Extending or Withholding Compassion?

Good morning, 121, will you stand and worship with us this morning. ♪ When He came and He died and He rose ♪ ♪ Those walls are level now ♪ ♪ Remember those giants we called death and grave ♪ ♪ They were like mountains that stood in our way ♪ ♪ When He came and He died and He rose ♪ ♪ Those giants are dead now ♪ ♪ This is our God, this is who He is, He loves us ♪ ♪ This is our God, this is what He does, He saves us ♪ ♪ He bore the cross, beat the grave ♪ ♪ Let heaven and earth proclaim this is our God, King Jesus ♪ ♪ He bore the cross, beat the grave ♪ ♪ Let heaven and earth proclaim this is our God, King Jesus ♪ ♪ He bore the cross, beat the grave ♪ ♪ Let heaven and earth proclaim this is our God, King Jesus ♪ ♪ In the wilderness, tell the story of His faithfulness ♪ ♪ Never once did He fail and He never will ♪ ♪ This is our God, this is who He is, He loves us ♪ ♪ This is our God, this is what He does, He saves us ♪ ♪ He bore the cross, beat the grave ♪ ♪ Let heaven and earth proclaim this is our God, King Jesus ♪ ♪ Who pulled me out of that pit, He did, He did ♪ ♪ Who paid for all of my sins, nobody but Jesus ♪ ♪ Who pulled me out of that pit, He did, He did ♪ ♪ Who paid for all of my sins, nobody but Jesus ♪ ♪ Who rescued me from that grave, Yahweh, Yahweh ♪ ♪ Who gets the glory and grace, nobody but Jesus ♪ ♪ Who rescued me from that grave, Yahweh, Yahweh ♪ ♪ Who gets the glory and grace, nobody but Him ♪

♪ This is our God, this is what He does, He loves us ♪ ♪ This is our God, this is what He does, He saves us ♪ ♪ He bore the cross, beat the grave ♪ ♪ Let heaven and earth proclaim, this is our God, King Jesus ♪ ♪ He bore the cross, beat the grave ♪ ♪ Let heaven and earth proclaim, this is our God, King Jesus ♪ This is our God Amen. Amen, we give God praise this morning. It is beautiful to be in the house of the Lord, worshiping together, and that's what we're gonna do today. We're gonna sing songs and praise Him, and worship Him for who He is, and praise Him for things that He's done. But another way we get to worship is in fellowship. So let's take a couple seconds and greet a couple people around you and say good morning. We'll continue in worship. ♪♪♪ ♪ Let the King of my heart be the mountain where I will live ♪ ♪ The fountain I dream from, oh, He is my song ♪ ♪ Be of my heart, be the shadow where I hide ♪ ♪ The ransom for my life, oh He is my song ♪ ♪ You are good, good, oh ♪ ♪ You are good, good, oh ♪ ♪ You are good, good, oh ♪ ♪ You are good, good, oh ♪ ♪ And let the key of my heart be the wind inside my sails ♪ ♪ The anchor in the waves, oh He is my song ♪

♪ And let the key of my heart be the fire inside my veins ♪ ♪ The anchor of my days, oh He is my song ♪ ♪ Oh let the key of my heart be the wind inside my sails ♪ ♪ The anchor in the waves, oh He is my song ♪ ♪ Let the key of my heart be the fire inside my veins ♪ ♪ The anchor of my days, oh He is my song ♪ ♪ You are good, good, oh ♪ ♪ You are good, good, oh ♪ ♪ You are good, good, oh ♪ ♪ You are good, good, oh ♪ ♪ You are good, good, oh ♪ ♪ You're never gonna let, you're never gonna let me down ♪ ♪ You're never gonna let, you're never gonna let me down ♪ ♪ You're never gonna let, you're never gonna let me down ♪ ♪ You're never gonna let, you're never gonna let me down ♪ ♪ You're never gonna let, you're never gonna let me down ♪ ♪ You're never gonna let, you're never gonna let me down ♪ ♪ You're never gonna let, you're never gonna let me down ♪ ♪ You're never gonna let, you're never gonna let me down ♪ ♪ But you are a God, You are a God, oh, oh-oh-oh-oh-oh ♪ ♪ You are a God, you are a God, oh, oh-oh-oh-oh-oh ♪ ♪ You are a God, you are a God, oh, oh-oh-oh-oh-oh ♪ ♪ You are a God, you are a God, oh, oh-oh-oh-oh-oh ♪ ♪ You're never gonna let, you're never gonna let me down ♪ ♪ You're never gonna let, you're never gonna let me down ♪ ♪ You're never gonna let, you're never gonna let me down ♪ ♪ You're never gonna let, you're never gonna let me down ♪ ♪ Cause you are good, good, oh ♪ ♪ You are good, you're good, oh ♪ ♪ And you are good, sing this with me today ♪

