and that which grew upon the ground. But his wife looked back from behind him and she became a pillar of salt. And Abraham got up early in the morning to the place where he stood before the Lord. And he looked toward Sodom and Gomorrah and toward all the land of the plain and beheld, and lo, the smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a furnace. So where was Nineveh, and who were the Ninevites? After the flood, Noah had three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. And out of Ham came Cush in Genesis 10. It says, And Cush begat Nimrod. He began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord. Wherefore it is said, Even is Nimrod the mighty hunter before the Lord. And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Echad, and Calna, and the land of Shinar, Out of that land went forth Asher and built Nineveh and the city Rehoboth and Calah. Nineveh was one of the cities that was built after the flood in the place that we call Mesopotamia. At the time of Jonah, Nineveh was the capital of Assyria. Israel was almost constantly at war with Assyria. They would take captives of the Israelites, probably treated them as bad or worse than the Egyptians did. In 2 Kings 15, it says, In the days of Pekah, king of Israel came Tiglath-Pileser, king of Assyria, and took Ijon, and Abel-Bethmeaka, and Jenoa, and Kadesh, and Hazor, and Gilead, and Galilee, all the land of Naphtali, and carried them captive to Assyria. In chapter 18, 2 Kings says, And the king of Assyria did carry away Israel into Assyria, and put them in Hela and in Habor by the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes. because they obeyed not the voice of the Lord their God, but transgressed his covenant and all that Moses, the servant of the Lord, commanded and would not hear them nor do them. So the Assyrians were fierce and violent enemies of the Israelites and sometimes were used by God to chasten them. But at this time, their wickedness was obviously more than God could stand. So the people of Nineveh were in very great danger of being likewise cut off for their deeds. But God was merciful enough that he called on a prophet to deliver a message to them beforehand. He told Jonah to arise and go to Nineveh and cry against it. And this apparently did not set well with Jonah. The prophet did not want to go to Assyria, to Nineveh, to warn them. Probably because of all the reasons that God had for destroying Nineveh, Jonah wanted also to see them destroyed. And he knew that if he went and warned them as God commanded, there was a good chance that they would repent and that God would not destroy the city that had been such a thorn in the side of Israel. Verse three says, but Jonah rose up to flee unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord and went down to Joppa and he 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. Jonah ran from God's work He rose up not to go and do what the Lord commanded him to do, but it says he rose up to flee from the presence of the Lord. Whenever a man is doing wrong, the last place he wants to be is in the presence of the Lord. When Adam and Eve sinned in the garden, and they heard the Lord's voice as he was walking in the garden, it said that they hid themselves from the presence of the Lord. Wherever the Lord was, that was not where they wanted to be. The presence of the Lord is the most uncomfortable place that a sinner could ever find himself in. The unsaved will most definitely try to flee from God's presence when the day of judgment comes. Revelation 6 says, And the kings of the earth and the great men and the rich men and the chief captains and the mighty men and every bondman and every free man hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb. For the great day of his wrath has come, and who shall be able to stand?" In 2 Thessalonians 1, verse 6, we read, "...seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you. And to you who are troubled, rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power. But believers who are walking disobediently will also want to remove themselves from God's presence and from other believers that are walking rightly before God. In 1 John chapter 1 we read, This then is the message which we have heard of Him and declare unto you that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. 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. 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. Believers who are shining their light will be just as uncomfortable to those who are walking in darkness, and they will not be able to have fellowship with them. They won't even want to have fellowship with them. They will just backslide right on out the door. When someone who was coming to church regularly just stops showing up, you know that there's something wrong. But there is a problem for that man that thinks that he can just remove himself from God's presence. Can anybody guess what it is? God is everywhere. Thank you, brother. Psalm 139 says, Whither shall I go from thy spirit? Or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there. If I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall thy hand lead me and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say surely the darkness shall cover me, even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee, but the night shineth as the day. The darkness and the light are both a light to thee. You can't run far enough or fast enough, swim deep enough, climb high enough. Even if you built the biggest rocket and took off for Mars, you can't get away from God. He will always know right where you are. He can see you in the dark. He knows what you're thinking before you even think it. You can't escape from God's presence. Jonah found that out pretty quick, although as a prophet, I think he knew it already. I think he was throwing a temper tantrum when he decided to run from the presence of God and get on a ship to Tarshish. Tarshish was about as far as a man could get from Nineveh in those days. It's almost 3,000 miles away from where God had commanded Jonah to go. I wonder if Jonah had any plans of ever coming back. I doubt he even thought that far ahead. He just knew that God was asking him to do something that he refused to do, and was willing to go to great lengths to avoid the task. Could he not have just stayed where he was? Apparently not. I suppose the Lord may have been insistent that he go do this thing. Perhaps he could get no rest from the Spirit urging him to go and preach in Nineveh. But it seems that he was able to get rest once he got on the ship. Maybe he thought that this was going to work out. He was going to take a nice ocean trip, see new places and meet new people. He was going to relax and finally get some rest. We see that Jonah was sleeping so soundly in the hold of the ship that he didn't seem to know that there was a great wind stirring up the sea outside the boat. It says, but the Lord sent out a