When You Just Want to Run Away

Automatically generated from the video captions and lightly tidied, so expect the odd misheard word.

All right, we are going to be going into our series. We're starting a new series. So, we're finishing up on the book. We finished up on Genesis. And we are now going to look at the book of Jonah. And I this is a well-known story.

Whether you've grown up in church or not, you have probably heard about Jonah and the big fish. So this is the prophet of God who ends up at the bottom of the ocean or sea wherever he was and he gets swallowed up by this fish and he lives to tell the tale. Actually so popular if you if you go to go cathedral this afternoon and if you just look at the windows you will see the story of Jonah actually portrayed on the windows. So what I'm actually going to do for us now is I'm going to read for us I'm going to read the story for us and also just kind of do some commentary as we go to just help us understand. So Jonah says this. Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amati, saying, "Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call against it, for they evil has come up before me." Jonah rose up to flee to Tashes for the presence of the Lord.

From the presence of the Lord, he went down to Joper and found the ship going to Tarses. So he paid the fair and went down into it to go with them to Tashish, away from the presence of the Lord. I'm just going to stop it there for a little bit. Have you ever heard of God's chicken? The Lord's chicken. If any of you ever tasted God's chicken, there's a lot of perplexed faces, right?

God's chicken is it's not Nando. It's not your mom's cooking or your dad's cooking. God's chicken is no Chick-fil-A. Chick-fil-A is God's chicken. But so Chick-fil-A is God's chicken. But today, I'm going to talk to you about God's sport.

I believe God has a sport. And as we read this story, you're going to see what God's sport is. And I wonder if you guys would see. So if we go back to verse four, but the Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship threatened to break up. So it seems like God's playing a bit of hurling over there. Then the sailors, the mariters were afraid, and each cried out to his God.

And they too were playing hurling. And they hurled the cargo that was in the ship into the sea to lighten it for them. But Jonah had gone down into the inner part of the ship, and it laid down and was fast asleep. So the captain came and said to him, "What do you mean, you sleeper? Arise. Call out to your God.

Perhaps God will give a thought to us that we may not perish. And they said to one another, "Come, let us cast lots." So, let us throw dice. Let us spin the bottle that we may know on whose account this evil has come upon us. So, they cast lots. And the lot fell on Jonah. Then they said to him, "Tell us on whose account this evil has come upon us.

What is your occupation? Where do you come from? What is your country? And of what people are you?" And Jonah said, "I am a Hebrew. I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry ground." That's a bit weird. So his god made the sea and he thinks he can run away from that god by going to the sea like I don't know the whole story is it's a bit comical and satirical anyway so the men were ex exceedingly afraid and said to him what is this that you have done for the man knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord but he had told them.

Then they say to him, "What shall we do to you that the sea may quiet down for us? For the sea grew more and more tempest oh that word wild. It grew more and more wild. then he said to them, "Pick me up and hurl me into the sea. Then the sea will be quiet. Then the sea will quiet down for you.

For I know it is because of me that the great tempest has come upon us. The men rode hard to get back to dry land, but they could not, for the sea grew more and more tempetuous. Someone Somebody help me here. Yeah, tempestuous against him. Therefore they called out to the Lord. Oh Lord, let us not perish for this man's life and lay not on us innocent blood for you.

Oh Lord, have done as it pleased you." So they picked up Jonah and hurled him into the sea. And the sea ceized from its raging. Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows. And the Lord appointed a great fish to catch. You know when you're playing hurling like that slither, you hit it with a stick and then you catch it. So the fish caught, right?

So that's hurling. So to swallow up Jonah and Jonah was in the belly of the fish. Three days and three nights. So on the next slide, I was thinking of calling this series catch me if you can. So there is Jonah. There is Jonah playing hurling with God and God is like, "Okay, I'm coming after you." That's what I was going to call it, but u I thought maybe it was a little bit of a stretch.

So maybe let's just call the series Jonah. But I think that's a good title, right? So let me know that. Do we call it catch me if you can or do we just call it a series in the book of Jonah? But any for right now, let us now pray before we start our sermon. Dear heavenly father, we want to pray right now for your presence that you might help us understand your word and to apply it to our lives.

