Tuesday, April 4th |Jonah and the Resurrection

Hello, everyone. Today is Tuesday, April the fourth. I'm Ryan Hill.

I'm John Galantis. You're listening to Clearview Today with Dr. Abbaran Shah, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can visit us online at ClearviewTodayShow.com. If you have any questions for Dr. Shah or suggestions for future episodes, send us a text at 252-582-5028, or you can email us at contact at ClearviewTodayShow.com. That's right. You guys can help us keep this conversation going in the airwaves by supporting this podcast, sharing it online, leaving us a good five-star review on iTunes, Spotify, anywhere where you get your podcasting content from.

We're going to leave a couple of links in the description, so you can do just that. Before you go click on that link, I think you want to hold on, because we've got the verse of the day coming right at you. That's right.

Opa all that style. Is it still? Because it's coming right at you. I am excited about the verse of the day today, because the verse of the day today is actually my favorite verse. It is my life verse. Habakkuk 3, 17-19. It's a little bit longer, but it's going to make sense when we read it in the whole context.

Let's do it. Though the fig tree may not blossom, nor fruit be gone the vines, though the labor of the olive may fail, and the fields yield no food, though the flock may be cut off from the fold, and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord. I will take joy in the God of my salvation. The Lord God is my strength. He will make my feet like the deers, and he will make me walk on my high hills.

Wow. Why is that your life verse? That verse, I first really was introduced to that verse when I was in seminary. I was working multiple jobs, and we had tiny kids at the time, full-time student, trying to make ends meet. All first-time parents have it tough, but we were in the thick of it. We were in the weeds. We didn't live near family. It was just tough.

It was a hard time in life, emotionally, financially, otherwise. I came across that verse. There was a visiting band in one of our chapel services at seminary, and they sang a song based on that verse.

I was like, what in the world? I went and read that verse, and in that moment, to me, it was God impressing upon my heart, I see you. I'm with you in this. I haven't abandoned you. You're not on the wrong path. You're on the right road.

This is just part of that road. I haven't abandoned you. I haven't forsaken you.

I'm with you in this difficult season. That's awesome. There are people out there listening that need to hear that right now. Shoot, I need to hear it today. There's a fundamental truth that God is always with us, and it's so easy to forget. It's so easy to just put that back there, like, yeah, he's with us, but I don't really feel it, so it doesn't really matter right now.

No, he's always with you. I think that kind of came through in your life. That's really awesome. That's a really awesome story.

That's my favorite verse ever since then, Habakkuk 3, 17-19. We did have a question come in. This is kind of a first for the show. We had someone send us a riddle. Oh, really?

Here's the thing. It was green, and it had a question mark on the envelope, and there is a bomb attached to it. Was it signed enigma? It was signed enigma, and it says, riddle me this, Batman.

I was like, I think this guy doesn't know how to spell. Oh, no. So, I was like, I don't know.

I didn't open it. Dressed to a wrong radio show. This is, it's coming in from John C. Okay. So, it's either John C. Reilly or it's, I don't know, maybe it's Dr. John Cech sent us the thing.

But John C. from North Carolina asked us this. There are two guards and two doors. One door leads to freedom, and the other leads to death. One guard always lies, and the other always tells the truth. Oh, I've heard this. Yeah, this is a good one.

I've heard it, but I can't remember how it goes. They know which they are. They know where the two doors go. They do not know which guard, I'm sorry, you do not know which guard is which, or which door is which. You may ask one yes or no question. I think it's just, you can ask one question.

I don't remember it being one yes or no question, but basically, what do you ask to determine? So, two guards standing in front of a door, two doors and a guard standing in front of each one. One always lies. One always tells the truth. One door leads to death.

One door leads to life or freedom. What do you ask? You can ask each guard one question or just one question altogether, and they're both going to answer. I think you can ask each one a question. Okay. I think, I can't remember.

I know I've heard this, and I can't remember the solution. I think I would ask, I'm trying to run through this scenario in my head. If you ask the guard, let's just say the guard on the left. If you ask the guard on the left, does your door lead to salvation? He might, he could say yes. He could say yes, and it genuinely does, or he could say yes, and it's a lie.