great wind into the sea and there was a mighty tempest in the sea so that the ship was like to be broken. Then the mariners were afraid and cried every man unto his God and cast forth the wares that were in the ship into the sea to lighten it of them. But Jonah was gone down into the sides of the ship and he lay and was fast asleep. So the shipmaster came to him and said unto him, what meanest thou, O sleeper? Arise, call upon thy God. If so be that God will think upon us that we perish not. How is Jonah able to be sound asleep while the tempest is raging around them like this? I'm a sound sleeper. I can ignore my alarm clock and just keep sleeping while it goes on and beeping and buzzing drives Christy nuts. But if my bed was rolling back and forth like Jonah's must have been, I think I would wake up. We're told that Jesus slept in a ship while his disciples were afraid of a storm that they thought might capsize them. They didn't understand how he could not be concerned enough to get up and see what was going on. And Mark 4 says, And the same day when the evening was come, he saith unto them, Let us pass over unto the other side. And when they had sent away the multitude, they took him, even as he was in the ship. And there were also with him other little ships. And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that it was now full. And he was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a pillow. And they awake him, and say unto him, Master, carest thou not that we perish? And he arose and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace, be still. And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. And he said unto them, Why are ye so fearful? How is it that ye have no faith? Jesus slept, because he had no worry that they would not make it to the other side of the sea. It was not their fate to perish in a shipwreck. Jesus had work still to be done, and his disciples did as well. His disciples didn't understand that he was in control the whole time. And when he woke, he commanded the wind and the sea to cease raging, and they obeyed. But Jonah's in a different state. Jonah is sleeping the sleep of a man resigned to his fate. He knows that he is running from God, and that God is going to catch up with him. And what can he do? So he does nothing. He sleeps while the others on the ship desperately try to lighten the ship so that they don't go under the waves. The goods that they were carrying with them to trade and make profit with, they were casting them overboard to try to save their lives and Jonah's life as well. But Jonah is complacent. The mariners cried to their gods to no avail because, of course, their gods were nothing but idols. But Jonah did not cry out to the one true God of all creation who could, of course, save them from this storm. Jonah knew that this storm was from his God, but he was quiet. I think at this point, Jonah was just ready to die. I don't think Jonah wanted to die, but he was in such a backslidden state and contrary to God's will, he had run from his duty and boarded a ship to take him as far from that duty as he could possibly get. And I think his heart was hardened at this point so that he couldn't soften it himself and repent and ask for God's forgiveness and mercy. So God, as a loving Father, would have to chasten Jonah with the rod. Proverbs 23 says, And of course, we know that the rod that God uses in Jonah's case is a fish that God has prepared just for him. And we'll get to that next Wednesday, but I want to close this message with a word of encouragement for anyone who might find themselves backsliding. I know that someone who is backsliding probably won't be encouraged by this, but know that God is a loving father who will chasten his children when they go astray. Proverbs 13, 24 says, he that spareth his rod hateth his son, but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes. Hebrews 12 says, And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children. My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him. For whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons. For what son is he whom the Father chasteneth not? The purpose of chastening is to bring us back into fellowship with God when we have fallen away from Him, when through sin we have removed ourselves from His presence. But we don't have to wait until the rod comes down on us to get back into fellowship with God. He is always ready to receive us if we confess our sins to Him and look to Him for forgiveness. In 1 John 1 we read, if you confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. So if you feel the desire to get away from God, to get away from God's people, from the church, and just go do something else, know where that comes from is sin. Walking in darkness, you can't have fellowship with God, because God is light, and in Him there is no darkness. 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, cleanseth us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. Confessing our sins to Christ, getting the sins forgiven, getting back the fellowship that we had with God when we were first made clean by believing on his blood, is an important part of our Christian walk. We need to remember that Jesus was also a man, 100% man, and He knows the temptations that we are subjected to, the trials, the emotions that we go through. He knows our weakness. And knowing all these things about us, He chose to suffer on the cross and die for us. because he loves us, and now that he is resurrected, he is still on our side. Hebrews 4 says, for we have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. And Romans 8, 34 says, who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea, rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us." So we can always come to God. We can always come to Christ, our High Priest. Confess our sins. There's no need, if we're in sin, that we have to wait for God to punish us before we repent. He will chasten us, because He is a good Father. My kids have never had enough spankings, probably. Couldn't give them enough, but they're good kids. But the Lord knows how to raise kids better than I do. Amen. Let's go to God in prayer. Father God, Lord, I thank you so much for all your blessings and all your mercies, God, and all your promises, Lord. I thank you for your chastening, God, that brought me back to you, Lord. And I thank you, God, that I know it's because you're a loving father. And I thank you for sending your son, Jesus, to die for us. Thank you for the blood that covers all of our sins, Lord. And I pray, God, that you would just help us. Never to forget that we do have an advocate, that we can come before you, confess our sins, and you're faithful and just to forgive us for our sins. And we thank you so much for that promise. God, I pray that you would just be with the rest of our night, be with our fellowship. Thank you for everything you've done for us, God. It's in Jesus' name I pray, amen.