♪ You are good, you're good, oh ♪ ♪ You are good, you're good, oh ♪ Oh, your mercy never fails me All my days I've been held in your hands From the moment that I wake up Until I lay my head Oh, I will sing of the goodness of God All my life you have been faithful All my life you have been so, so kind With every breath that I am able Oh, I will sing of the goodness of God I love your voice You have led me to the fire In my midst, you are close like no other I've known you as a father I've known you as a friend And I have known you in the goodness of God All my life you have been faithful All my life you have been so, so good With every breath that I am able Oh, I will sing of the goodness of God Oh, your goodness is running after, running after me Your goodness is running after, running after me With my life laid down, I surrender now I give you everything Your goodness is running after, running after me Your goodness is running after, running after me Your goodness is running after, running after me With my life laid down, I surrender now I give you everything

Your goodness is running after, running after me All my life you have been faithful All my life you have been so, so good With every breath that I am able Oh, I will sing of the goodness of God I'm gonna sing All my life you have been faithful All my life you have been so, so good With every breath that I am able Oh, I will sing of the goodness of God Oh, I will sing of the goodness of God This past week I had the opportunity to spend some time with some of our global workers at a retreat and we spent time talking about rest we talked about lamenting but another thing we talked about was remembering it is how beautiful it is to remember the things God has done, to look back to look back as we sang over there who pulled us out of the pit, he did who rescued us from the grave, to remember those things to remember the goodness of God to remember that he is the king of our heart and the mountain that we run to and as we dive into Jonah 4 today we see that even though God God does amazing things, how quick we are to quickly turn back away to our own ways and our own thoughts.

So as we sing, come thou fount here in a minute, we understand we're so much like Jonah. We are so prone to wonder. But there's another part of this song that I love, especially as a musician. There's a line that says, tune my heart to sing that grace. And if you know anything about instruments, if they get put into elements that they're not being used to, they get out of tune. They don't sound right, they don't work right. So we have to retune them to hopefully make a beautiful sound. And that's how our hearts are with the Lord. So as we sing that this morning, we learn that we are prone to wonder, but we ask God to tune our hearts and sing his grace. Remember the good things that he has done for us. ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪

♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ I call for songs of loudest praise And teach me some of your song Some by flaming tongues of woe Praise the mountain fixed upon him A mound of lightning to my head So God, we praise you for the gift of song and worship this morning, God. We praise you for every person that has walked through these doors, Father. I pray that you meet us here in whatever we're walking in with, God. Would you open our ears to hear your word, God? Would you open our hearts to receive it? Would you open our eyes, God, to see where you're leading us? And would you use our hands and feet to do the work you're calling us to do, Father? God, we love you. We praise you. We ask all this in the mighty name of Christ. Amen. The news tonight out of Texas. 95 people have been killed. Breaking news here in Texas as we come on the air at four. Deadly flooding in Kerr County. Six people confirmed dead. You can see the power of the Guadalupe River right now. The county sheriff saying the search continues for 10 campers and a counselor still missing. I thought it was a pipe leak again, but it wasn't. It was a flood. We woke up to about two inches of water on the ground, and it just kept rising.

We've been here for 19 years. Neighbors have been here for 50 years, and they've never seen anything like that. Lying across the wall, that's how far the water came up in this room here. So that's how far it would have been in this whole house. It's really been cool to see as we're pulling off the sheetrock that on the studs underneath, they've got Scripture written. Jesus says, I am with you always. I will be your guard, and I will defend you. It's been super encouraging to work with this family. There is a family heirloom. It's a Tiffany lamp that he had wrapped. My job has been to look for this Tiffany lamp and pray that I find it and pray that it's not broken. The biggest help has been the Baptist Men organization coming out and helping. It's been a big help. It's been our privilege to serve you today. It's been great meeting y'all and just watching y'all work. I mean, y'all got in here like a bunch of ants on a piece of candy and got that knocked out. So thank you so much. Thank you so much. We hope this makes it a little easier for you. It's been a blessing to us to bless them, but you can just tell that we're just doing what God is leading us to do, and it's really something. Well, that team recently returned, and so grateful for the multiple ways that we can get in the mix and serve and be a part of where God's sending us to love people well in His name. That reminds me, as I was watching this morning, I had not seen that until the 8 a.m. service, and it reminded me of a conversation I had this week that was an unexpected one. I'd invited a friend to lunch on Wednesday to talk about the 60s, 70s, and 80s year olds and how we can best evangelize our faith in that age range. He invited a friend of his to come that is just bold as a lion in his faith. Within the first five minutes, he'd already shared the gospel with the waitress before we ever got started. This is what he said. He said, Why would I wait? I probably will never see her again. I don't know what will happen to her this afternoon. And then this morning when I was watching the video, I thought, gosh, that's 95 people dead. They had no idea. I mean, that just happened. So there's an urgency to bring the message of Christ to people because we literally do not know what each day holds. We don't have to be alarmist about that. We don't have to yell about that.

