And I believe with all of my heart that it is in God’s heart to tie all these things together and to clinch His great revelation in our hearts.
As we come again to share together from the pages of this precious revelation, this precious book, there is a principle of Bible study that is absolutely indispensable: total reliance upon the Spirit of God—helpless dependence.
God delights to meet with us and unveil Himself to us. He has promised that He would meet with those who would come in childlike faith. And so I invite you again to bow with me as we commit our time unto the Lord, and let us trust Him together to show Himself in a way that clinches all that He wants to accomplish in our hearts.
Our Father, we do thank You again that You have gathered us in this place, every one. We thank You for the way already that You have visited us. We thank You for Your marvelous presentation of Yourself through the children, and just such a miracle that You have done in bringing all of this together.
We pray now, as we look again in Your Word, that by Your Holy Spirit You would get beyond the sacred page, and that You would get beyond any human words that are spoken, and that You would communicate with us, each one and corporately, and make Your heart known unto us.
We thank You in advance that this is Your delight. Shine forth, Thou who dwellest between the cherubim. We ask to see Jesus once again. In Jesus’ precious name, amen.
I will ask you, if you would, to open your Bibles, please, to Jonah 4. We look now at this final chapter. Let me just sort of review. I am sure you are familiar with all that we have touched upon.
The theme of the book has to do with God dealing with the crisis in the heart of one man—a prophet. God reached down to this prophet, who had an anti-missionary heart and a non-missionary heart, and God determined that He was going to turn this man into a sign. By the grace of God, He has given us the revelation of that process.
Listen again as I read from Luke 11:
As the crowds were increasing, He began to say, “This generation is wicked.
It seeks for a sign, and yet no sign will be given unto it but the sign of Jonah.
The men of Nineveh will stand up with this generation at the judgment and condemn it,
because they repented at the preaching of Jonah;
and behold, something greater than Jonah is here.”
We have tried to show how this marvelous book unfolds the process by which God turns a man, a woman, His child, into a sign.
The story begins with Jonah running from the presence of the Lord, resisting the idea of being a missionary channel. In fact, he had no clue about all of that. God brought him to the place where he finally knew the life of Jesus.
In Jonah 1, God chased him down to the place where he made full surrender. In Jonah 2, God did the deeper work and taught him that he was on level ground with all those who needed the undeserved mercy of God. He needed it. He needed it. God put him in the shoes of the heathen until he realized.
Then, in Jonah 3, we saw that God surprised him and raised him from the dead, gave him a life that was not his own, and he became a sign. He became Christ unto the Ninevites.
They heard the gospel. They heard from his preaching the wrath of God. They saw in his person their only hope of salvation. He was a picture of Jesus, and because they saw Jesus, they repented.
That brings us to Jonah 4. As we have suggested, God is not finished with him. God must bring him now to understand the end of everything. He must change his focus—and change it forever.
God will bring him now to understand that the divine end is the satisfaction of His heart, as our children so wonderfully portrayed.
As we come to Jonah 4, the first thing that hits us is a thousand and one questions about this chapter. The first question that came to me was, why did the book not end in Jonah 3?
I thought—I speak as a fool—that would be a better ending. Why not just end with Jonah 3? God has mercy on Nineveh. They see Christ finally in a man raised from the dead. They see the life of Christ. A half-million people turn to the Lord. The disobedient prophet has become the obedient prophet, and everyone lived happily ever after.
That is how Jonah 3 ends. I wanted to write in my Bible after Jonah 3, Mission accomplished. Then I looked at Jonah 4 and said, “Not quite.”
What is this all about? And then the second question has to do with that: what in the world is going on with Jonah?
This man was raised from the dead. If we follow the spiritual principle, he has come to the place where he surrendered everything. He has embraced the grace of God. He has identified with Jesus in His death, His burial, and His resurrection. He has experienced supernatural life.
And we look in Jonah 4, and the man is angry, depressed, pouting, and wants to die. Is that a way for a man who has just been raised from the dead to act?
Especially, it is confusing when you are tied into those spiritual truths. Did he not learn anything from the storm? How could you be in a place like this and not learn something from the Lord? Three days and three nights in the belly of the fish.
When you turn to Jonah 4, honestly, it looks like he is right back where he started. It looks like there has been no change in his heart, that he still hates Nineveh, and he is still anti-missionary and non-missionary.
You say, “Well, what is all this change? How is he conformed to Christ if this happens? Has he forgotten all the mercy that he received?”