Yeah. So basically, okay, what I think it's, if you ask the truth guard, you have to ask what the other person would say. You have to ask what the other, like, okay, so I'm talking to one of the guards and I say, what would he say if I asked him? Because if I ask that to the truth guard, the truth guard would say that the liar guard points to death because that's the lie.

So if I say, hey, if I wanted to get out of here, which one should I take? If that's the fundamental question and I ask any of the guards what the other one would say, it's like, okay, I'm talking to the truth guard right now. What would he say? He's like, well, he would lie and he would point to the truth door. So then if I ask the liar guard, like what would the, what would the other guy say if I wanted to get out of here?

He would point to the door that leads to death because he's telling the, he would lie about the truth guards intentions. Right. So I think if you, I believe, I believe I'm doing this right, but if it's supposed to be no matter who you ask and John Z, this is my, this is my answer.

No matter who you ask, they're going to point to the door that leads to death because the liar guard will tell you that the truth guard would point to the door that leads to death. Okay. Yeah. Which door would he suggest?

Yeah. You always ask which one would he suggest? And the truth guard is going to tell you that the liar guard would point to the wrong door, which is the door that leads to death. So no matter what, no matter who you ask, you take the opposite door.

Okay. That's my answer. So on today's episode that we're talking about doors that lead to life, doors that lead to death, we're talking about the door that leads to life, specifically resurrection. Jesus is the door that leads to everlasting life. Look at that segue. That was pretty good. Tell them about Jonah, man. I'm telling you what, that's pretty exciting. So we're going to talk about Jonah today and that's, you know, if you're thinking about the resurrection, Jonah is probably not your go-to story, but we're going to learn today that Jonah is actually a picture of the resurrection of Jesus.

That's right. We're going to get to Dr. Shawn in just a minute, but if you guys have any questions or suggestions for new episodes, send us a text at 252-582-5028 or visit us online at clearviewtodayshow.com. We'll be right back. Hey everyone, my name is Elli and I'm David. We want to take a minute and let you know how we can actually serve you as you're listening to Clearview today. The Bible paints an extraordinary picture of who we are as a church body. The mission of Clearview Church is to lead all people into a life changing, ever-growing relationship with Jesus Christ. A huge part of leading people is praying for them. A big reason that Christians have unanswered prayers in their life is because they're not praying.

You know, first John 5, 15 says, and if we know that he hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of him. If you're listening to the Clearview Today show, we want to know how we can pray for you as well. There's a number of ways that you can get in touch with us at Clearview and share your prayer requests. But the best way is by texting us at 252-582-5028. You can also send us an email at prayer at clearviewbc.org or you can download the Clearview app on iTunes or Google Play.

You know, on that app, there's a dedicated prayer wall that helps us to get to know what's going on in your life, how we can pray for you and how we can take any necessary steps to get you moving in the right direction. Thanks for listening. Now let's get back to the show. Welcome back to Clear View Today with Dr. Abbadon Sharman, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can visit us online at ClearViewTodayShow.com. If you have any questions or suggestions for future episodes, send us a text at 252-582-5028.

That's right. If you guys are joining us for the first time today, we want to let you know who's talking to you. Dr. Abbadon Shah is a PhD in New Testament textual criticism, professor at Carolina University, author, full-time pastor and the host of today's show.

You can follow all of his work on his website. That's AbbadonShah.com. I'm going to tell you, I was about to read the intro and I shifted gears. I was reading the intro and saying the intro. Very nice. Very impressive.

It's hard to fight that muscle memory. It was like my brain doing one thing and my mouth saying another. So we are going to take a look today. We're continuing the series as we are in Passion Week, heading up toward Easter. We're going to shift gears a little bit and we talked yesterday about Jonah. I'm sorry, we talked yesterday about Job. He gave it away. I know, I'm sorry.

I was thinking ahead of my eyes. We were talking today about Jonah. I was trying to segue that cleverly, but we're talking about Jonah today. That's right.

That's right. When it comes to the resurrection, of course, Job talks about my Redeemer lives, the resurrection that is coming, even when my skin is destroyed, this I know that in my flesh I shall see God. I mean, what a powerful statement. But there's also another book that talks about this and that is the book of Jonah. And John, you mentioned it's one of your favorite books. I love Jonah.