So about a decade and a half ago, my wife and I were on our holidays and we went to a lovely place called the Maldes. Like if you have never heard of the Maldes, just think of Hawaii but better, you know, you know, sandy beaches, you know, tropical fruit and you know, like just the water is so blue, you couldn't believe. So this is the actual resort we did go to. It's called Meduushu. And we stayed in this resort right there. It was just beautiful.

It was lovely. And when we were there, one of the activities that we did was we went reef snuckling, you know, like you so you actually get onto the boat and they take you out to the ocean you know, so that you can you know, the see the coral reef you know, kind of see the sea and you know, you can see the fish and the life under there. It was all just beautiful and we were excited. We're having a good time. We were like, "All right, let's go." But then as we were in the boat getting closer to the place then I started to panic and I don't know if you guys know but black people are not really known for their prowess in swimming right so when we got there I was like oh my goodness how am I going to swim like I just think my exuberance it got the better of me. So I was like started to panic.

But then you know as this storm was now starting to go on in my head I said ah don't worry they'll give you life jackets you know and there were lifeguards all over the place. So I was like you know what I'll be fine. So when we got there the strongest swimmers put on their gear and they jumped straight in. They didn't need any life jackets. Just jump straight in. Then of course the people were left on the boats, right?

Where the weaklings, right? The ones that don't swim so well. So then they started handing out the life jackets life jackets, life jackets. But then when it got to me and one other person, there was just one life jacket left. And then he turned to me and he said, "Sir, you don't need a life jacket, right?" So, and of course I said, "No, I do not need it." Because the other person was a kid was like a 12year-old kid. So, I was like, "No, I'm not going to let him kind of punk me out like in front of the kids." So, I was like, "No, I don't need a life jacket, you know." But, but, but then I told myself, "Uhuh, it's okay.

It's okay." Because my plan was I could just kind of get my gear, kind of just jump in, swim around the boat, and get back into the boat, right? You know, no one's done the wiser. Nobody can nobody knows that I can't swim that well. So I get the gear, I put my goggles, I put the snorkeling the snorkeling item, I put the fins, or the flippers, right? And I go in and I kick I kick around a little, you know, kick. I'm just looking at the fish.

Oh man, this looks nice. You know, just kind of looking underneath the ocean. Man, this is nice. And I kick and kick. But unbeknownst to me, when you kick with those fins, right, it moves you further than you realize. So, I'm thinking, I'm safe.

I'm still around the boat, right? And I kick I kick I kick. And I kid you not, my spidey sense started tingling. It started tingling. Something is wrong. So I get my head up.

Oh my goodness. The boat was far away from me. I mean, it was far and I just started to panic and my muscles tensed up on me. I sizzed and I felt like I was going to die. I forgot how to use the fins. I forgot everything.

And I just headed it back to the boat. But because I was now panicking, because I was now frantic, I was, you know, like when you're kind of swimming but sinking at the same time. You're like swimming, sinking, screaming, sinking. That was me as I headed over back to the boat. But then this thing really kind of shocked me like because these lifeguards, the two of them, they saw me. They saw I was sinking, swimming, but instead of jumping in to come and save me, they just burst out laughing.

I'm like tears, crying, laughing on the floor, laughing, and I'm mad. I am swimming for my life. And I'm like, I'm going to make it. I'm going to make it through. I'm going to make it through. And then I just keep going.

I keep going. And then almost towards when I got near to the boat then they saw that this was serious. Then they started say sir stop panicking stop panicking you know relax breathe just do slowly and then I just do my breaststroke slowly and I got to the boat. And then when I got to the boat then again they continued laughing and just kind of looking at each other. I knew it. I knew it.

Black people can't swim. I knew it. And then at the end they were like, "Sir, we asked you. We asked you, do you need a life jacket?" And you say, "You didn't need a life jacket." And they were like, "Why on earth would you go to the deep end when you cannot swim properly? Why would you go to the deep waters?" our sermon today I'm titling it swimming in the deep end. I mean some of you probably feel that when it comes to you have gotten in too deep.