I do not know if those questions struck you, but as I came under the guidance of the Holy Spirit to study this chapter, those are the questions that begged to be answered in my heart. As I looked at that, I said, “What is this all about?”
The work in Jonah is not quite finished. There is yet a work of transformation that needs to be done.
Now, to get to the heart of the Lord in this chapter, I think it is important to at least look at Jonah’s attitude. Look at what is going on in this man’s heart.
Now, do not get me wrong. I am not going to try to take him off the hook. I am not going to try to defend Jonah. But I think it is very important that we understand what is going on in his heart. What is he thinking?
After all he has been through, after all he has tasted of the goodness of God, the Lord has chased him down. The Lord has done deep work in his life. By undeserved mercy, he has been raised from the dead. He has been used in a mighty way. What happened?
Let me try to set before you some possibilities. I am going to ask you to follow along as I read the first five verses.
It greatly displeased Jonah, and he became angry.
He prayed to the Lord and said, “Please, Lord, was not this what I said when I was still in my own country?
Therefore, in order to forestall this, I fled to Tarshish;
for I knew that You are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, and One who relents concerning calamity.
Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for death is better to me than life.”
And the Lord said to him, “Do you have a good reason to be angry?”
Jonah went out from the city and 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 to the city.
It greatly displeased Jonah. It. What is the “it”? Well, if you go back to Jonah 3:10:
When God saw their deeds, that they turned from their wicked way, God relented concerning the calamity which He had declared He would bring upon them. And He did not do it.
Evidently, Jonah was disappointed that God did not judge Nineveh. He said He was going to judge within forty days, and He did not do it.
As Rick Baker would ask, “What is that all about?” Well, those are the kinds of questions you need to ask. Clearly, Jonah is angry about the way things turned out—that God did not judge.
Let me suggest some possibilities, and along the way make it intensely practical. I will try to take the facts and look at the principle side, and then we will move in the book, in the chapter, to God’s precious heart. May God help us as we do that.
One reason God may have included this chapter—I am not saying this is everything or this is the answer—but one reason He may have included this chapter is to teach us that resurrected Christians have not arrived.
I mean, you have got to see that when you read this chapter. Just because we have surrendered to the Lord, just because we have embraced pure grace, and just because we have experienced the life of God living in us, that does not mean that there will not come a day when we have a controversy with the Lord.
That does not mean that, as living Christians, we will not someday be found angry, depressed, pouting, complaining, and wanting to die under some gourd. Maybe that is why He gave us the chapter, so we do not get the idea that resurrected Christians have already arrived.
I know that is a fact—a Bible fact. And I know it is a fact for those who have most known the Lord.
You do not have to be a seminary professor to know that, at any moment when you take your eyes off the Lord, anything is possible. Any Christian is capable of any sin at any time when he takes his eyes off the Lord.
I like to think God has begun to teach me some of these principles. I have surrendered my life to Jesus. I have tasted a little of the pure grace of God. I have experienced some of the life of God in me.
If I take my eyes off Christ, get out of my way. It is amazing how the flesh will sometimes come back again. It seems like we have come so far, and we are never going to have that again.
Maybe that is why God gave us this chapter. But I think it is a little deeper than that. That is a principle, of course, but I think Jonah’s anger had to do a little bit with the confusion that he did not know what the real issues were.
Even though God had done all that for him, he still lacked direction in his life. He lacked focus. He lacked purpose. He did not seem to have the single eye—the one direction.
Some try to explain his anger by saying that his issue was ministry. “That is my issue. I am a prophet of God.” Somehow, all of this experience that he went through was affecting his ministry.
He was in danger of losing his reputation as a prophet. He was a prophet of God. God said in Deuteronomy 18, concerning the prophet, “How do you know a prophet is true? If his word comes to pass.”
He goes out there and says, “In forty days Nineveh will be overturned,” and it did not happen. That was his issue—his ministry.
Jeremiah 28:9 says, “When the word of the prophet comes to pass, that prophet will be known as one whom the Lord has sent.”
So Jonah may have thought, “My reputation as a prophet is at stake here. God has ruined my ministry. I might as well die. There is nothing else to live for. My whole ministry—that is the issue.”
“I am going out with the Word of the Lord, and then it does not happen. Forty days come, and forty days pass, and God did not do what God said He was going to do.”
