Jesus, Lord Jesus, for I am the Son of the Heavenly King Jesus, Lord Jesus, for I am the Son of the Heavenly King I never knew who to be. All of my ambitions, all of my plans, I will never ever be. Thank you for your time. For it only is true that I dream. For it only is true that I am free. For it only is true that I am free. I'm just going to get a few announcements out of the way. It's great to see everybody here again at the Youth Rally and tonight our speaker is Andrew Thompson. It's great to have Andrew here this evening. Just the usual CDs and DVDs are available out in the hall there, £2 and £3 each. Or you can download it for free off Sermon Audio and it'll be uploaded two or three hours after the the meeting tonight, and you can download that for free, and there's a link from the Facebook page, so please remember to join that. The Bible class here continues on Tuesday night, and the topic, we're going through the book of Daniel, and the topic is the gospel according to Nebuchadnezzar, so that'll be very interesting as well. There's a petition in the hall that our pastor has asked if you would please sign this if so about. The persecuted church has a petition that's going to be going to the government, And please sign that, there's details and information on that card. And there's also, there's plenty of these wee Youth Rally bookmarks left. So if you haven't already got one, we usually give them out just at the start of the year. There's a pile of them out in the hall as well. And on the 18th, the Banbridge Youth Rally continues and most of you know about it anyway, but there's also the first of four special testimonies starting in the church here. And it would be great to see, maybe bring your friends, maybe some unsafe people to that as well. And then, on just the Saturday before that, there's a CEF fellowship meeting, and the speaker is David Legge. That's Saturday the 17th. I think they told me you were going to get cards on the way, and I don't know if you got them or not, but you maybe have them already. So that's it. Thank you. Thanks, Richard. Okay, we're just going to sing another piece of this. There's still people joining us there. So the Lord is my shepherd, please guys. Though it might have hurt, I don't know. It's fine, I'm still screaming. It's fine, it's fine. It's fine, it's fine. I love you. I love you. I love you. Let us just take a moment here and turn around and see the people standing in front of us. Let's just stop for a second and say amen. Thank you for this sacrifice that we've been sacrificing. We thank you for being sent by the Lord, my shepherd. We are thankful. We are ashamed. We thank the Lord for our son, for the good shepherd, for the good shepherd who keeps his eyes on the sheep. We thank you for the lamb. We thank you for the direct speaking to me, and we would like you to let us know this Christmas when we can appreciate you in our own time. And Father, we even look forward to the heavenly coming season to receive us all as we serve you. Father, we just ask now for your help and your blessing tonight as we would meet once again around the open Word of God. We thank you for thy servant, Andrew. We thank you for bringing him safely to us tonight, and we just pray that as he would come here tonight, as he would open the Word of God, as he would minister to us from it, Father, that the Spirit of God would speak tonight, speak into the hearts of the young people who are gathered in this building tonight. Father, you know us, each and every one. You know us better than we know ourselves. You know our very needs tonight, and Father, we pray that as thy Word goes forth, that you'd meet us at the point of our need. Father, we would be conscious tonight that there may be some amongst us And the greatest need of their heart is the need of salvation. And Father, for those tonight we would pray that the spirit of comfort would come upon them in power. And that before this night would close, before the lights would go out in this building, Father that they would come and put their faith and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. Bless us now as we continue in your presence. Bless us as we sing some more of these hymns of praise. And then later on as Andrew comes, bless him and use him for thy glory. We ask it in the Savior's name. Amen. Light of the world. Please, guys. Thank you very much. you You know, it's fantastic to see you all here tonight. And it's fantastic to actually be here tonight. I very nearly wasn't here tonight. This afternoon, just to put this in context, my wife's expecting our first baby in about four weeks. And she asked me to go up into the attic and to get a suitcase for her to pack, you know the bag they have to pack to go quick and she wanted to get the bag packed and I went up to the attic like a good husband and I came straight back down again through the huddle in the attic and landed on my back on the landing so I fucking nearly broke my neck and wasn't