We don't have to scream about that. We don't have to create guilt about that. What we can do is sit in the reality of the urgency of people needing to hear the message of Jesus Christ. We simply do not know what life holds from day to day. What I'd like us to do today is to finish up in Jonah, chapter four. So if you have your Bibles, you can turn to Jonah four. At the risk of confusing you, I actually want to start in 2 Chronicles. Corinthians 5, 17 through 21. But to be clear, I'm using that as an intro to bring us to Jonah chapter four. My wife and I were at a church several weeks ago and said we were in this part of the Bible and then they started somewhere else and we got all confused. So I thought I would make sure and clarify what I'm doing. So St. Corinthians 5, let's launch from here. And this is actually scripture that that gentleman at lunch shared with me. Really the way I roll through life is in my relationship with God and I'm just interacting with God and people and just moving along and seeing what God has as I move. I love Psalm 5, three, it says, "'In the morning, O Lord, you'll hear my voice. "'In the morning, I'll order my prayer to you "'and eagerly watch.'" So I just get up and start watching and say, all right, God, what do you have today? And there are oftentimes unexpected times, there are oftentimes that they were the plan that I believe that God had already ahead of time.

They're simply walking in those. But the guy shared this verse and I wanna give you the reason why after I read it. Verse 17 of chapter five. "'Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature. "'The old things passed away, behold, new things have come.'" So every person that knows Jesus Christ has become a new creation. So if that's you today, online, in prison, in person, if you know Jesus Christ, at some point, you change from something old into something new. And then he says in verse 18, "'Now, all these things are from God "'who reconciled us to himself through Christ "'and gave us the ministry of reconciliation. "'Who God is the one who does this.'" The word reconcile means to make friends again. "'We were once enemies with God "'and now through Jesus Christ, we can be friends with God.'" Verse 19, "'Namely, that God was in Christ "'reconciling the world to himself.'" So God is all about the world coming to himself. "'Not counting their trespasses against them.'" Not counting their sin against them. "'And he's committed to us the word of reconciliation.'" I'll come back to this in a moment. Verse 20, "'Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ. "'As though God were making an appeal through us, "'we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. "'He made him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf

"'so that we might become the righteousness of God in him.'" At the point where a person moves from being old to new in Christ, we become new creations right with God and all of us in verse 18, if we could go back to verse 18, all of us have been given the ministry of reconciliation. And at lunch, this guy said to me, it was really interesting, he said, he said, one of the problems with what the church has done is it emphasizes everybody has spiritual gifts and you just need to do your spiritual gift. And he said, that's fantastic. He said, but this is everyone's responsibility and opportunity and privilege. It's not if you're gifted at evangelism that you share your faith with people. If you've been reconciled to God, then God in turn has given you a ministry of reconciliation, of helping other people also know God. And at that point that we become a follower of Christ, we're an ambassador of his, verse 20. That means we represent him. We're not trying to do anything different. We're just simply passing on what he's given to us. We're ambassadors for him. And that happens through what Jesus Christ did for us in becoming sin for us on the cross. Now, if I were to lay out the gospel, and I was challenged on that this week,

I've had more fun the last few weeks. I get challenged on multiple fronts, but let me be abundantly clear what the gospel is today. If we take what Jesus said and what Paul said, we look back at the beginning and creation in Genesis 1 and 2, and God made everything perfect. And he created us in the image of God. So Adam and Eve, the only two perfect people ever in Genesis 1 and 2. In Genesis 3, we see when we look in Romans and read back that what Paul says is that through one man, sin entered into the world. The responsibility is put on Adam that sin entered into the world. And every person in this room and every person before us and every human being is a descendant of Adam. And being a descendant of Adam, all of us inherit a sin nature. That is our natural inclination is to sin against a perfect and holy God. We have that sin nature. and then we choose to sin. That sin then makes us guilty before God. We are all in a position of legally being guilty before God. And that guilt has a punishment that comes with it. That punishment is eternal destruction, judgment, damnation, hell, separation from God, and an eternal death. That's the penalty of our guilt and sin. The only way out of that is through the God-man, God in the flesh, Jesus Christ, who is the one mediator