I have two comments to make about that possibility. The first comment is this: it is true. It is Bible truth. In many cases, before the Lord can really use a man, a woman, or a work, He has to destroy their reputation.
That is often very, very true. God loves us too much to let our reputation as a servant of God get in the way of serving God. If He has to shatter our reputation, He is going to do it.
Our Lord Jesus Himself was of no reputation, and He is not going to let our reputation hinder us. If that is the case in this book, that probably opens the question.
My second comment about that is, unless Jonah was afraid of returning back to Israel and looking like a false prophet when he got home, I do not see how that would apply to him.
The reason I say that is because I do not really think Deuteronomy 18 meant anything to the Ninevites. This is the evidence of a true prophet? I do not think they were going to say, “Well, look at that. Forty days have come and gone. He promised we would be incinerated. It did not happen. What a false prophet he is.”
Why, they would be happy if it did not happen. They would not be thinking, “Oh, what a terrible guy. He did not fulfill his word.” They would not be thinking about that.
So I do not know if the fullness of Jonah’s anger can be understood in terms of that. But I think, when you read the record, Jonah had many issues. He was running in a lot of directions, and one of his issues was ministry: my name, my reputation, my prophecy.
He had another issue—another possibility: results. He did not see results from his preaching.
He was ignorant. I do not mean stupid, though that might be true too. But ignorant was something he did not know.
We assume, by the way, Jonah 3 ends and Jonah 4 begins, that Jonah was angry because he knew that God forgave the Ninevites, that he knew that they repented.
We get the idea that Jonah saw all the people in sackcloth, and saw them putting sackcloth on the cows, and sackcloth on the dogs, and on the cats, and every animal in sackcloth.
Let me ask this question: did Jonah know they repented? Think about it. Did Jonah know that they repented?
According to the record, he was only in the city one day, or at least it is implied that he left after that day. He only had ministry for a day. When he went in, he knew what they were like. They were a wicked people, like our young people sang about. They were a terrible people.
I think the last thing Jonah ever expected was that they would repent. I mean, he went in to preach, and these were a wicked people. He thought, as one of our teams gave testimony, that they would just blow it off.
He did not expect them to repent. And he did not know when the fire was going to fall. I have an idea that, when God did not say, “Go back again,” he could not get out of there fast enough.
Then he set up his little booth—you know, his shelter—and he sits over on the hill. Remember, if the descriptions are correct, there was at least one wall one hundred feet high around, probably five walls one hundred feet high, and he is on the outside. He is waiting for smoke.
He is waiting to see what happened in Sodom and Gomorrah. He is sitting out on the hillside. It takes time for that repentance. It takes time for the word to get up to the king, for the king to give a proclamation, and for that proclamation to be carried out.
He is sitting behind a one-hundred-foot wall. I do not think he knew that they repented. There is no evidence that he knew.
I cannot imagine any heart, even Jonah’s, as anti-missionary and non-missionary as it was—I cannot picture any believer who knows that somebody in reality turns to the Lord and not be thrilled with that.
I cannot imagine, if Jonah knew half a million people in reality turned to God, that his heart would not have been thrilled.
I think his issue was wrong. I think he said, “I preached, and nothing happened.”
Is it not amazing? When Jonah thought God was doing least, in reality God was doing the most.
I think that is part of being raised from the dead. I think the idea is that God will not let you know what He is doing. God did not let Jonah know how God was using him.
He was bringing a half-million people to the Lord using Jonah, and Jonah did not even know it. Very seldom will someone who really knows the life of Christ realize how God is using them.
The results are His business, not your business. They are His business, not my business. The results belong to the Lord.
Over and over again, those who are raised from the dead, it will seem like nothing is happening. “God is not doing it. Where is the great work of God?”
I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall when God told him. You say, “Did God ever tell him?” Sure He did. He wrote the book. Right? We know he knew.
I will bet he was so embarrassed and so ashamed when he said, “Oh, God, I did not know. I did not know You used me. I thought I had preached and nothing happened. I thought You did not use me.”
His issue first was my ministry, my prophecy, my service. God said, “Jonah, that is not the issue.”
“Well, I mean because there are no results.” Jonah, that is not the issue. The issue is not the results. It is deeper than that.
I know Jonah has not arrived, and at any moment when we take our eyes off the Lord, we can fall. God brings us to the place where we say, “Well, all right, my reputation means nothing, and my ministry—that is not the issue. I cannot look at that, and I cannot look at the results.”