You are swimming in the deep end and people are looking at you and maybe laughing at you saying what are you doing? Maybe you just feel that you are at the start of your Christian journey. Maybe you're still just exploring and you just feel to your you just feel this is too deep. This is too much. I cannot do it. Maybe somebody asks you to pray in public and it's just it's too much.

You cannot do it. You pick up your Bible. You try and read it and nothing in it makes sense to you. And maybe somebody asks you that do you do you want to disciple somebody? Do you want to mentor somebody? And the whole thing just sounds too much.

Or maybe you are even afraid that even people in your work or people in your family might ask you, could you explain your faith to me? Could you tell me about this thing that you believe and you just feel it's too much? You can't do it. And then we all have this inner critic, right? We all have this resistance in our head that's always screaming at us, you can't do it. You can't do it.

You can't do it. And it tries to weigh you down. That you cannot be deep in your faith. But I'm here to tell you using the story of Jonah, that is a lie. That is a lie that is meant to keep you in the shallow waters. And even if your inner critic is like mine, it's probably trying to banish you to the kiddies pool.

It's saying you do not belong in the deep waters. But I hope in this sermon that I can assure you that you do belong in the deeper waters. Wherever you are on your Christian journey, whether you're right at the start still you can swim in the deep end. Whether you're in the middle, wherever you are, you can swim in the deep end. And it is a myth. Black people can swim.

By the way, just let me just clarify it. They can swim. They can swim. So anyway, so let me just recap our story now. So, okay. So, we are so in the story of Jonah.

So, so what happens is in this story, right, is God comes to his prophet. And a prophet is there should be a slide of what a prophet is. So, a prophet is somebody who represents God to the people, right? So, whereas a priest is a person who represents the people to God. So, that's just the distinction between the two. So God comes to the prophet with a message and normally what happens is the prophet then conveys the message to the people.

But there is something quite strange about the book of Jonah. It's it's almost like a comedy. It's almost like a satire. It is kind of nonsensical in a way with that everything that happens in the book. A lot of the things that happen in the book do not happen in the way that you think. Like they don't make sense.

If you think about it like God comes to a prophet. If God comes to a prophet and tells him to do something, normally the prophet agrees and does it. But in this book, the prophet says, "Nah, God, I'm not doing it." And runs away. And then another thing as well, like when he runs away, there's this massive storm that everybody can see that there's something supernatural about this storm. Even the sailors who do not know Yahweh, the God of Israel, they're like, "This is a storm that's been sent from God because there is just something supernatural." But Jonah is sleeping. And then the other one is how can you run away from God who's all powerful and all knowing by going to the boat like a lot of the stuff that happens here doesn't make sense.

So the prophet doesn't do what they're supposed to do. And you're going to see later that actually the sailors don't act the way that they're supposed to do. And even Nineveh, when Jonah eventually gets to Nineveh in chapter 3, they also don't behave in the way that they're supposed to behave. It's like that book or movie if you've ever watched the cartoon Alice in Wonderland. Do you know like when up is down and fast is slow? Like everything is just whimsical and nonsensical and that is what is going on in this book.

So one of the things that I want to show you this contrast that happens in this book. So this word fear so there is this word fear which means to worship that's spelled wrong but fear which means to worship or I should fire my editor or revere right so it's this idea of Jonah claims to fear God and the sailors are going to fear God but their fearing is different so then we need to figure out who really is fearing God because their actions are very different. Like if God if Jonah fears God and if the sailors fear God then their actions should be the same but their actions are different. So let's look at Jonah first. So Jonah says this in verse 8. So when he gets find out right they say to him please tell us whoever is responsible that this so they say to him please tell us whoever is responsible this disaster has come upon us what is your occupation and f and from where do you come from what is your country and from which people are you and Jonah responds right in nine it says I am a Hebrew and I fear Yahweh, the God of heaven who made the sea and the dry land.

So Jonah makes it known to them, you know, I know He is the one who made the heavens and the earth. So I fear Yahweh. So Jonah fears God. That's what he claims. But then when it comes to the sailors, so this is what happened. So, so all the sailors were afraid.

