Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
There's a battle going on for the soul of me.
He's the worthy. But I'm saying, within the arms of God,
Dear Brian, she's the keeper of the surgiser to Christ.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
I'll not surrender. I'll have surreyender. I'll have surreyender.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
I allow it be a godspel.
Speaker 4 (00:42):
Defender, Ladies and gentlemen, Rick Bright in Baw of the
Gospel Defender Ministries. This gospel message will encourage and equip
those who have ears to hear to be a Christian
clothes with the armor of a gospel defender.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
I'll not survey.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
I'll not survey.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
Ridalu a godpol.
Speaker 4 (01:28):
Ladies and gentlemen. It is in the twenty fourth chapter
of Loop that we read these words of Jesus, that
we're spoken to two men who walked with him on
the road to Emaeus following his resurrection from his tomb.
These are the words which I spoke to you while
(01:51):
I was still with you, that all things must be fulfilled,
which were written in the Law of Moses and the
Prophets and the Psalms concerning me. In the next verse,
it is stated, and he opened their understanding that they
might comprehend the scriptures. It does little good for anyone
(02:16):
to read the scriptures and not understand what they read.
And yet this is what some good people routinely do.
They deceived themselves by believing that following a suggested daily
Bible reading schedule, they are somehow made right with God.
(02:36):
As James wrote in chapter one and verse twenty two
of his Inspired Book, be doers of the word and
not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. Or to say it another way,
be doers of the word and not readers only. In
this series of messages concerning the Old test Book of Jonah,
(03:01):
we have noted Jonah's rebellion in verses one through five.
In verses six through seventeen, we are noting Jonah's repentance.
We have considered his personal confrontation with his sin, his
personal confession of his sin, and his personal conviction over
(03:23):
his sin. We now consider Jonah's personal consequences from his sin.
It begins at verse thirteen, where it is stated, nevertheless,
the men rode hard to return to land, but they
could not, for the sea continued to grow more tempestuous
(03:44):
against them. The men of this verse are the mariners
aboard the ship that was headed for Tarsish, with God's
disobedient prophet as one of its passengers. It was because
of this passenger, a prophet of God, that the ship
was in danger of sinking to the bottom of the sea.
(04:08):
To get Jonah to repent of his disobedience and return
to the vocation of preaching God's word, the Lord had
created a great wind on the sea that, if not stopped,
would have destroyed the ship and drowned every living person
walking its decks, and his prophet, who was fast asleep
(04:32):
in the lowest parts of the ship. This great wind
was sent out by the Lord, and it was not
to sink the sailors. It was to bring Jonah to
his senses. To do that, the lives of the innocent
were also placed in jeopardy. And that is the way
it is sometimes with sin. Not only must the sinner
(04:56):
pay a price, but others who are guiltless also get
tangled up in the mess. In the days of Noah,
when the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was
great in the earth, and that every intent of the
thoughts of his heart was only evil, continually the Lord said,
(05:17):
I will destroy man whom I have created from the
face of the earth, both man and beast, creeping thing
and birds of the air. For I am sorry that
I have made them. What did the animals have to
do with the disobedience of men? Nothing? Yet they paid
(05:39):
a price. What did children have to do with the
disobedience of the adult men and women? Nothing? Yet they
paid a price. Sin affects not only the sinner, It
often affects others. An alcoholic or drug addicted mother gives
birth to an innocent baby who suffers the consequences of
(06:03):
its mother's sin. A father is convicted of a crime
and is sent off to prison, and the family suffers
the consequences. A married couple can't get along, gets divorced,
and the children suffer the consequences of their parents acting
like children. A driver is drunk and crashes his car
(06:28):
into an oncoming vehicle carrying an innocent family. Everyone is
killed but the drunk driver. The illustrations could continue, but
you get the point. Sin destroys the life of not
only the sinner, but also those around him. Such was
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the case with Jonah. He rebelled against God, and those
around him were going to pay a price for his disobedience.
They tried to avoid it by taking him back to land.
But they could not. They could not because that was
not how God was going to get Jonah to repent
(07:10):
of his sin of running away from God. That would
have been too easy. From what is written in verse fourteen,
it seems that the pagan heathen Mariners were closer to
God than was God's own prophet. Therefore, they cried out
to the Lord and said, we pray, O Lord, please
(07:33):
do not let us peris for this man's life, and
do not charge us with innocent blood. For you, O Lord,
have done as it pleased you. The Mariners were pagan heathens,
but they recognized God's sovereignty in this matter. The Lord
(07:54):
did what pleased him. Although it was Jonah's sin that
created the circumstance dances in which they found themselves, the
Mariners had compassion for him. He had confessed to them
in verse twelve that it was because of his disobedience
that the men and their ship were in great danger.