here tonight but the Lord had his hand upon me and everything was alright so just a few bumps and bruises but it just goes to show you One second, you can be there, everything's fine. And then a split second, something can go wrong, something can happen. I might could have broke my neck, could have been dead. And praise God I'm here today. But if I had a decade this afternoon that would have been well with my soul, I would have been in heaven. What if something happened to you? When you're young you think you're invincible, when you're young you think It's only old people that die, but that's not the case. Young die, middle-aged die, old die. Just think about the brevity of life. And if you're not saved tonight, come and put your faith and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. We're going to do one more song before Andrew comes to speak to us. It's really good to have Andrew. And just after we sing this song, he's going to come up. and he's going to bring his word to us. The splendor of the kingdom will stand while we sing this one place. Thank you. ♪ There was an angel on the moon ♪ ♪ So let it go, let it go, let it go, let it go, let it go ♪ ♪ Don't take it away, don't take it away, don't take it away ♪ ♪ So let it go, let it go, let it go, let it go, let it go, let it go ♪ It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. It's not me. Our hearts sing the praise of God. I want to hear what he said about you, sir. Are you slabbering about yourself? It's good to be here to speak tonight. I've just realised I've come up with tunes on there. I'm going to speak to you tonight, not on the Nazarene's via. If anybody's seen it on Facebook, I told Morris I was going to speak on that. But I can't get away. I really can't get away from someone else in the Bible. That's a chewing gum swallowed. I was working on it there while I was speaking and it wasn't happening, so I had to just take a wee moment, you know. There we go, it's all the way. There for seven years or something. I'm going to speak to you tonight on the character of the book of Jonah. It's someone I've been speaking to the past four Sundays and I just cannot get away from Jonah. And I was determined in my heart that I wasn't going to go back to him tonight, but I just can't get away from him. And the challenge that hits me every day with this man, and the challenge that I hope hits you tonight, especially tonight if you're not a Christian, and especially tonight if you're a cold-hearted Christian. We're going to look at Jonah, but there's lessons in here for every one of us. So we'll read the first part of the first chapter. Oh, here, sorry, I forgot. Richard's shaking his tie out now. Give us a little time to find it. There we go, the wee green light's on. Okay, Jonah can be a hard book to find. I'm not going to tell you how to find it. It's between Obadiah and Micah. That's absolutely no help probably. So just take your time and flick away until you find it. I usually do the thumb roll to find Jonah. It's one of those thumb roll books that you just flick until you find it. And once you hit Matthew, you know you've gone too far. So take your time and find it. I'm in no rush to get started. I'm in no rush to get finished either. No, I'm working all day. in the hospital, so don't shoot me down. I'm working all day and I'm wrecked, so I'll be five or ten minutes and I'll get sent down rightly. So, all the flicking seems to have stopped near enough. If you're still flicking, don't worry. I'm going to start reading in chapter one and verse one, okay? Now the word of the Lord came on to 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 Tarsus from the presence of the Lord, and went down to Joppa, and he found a ship going to Tarsus. So he paid the fare thereof, and went down into it, to go with them unto Tarsus 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, Liam, was fast asleep. So the shipmaster came to him and said unto him, What meanest thou, sleeper? Arise, call upon thy God. If so be that God will think upon us that we perish not. And they said every one to his fellow, Come and let us cast lots that we may know for whose cause this evil is upon us. So they cast lots and the lot fell. upon Jonah. Then said they unto him, Tell us, we pray thee, for whose cause is this evil upon us? And what is thine occupation, and whence comest thou? And what is thy country, and of what people art thou? And he said unto them, I am in Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, which hath made the sea and the dry land. Then were the men exceedingly afraid, and said unto him, Why hast thou done this? For the men knew that he had fled, from the presence of the Lord." And we'll leave it there because he had told them. Jonah was kind of an ordinary guy. He was used a couple of times by the Lord in the past. But at this point in his life, he's given a unique call by God. It was a very unique call, a missionary call. And it didn't really happen that