Sermon Idea: Jonah’s salvation from the sea reveals both God’s judgment and mercy.
Introduction: How many times have you been engrossed in a television show or movie, only for the credits to roll, and you’re left with a certain level of tension as to how the story will end? A good cliffhanger keeps the audience coming back. The viewer is left with enough unresolved tension or uncertainty that they can’t help but watch again in search of resolution.
If Jonah were a running television series, the credits would have rolled the moment Jonah hit the water after being thrown overboard. What will come of Jonah? Will he die in the sea under the judgment of God, rejecting his commission to Ninevah? Does this mean a prophet will not take the Word to Ninevah? Is their fate now doomed, void of God’s message through God’s messenger?
When we last left Jonah, he had run from the Lord’s presence after God commissioned him to go and cry out against the evil city, Nineveh. In fact, he runs in the opposite direction and sets sail with some Gentile sailors. While he is sleeping in the boat, God sends a violent windstorm upon the sea, and the sailors become curious about Jonah. They soon learn he is on the run, and their predicament is a judgment from the Lord. They tried with all their might to row to land, but, desperate, they did the unthinkable. They granted Jonah’s wish to be thrown overboard. The storm ceased, and Jonah began to drown.
There are two related themes in Jonah that are essential to the book’s meaning. The first is the judgment of God, and the second is the mercy of God. The storm was a judgment on Jonah, a discipline for his sin, and yet that judgment was an act of mercy, because as we will see, Jonah is going to be saved by the mercy of God in the midst of the sea of judgment. First the judgment, then the mercy. Look with me at verse 17 of chapter one.
I.) Jonah experiences God’s judgment
The text moves seamlessly from Jonah’s drowning to his being swallowed by a great fish. It did not take long to read of Jonah’s deliverance after learning of his distress.
17 And the LORD appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. (Jon 1:17)
We are told this because we are meant to reflect on the harmony of God’s justice and mercy. God brings salvation to Jonah through judgment. In the gospel, salvation comes to us through judgment on the cross of Christ. Wallowing in the sea is God’s judgment; the great fish is his salvation.
Jonah 1:17 reads, “…the LORD appointed a great fish.” The word translated ‘appointed’in the ESV (provided in the NIV and NKJV) teaches us two things. The first is that God is sovereign over all of creation. In fact, our entire passage is bookended with God’s sovereign control. In 1:17, God appoints the fish; in 2:10, the fish obeys the Word of God: “The LORD spoke to the fish…”
Not only does it teach us about God’s sovereign control, but it also teaches us about God’s intention. The word translated as “appoint” occurs 4 times in Jonah, and each time it appears in a context where God is teaching Jonah a lesson. God appoints a great fish, a leaf plant, a worm, and an east wind to teach Jonah a particular lesson. God has been precise with his salvation of Jonah. He doesn’t merely bring him to shore, but he appoints a fish to both save Jonah and instruct him.
God will accomplish his purposes in us. We may remain under the delusion that we can hide or outrun for a time, but in our lives will be people and circumstances appointed by God to conform us to his will and purpose. When this happens, don’t be too quick to despair, because what feels like the judgment of discipline may be leading to God’s merciful work in you.
Now let’s turn our attention to Jonah’s prayer. It is a prayer of thanksgiving.
God heard Jonah’s cry for help while he was drowning in the sea. That is what we read in verse 2, “I called out to the LORD, out of my distress…” So the prayer we are reading this morning seems to be the second prayer of Jonah; the first is not recorded.
What was Jonah’s distress? His prayer makes clear that Jonah was experiencing God’s judgment, which is described as dying.
How do we know it was God’s judgment? Let’s look at verse 3. Although it was the mariners who threw him overboard, Jonah says God did it, “For you cast me into the deep.” While describing his drowning, Jonah says to God, “all your waves and your billows passed over me.”
Last week, I mentioned that Jonah makes several descents in chapter one. He goes down to Jappa and down into the ship. Now Jonah is descending into the sea, and the descent is described with the language of burial.
In verse 4, Jonah reflects that he was being “driven away from your sight…”
In verse 5, Jonah says, “The waters closed in over me to take my life; the deep surrounds me.” Then Jonah begins to describe his descent with the language of burial.