that can actually do something about the guilt, the condemnation, the death, and the sin. So Jesus Christ, verse 20, he made him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf. Jesus on the cross took all of that on himself and when we repent and believe, there's an exchange that happens. We're no longer in the line of Adam. We're removed from that line and now we're in the line of Jesus. Jesus Christ is the one who became the sacrifice on the cross, the atonement for us. He atoned for our sin. He's the one that makes us possible to be brought back from being dead in sin and to being alive in Christ. It's through Christ and Christ alone. There's not another option, there's not another way. The good news today is that there is such bad news of where we all are positionally that what Jesus did for us is the greatest news we could ever possibly hear. And when we receive that, then we become this new creation and then we have the privilege of taking that same message to other people that they might experience the same. That's the gospel today. Do you believe that? Have you repented and are you following after Jesus? Well, God had his prophets to be ambassadors for him as well and he chose a people to be a kingdom of priests in order to mediate and to help the nations

come to know God as well. But they refused to do that part of what God had for them as a people. It leads to all kinds of trouble and stories that we read in the Old Testament. But I want us to think about that as we think about Jonah. So let's move to Jonah chapter four and we'll build on what I just spoke of in 2 Corinthians. Now someone asked me this week, they said, I'm not sure we're all clear on the connection between Jonah and this series that we're doing for the year on being sent. So I wanna make sure we're clear. At the beginning of the year, we spent time talking about loving God, loving neighbor, making disciples of all the nations. We focused on the globe, all of our different partnerships. God has a heart for the world. We're a part of that. He lets us play a small part in his global mission. Then we worked our way through 1 Thessalonians. Paul wrote that letter after he started the church. So we focused on church planting. It's one of the ways that the gospel spreads the most rapidly through the planting of new churches so we spent some months talking about that anchored into 1 Thessalonians, they were a church start. I wanted Jonah to be a pause for us between talking about global things, church planting,

and we're about to shift to talking about our neighborhood around the church, our neighborhoods where we live, and the cities in which we live, and what God's heart is and how he wants us to live. He wants us to be a part and be sent there. Jonah is a great spot to pause and to really ask the question, am I in on whatever mission or assignment that God has for me, whether it's comfortable or uncomfortable, whether it's people I like or it's people I don't like. Ultimately, we wanna ask as we've worked our way through Jonah, are we more like him? When he launched us in Jonah, asked this question, are we more like Jonah or are we opposite of Jonah? So what I want us to think about as we move through chapter four and wrap up this part of Jonah is extending or withholding compassion. Are we a people and a person who extends compassion or withholds compassion? We'll finish Jonah today. Next week we have a guest speaker, an apologetic speaker. At least twice a year we try to have someone come in and talk about issues to help us defend our faith. Next week we have someone coming that will be talking about end of life issues. Doctor assisted suicide, withholding treatment. When do we let life go? The kinds of questions that are hard to agonize

and walk through and many of us have had to walk through those issues. But what does God say about those? And how do we wrestle through some of those hard questions about end of life? The reason for this topic is what I keep hearing most podcasts that I listen to say, they'll say the church doesn't talk enough about this issue. And I'm thinking man, if I listen to all these different things we're not talking enough about, I don't know how we would. I get 50, we get 52 shots a year at something. Some point we wanna resource you and help you so that you personally can go after all the topics as well. We can only do so much. Part of what we do is work through books of the Bible so that we'll hit as much as possible of what's going on. And we believe God will lead us as we move through his scripture that way. But I asked last year, I asked somebody, I said what are they saying right now that as the church we're not prepared for? And one of them was end of life issues because if you're keeping up, Canada is all over the doctor assisted suicide. The reality is the US has become a culture of death as well. We just don't know it as much as they do in Canada. So it's here and it's well on its way. So how do we, and continuing, so how do we deal with that

as Christians? That's what we'll deal with next week. But today let's think about extending or withholding compassion. And then we'll move in Nehemiah. Enough of the introduction, let's get in the work. We're talking about extending or withholding. And in the first part of chapter four, we're gonna look at an angry prayer. Remember what's happened with Jonah so far. He was given this assignment by God to go to the Ninevites. They were Israel's enemies. They ultimately would be ones who create all kinds of havoc for Israel. And Jonah says, I'm out. I'm going another direction. He ends up on a ship. God brings judgment through a storm. He ends up owning that it's his fault. Gets thrown overboard. The sailors, they're a pagan, actually end up turning towards God while Jonah's running from God. And then God appoints a great fish to swallow up Jonah. By the way, this story is not about a fish. This story is about what God is doing in a man's life. And it is a mirror for us to look and see what is happening in our own lives in regard to the things God has for us. Then Jonah prays, I love this about him.