All right? So you can see the sailors, they also afraid and they cried out to and they cried out to his own god. So they recognized that there's something about the storm and they cry out to a god, but they don't actually know which god. You know like they lived at a time where people believed in a lot of gods. You know in that time there were no atheists right? You know there was no people who said there were no gods.

It was a matter of which god. So they just afraid. They know the storm is from a god. So they are afraid. And then in verse 10 after Jonah says his speech now they know the god who's doing this is Yahweh the God who made the heaven and the earth. So then the men were greatly afraid and they say to him, "What is this you've done?" So now you see the sailors are also fearing Yahweh.

And then when you get to verse 16, after they hurl Jonah out of the ship, right? So the men feared Yahweh greatly and offered a sacrifice to Yahweh and made vows to him. So then this idea is who is fearing Yahweh? And again remember you would expect the prophet to be the one who fears Yahweh. But this is like Alice in Wonderland. Things don't work the way we think.

Actually the ones that fear Yahweh in this story is not Jonah. It's God. No. Sorry. Sorry. It's it's it's it's the sailors.

It's the sailors that fear God. Why do I say that? Because on the next slide, to fear God, you have to obey God. Right? You cannot say you fear God and you do not obey him. So if you look at this story, Jonah does not fear God.

He actually hears directly from God and he disobys God and he runs away. But the they don't have much knowledge about Yahweh. All they know about Yahweh is what Jonah has told them, but they obey God. So one thing that I wanted to tell you guys when it comes to the thing that I started this sermon with a deep Christian is one who obeys God. So a deep Christian is not a person who knows loads of facts about God. It's not a person who knows more information about God.

He's not somebody who's with the swollen brain with information about God. But a deep Christian is a person who obeys God, who applies what God has done. So my heart's desire is that you will desire to be a deep Christian that you can swim in the deeper waters and don't let the inner critic or anybody tell you different that you cannot be deep that you cannot be deep in your faith because deep faith is not about knowledge and faith. Facts in your head. It's about whether you obey God. So this morning, I want to ask you this.

Where are you doing at Jonah? Where are you doing a Jonah and running from what God is asking you? Like you know in your heart of hearts, God is asking you something, but you're running away. We just came out of the series about Joseph and his brothers. Is God asking you to forgive your mother? Is God asking you to explore and test reconciliation with that friend, that best friend of yours that disobeyed you.

Sorry. So that betrayed you. Just checking if you're listening. Is God asking you to start tithing? A and maybe God's not asking you to do something. Maybe God is asking you to stop something.

Maybe God is asking you to stop getting drunk. Maybe God is asking you to stop a particular relationship. Maybe God is asking you to stop watching particular things. You see, are you doing a joner and running away? And I know you might be here and you might have an objection. You might say to yourself, "This is too This is too hard.

What God is asking is too hard." So just like Jonah, you feel like running away. You feel this is too hard. You cannot do That person, your mother, she did wrong to you. Your best friend betrayed you and gossiped about you. You feel you can't tithe because you're on welfare. You don't have enough money.

Your wages are meager. And you feel that you need to cling to that relationship. You feel you need to watch those things that you watch because without it you feel lonely. So it is hard. But I want to ask you this, how much is not obeying God costing you? There's always a cost.

There is always a cost to not obeying God. And there is a cost to obeying God as well. But there is also a cost to not obeying God. Like in verse three, I won't read verse three, but look at what Jonah does. He has to pay. That's a cost to run away from God.

It's costing him time. It's costing him his peace. It's costing him just everything to run away from God. I want to say to you, you need to choose your heart. On the next slide, you need to choose your heart. There is a cost that will add to your benefit and this is obeying what God asks of you.

And you know in your heart of hearts what God is asking you. But there is also a cost that subtracts from you. So when you do not obey God's ask, it subtracts from you. There's this quote from a guy Tony Evans on the next slide who says running from God's agenda or running from what God is asking you can cost you time, money, health, peace, and joy. But make no mistake, it will cost you. It will cost you something.