much back in the land of Israel because The nation of Israel, the Jews, were to be like a diamond in the center of the earth that everyone else around could look in and be jealous of what they had with their relationship with the one true living God. And that's sort of the time that we're in. But Israel were a bit of a mess, and they kept messing up. They kept failing and falling and doing things wrong. And God picked out Jonah to do something different. to do something new, and that was to go and be a missionary somewhere else. And of course now, in the age that we live, that's what it's all about nearly. There's so much emphasis on mission, on going out and reaching people, but not back then. So Jonah was given this call, Jonah go and move 600 miles, travel about that distance northeast of Israel to a city, Nineveh, and go and tell them that their wickedness has come before me and I'm going to judge them. And so Jonah doesn't have to take very long to think about this. And in verse 3 it says Jonah rose up to flee. So Jonah go to Nineveh. No, I think I'll not bother going to Nineveh today. I think I'll go the other way. And went, got a boat and went to Tarshish or set out for Tarshish. And he goes down to Joppa on the coast of Israel and then heads on, on the ship on his merry way with God in the background, the mission in the background. and the presence of the Lord fading into insignificance. And off he goes into the Mediterranean, into the sunset, off to sunny Spain, southern Spain. He knew God well. This is the thing about Jonah, he knows who God is, but yet he still thinks that he can run from God. And Jonah knew God, and knew that if he went to Nineveh, that the chances would be, if the people of Nineveh repented, that God would show grace to them. But Jonah wasn't too friendly with the people of Nineveh, and none of the Israelites really were. They were sort of enemy states. Nineveh were sort of a rough crowd. Just imagine yourselves. They were sort of a rough crowd. And sort of a rough crowd that if you went to them and challenged them with anything or if you annoyed them in any way they would probably cut your head off or put your head in a spike or burn you out or do something terrible to you. So that's the sort of people they were. And in the past they had attacked Israel, they had done things to upset them. And so Jonah had this image of Nineveh as just a people who did deserve God's judgment, who did deserve to be punished by God, so why would he go and warn them? Why would he want to see God forgive them? It doesn't make sense to Jonah. Jonah's emotions take over his response to God, and he starts to just think, no, I don't want to have anything to do with seeing them forgiven, so I'm going to go my own way. We could call him foolish in a way, but in a way we haven't really any right to. I haven't any right to. When we see him run to Joppa, pay the fare, get on the ship, and off he goes, and he thinks he's away from God. We know God better than that. We know who God is, but Jonah doesn't have the whole of scripture. He just has a few experiences in the past with God, and then he thinks he's away, run the other way. He makes his best efforts to get away from God, and off the job he goes about two and a half thousand miles away. He's seeking to travel. In his mind, I want you to get this. I really want you to see this tonight. I'm going to be making my very best effort to be truthful with you, to be straight and to be honest. Truthful and honest are the same thing. But to be frank, to just be blunt with you tonight, I am not a big special preacher or a big special holier-than-thou person. I'm really not. Every day I'm more aware that I'm not that person. And I've went to youth rallies for years and sat and watched the speaker and thought, they must be in such a class place with God and know their Bibles super well and be such an amazing Christian. Well see, tonight maybe it's the only time in the year it happens, but that's not who you have in front of you tonight. You have someone in front of you tonight who does a very good job sometimes of running away from God and messing up. I'm speaking from experience when I speak of Jonah as well. So what I want to do is look at the decision that Jonah made, the heart decision, the change of mind that Jonah had about God and how it affected him, the effects that running away from God had on Jonah's life. And the question that I want to end up with to you is, is there someone here tonight and you're sitting, maybe you've even got your phone out right now, and you're running away from God. Maybe you've got your Bible in your hand and you're running away from God. Maybe you think it's funny that I'm talking like this. Maybe you think you're too big to be talked to about running from God. Let's see what happened to Jonah. And I trust that God's going to actually speak into people's lives tonight. And affect you. And affect the hardest people to get to tonight. There's plenty of