Good morning!  Thanks for being here!  This morning we look at the second part of a 4 sermon series on Christian vocation.  An occupation occupies your time. It’s something you choose to do. But a vocation is a calling from God that is specific to you. An occupation may give you pleasure, but it won’t of itself, produce anything of eternal value.  A vocation, on the other hand, a calling from God, will produce eternal rewards and treasure in heaven.

 

Your vocation begins with the responsibilities God has given you right here, right now. This includes family, job, community.  We are called by God to serve, pray, love, learn, grow, serve, lead, teach, according to the gifts we’ve been given, not to please ourselves, but bring glory to God and to further his kingdom. Occupation is about us, vocation is about God.

 

Let’s open our Bibles to Jonah chapter 2. Jonah is called by God to go to the pagan city of Nineveh, capital of Assyria, and preach the word of the Lord.  But Jonah flees from the Lord. He pays his fare out of his own pocket and boards a ship bound for the Spanish Riviera.  

 

Why does he run the away when God calls him?  Maybe the same reason we run away when God calls us. We have this childish idea that life is about me and if I let God have his way, he’s going to do something crazy like make me a missionary to Nineveh. I mean, God obviously doesn’t know what’s right for me!  Right?   Anybody else been there or am I alone here?

 

Consider this: God not only loves the Ninevites enough to send Jonah, but he loves Jonah enough to send him to the Ninevites.  Why? Jonah has some things to learn about God, the Ninevites, and especially about himself.  And God loves him enough teach his stubborn child.

 

Suddenly the ship is swept into a great storm. The sailors quickly realize this is no ordinary storm.  Something more is going on here. The wrath of God is on them and they cast lots to find out who is to blame. Guess whose number comes up?

 

Jonah, meanwhile, is doing his best to remain in total denial of what’s happening around him. As the storm worsens, Jonah burrows deeper in his bunk, pulls his pillow over his head and pretends its not happening.  It’s all about me until I begin to face the consequences – then somebody else is to blame! Right!  Can you believe how patient God is with us?

 

This is the epitome of self-centeredness. Jonah shows no concern for the eternal destiny of the Ninevites.  He shows no concern for the lives of the sailors or the other passengers on the ship. The sailors have to drag him out of his bunk to get him to respond to their plight.

 

There was something desperately rotten in Jonah’s heart.  Jonah scorns the depravity of others, but he’s oblivious to the depravity of his own soul. Key: God must expose the sin in Jonah’s heart before Jonah has any message of grace to share with Nineveh.   And the same is true for us as individual Christians, and as the church.

 

This is where it gets interesting! The name Jonah means “dove”.  Not dove as in peace and innocence.  But dove as in senseless and easily deceived.  Jesus on the other hand means “The LORD saves”.  Saves who?  Senseless, easily deceived doves – i.e. Nineveh, Jonah, you, me.

 

The sailors do their best to save the ship and Jonah, but they can’t. Only Jesus saves. We think if we try hard enough we can safe ourselves, we can save others. But the harder the sailors try, the worse the storm becomes. Finally Jonah tells them, “Throw me in the sea and it will grow calm for you.”  What Jonah was thinking when he said this is a whole other sermon!

 

The sailors refuse. I find it pretty convicting for us as the church that the pagan sailors are willing risk their lives to save Jonah, but Jonah is unwilling to risk getting out of himself to save Nineveh!

 

 Finally, it becomes clear, the sailors have no choice. They pray the Lord will not hold them accountable for killing an innocent man - Jonah innocent?  He’s the only one on board that really knows the Lord and he’s the only one on board that hasn’t yet prayed! He’s not willing to submit to the Lord yet is he?  Ever been there?  So what happens next?  The sailors baptize Jonah! They throw him in the sea, and instantly the sea becomes calm.

 

Notice Jonah doesn’t walk on water.  He sinks like a rock.  He experiences being banished from God’s sight, ultimate separation. He is dying the death of those who die without the Lord. He experiences the very curse he wished on the Ninevites. Seaweed tangles around his head. He sinks to the very roots of the mountains.  He descends to Sheol, the place of the dead.

 

In his terror and despair, he finally cries out to the Lord and the Lord descends from heaven into the depths of hell to rescue his lost son. Sounds like Jesus doesn’t it? That’s because it is.

 

The Lord has already prepared a great fish to dive into the depths and swallow Jonah. The Hebrew word for great fish is not the same as the one for sea monster. The belly of this great fish becomes a sanctuary, a church, a safe place in the chaos of the sea. One full day and parts of two others, Jonah cruises home in the belly of God’s custom made submarine.

 

Question! What did Jonah do to merit that salvation?  Nothing, he deserved just the opposite. The early Christians used the fish as a sign of the church. The Greek word for fish is “Icthus”.  The letters are the first letters of phrase, “Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior”.

 

Let’s read together vs 7-10.  “When my life was ebbing away, I remembered you, LORD, and my prayer rose to you, to your holy temple. Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs. But I with a song of thanksgiving will sacrifice to you. What I have vowed I will make good. Salvation comes from the LORD.”   And the LORD commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land. Jonah 2:7-10

 

Jonah says “those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs.”  What idols is Jonah referring to? His own or the idols of the Ninevites?  An idol doesn’t have to be made of stone. An idol is a lie, a delusion. Like My way is better than God’s way.  I know what’s right better than God does.  My reluctance to submit to God’s way in my life.

 

Jonah is as captive to sin as the Ninevites.  His own sinful nature is like that seaweed wrapping around his head, dragging him down to the grave. He cannot save himself.  His own righteousness is as filthy rags. We are no different.  Unless God acts to save us, we’re toast.

 

It’s scary to have God expose the lies within us, sinful attitudes, our own self-centered ways. Those things we are willing to point out in others, but unwilling to face in ourselves.

 

The Apostle Paul wrote in Romans 7, “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do….I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me… in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members.  What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?  Thanks be to God--through Jesus Christ our Lord!” Rom 7

 

Remember the meaning of Jonah’s name?  It means “dove”.  Not dove as in peace and innocence. But dove as in easily deceived and senseless. The Bible tells us that the human heart is deceitful above all else.  Who will rescue us from ourselves, from our sin and self-deception?

 

Jonah was sent to Nineveh to shine God’s truth and light on their depravity and to announce to them that God had made a way for their sins to be forgiven. But first, Jonah needed to come to terms with his own depravity. He needed to experience God’s grace and mercy for himself before he had anything to share with Nineveh.

 

That’s not an easy lesson.  The old Jonah in us dies hard. But God is greater than our sin. There is a picture here of our baptism and conversion.  Baptism, whenever it took place, is a sign of Jonah, of the old sin nature being drown. Jonah’s repentance is connected with conversion, new birth.

 

Baptism and conversion are not the same, but they cannot be separated. They are both God’s work bringing us to faith, living faith. We move from living to please ourselves to living to please him in everything we are and do. Until that happens, full conversion has not yet taken place.  We have not moved from occupation to vocation.

 

Baptism and conversion are not one time events in the life of a Christian. They are ongoing events as long as we live in this world. As long as we live in this world our old sinful nature is going to try to rise up and rebel against the Lord. It needs to be drown by daily confession. No one can do that for you.  It’s between you and the Lord.  But unless our old sinful nature is crucified and drown on a daily basis, it will always take over and we will find ourselves doing a Jonah.  I know the prayer I need to pray every day. It goes something like this.  Maybe you want to make it your prayer as well.