He's in the hardest spot imaginable to me, and he prays a psalm of gratitude. And then God brings him out of the fish, and then he gets a second shot at what God had assigned to him and where he'd sent him. And then he goes, and this time he obeys, and he does it. And the people of Nineveh actually repent and turn to God. That's what brings us to chapter four. And Jonah is angry about it, verse one. But it greatly displeased Jonah, and he became angry. That word greatly displeased means that he was extremely furious. This isn't the kind of anger that's frustration. We tend to give anger levels. It's all anger, by the way, but we wanna make ourselves feel better. And so I would say I'm frustrated rather than I'm angry. The reality is you're angry. You're just giving it a different term. And this is not that frustrated kind of anger. This is, he is furious that this has happened. And he is burning on the inside. He's burning mad. And he's greatly displeased that this would occur. His response is actually opposite of what we see in Luke 15 when people who are lost come to Christ. In Luke 15, we have a sheep that is missing. The shepherd goes after the sheep. The guy goes after him.

He brings back the one sheep, calls all his neighbors together, and says, let's rejoice and celebrate. This sheep was lost, and now it's found. So there's a celebration about it, not anger because the sheep was lost. And then it says, He tells a story about a woman. She's lost a coin. That money would have been valuable to her. And she's sweeping and she finds the coin and calls everybody together. Let's celebrate. This coin was lost. Now it's found. We're gonna celebrate it. But then the third story is the most telling in Luke 15. Jesus tells about two sons and a father. One son is wild and out of control. He wants his inheritance. The father gives it to him, lets him go. He creates all kinds of chaos in the family. The older son, he stays there. He does everything his father asks him. The wild son comes back. And what's the father say? Man, we need to throw a party. Our son was lost and now he's back. It is time to celebrate. And then we read in verse 28 of Luke 15,

but he, the older brother, became angry. He was like Jonah. The people repented in Nineveh and Jonah was angry about it. And the brother, the older brother, is angry and he wasn't willing to go in. And then his father came out and began pleading with him. Your brother was lost. Now he's found. He's dead. Now he's alive. Why will we not celebrate that? And you know what, I started thinking about that. And I wonder if some of the hardest people to extend compassion towards are those family members that are chaos causers in the family. And they caused mom and dad's attention to be on them all the time because of their rebellion and it robbed the rest of the family of a joy and a life that could have been there if not for this one sibling that kept going off the rails. And then that sibling comes back years later and repents and turns and God rescues and saves. It would be hard to extend compassion to someone that had wreaked that much havoc on a family. At the same time, that is the heart of God is to continually extend compassion with the hope that people will respond and receive it. Who are those people that would be really difficult

to extend compassion towards? I really thought I was pretty good on this one as I was studying. And God brought to mind a couple days ago a person that I have withheld compassion from and actually have been mad about over the years. And I think this might be a struggle for maybe one or two others as well. But sometimes the hardest place to extend compassion is on someone that hurt your child. And so this young man that I've withheld, I feel like he wreaked a little bit of havoc in our family. And then God's done an amazing work in him over the last several years. And he's about leading all kinds of people to Christ through the ministry that he's leading. But I've refused to support it. I've barely prayed for it. And I tend to get mad when I see it. And I've refused to support it. And I tend to get mad when I see it. And so I repented of that this week because I've failed to extend compassion and mercy where God has. And I look forward in the future to extending compassion to him rather than withholding compassion. What about you? Is there anyone that you're displeased with or you're angry about because God is doing a work in them?

Well, again, I like what he did in verse two. He prayed to the Lord and he said, please, Lord, was this not what I said while I was still in my own country? Therefore, in order to install this, I fled to Tarshish. So Jonah's solution was he prays. I love that he takes it to God. He's taking his anger to God. So it's a good place to take our anger. So we take our anger to God and he said, I knew you were going to do this. Before I ever left, I did this because I knew you would do it. I know your character. I know what you're about. And I just thought if I go hauling off over here, I can stall this a little bit and perhaps you'll bring judgment on them instead of bringing rescue to them. So he fled rather than going where he was sent. For I knew, he said, that you're a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abundant in love and kindness and one who relents concerning calamity. Moses said this about God as well in talking about his character. But he just said, God, I know what you're like. I know you're gracious. I know you're compassionate. The word compassion here means soft like a womb.