young Christians who are upstanding, outstanding, better Christians than I will ever be. But there's people in here tonight and you just don't even care. You know, when the hymns are up on the screen, it doesn't even mean a thing to you. When you're singing about the Lord Jesus being wonderful, that's just words. It's just words falling out of your mouth. I want to speak to you tonight. And more than that, God desperately, from a heart of love, wants to reach you tonight and bring you to Him to live for Him. What happened to Jonah? Well, it affected the ship. In verse 4, the Lord sent out a great wind into the sea. At the end of the verse, the ship was like to be broken. See, when you run from God, When you spend your time running from God, making decisions and making choices that go against God's will for your life, it will break your life. It will destroy your life. The devil himself is a roaring lion walking about seeking whom he may devour. Listen, young people. I'm a young person. Listen, Satan is a real entity. He is a real being. He has demons, fallen angels present on the earth at this very minute. And they want to destroy your life. Young Christian, they want to pull you down. They want to put things in your life that drag you away from God. Now, it's good to have leisure. It's good to have all sorts of things, a nice car and all that. But if it's getting in the way of God, guys, get rid of it. Make the sacrifice. Make the change. Back earlier in the year I bought myself a car and I loved it to pieces. It was a blue Cupra, just amazing. And I just, you know, you just didn't buy it to drive it slow. Everywhere I went I raced everything. I raced evils, raced everything I could, even for a good beat. But it was just an unbelievable wagon to drive for a while. And then I went to Israel and I seen the way the Lord Jesus And it hit me. Andrew, you have bought a car that is 240bhp, and you love it to pieces, and you race everywhere you go. You don't even keep the speed limit when you're reversing. And I just became, slowly but surely, became my idol. I spent more time washing and polishing, washing the seats, doing everything to that car. that I could, to have her signing for the port, you know what it's like. You know, doing everything I could. And slowly but surely, my time with the Lord diminished and slowed down. And when I got to Israel, it wasn't any big thing, but I just seen the roads that He walked. And I remembered the fact that He had nowhere to even lay His head. And yet I'm driving around in a car that I just love to pieces. And I come home, I had to sell it. I had to get rid of it. And see, even today, I miss it. I would love to have it back. I would just love one more drive in it. It's just such a great wee toy. But Satan just wants to fill your life with things and stuff, with time-consuming things and stuff that is going to take you away from learning who God really is, from getting into the Word, and you could be spending your time running from God. What else happened? It affected those around him. Jonah had run from God, and all these mariners in the ship, all these boatmen, fishermen, whatever you want to call them, sailors, they're all sort of in this boat, sailing away, doing what sailors do. As far as I know, they just sail. And just doing what they do. And because of Jonah's disobedience, these men are now pulled into a storm. that God has sent to bring Jonah back. And the thing that I want to put across to you from this point is, guys, if you're running from God, young adults, young people, if you're running from God, what effect is that having on those around you? What effect, young person brought up in a Christian home, is that having on your parents? Is there a young man or a young woman in here tonight, and you currently, the way you're living, is breaking your parents' heart? Well, do you know what? It's actually time to face up to that. And God is highlighting that in your life. I've done it. I've been there when I was younger. If there's someone here tonight and you're breaking your parents' heart, and because their hearts are broken, and they pray for you, and they want to see you go on with God, you actually resent it. And you actually hate that. And it actually makes you harder and colder and go further away. Listen tonight, the word for you is just to repent and to come back. No one will look down on you. No one should look down on you. You should be received gladly back into a warm fellowship with God. That's what he wants for you. That's what he desperately wants for you who are cold and affected those around him. What about you who are unsaved? not even a Christian, and you've been challenged in other meetings, you've been challenged in the past, even in the quiet time, even in bed at night, you have been challenged about your soul and the fact that if you are not saved, you will be in hell for eternity. And yet you turn your back and you walk away from it. Listen, in all honesty and