I want to show you this movement that happens in the book of Jonah on this slide. That's why I had some of the words underlined when I was reading. Jonah goes down to Joer, right? It's the same word. And then he goes down in the ship. Then he goes below deck.

Down below deck. Then he goes down into the belly of the great fish. Like he's continuing to go down and down and down. Have you ever noticed that nobody ever wakes up saying, "I'm no longer a Christian. I don't want to be a Christian. I'm questioning all these things." A decision that might get announced today started two three years ago.

But there was this movement that was happening as a person was disobeying God, disobeying God, disobeying God, disobeying God to the point now they walk away. It's gradually then suddenly you might think that you're disobeying God is just something small but again you are making that descent that Jonah was making and it is costing you and not only is it costing it is costing people in your life. You see sin spreads like a virus. It affects other people around you. There are people in your life that are just collateral damage. They're catching stray bullets you are not obeying God's ask.

Again, Tony even says this, "When we run from God, the same storms we cause hit the people in our vicinity." Think about it. The people on that boat, the people on that ship, they hadn't done nothing. It was Jonah. But his disobedience meant that the other people were caught in Jonah's storms. So the thing is it affects you. It costs you.

It cost you so much and it costs even the people in your life. There are people in your future that are going to have to battle with unhealthy generational family dynamics because you started them now. There will be reverberations for generations to come because you start them now. But you can reverse them by doing it the right way. So being a deep Christian is obeying God. That is what fearing God is.

It's so funny like there's this story that is told by that is told of this evangelist called Dio Moody. And Dio Moody Dio Moody was this famous evangelist who put this big tent ministries like crockpark type thing right where he would just go and preach the gospel. And then one lady came to criticize him and says, "Hey, I do not like your methods of evangelizing. I do not like your methods of telling people about the gospel." That's what evangelism is. And then Dio Moody asked this lady, "How do you evangelize? How do you tell people about Jesus?" And the lady turned to him and said, "No, I don't tell people about Jesus." And then Dio Moody says this then I like my way of evangelizing better than your way of not evangelizing.

It's better a person who says two words to a friend today I was a church. That is better than a person who reads 50 books about evangelism but never tells anyone about it. Actually this morning my wife checked me on this like on the next slide. I was like I was like ah you know we all saw Katy Taylor yesterday and there was that song and then I was like oh hell king Jesus. I was like oh man that's so powerful. I was like oh why didn't she just start at the chorus you know and just starts with oh hell king Jesus you know she should have done it that way.

Then my wife checked me on that. It's like hey she did something. What are you doing? She's putting this song to 83,000 people in that arena and I don't know how many millions we're watching. So I cannot sit there and say I don't like your way of evangelizing because she's evangelizing. That's being a deep Christian.

Being a deep Christian is doing I'll just finish on this story. When I when I went to Bible college, you know, I was with a bunch of people who were like this kind of young hungry preachers and we all wanted to learn how to preach and one of the preachings was one of the lecturers was a guy called Tim Ward. I mean these guys were was accomplished, renowned, he's written a book on sort of like scripture and preaching. So we're so excited. He's going to teach us about preaching. So we sit in his class and one time he's like, "Okay guys, I am going to preach for you.

I'm going to preach you a sermon that I preached in my church as an example of what preaching looks like." And then he preaches to us, you know, 20 25 minutes. And then at the end of there like to a person we were all It was so simple. And when he asked for feedback and he was expecting this and we told him to his face, we're not I'm not proud of I'm not proud of this. We're like that's so simple. That's so shallow. That's not deep.

We know you know the languages. You know the Hebrew. You know the Greek. You know all these things and now you're just going to preach this simple message to us. And he tried to teach us. It took me years to understand this.

It's like deep preaching is not spouting a lot of Greek words that people do not understand. That's like trying to give water to a baby, but instead of using a glass, you use a firing horse. That's too much. You have to give it. You have to give information that people can apply and understand. That's deep preaching.

And this is the same when it comes to A deep Christian is a person who's actually doing what the Bible says. And I so hope that you desire to be a deep Christian.