It's the protection of a mother of a baby in the womb. It's the kind of compassion that God has. Slow to anger, compassionate. Think about how quick people are to anger. When God brings judgment, it's never out of an uncontrolled anger. He's never out of control. It is a measured response to things that are done against a holy God. So he's slow to anger and he's abundant in love and kindness. He is waiting to pour out an unconditional love on his people. This is who God is. Micah would say something similar in chapter seven at the end, verses 18 through 20. He said, who's a God like you who pardons iniquity and passes over the rebellious act of the remnant of his possession? He does not retain his anger forever because he delights in unchanging love. That's what God delights in and pouring that out. He will again have compassion on us. He will tread our iniquities underfoot. Yes, God, you will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea. You'll give truth to Jacob and unchanging love to Abraham, which you swore to our forefathers from the days of old. That's the character of God. I think one of the best things we can do

is linger on the character of God himself. Too often we get issue focused. I can do that easily. But when I can sit back and linger on who God is and on the character of God, it starts to take care of everything else. One of the things that I'm trying to do right now is identify the top 15 or 20 issues that I see going on with people and then identifying what are one or two scriptures that I can make sure I have memorized, that I could share with them. God's Word is the most powerful thing we can share in any kind of conversation. And then what's a story in the Gospels where Jesus encounters someone and something's happening there with that issue. I think if we can just find ourselves in the story. And then Romans tells us that we're encouraged by Old Testament stories. And so I'm looking for an Old Testament story on that same issue to encourage. And then ultimately making a run to the cross because that's where our help comes from for all things. And this, about a week ago I wrote one and I titled it Relief from Anxiety. And as I was looking through it, and I'm just writing these things scripturally. I'm not dealing with all counselor kind of issues that we can talk about with them.

It just straight up was scripture say. And where God took me was in to Luke and Jesus is visiting a village and he comes into the home of Mary and Martha. And Mary just immediately sits at Jesus' feet. And Martha's running around making preparations, trying to make sure everything's what they need to do and hospitality, I'm sure it's all the right thing to do. But she gets frustrated with her sister. And Jesus says, why are you frustrated with Mary? She's doing the one necessary thing. What if we did the one necessary thing more often than we did all the other things? What if we sat at the feet of Jesus with our anxiety, for example, for two hours and 50 minutes, just like we'll sit in the movie, The Odyssey, at the feet of the movie screen. Imagine if we spent two hour and 50 minute increments like that, thinking and dwelling on who God is, who Jesus is, and what that would do to our hearts. So Jonah at least acknowledges, knows who God is. Verse three, therefore now, Lord, please take my life from me. for death is better to me than life. This is so dire to Jonah that he would rather have his life taken away. In chapter two, verse six, he's praising and thanking God for bringing his life out of destruction. Now he's going back and forth, and here he is. This is so dire to him

that death would be better to him than life. And then verse four, the Lord said, and this is a great question, do you have good reason to be angry? Now questions are a great way to help us sort through what's going on in our own hearts. So God asked the question, lets him sit in the question for a minute. By the way, when we ask questions, it's good to just sit there and let the other person respond rather than being uncomfortable with the silence and trying to help with the answer. So God says, look, do you have good reason to be angry? God has been merciful and compassionate to Jonah, but Jonah does not want God to extend his compassion and mercy to anybody else. Verse five, then Jonah went out from the city and he sat east of it. There he made a shelter for himself and sat under it in the shade until he could see what would happen in the city. This, some people have said this is almost just comedic, what goes on here, the back and forth. But here's Jonah, all this is happening with God. He sees that the people are repenting, but he's just hopeful that maybe if he just goes and sits outside the city and watches, maybe God will bring judgment on the city. So I'm just gonna go out here, sit it out for a while

and see if God will actually come through the way I want God to come through, I want God to come through, not with compassion and mercy, but to destroy the city. And so while he's sitting out there, then he's waiting to see if God would extend or withhold that compassion. Are there any people, as you think about this this morning, that you are withholding compassion from? Is there a political party that you're withholding compassion towards the people? Is there an ethnicity that you withhold compassion from? Is there that chaos causing family member that you're withholding? Is there a coach that did your kid wrong that you're withholding compassion? Is there a boss that's made your life miserable that you're withholding compassion from them? Is there a nation that when you were watching the World Cup and you heard about that nation, something boiled inside of you because of what they represent? Withholding or extending? And as Jesus did in his life, he often would tell parables and give word pictures to help everyone understand what's happening. And God does that with Jonah. He gives a vivid picture response, verses six through eight. So Jonah, Jonah, Jonah, Jonah, Jonah, Jonah,