in love, I want to say to you tonight, stop running from God. God is not a trick question God. He's not going to trip you up. He's not going to make it hard or difficult for you to come to Him tonight. He makes it very plain and very simple. Just come. Just come and pray, whatever way you know how, and put your trust in Christ. See, the effect, the biggest effect is on yourself, if you're running from God. Sinful life seems to cause pain to others. When you give your life to God, guys, You don't know the potential in this room. Look at me, I'm a complete idiot who fails God all the time, who messes up, who does not deserve to be standing here, who does not deserve to be saved and yet he has someone like me talking for half an hour, preaching for half an hour to other people. Do you see how God can use you? Young men and young women Surrender your lives fully to God. I'm speaking to myself when I say that. There's stuff happening in this country at the minute. And if we keep running from God, if we keep holding things back, even as Christians in our lives from God, there's stuff coming into this country at the minute. Government are trying to put in laws regarding homosexuality and marriage. Let's see in five or ten years, guys, Dennis Lyle, your pastor, your minister, is going to have their arm up their back. being forced to marry homosexual couples. And if they don't, the church should be closed down. It'll be an illegal fellowship, an illegal church because we're going against the saint. Guys, we need to stop running from learning the truth. Young Christian men, it's time to actually stand up and seek the will of God for your life, what he wants you to do as a young man. Young women, it's the same for you. What way does God want you to live? What way does God want you to act in your church? What way does he want you to dress? It's time to stop, run from the niggly bits, the grey areas and face up to them and seek God's will on every single one of them. I speak to myself, where was Jonah in this whole thing? So like us, Jonah, in the midst of this storm, he's run away from God. He's made a decision to run from God. You know when you make a bad decision and it annoys you and you can't sleep? Jonah's snoring his head off on the side of the ship. He's run from God. He has run from Jehovah, the one who has created the heavens and the earth, the seas and everything that's in them. And Jonah knows this full well. And he has run from the God who has used him in the past. And he doesn't even care. doesn't seem to convict him that he has run from God. There's no pain in Jonah's heart right now, because if there was, he wouldn't be sleeping. And it's a dangerous place to be, guys. If you profess to become a Christian as a child or a young person, but for the vast majority of your life, you have constantly been attracted to sin, after sin after sin and you have now found yourself in just a sinful godless lifestyle and you're asleep not aware of it i warn you from the word of god make sure you're truly saved make sure god the holy spirit lives in you tonight because if god lives in you there should be a stirring Every time you sin, and every time you fall. I fall all the time, and every time I fall and sin, I know it. Because God has offended in me. But if you're like Jonah sleeping, without a care, it terrifies me to say, but you might not even be saved. Now don't, that's not for me to judge. It genuinely isn't. But even worse, it's for God to judge. Search yourselves tonight. Examine your life. Examine your testimony. Profess in Christian. So in terror these men, in absolute terror, absolute fear, these men are experienced sailors. They've been through this before. They've been through storms before. They know what to do. They know the crack. They know the you know, all the sailor stuff to do when a storm comes. And yet these men are terrified. These men are petrified of the storm that God has sent. It's something new. It's something different. It's something stronger. Because it's from God. And the sheikh Jonah, you know, wake up while I say it. Why is this happening? Jonah explained to us. What's going on? We now know that it's your fault, Jonah, that this whole storm thing's happening. What's going on? Jonah then admits that he fears the Lord and that it's his fault. And he then goes on the rest of chapter 1 to say that, well, the only way you're going to be able to sort it is if you lift me up and throw me over into the sea off the side of the ship. And the men say, no, can't do that, that's not very fair on you Jonah. So they sail even harder, they row even harder, they throw more out, and they try their best efforts. They try their own best efforts. And that's right across Northern Ireland tonight. People trying their best efforts. Religious people who haven't got the light of Christ and the liberty and the freedom that his death and resurrection brings. And the fact that there is no work to do, it's amazing. And yet there's people