Jonah, it is even more basic than that. Jonah had another issue: theology.
It had to do with the knowledge of the Lord. Remember, Jonah did not have a clear view of the Lord. It was tragically deficient.
Jonah had this idea that the attributes of God clashed, that they did not reconcile. In Jonah 4:2:
I knew that Thou art a gracious God and a compassionate God,
slow to anger, abundant in lovingkindness,
and One who relents concerning calamity.
“You are so gracious and loving and kind and compassionate and merciful and forgiving. You do not have it in You to judge. You are too soft. You are soft on sin.”
Of course, all of that calls into question God’s holiness, and God’s unchangeability, and so on. He thought that was the issue: God’s nature, God’s character. “I do not understand how this—and I do not understand God.”
Did you notice? Now we know that was his view: God’s attributes contradict one another. Would you not think God would straighten that out?
God ignores it. That is not the issue. The issue is not theology. God does not try to justify Himself.
It would have been so easy for God—and I speak as a fool. If I were God, I would have put my arm around Jonah: “Jonah, come here. Sit down. Let Me talk to you. You are confused about My love and My holiness. Let Me straighten you out.”
“I will try to explain how they blend together, and how a holy God can be just and the Justifier. I will try to put that together. I will say, Jonah, what you do not know is they repented.”
“You expected Me to judge them because they were wicked. You saw they did not get judged because I am soft. What you do not know is they repented.” God could have explained that to him. Not a word.
You know why? Because theology is not the issue. God does not try to defend Himself. God does not try to straighten him out. God does not try to get him to balance all those attributes of God.
He does not say a word about that because He is reaching down. There is a deeper problem.
“It is not the issue. It is not you. It is not ministry. Jonah, the issue is not results. Get your eyes off results. Jonah, the issue is not theology, making sure that you have this great creedal statement and that you are orthodox in every expression of your knowledge of God. That is not the issue.”
Jonah had another issue. Talk about leaning unto your own understanding.
Jonah wanted to understand what was going on. He did not understand, and he made his understanding the issue.
Jonah honestly believed with all of his heart—do not forget, he is not some wicked man. This is a prophet of God. He has come to surrender, embraced the grace of God, he is raised from the dead—but he honestly thought, “God made a mistake here.”
God made a mistake here. The reason he knew that was because he knew better than God. God never consulted Jonah on this whole issue of what He was going to do.
Now, before we get too hard on Jonah, remember: it is our natural hearts to lean on our own understanding, and over and over again to believe that we know better than God.
I will just take it out of my own life so I do not convict you. I think God has not saved some people that I think should be saved. I know some people that are still sick that should be healed. He did not do it.
I think He is wrong. I speak as a fool—understand that.
I think He took some people home that I think should have stayed on here. I know better. God did not do it my way.
God closed some doors that I was sure should be open. God opened some doors that I thought should be left shut.
God did not provide those things I thought He should provide: that promotion, that advance, that raise in salary, that life partner.
God is not doing things the way I think they ought to be done. Great day, if God only knew the good I could do for His name and cause, He would let me win the lottery. I could use that for Him.
Jonah thought it would be better for all concerned if God did things his way. It would be better for His name. It would be better for his reputation. It would be better for God’s honor. It would be better for God’s glory. It would be better for the people of God—Israel certainly would be better for them.
The one hundred and twenty thousand infants that God spared grew up, got married, had babies. Their babies grew up, became soldiers, and attacked Israel. Jonah was right. What he feared came to pass.
But he thought he knew better than God, and he was leaning on his own understanding. Did you notice where that led him? To this depression.
Look at Jonah 4:3:
Now, O Lord, take my life from me, for death is better than life.
Jonah 4:8:
When the sun came up, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on Jonah’s head.
He became faint and begged with all his soul to die, saying, “Death is better than life.”
He is despondent. If ever there was a day of Jonah, it is today. I am amazed at the emails, letters, and calls I get from depressed people. There is a spirit of heaviness on the people of God today. I cannot believe it.
All these counselors and psychologists and psychiatrists—everybody is running here and there, taking this pill and that pill.
I will tell you the cause of Jonah’s depression, and I will tell you the cause of all depression. No exception to this. It is not knowing what the real issue is. It is not having a focus.
It is believing we know better than God knows, and His ways are not higher than our ways. We think we know best, and we say, “I am going to sit here until God sees it my way.”