I don't know what it is. We did a Bible study on it. In Israel of 2019, we went to... Well, I've loved Jonah since I was a kid.

I remember like they would put up like in VBS, they'd put up like little posters. And I always just love the story of Jonah. But then in 2019, you and myself and David went to Israel and we filmed a series of videos on the book of Jonah. Like our own Clearview Bible study, we filmed Jonah.

And the way that book came to life, I don't know if it was just being in Israel, reading Jonah in my devotion times those mornings, just something about... Filming in Joppa, right by the seashore. Yeah, filming in the... Yeah, talking about coming to life. Like having the camera and Dr. Shah being like, you know, Jonah came to this dock. Where we're standing, he came here. He walked on these pebbles, on these roads. I was like, golly, he did.

He really did. And then seeing like the house where, I know it wasn't Jonah, but seeing like Simon Peter's house where the sheik came down from heaven, I was like, that's where it happened. Something came awake in me on that trip. And ever since then, I've loved Jonah.

I've really loved it. Well, a side note, one of our trips, Niko and I actually went down to the ground level because this is below the modern town of Joppa, which is kind of like on the Southern end of Tel Aviv. But they, in digging and excavating and archeological work being done, they came to the level where Jonah would have walked.

That's crazy. And I was able to go down there, you know, and he can, you can go down there for a fee, but typically in tours, they're not able to do that because of time. But Niko and I had some time and I'm like, I want to go down there because I want to see the ground where Jonah would have walked. Because you know how with time, those tells, T-E-L, tells kind of build up.

You know, dirt ads on. But this was the ground level. It was just a surreal for me to know that this is somewhere here. It all took place. And what took place? If you know the book of Jonah, God came to him and said, I want you to go and go to that great city and cry out against it, the city of Nineveh in Assyria. And the reason for their wickedness has come up before me. The word for a rise in Hebrew is the word kum, which meaning, which simply is like up, up.

It's just like you tell your teenagers up, let's go. And Jonah was very comfortably asleep when God came to him. And you know, not only physically he was asleep, but also spiritually, I would say he was also asleep. And instead of going to Nineveh, he arose and fled to Tarshish from the presence of God.

And this is where all hell breaks loose, literally speaking. Yeah, absolutely. And that running, I mean, that's the thing that we identify quickly with Jonah is that he heard God's command and he turned and ran. And you said this before, but that's indicative of sin being present in your life when God calls you so that sin is going to repulse you in the other direction.

Right, right. And in Jonah's case, maybe there was some sin in there, but it was also a sense of prejudice against the people of Nineveh. Why them? I mean, these people hate us. These people are pagan. They worship gods that are, you know, just heinous.

Why would you want to save them? But he forgot that, yes, these people are mean. Yes, these people are hateful. Yes, they were against God's people, but this is the reason why God's people existed so that they could reach people. I think one thing that stuck out to me, just in us talking about it, I know you've said this several times, but we typically misassociate the greatest lesson is that, hey, after three days, Jonah was still alive. Look what God can do.

Yes, that's true. And it's a picture of the resurrection. We get that. But the most amazing lesson is that Nineveh got saved, Nineveh was delivered. And it wasn't that Jonah was like an amazing preacher or that he was like, hey, look what God can do through disobedience.

That's there. But it's that God's delight, like we talked about last week, his delight was to save his people and to save them. And that's the greatest work of the book of Jonah.

Right. But when he ran, of course, God sent out a great wind on the sea. There was a mighty tempest on the sea so that the ship was about to be broken up. And his resolution in verse 12 is, pick me up and throw me into the sea. Then the sea will become calm for you. For I know that this great tempest is because of me. So you remember that when I said that? I remember exactly what you meant to say, if you want to say you.

Think about it this way. Why did he not just, how do I say this? He said, so Dr. Shaw preached on Jonah like, I don't know, like eight or nine years ago.

Three years prior to 2017, so it would have been 2014. But I remember specifically him from the pulpit saying, why didn't Jonah just say adios and pitch a backflip off the, like, I don't know why. Reverse gainer off the side of the boat.