striving harder and harder than ever to be right with God. And the only way to solve the storm was to lift Jonah up and throw him in. And the moment it threw him in, peace, stillness, a calm, sunny Mediterranean Sea, the sort of one you want to go to. And yet Jonah is now cast into the sea. And we're going to go into chapter 2. He's now, at the end of chapter 1, he's been swallowed by a fish. You see, the circumstances, if there's someone here tonight and you're in a position where you're actually thinking about getting saved, where you're actually thinking, considering these things, the circumstances in your life, God will bring them all together. In the vast Mediterranean Sea, these sailors throw him out into the sea, and just at that pinpoint place, God has a fish waiting to pick him up, because he's going to drown in minutes in a storm. That's all he knows. He doesn't know the storm's going to stop. He doesn't know anything like that. And God straight away saves them from drowning. What can we learn from this? To be simple and plain, running from God will always get you in a mess. I work in A&E and I see people whose lives are just destroyed. I looked after a woman the other night who had so little in her life. She wanted to commit suicide and she didn't even know how to do it. So she took her shoelaces off her shoes and tried to hang herself with her own shoelaces. Do you see What the devil is doing in our land? Do you see the grip that the satanic realm has on our people's lives, in our country? And what are we doing about it? Because that's day and daily. Overdose after overdose. Attempt at hanging after attempt at hanging. People jumping out in front of cars, everything. In little Northern Ireland, in sweet fair Ulster, Devil has a grip guys. Anybody in here tonight and you're sitting listening to me and the devil actually has a grip on your life. We're going to see how you can be freed from it. So Jonah then ends up in the belly of a fish now, a few times I've said the fish of a belly, I can't help that, but the belly of a fish, and he's now time to think, he now has time, three days and three nights in the belly of a fish to think about what he's done. to think about the fact that he's run from God and that he's got into a mess and he's now somewhere. Here's where sin takes you. Here's where running from God takes you. It takes you somewhere you never thought you would go. That I have a fish? Wise up. But that's where he is. Contemplating suicide? Never me. Alcoholic? Not a chance. But yet, there's thousands of people like that who never planned to get like that. But they're now like that, gripped. held down, total and utter bondage and chains by sin. You end up somewhere you never thought you'd be. You end up somewhere that's just isolated, dark, cold. All these attributes that would be in the belly of a fish, I imagine, are the same as the attributes of a sinful life running from God. Anybody here in your life is just dark, and it's cold, and it's miserable, and you put on a show, you put on a smile, You have a bit of crack, but when you're on your own, it's different. When you're on your own, you're actually quite like Jonah. Isolated, lonely, away from God, away from the warmth and the peace and the love that a living relationship with God actually brings. There's people in here tonight, and if I brought them up to give a testimony and back down again, you would soon see what God does in lives. And I'm sure there's plenty of you who'd be willing to do that. Someone here tonight and you are running from God as I speak. Time to wake up. Time to face up to it. And time to make a change in your life. This isn't all negative. Will it be positive too? I was looking after a man one time who was in for a wee sort of day procedure and it ended up, long story short, he ended up nearly bleeding to death. And we had to call an ambulance for him and get him up to theatre and all that sort of stuff. Ambulance came, and he decided he didn't want to go to the hospital, the bigger hospital. And we're like, OK, you're actually going to die in the next five, 10 hours. So you don't really have a choice. You kind of have to go to the bigger hospital, the theatre. And he just said no. And for 45 minutes, we argued with him. And I love a good argument. But we argued with him and fought with him. Me, a couple of other nurses, doctor, two paramedics, and his own daughter. standing crying and the man getting worse and worse as we could see I didn't want to go to hospital and we couldn't force him that's the thing tonight I can't force you to start living for God I can't force you to be saved but I can stand and plead with you from my heart and from the heart of God think seriously about it young cold Christian think seriously about getting right with God young person that's not even saved. I plead with you the same way I pleaded with that man. Do not walk away tonight unsaved because you do not know. You do not know what lies out in that