That is what Jonah said. “I know what should be done, God. God, You are not doing what should be done, and I am depressed about it. I am going to sit here under this tree until I die.”
Sadly, some Christians are under the gourd, and they are going to stay there until they die because God will not do things their way.
Two times God asked, “Do you have a good reason to be angry?” Notice what He did not ask. He did not ask, “Do you have a reason?” Because he could have come up with a reason. “Yes, I have got a lot of reasons.”
“Do you have a good reason?” There is no good reason to be angry with the Lord. There is no good reason to be angry with His will.
If He has put you in a place and He has allowed something in your life, you bow down by His grace and thank Him for that. He—believe it or not—He knows. He knows more than we know.
In order to communicate His heart, God said, “Look, you do not have the right issue. It is not you. It is not ministry. It is not service. It is not your reputation. It is not results. It is not having good theology. It is not your own understanding of what should be.”
“You are going in all these crazy directions, Jonah.” Then God says, “I am going to reach down, and I am going to touch bedrock, and I am going to do the last change in making a sign.”
He has learned to surrender. He has embraced the grace of God. He has been raised from the dead. He has learned to live by the life of God, but he has not seen this, and he is still aimless.
He is running after missions, running after ministry, running after a reputation, running after good theology, and trying to straighten all this out and understand the will of God and all that kind of thing.
God uses the gourd. God uses the plant to settle forever the basic issue and work in him the final change. Let us look at that together, and God help us to see it.
Verse 5:
Jonah went out from the city and sat east of it, and there he made a shelter for himself.
He sat under it in the shade until he could see what would happen to the city.
And so the Lord God appointed a plant, and it grew up over Jonah to be a shade over his head and deliver him from his discomfort.
Jonah was extremely happy about the plant.
But God appointed a worm when dawn came the next day, and it attacked the plant, and it withered.
If you want to know what that worm looked like, I do not think I will ever forget that. It was—
When the sun came up, God appointed a scorching east wind, 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.”
Then God said to Jonah, “Do you have a good reason to be angry about the plant?”
And he said, “I have good reason to be angry, even to death.”
Then the Lord said, “You had compassion on the plant, for which you did not work and which you did not cause to grow, which came up overnight and perished overnight.
Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than one hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know the difference between their right and left hand, as well as many animals?”
What is that all about? What was God trying to accomplish with this wonderful plant—appointing the plant, appointing the east wind, commanding the sun to shine upon it? What is that all about? What did God accomplish with that object lesson?
God had to raise Jonah to a new level, to a new height. He had to raise him up where he would learn to rest in that which was enduring and solid.
Jonah’s attitude was all confused. He had no direction. He still did not understand the eternal issue.
Notice, if you would, at the end—Jonah 4:11. As the book closes, God says, “Jonah, I want you to see one more time your own heart, and then I want you to see My heart.”
It was the revelation of Jonah’s heart that did it, and the revelation of God’s heart that did it. That is the final change.
At the end, Jonah 4:11, God called attention to three things: the city of Nineveh, one hundred and twenty thousand infants, and many animals.
Jonah did not seem to care much about a half-million people. Jonah did not seem to have much care about one hundred and twenty thousand little babies that had not reached the age of accountability. Jonah did not seem to care very much about thousands of innocent animals that would be destroyed if God judged the city.
But he was extremely happy about one plant whose life was a day—a moment.
Now, you cannot compare human life with animal life. Man, created in the image of God, is destined to live forever. You cannot compare that with animal life, just as you cannot compare animal life to plant life.
Just before Joshua, I ran over a rabbit. It did. It killed me all the day long. I just felt so bad that I ran over that silly—it was his fault—but I ran over a rabbit.
It bothered me a lot. I do not think I would have felt that way if I ran over a daisy, or a dandelion, or even a rose. I just do not think I would have had the same emotion if I killed a plant that I had when I killed that rabbit.
My dad—my stepdad—just lost a sheepdog. He just loved him, and the dog—they were one. They just lived together, and he lost it. I tell you, it tore him up.
It tore him up. All the years he was with that dog, and then he lost the dog, and that was a big thing to him.
Here is Jonah. He has no compassion on human life and no compassion on animal life, but he is in love with this plant.
God begins to show him his heart. He begins to show him where his affection is.
Then God continues the object lesson, and He sends a worm—or the Hebrew might be a species of worm; it might be a lot of these little creatures.