In verse 6, Jonah finishes his descent as he hits the bottom, “I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me forever…” The original readers of Jonah would recognize these mountains and think of the gateway to the grave.”
Jonah thought that it would be better to experience God’s judgement that to obey God’s command, so Jonah flees the presence of the LORD. But when it comes, Jonah realizes God’s judgment is not preferable to anything.
Perhaps you’re here this morning, and you’re trapped in the lie that disobeying God is somehow good for you. Jonah teaches us that disobeying God is never good for us. Being away from the presence of the LORD is never good for us. The New Testament is clear that sin brings death.
23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Ro 6:23)
15 Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death. (Jas 1:15)
When we consider the story of Jonah and the New Testament teaching about sin, we should be ready to cast off sin. There is no temptation you’re experiencing, no sins you’re covering that are worth separation from God. The good news is none of us has to experience the descent into death for our sin like Jonah. For there is one who has descended to death for us. The good news of the gospel is that God has punished our sins on the cross of Jesus Christ. He descended into death for us.
Run to Christ, who is the greater and better Jonah. In Matthew 12:40, we read, 40 For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. (Mt 12:40)
Repentance will be made possible, and mercy will be available for Ninevah because of the death, burial, and resurrection of an Israelite prophet named Jonah. Repentance is possible and mercy available to you this morning because of the death, burial, and resurrection of the greater Jonah, Jesus Christ.
This connection between Jonah and Jesus, the typology, is not limited to the belly of the great fish. Jonah does not stay in the belly of the great fish just as Jesus did not stay in the belly of the earth.
II.) Jonah experiences God’s mercy
During his prayer of thanksgiving, Jonah makes it clear that during his descent, he was persistent in his cry for help. In verse 4, Jonah says, “…yet I shall look upon your holy temple.” In verse 7, we read, “…and may prayer come to you, into your holy mountain.”
We saw earlier that God’s judgment was communicated with the language ot death and burial. In Jonah’s prayer, God’s mercy is communicated with the language of resurrection.
In verse 6, we read, “yet you brought up my life from the pit, O LORD my God.”
In verse 10, God speaks to the fish, “and it vomited Jonah upon the dry land.” He was once in the belly of Sheol—the place of the dead. Now he has been resurrected to life on the land.
Jonah is about much more than a fish. It is about the mercy of God going to the nations through the death, burial, and resurrection of an Israelite prophet.
Vomiting and resurrection seem at odds. The former is bad, the latter is good. God’s appointment of the fish means God is teaching Jonah a lesson. What lesson is that?
God is stripping Jonah of his pride. You seek Jonah’s prayer of thanksgiving suggests that God’s mercy has come to him because of his piety and prayer.
Notice that when Jonah prays in verse7, When my life was fainting away, I remembered the LORD. Not the LORD remembered me, but I remembered the LORD.
In verses 8-9, Jonah compares himself with the Gentile mariners on the boat in chapter one.
8 Those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love. 9 But I with the voice of thanksgiving will sacrifice to you; what I have vowed I will pay. Salvation belongs to the LORD! (Jon 2:8–9)
Although Jonah rightly says, Salvation belongs to the LORD! He believes to have received God’s mercy not as an undeserved sinner, but as a pious Hebrew who called out to God.
Jonah is taking slow steps in the right direction, but he was not fully and rightly responsive to God’s mercy with a contrite heart and repentance. Jonah 3-4 will make this abundantly clear.
Jonah has been saved by God’s mercy, but he is not responding rightly to it. His pride is still at play. How different is Jonah’s prayer from that of David?
16 For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it; you will not be pleased with a burnt offering. 17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. (Ps 51:16–17)
The Lord loves Jonah and the Ninevites, so he must sanctify Jonah. The LORD is working on Jonah to bring him into conformity to his will and will teach him that salvation really does belong to the Lord.
Application
- Rightly understand God’s mercy: Salvation belongs to the LORD.
- Rightly respond to God’s mercy.
- Reflect on the gospel of Jesus Christ. If we receive God’s mercy, his justice must be satisfied. How?
Nathaniel R. Martin 