Jonah 3:1-10

¹ Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, ² “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you.” ³ So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three days’ journey in breadth. ⁴ Jonah began to go into the city, going a day’s journey. And he called out, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” ⁵ And the people of Nineveh believed God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them. 

⁶ The word reached the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, removed his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. ⁷ And he issued a proclamation and published through Nineveh, “By the decree of the king and his nobles: Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything. Let them not feed or drink water, ⁸ but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and let them call out mightily to God. Let everyone turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands. ⁹ Who knows? God may turn and relent and turn from his fierce anger, so that we may not perish.” ¹⁰ When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it.

In the name of Jesus. Amen.

For several reasons, I don’t preach with props, but if I did tonight’s sermon would begin the sermon with a ‘clapperboard’ – one of those things used during the filming of movies and TV shows. “Jonah called to preach to Nineveh; take two.” “Action!”

We know about the ‘out-take.’ Instead of going to preach to Nineveh, Jonah ran the other direction. He was thrown overboard in a stormy sea, swallowed by a great sea creature, and submerged to the depths of the sea to be digested and die. It looked like Jonah’s refusal to preach to Nineveh would be his own undoing. But from the depths, Jonah prayed to God for mercy, and God heard. God answered from heaven and sent out His steadfast love and faithfulness (Ps. 51:3). God is merciful, but His mercy takes different forms in different situations. In Jonah’s case, mercy looked like being whale vomit instead of becoming whale poo.

God gave Jonah a second chance, “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you.” Jonah preached a one-course sermon of Law, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” Notice what the sermon doesn’t do. It does not accuse the people of specific sins. It doesn’t name any of Nineveh’s many evils (Jon 1:2). The sermon only does one thing – it calls Nineveh’s future into question. This is just an aside: In your conversations with unbelievers, be on the lookout for opportunities to point people to the return of Christ, the final judgment, and end of the world (Act. 17:31). Those may be the windows where God will shine the light of the Gospel into the darkness of people’s hearts.

Well, Jonah’s doomsday sermon was used by the Holy Spirit to change the hearts of the Ninevites. From the greatest to the least of them, they called for a fast. Even the king of Nineveh descended from his throne to sit in sackcloth and ashes. He gave a command to all the people of Nineveh, “Fast. Don’t eat or drink. Call out mightily to God. Turn from evil and violence. Who knows? God may turn from His fierce anger against us, so we may not perish.” This wasn’t a revival, it wasn’t a reawakening, it was an initial awakening. But also notice that for the Ninevites this was a shot in the dark. At best it was a, “Maybe,” a “Let’s give this a try,” a, “What if?”

Well, their blind shot at repentance paid off. “God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that He said He would do to them, and He did not do it” (Jon. 3:10).

Dear saints, as we begin this repentant season of Lent, you have something better than the preaching of Jonah. You have God’s sure and certain promise forever etched in the Scriptures, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 Jn. 1:9). That verse is so important because it contains a promise. We can, and probably should, understand it as, “When we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us and cleanse us.” Whenever you bring your sins to God, He responds with His forgiveness and mercy.

In Greek, the word ‘confess’ is two words smashed together – ‘same’ and ‘words.’ So, when you confess something, you have the same words as someone or something else. This means that biblical confession of sins has two parts. To confess your sins, you say what God says about those sins. First, you say that those sins are horrible, they are deserving of death, they separate you from God, they harm your neighbor, they earn eternal damnation. That’s what God says about your sins, and when we confess our sins, we have those same words. That’s the first part of confession. But don’t ever stop there!

Keep saying the same words about your sin that God clearly says in His Word. Those sins have been removed from you by Jesus who became sin (2 Cor. 5:21), and God has laid your sin on Christ (Is. 53:4, 6). Those sins are died for by Christ who bore them to the grave which is now empty (Col. 2:14). Those sins are removed from you as far as the east is from the west (Ps. 103:12).

Dear saints, there is no question whatsoever about how God will respond when you confess and cry out to Him for mercy. The answer is the cross and the empty grave. Because of what Christ has done, you, sinner, are forgiven (1 Jn. 2:2). Amen.

The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.