(08:16):
He even suggested they throw him into the sea. He
appeared to be sincere about what he said. They saw
him as a man who, though not right with his God,
was a defeated man in great distress. We take no
pleasure in saying this, but we have seen it more
(08:38):
than we care to admit. Sometimes ungodly and worldly people
are more ready than are some self righteous people in
the church that Jesus built to show grace and love,
forgiveness and mercy to those who have royally messed up
their lives. This surprise us, but it ought to disturb us.
(09:04):
For thus it was in the ministry of Jesus. It
was Pharisees and scribes, the religious elite, who criticized him
in Luke fifteen for receiving sinners and even eating with them.
I have labored in the church that Jesus built for
more than five decades, and I have seen my share
(09:27):
of self righteous hypocrites who find it difficult to show grace, love, forgiveness,
and mercy, not to those outside the church, but to
those inside the church. Some of the meanest and most unloving,
unforgiving people I have had the unfortunate displeasure to know
(09:49):
claimed to be members of the Holy Body of Christ
his Church. But before someone says, preacher, that is exactly
why I have no interest in being associated with the church,
let me be quick to admonish you that I would
rather sit on a pew with these unpleasant people for
(10:13):
seventy years than I would to reside with them in
hell for all eternity. So this is only one more
reason I urge every one of you who has not
been scrubbed with the blood of Christ to repent and
be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. For the
(10:35):
remission of sins. You will not have to worry about
rubbing elbows with self righteous hypocrites in the New Jerusalem.
They won't be there. The Mariners did not know the
Old Testament Hebrew scriptures, and they did not know the
God of Israel. But they knew enough to discern that
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what was happening with them and their ship was the
result of the Lord doing what pleased him. You, o, Lord,
have done as it pleased you. They accepted and acknowledged
that the hand of the sovereign Lord was administering judgment
on his prophet. It would be a great thing if
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the religious world was as smart as were those Mariners.
If the religious world recognized that God was and is
sovereign in all religious matters and doctrine, we might see
more of the world converted to Christ. At least, that
is what Jesus said in John seventeen, in his high
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priestly prayer, he told God his father that he had
given the apostles, who his father had given to him
his father's word. He said in verse seventeen, your word
is truth, and then said in verse twenty, I do
not pray for these apostles alone, but also for those
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who will believe in me through there the apostle's word.
For those who may not get the point, it is
not the word of your favorite preacher, your favorite scholar,
or your favorite church father who establishes what truth, biblical
truth is. Their words may be interesting to hear and
(12:26):
even helpful to understand the truth communicated from God, our creator,
to the human race through the apostles, but their words
are not the truth. The truth is God's word that
is revealed to us in the sixty six books of
the Book. Unfortunately, many of the religious world is deaf
(12:51):
to the truth written in that book. It is unfortunate
that most of the inhabitants of the natural world is
not only death, but also does not even believe there
is apostolic truth. Thousands, if not millions, reject the one
book in which is written God's truth. Jonah's judgment was
(13:16):
for that very reason he rejected God's word. Before his
rejection was complete, he would be deposited inside the belly
of a fish. I do not expect anyone to experience
this same judgment ever. Again, a far worst judgment will
(13:36):
come upon those of Jonah's tribe, eternal fiery judgment of
condemnation for not confessing with their mouth the Lord Jesus
and believing in their heart that God raised him from
the dead. It isn't only God deniers and christ rejectors
(13:57):
who don't believe. It is also good respectful Bible believing
churchgoers who don't really believe. They do not believe and
have not obeyed everything Jesus said in Mark sixteen, verse sixteen.
They believe he who does not believe will be condemned,
(14:18):
but they do not believe he who believes and is
baptized will be saved. There will be judgment day surprises.
Realizing that no calm would come up on the tempestuous
sea until they did what Jonah exhorted them to do
in verse twelve, pick him up and throw him into
(14:39):
the sea, they did what they did in verses fifteen
and sixteen, so they picked up Jonah and threw him
into the sea, and the sea ceased from its raging.
Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly and offered a
sacrifice to the Lord and took vows. The mariners had
been caution in the way they had treated Jonah. After all,
(15:04):
he was a prophet of the God of Heaven, who
made the sea and the dry land in the midst
of a tumultuous sea. You need to be careful what
you do to a servant of the God who made
the sea. But the time had come there was no
other way to solve the immediate problem that confronted them
(15:26):
death by drowning. They laid hands on him and excommunicated
Jonah from the ship. Here we are reminded of the
exhortation of Apostle Paul to Timothy in One Timothy five,
verse twenty two. Do not lay hands on anyone hastily,
nor share in other people's sins. Keep yourself pure. This
(15:51):
verse has absolutely nothing to do with ordaining elders, although
most people in the church believe it does. It has
everything to do with disciplining elders. In the presence of
all the church. The mariners were not laying their hands
on elders. They were laying their hands on a prophet
(16:11):
of God Almighty. The mariners did what the twenty first
century church believes is unthinkable. They threw him overboard. No
one shouted man overboard. They slung the man overboard themselves.