This worm comes, and I do not have time to develop it, but how many times God will, in order to enhance the affections of our heart, raise up for a moment of time something that we love and then wipe it out—blast it—the next day.
He is not afraid to blast our gourd, to unsettle us from finding any comfort in that which is rooted in this earth.
What an apt illustration of the vanity of life: this gourd, which is rooted in this earth, whose life is just a moment, and it fades away. Jonah is all attached to this thing.
Then God sends His east wind. The purpose of the east wind and the hot sun was to make Jonah faint.
Because if God is going to reveal Himself, He is going to—do not despise it when God brings you to helplessness, when God makes you faint. Every forward step in helplessness is a forward step in the knowledge of God and in the revelation of His own heart.
Now let me show you what I think is the great revelation of this gourd. He thought his issue was his ministry. He thought his issue was his reputation. He thought his issue was results. His issue, he thought, was having a good theology, understanding what should be happening, and all that kind of thing.
God says, “Let Me give you the real issue.” Jonah 4:10:
You had compassion on the plant,
for which you did not work
and which you did not cause to grow,
which came up overnight and perished overnight.
Jonah, verse 6—Jonah, why were you so happy about the plant?
The answer is—I am paraphrasing, but this is the point—“Because, God, You do not understand. That plant ministered to me. It made me happy. It gave me comfort. It brought me pleasure. It satisfied my heart.”
Then God raised him to the level above and said, “Study your joy. What makes you so happy?”
“Jonah, what you do not understand: you thought the issue was the missionary—you. It is not about you, Jonah. You thought the issue was them, the Ninevites. It is not even about them.”
“It is about Me, Jonah. It makes Me happy. It brings Me pleasure. The goal is My joy. Do you not see, Jonah?”
The reason you were happy is because it brought you joy. The reason I am happy is because it brings Me joy.
Jonah saw for the first time: that is the goal, the direction, what he was missing. He had all these other issues, and the issue now was how to satisfy the heart of God—to satisfy Him, His joy.
What makes Him happy? What pleases Him? In that moment, God worked that final change.
The question comes, and we will close with this: did it work? Was Jonah changed?
Captain Joe, or whoever it was, he said, “It worked.” It did work.
Let me give you two evidences from Jonah 4 that Jonah was changed, that it worked.
The first evidence is this: he wrote the book. He wrote the Book of Jonah.
Did you notice how he wrote the book? He is not trying to protect his reputation anymore.
He knew that Ed Miller would think he was a big jerk when he read this book, and he did not care, because it is not about him anymore.
The way he wrote the book tells us that there was this glorious change.
Did you notice how the book ends? God gets the last word, and the law of silence is over Jonah’s lips. He does not say a word. It worked.
This book, like the Book of Acts, stops, but it does not end. It goes on. Jonah had come to the place: “I have surrendered to the Lord. I have embraced the grace of God. Christ lives in me.”
“Now I understand all those issues, all those changes, all those attitude things. I do not have to worry about results. I do not have to worry about my reputation. I do not have to worry about my theology being all straight and connecting all the dots.”
“I do not have to worry about understanding. All I have to worry about: have I brought pleasure to Him? Have I satisfied His heart?” He had a new direction.
May I suggest, brothers and sisters, as we leave Joshua, this is the sign, and no other sign will be given to this generation.
God is looking for a people who have surrendered. God is looking for a people who have embraced the grace of God—salvation is of the Lord.
God is looking for a people who have identified with the Lord Jesus in His death, burial, and resurrection, and are allowing Christ to live in them.
God is looking for a people who do not have issues, but have a direction. “I live to please Him. I live to satisfy His heart.”
If God works that in us, thousands will come to Christ. That is the sign that He has given. That is what He is doing in our hearts. That is what He is doing in our lives.
It may take many storms for us to get there. It may take a few of these to get us there.
Many gourds may have to be clipped down as God moves your affections from the things of this world—changing, fading, passing—to His heart.
But once we see those great principles, that is the sign. May God work it for us individually and corporately.
Father, we thank You so much that You had the last word in this book, and that Your child was brought to silence and worship and humility.
Thank You for clipping our gourd. Thank You for the east wind, and for the storms, and for the fish, and for all the ways You work in a heart to conform us to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Lord, we know You want to reach the world, and You want to go through the missionary vehicle. By Your grace, we offer ourselves as missionary channels.
Go in us individually, in families, and corporately as the expression of Christ in the world. Have Your sign, we ask, in Jesus’ name. Amen.