Jonah, Jonah, Jonah. He bring lots of consolation of Israel to people to answer their prayers. And after he descended, a few heavens went by. And in one of the heavens, there was a woman in the sky holding his hand and praying, and she said, the lord brought avait the feet of the woman and she prayed. So the Lord God appointed a plant hoping God will change his mind and bring judgment on Nineveh. And God gives him a plant. God is sovereign. He's over all creation. So he points the plant to do what he wants it to do. It becomes shade for him. And now he's extremely happy about it. But verse seven, God appointed a worm when dawn came the next day and it attacked the plant and it withered. God appointed a fish, plant, a worm. Verse eight, when the sun came up, God appointed a scorching east wind, a dry wind that would come in, that would be incredibly hot.

And the sun beat down on Jonah's head so that he became faint and begged with all his soul to die, saying, death is better to me than life. So he could. Comes back to what he said earlier. Everything about this whole scenario is awful. I would rather die than live. There are all kinds of things going on here. One of the books I mentioned that I read while I was gone is The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment by Jeremiah Burrough. I was reminded of that again as I was looking at this part of Jonah. And Jonah was incredibly discontent with what God's assignment was for him. Rather than what Burrough said, are we as thankful for the abundant mercies that God gives us as we are for the afflictions that God brings us? And the afflictions will only go as far as God allows the hand, he allows them to go. But can I be content in the affliction as well as in the abundant mercies? Can I be content with this assignment or that assignment? Y'all, I tell stories often of the gym, the sauna. I know that's weird to some people. But you know why I'm there? When I was 31 years old, I had surgery on my low back. I'd had back issues for years up to that point.

And I've spent the last 30 plus years managing my back. And one of the ways I figured out to bring relief was to sit in a sauna and stretch. And through that, God started opening up doors for me to be able to share the gospel with people. I would never have gone into a sauna if I did not have back surgery 30 plus years ago. So I can be thankful on my best days because God in that affliction has opened the door for the gospel to go to places perhaps it might not have gone. Those have been my assignments. What are yours? What afflictions has God brought on you that actually puts you in a place you never would have gone? If we can find contentment there, we'll find a deep joy in the midst of it as well. Extend or withhold. And the last part of Jonah is a thought-provoking question. And the question is not just for Jonah, the question is for you and me. Verse nine, then God said to Jonah, do you have good reason to be angry about the plant? Now in verse four, he said, do you have good reason to be angry? Now he's coming back, asking a question again. Sometimes it's good to let a question sit, come back, ask the question again.

This time he's asking it specifically regarding the plant. In other words, he had nothing to do with the plant. And so Jonah says to him, I have good reason to be angry, even to death. So he's still being honest before God. And he's still angry at God. Verse 10, the Lord said, you had compassion on the plant for which you did not work, in which you did not cause to grow, which came up overnight and perished overnight. You had compassion on this plant. You had nothing to do with it. And yet you were compassionate towards it. Verse 11, should I not have compassion? And this word compassion in verse 11, in the Hebrew, and then we see it later, Jesus' scripture in the Gospels, but it's compassion with tears. It is such a softness for a people, and it's compassion with tears. It's such a softness for a people that there's a weeping over the people. God has created every person. Jesus, when he looked over Jerusalem, wept over the city because of their refusal to follow him. So with the kind of compassion that carries tears with it, God says should I not have compassion on Nineveh the great city which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons Who do not know the difference between their right and left hand? He's saying to Jonah they're ignorant they do not even know God is saying that that I'm a possibility for them Should I not have compassion on those who have no idea

And then he appeals It's a bit of an odd way to end a book of the Bible as many as well as many animals In other words Jonah should I not have compassion on a hundred and twenty thousand people who are lost And if you can't muster the compassion for them How about the animals in the city what what if we just spare them Now our culture today ought to love that because we've basically put animals above humans in the way we're treating them Should I not have compassion on a lost people That's the question he's asking Jonah So It leaves us with that question Again, we don't get an answer from Jonah. We don't know what he did with this Some people have said what is Jonah about it's about worldwide mission. It's about going to people in other nations. Well, that's in there And then others would say Jonah is about us seeing Jonah And are we like Jonah or not? I Think that's the right question So as we think about being sent should we not be a people That are on mission for God to the nations of the world To Places all over the u.s The state in which we've been placed the cities in which we live the neighborhoods in which we reside The church in which our building exists where we can gather Should should we not have compassion On people who have no idea the message of the gospel that I shared at the beginning Of the message What if we were to look at our time How much of our time is spent with compassion extending compassion On those who don't know Christ How much of our resource that we have is spent