There were two immediate results. First peace was restored to
(16:34):
the sea, and second converts were made to Jehovah. The
ship was not safe until Sin was excommunicated from her
passenger list, and as alarming as it is to say
to the modern day liberal twenty first century church, the
old ship of Zion is not safe until Sin is
(16:57):
excommunicated from her roe book. She may meet in nass buildings,
she may have large offerings, she may have a large attendance,
but she is not safe from the judgment of God.
Even though they continued to assemble for a while. Five
of the Seven Churches and Revelation Chapters two and three
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were not safe until some of her members were removed.
Church discipline is sometimes necessary for church growth. When God's
judgment and discipline is administered, souls can be saved. Such
was the case and Acts five, when two hypocrites Anoneus
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and Sephira were struck dead by God himself. It is
written in verse fourteen. The following God exercising his sovereign judgment,
believers were increasingly added to the Lord, multitudes of both
men and women, Unless we forget Apostle Paul admonished the
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church in Corinth in First Corinthians six, verse fifteen, to
deliver to Satan, the incestuous fornicator in their assembly, to
save his spirit in the day of the Lord Jesus.
Some well meaning brethren think the most important characteristic for
a local church to exercise is to love. It is important,
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but the most important characteristic for a local church to
exercise is to be holy. Love will not trump holiness.
At the judgment seat of Christ, our Lord said be loving,
for I am loving. But he also said, be holy,
for I am holy. After Jonah was tossed into the sea,
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the heathen mariners worshiped Jonah's God in three ways. They
feared the Lord. Holiness is the result of fearing the Lord.
Two they offered a sacrifice to the Lord. Do you
offer the sacrifice of yourself to the Lord? And three
they took vows. Christians are supposed to do this. When
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they obeyed the Gospel terms of salvation. Are you fulfilling
your vowels? If not, why not? The ultimate consequence of
Jonah's sin culminated in the final verse of this first chapter. Now,
the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah,
and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three
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days and three nights. People have little problem with this
Old Testament account until this last verse. Being swallowed by
a great fish and living in that fish for three
days and three nights is a bit too much for
some people to swallow. But there it is. Like it
or not have changed the story to read that Jonah
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fell on a dead carcass that was floating in the sea,
became delirious, and was picked up later by a ship
named fish. Translators have described the fish in different ways,
a sea monster or a huge fish. The Old King
James has Jesus calling it a whale in Matthew twelve,
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verse forty, Well, a whale is certainly a huge fish.
As with most things men do with God's word, men
missed the point. They can't see the trees for the forest.
If you believe that God is supernatural, and he is,
he can do the supernatural. If God can create a
(20:46):
universe from nothing, and he did. If God can cause
a bush to be set on fire but not be consumed,
and he did. If God can create a bottomless pit,
and he has. If God can impregnate a virgin girl,
and he did. God can create a big fish, big
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enough to swallow manhole and live in the belly of
that fish, and he did that also. Actually, that is
the key to understanding and believing what is written. The
Lord prepared this great fish to swallow Jonah. It was
no ordinary run of the millfish. It was a specially
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designed fish. With God, nothing will be impossible, including by
the way your being saved from your sins. What Joni
did not realize was the great fish was prepared not
for his punishment or for his destruction, but for his salvation.
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He would have drowned and died otherwise. Not only that
he prefigured, foreshadowed, foretold the burial and resurrection of Christ
from the dead. Your immersion and water in the name
of Jesus Christ for the remission of your sins illustrates
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the same thing. It is written in Romans six, verse four,
we who are buried with him through baptism into death,
that just as Christ was raised from the dead by
the glory of the Father, even we also walk in
newness of life. Things do not seem to be progressing
very well for Jonah. Earlier in this book he was
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left sleeping in the bottom of a ship headed for
Tarsish while running away from God. And now he is
wide awake in the belly of a great fish that
had been prepared by God. But if you know the story,
all of this leads to Jonah's running back to God,
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and he did. Why won't you?
Speaker 1 (23:01):
There's a battle going on for the soul of me.
He's the wythy. But I am saying, within the arms
of God, dear Brad, She's.
Speaker 3 (23:19):
The keeper of the Sorgeus of Christ.
Speaker 2 (23:23):
I'll not surrender. I'll have Surreyender, I'll have Surredyender.
Speaker 3 (23:38):
I don't I always be a godsporn defender, Ladies and gentlemen,
Reck writ in Boss speaking, you have just heard another gospel.
Speaker 4 (23:53):
Defender Ministry's radio broadcast brought to you by the Church
that Jesus built and preaches all of the Word to
all of the world. Jesus said in Mark sixteen, verse sixteen.
He who believes and is baptized will be saved. So
(24:15):
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before it is everlastingly too late. Our mailing address is
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(24:41):
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org or by email at a gosdef Ago s def
(25:02):
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(25:28):
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