road. I'll speak from experience. See tonight, this could be your time to get right with God. This could actually be your time just now to settle things. with God on God's terms. Problems won't disappear, but they'll be peace in your life. All the circumstances don't end, but God gives grace to deal with them. Now, Jonah in chapter 2, he has a few choices lying in the belly of a fish, okay? He's time to think. He has a few choices. He can either give up, while I'm in the belly of a fish, But on the sea, not a lot of hope for me. Anybody like that? No hope. He has that choice to just give up and just wait to die of hypothermia or drowning or whatever else. That's the mindset Jonah can take. The next option he has is he can get angry with God and he can become bitter with God. About why he's in this situation. About why God has caused this to happen. About why God allowed it to go this far in his life. Or he has the third option that he took. Admit that he failed. Turn back to God. Change his mind. And change his attitude. That's what he done. And he goes on to pray in chapter 2. About how he's cast into the deep. The floods have compassed about him. Billows and waves have passed over him. You see he's just out of control. You have to get caught in waves out in the sea and you just have no control. They're too strong. They're too big. They just cannot battle with them. You just have to give in and wait until the lifeguard comes and saves you or whatever. But that's what happens Jonah. And that's what happens to a sinful life run away from God. You end up not being able to control it. And you end up, the only thing that you can do is come to God. and his mighty power to save you. Jonah couldn't control the billows over his head. He went down to the bottoms of the earth. He describes it as being in hell. You see, Ron, from God, it's a life that leads to hell, but it can be a life living pretty much in hell, separated from God, even on the earth, ignoring his call too many times so that he stops. Jonah in chapter two, he comes back and he prays and he repents, he turns back to God. And then in chapter three, I'm going to race through the next two minutes and I'm done. Maybe five. In chapter 3, Jonah has vowed that he's going to return to God. He has vowed that he's going to get right with God. That's what's happened to him. And he ends up in chapter 3, at the end of chapter 2, sort of vomited out onto the beach. I just imagine him sitting on the beach, sand everywhere and seaweed and smelling like you know, insides of a whale or a fish. You know, he's just stinking. He's just a mess. He's just been in the belly of a fish for three days. What are you going to be like? You know, you're going to be rough. You're going to be just sort of stained and tainted with whatever was in there. And maybe there's someone like that. You've got so engrossed in the world and you're lying, you know, spiritually just on a beach and you're stinking with sin. Totally wrapped up in it. But yet God, if you come to him, in chapter 3, Jonah didn't have a suit on with his Windsor knot up and all straight and his nice shoes on. Jonah wasn't like that when he came back to the Lord. Jonah was thinking on the beach. And it says in chapter 3, the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time. You see, young Christian, if you've messed up, if you've got addictions, if you have made big mistakes. God is a God of the second chance. He really is. And I speak from experience. That's part of my testimony. God of the second chance. He's a God who will take you back if you repent in your heart and use you again. Give you a purpose. Give you something to live for. Give you an opportunity to serve Him and to live for Him. And so Jonah goes to Nineveh and starts to preach. And walking up to the big gates, sort of thinking, I'm going to get my head cut off, but Lord, you said to go in and preach, so I'm going to have to go in and preach, so I'm not going to get my head cut off straight away. But he goes in to preach, and the people of Nineveh don't rebel, don't get all angry at him, they believe. And the king proclaims a fast, and wears sackcloth and ashes to show that they've repented. And so Jonah's standing, just totally baffled, you know, Lord, These people are like animals and I've come in and preached to them that you're going to judge them and they just believed. How we would love that today. How I would love it if someone tonight would just believe that God loves you no matter what you've done. And yet these people in Nineveh just believe and they just give in and let God have his way and they turn. And the king says something In verse 9 of chapter 3 he says to his people, who can tell if God will turn and repent and turn away from his fierce anger that we perish not? Who can tell tonight in Lurgan Baptist if some young adult, if some young person surrenders fully their lives to God, who can tell where he will have you? Who can tell where his call will