Extending compassion On people in need How much of our giftings and talent are spent on extending compassion rather than withholding compassion Last week I talked about 60 70 and 80 year olds I'll continue to talk about that and and I believe I can't remember when I said what in which service I said different things But I do believe that we have the greatest mission force Accessible to us today than probably any time in human history In our 60 70 and 80 year olds if they would just see themselves as such We don't have to raise money for them We don't have to fund them people are traveling all over the world if we would just see ourselves as ambassadors for Christ We're an unleashed mission force not just in that age range all the way through Sometimes I'll hear people say why would we spend so much time thinking about over there? other nations We have so much here so much lostness here Did you know that in Hearst, Hewlett-Bedford? There are 70 plus languages spoken in those three cities You're right the nations are here But I think it begs the question Do I just raise the theoretical question or what will I do? To be a part of extending compassion in the message of Christ to one of those 70 plus language groups. Who's willing to go? Is God giving anyone that assignment? The nations are here. We are an influx of the nations. We both go abroad and we go here. I had such a privilege on Thursday to meet with some of our young adults.

And here's one thing I would say today. If I were wanting to just catch a zeal and have compassion for the lost and bring the gospel, I would find Caleb Bundy and our young adults and Sophia and her husband Davey and our young adults and I would go hang out with them a lot. I was so fired up when I left the meeting with them and their passion and zeal for the Lord, they're doing it. And they want our young adults to be on fire. They want our church to be on fire for it. They want it to be a contagion that just runs across our church. And I love that we're just building on that because it is in so many ways, we're just building on that because it is in so many places and pockets in our body. We're actively getting after it, extending compassion and sharing the gospel and not withholding. So we wanna be a people that are sent. I wanna end with Romans 10, 14 and 15. So we think about what God had sent Jonah to do. This is what God has sent every person that's a new creation in Christ to do. Verse 14, how then will they call on him who they have not believed? If they don't know who he is and what I shared, how can someone call on him?

How will they believe in him who they have not heard? How will people in the 1040 window in mostly Muslim countries across the world, how will they even know if they haven't heard? How will the 60 Bangladeshi Muslims that my grandson and I hung out with a few weeks ago, how will they know unless someone tells them? We were at the park, it was my grandson and I and 60 of my new Muslim friends. How will they know? And how will they hear without a preacher? And this isn't saying we put it off on a few preachers throughout the land. It'll never happen that way. It won't spread fast enough that way. Yes, with preachers, but it's to equip so that we can all do it. How will they preach unless they are sent? How will they do it unless we send them? Just as written, how beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news of good things. We have the most beautiful message of all. Let's not be Jonah and flee, but rather let's run in pursuit of those who are in the most desperate need of the compassion and mercy of God. Just like you and I once were before God graciously pursued us and rescued us at the foot of the cross. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you today for your word and so grateful for the whole thing and just the richness of the gospel today. And I pray, Father, that we would linger in that, that we would linger in your compassion and mercy, your slowness to anger, your desire for all to repent. Father, I pray we would linger today in just your goodness and Jesus, thank you for the life you give us, that you extended compassion to us through your work on the cross and the power of the resurrection. And thank you for your mercy and grace on us today. And Father, I pray we would be so quick and ready and looking for every opportunity, knowing where you've sent us, in our homes, in our neighborhoods, in the grocery stores, at the gyms, at the ballpark, in the cheer places, at our jobs, on vacation, wherever you send us, God, I pray, we would eagerly be looking and see what you're doing and get in on being an ambassador for you in those moments that people might know Jesus everywhere. Let us just see movements of people coming to Christ. Thank you for the. the excitement of so many in our church that desire to see more and more come to you. Thank you, Father, for those who are here today that don't know you, and I pray, Father, that they would know they can have that freedom today that comes through Jesus. So we love you, and we're thankful for your word

that stretches us, convicts us, encourages us, and Father, that there's just power in it, and I pray in Jesus' name. Let's be quiet before the Lord for just a moment and ask God, I wasn't even trying to ask real hard this week but maybe we ask specifically, where are we extending compassion or not and see who God brings to mind that you're extending it so receive the affirmation, but are there some also that perhaps you've withdrawn it, that maybe he's working in you that way as well?