Jonah – Red-Neck Missionary

Extracted Verses and Quotes from the Sermon

Biblical Verses

2 Kings 14:23-27

“In the fifteenth year of King Amaziah son of Joash of Judah, Jeroboam son of Joash became king of Israel in Samaria, and he reigned forty-one years. He did evil in the eyes of the Lord; he did not turn away from the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, which he caused Israel to commit. He restored the border of Israel from Lebo Hamath in the north to the Sea of the Arabah in the south, according to the word of the Lord, the God of Israel, spoken through his servant Jonah son of Amittai, the prophet who was from Gath Hepher.”

Jonah 1:1-3

“The word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai: ‘Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me.’ But Jonah ran away from the Lord and headed for Tarshish.”

Nahum 3:1

“Woe to the city of bloodshed, full of lies, full of plunder, never without victims!”

Jonah 1:4-6

“Then the Lord sent a great wind on the sea, and such a violent storm arose that the ship threatened to break up. All the sailors were afraid and each cried out to his own god. They threw the cargo into the sea to lighten the ship. The captain went to Jonah, who was sleeping below deck, and said, ‘How can you sleep? Get up and call on your God! Maybe he will take notice of us, and we will not perish.’”

Jonah 1:9

“I am a Hebrew and I worship the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the land.”

Jonah 1:11-15

“‘Pick me up and throw me into the sea,’ Jonah replied, ‘and it will become calm. I know that this great storm has come upon you because of me.’ Instead, the men rowed hard to get back to land, but they could not. Then they cried out to the Lord, ‘Please, Lord, do not let us die for taking this man’s life. Do not hold us accountable for killing an innocent man, for you, Lord, have done as you pleased.’ So they picked Jonah up and threw him into the sea, and the storm stopped.”

Jonah 2:1-6

“From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the Lord his God. He said: ‘In my distress I called to the Lord, and he answered me. I called to you from the land of the dead, and you listened to my cry. You hurled me into the depths, into the very heart of the seas, and the currents swirled about me; all your waves and breakers swept over me. I thought I was condemned to death. The engulfing waters threatened me, the deep surrounded me; seaweed was wrapped around my head. I went down to the roots of the mountains; the earth beneath barred me in forever. But you, Lord my God, brought my life up from the pit.’”

Jonah 2:10

“And the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.”

Jonah 3:1-2

“Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: ‘Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you.’”

Jonah 3:10

“When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he relented and did not bring on them the destruction he had threatened.”

Jonah 4:1-3

“But to Jonah this seemed very wrong, and he became angry. He prayed to the Lord, ‘Isn’t this what I said, Lord, when I was still at home? That is what I tried to forestall by fleeing to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. Now, Lord, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live.’”

Jonah 4:6-8

“Then the Lord God appointed a leafy plant and made it grow up over Jonah to give shade for his head to ease his discomfort. Jonah was very happy about the plant. But at dawn the next day God appointed a worm, which chewed the plant so that it withered. When the sun rose, God prepared a scorching east wind, and the sun blazed down on Jonah’s head so that he grew faint. He wanted to die, and said, ‘It would be better for me to die than to live.’”

Jonah 4:10-11

“‘You have been concerned about this plant, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight. And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left—and also many animals?’”

Ecclesiastes 4:1

“I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun: I saw the tears of the oppressed—and they have no comforter; power was on the side of their oppressors—and they have no comforter.”

Numbers 6:24-26

“The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.”

Memorable Quotes

“Jesus said, ‘I must work the works of Him who sent me while it is day; the night is coming when no one can work.’ What can you do in your practice for the Lord today?”

“Jonah maybe wasn’t the most effective of prophets because God had to call Amos from the kingdom of Judah to come up to Israel and to call them to account for the fact that the rich were exploiting the poor.”

“When we run from God, we have that little ‘tarshish’ space in our lives. You may have a man cave, a habit, a thought, or a series of events that you nurture to justify less than Christian behavior. What is your tarshish?”

“These pagan sailors, before they start to throw the stuff overboard, they start praying—to their gods, not to Jehovah. Yet they turn to God in their distress more readily than Jonah.”

“Did Jonah know God’s will for him? Yes. Was Jonah following God’s will? No. How can we ask for God’s blessings and ministry while living in willful disobedience to God’s revealed will?”

“If you’ve never experienced God’s grace for yourself, how can you be a minister of God’s grace to those around you?”

“We don’t need a degree in systematic theology to share our faith; we just need a willingness. A simple thing to say these days is, ‘Well, life is complex, I don’t have all the answers, but I found this little pamphlet useful.’”

“The gospel is already going to the Muslim world. Since about the year 2000, Jesus has been appearing to Muslims in dreams and visions inviting them to follow Him.”

“Jonah’s life is a series of downward motions as long as he is living in willful disobedience to God’s will. The turning point is when he starts to pray.”

“Bathed your ministry in prayer. Don’t go through all kinds of traumatic experiences and then say, ‘Maybe we should pray about it now.’ Start with prayer, lead with prayer, bathe it in prayer.”

“The first Christian many local Muslims meet is a medical missionary—a doctor or a nurse—and because of their ministry, the gospel is going forward among unreached people groups.”

“The hardest heart to reach is that of his own missionary, which is why we end with chapter 4, with God still wrestling with this hard-necked missionary.”

“If God has been gracious to you and given you a new chance every time you repent, I want to challenge you today to be just as merciful to those in your life.”

“God blesses us not that we hold those blessings but that we can pass those blessings to other people.”

“Do you have credibility in your personal life? Do those closest to you see Jesus in your character? Because if they do not, neither will your work colleagues or those you minister to.”

“God has a concern not just for the victims but for the oppressors. The Assyrians as oppressors are not acting out of hate but out of fear for what might happen to them if the situation was reversed.”

“Mission is not my story but God’s story. The ministry is only alive by the grace of God, not by the virtue of human planning.”

“The harvest is white, the fields are ready to harvest, but the laborers are few. If not you, then who? If not now, then when?”

“God may be calling you into ministry so that you realize you are saved by grace—and so is everybody else.”

“May our walk with God be credible; may we yield to Him today our private Ninevehs and Tarshishes, so that people will see Jesus in each of us.”

Other Quotations

Ellen G. White, quoted indirectly

“The name of God is His character, and God’s character is love. To be baptized in God’s character of love means God’s love permeates every aspect of your being.”