take you if you stop running from him? Who can tell if you are saved tonight what he will have you doing and where he will have you in 10, 15 years time? Who can tell? I know a young man in here tonight who's only saved a couple of months and has been out serving the Lord already in other countries on fire for God. Still messing up, still failing, still making the mistakes. But I know young people in here tonight who are not long saved, and yet God has totally, totally transformed their lives, totally made the change. The old passions, the old desires are fading away, and new ones are coming in, and that's what being saved is about. Old passions, Kupras, coming into your life, start to fade away again, and you see Christ for who He is, and not the Kupra. What is it in your life? God saw their works, and he turned from his evil. And I'm finished now. Chapter 4, Jonah goes out into a hill in a huff. He's huffing with God right now, and it's because God has forgiven the people, and Jonah didn't think they deserved that. Jonah thought, you know, Lord, you should have judged them. But he doesn't. He forgives him and Jonah goes off up into the hill outside the city in a huff. And he's sitting on the hill looking over at Nineveh thinking, that city should be on fire right now. Just like Sodom and Gomorrah. That should be what happens to them people. But he doesn't. He falls asleep and God has provided this plant to cover him from the wind and the sun and he goes to sleep happy again. He's so up and down this boy. He's like a woman. So emotional. Unbelievable. I truly am sorry for that. I truly will be sorry for that. He's so up and down and he goes to sleep happy because God's given him this wee plant just to cover him for the night. And he wakes up and a worm has been sent to eat the plant and the plant dies. And Jonah wakes up with the sun beating on his face and the wind. Everything's sort of going wrong again and he wakes up grumpy. Okay? He's just so up and down. Happy, grumpy, huffy, happy. Alright? And he then says to God, you know, Lord, I just want to die. He says it earlier in the book as well. I just want my life to end. Anybody like that tonight? Anybody in here? A new thought like that? Take a moment and think, is it really worth that? Because see tonight, the answer actually lies in the book of Jonah. For you, if you've been running, for you, if you're not saved, for you, if you're a cold Christian, for you tonight, if you would just love to end your life. The answer is in Jonah, because just as Jonah was in the belly of the fish for three days and three nights, so the Lord Jesus, so the King of glory came to this earth and lay in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights. He was crushed. He was abused on the cross. He was beaten to a bloody pulp. and the spittle of those Roman soldiers mingled with his ruby red blood running down his face as they plucked the very hairs from his beard. As they whipped him and lashed him and tore his skin off his back, he hung on a cross, totally writhing in agony, unable to catch a breath, When he lifted himself up on a spike, agony to breathe. When he dropped himself back down, agony to breathe. He hung and in those three hours of darkness to follow, sheer agony as he took your sin, all of your mess, all of your failure on his holy shoulders. And the world's sin was plunged on him and he was plunged. into God's wrath. And three days later, he rose victorious. He rose a mighty Savior, one who killed death, one who destroyed the works of darkness in your life. Guys, I'm finished. I've spoke too long. Hot dogs are probably burnt. Listen tonight. This is serious. You're a cold Christian. I challenge you tonight. Get right with God. Don't do it, Jonah. Stop running. Come back. Don't be ashamed. Don't be proud. Don't be hard-hearted. Soften your heart. Get right with God. Unsafe person, see what Christ's done for you as he died and hung on a cross to save you. Let's pray. Father, we thank you. Father, we praise you. Father, we worship you tonight for the way you use those of us who are just useless, who are just sinful, wicked, fallen people, and yet you loved us and saved us and give your son for us. Lord, I pray for every single person here tonight. Those who are running well for you, those who are cold, running from you, and those, Lord, who are unsaved and have no hope of heaven. Father, we pray for the Spirit of God to just cause people to think, to evaluate, Lord, the big picture. Jonah didn't have the big picture. More worried, Father, about a plant than he was about a lost city of men and women, boys and girls. Help us, Father, tonight to live our lives in the light of eternity. Father, we give you thanks for the ladies, Lord, who have prepared the supper. We praise you for them. We praise you, Father, for their faithfulness in the cooking and cleaning, Lord, so much to do. Lord, we give you thanks for them. In the precious, worthy, lovely name of the Lord Jesus. Amen.