Yeah, just be like, adios gang, backflip right off. That image has stuck with me for going on like nine years now. Because the sailors had to throw him into the raging sea. In the same way, Jesus was taken by lawless hands and nailed to the cross. There's that active, you know, taking and being nailed is what Jonah was representing in that, in that action. And as the great fish kind of nose dived into the deep, Jonah cried to God and said, for you cast me into the deep. You know, so also Jesus was a victim of the cruel and the evil. He was delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, as Peter says in Acts 2 23. Jonah felt abandoned by God.

He said, I've been cast out of your side just the way Jesus said from the cross, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Now let me make a clarification here. This does not mean that the Father and the Son were separated. Right. You know, there's this idea of a broken trinity.

There was never a broken trinity. That's where people like say, like the Father like turned his face away. Right.

And we have then the songs and things like that too. And I get what they're saying, but keep in mind for the Godhead to be broken up. That is not good theology.

That's not biblical theology. So Jonah is describing his experience in the belly of the fish. She talks about the water surrounding me, even to my soul, the deep clothes around me. And here's a funny one. Weeds were wrapped around my head.

Buddy boy's having a bad time. Like a turban just suffocating. Well, I mean, we see these pictures of like, you know, these coloring book, little images of Jonah, like floating on some, some wreckage inside of the fish. It's kind of brightly lit.

It's like the pink wall. Let's not forget that he was in the stomach of a fish. There's stomach acid. There's like decomposing fish all around him.

I mean, that was a wretched. Smelly, nasty, salty water. Like, oh, you always see Jonah and he's like sad and he's grumpy and like, it's like brightly lit stuff, but it's a hundred percent like pure dark.

There wasn't a window in like the bay of the fish. I'm sure there's like water all in his face and in his mouth and stuff. I mean, it's a glimpse of what Jesus went through. You know, he felt the death grip of sin rising around him. You know, the weeds around his head. Think about the crown of thorns.

That's what I think it represents. And not just, you know, Jesus just, just there and Jonah just here. Also he talks about being cut off from the earth.

I went down to the moorings of the mountains. The earth was with his bars closed behind me forever. So also Jesus, it says in Isaiah 53.8 was cut off from the land of the living.

That's a powerful statement, isn't it? Yeah. And then, so three days and three nights, Jonah was in the belly of the fish. So also Jesus was in the grave three days.

Right. And then what happened to Jonah afterwards? The Lord spoke to the fish and it vomited Jonah onto dry land. And what happened to Jesus?

On the third day, having loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that he should be held by it. And Jesus was also in a way kind of, you know, spewed out of the grave. Yeah.

Yeah. I think that's, that's interesting because it's not like, I think we kind of hit on this earlier. It wasn't that Jonah preached the gospel well. He literally became a living embodiment of the gospel and that's why Nineveh was able to be saved. Because if it was him, it's like, see Jonah, you had it in you all along. But it was, no, God was going to do it all along through your obedience. God used to use a picture of what reality that was to come.

Yeah. You know, when we think about Jonah's message to Nineveh, it's simple. How many words it is? If I'm not wrong, it is, um, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, eight words in English and Hebrew is different, but in English is yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown.

Now we think, yeah. So you think he's just walking around saying yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. In a sense that is true, but I think he spoke more than that. Why doesn't the Bible say that? Why doesn't the Bible tell us that he went and talked about, look, just the way I was in the belly of the fish and I almost drowned and I was cut off from the land of the living. One day someone is coming who also will be in the belly of the grave and be cut off from the land of the living and be spewed out the third day. Why didn't he go into all the details?

Because God in his divine wisdom allows us to study his word and draw these conclusions. Right? Imagine if everything was laid out for you.

Everything is perfectly laid out. What, how boring would that life be? Yeah. I mean, I would just, it was just, all right, that's what it is.

I'll just, I'll just do it. Yep. Right. So, so also when it comes to the word of God, you know, there's a statement in the book of Proverbs. It says something and I'm kind of paraphrasing here. It is the glory of God to conceal a matter and it's the glory of Kings to uncover it. So in a sense, God has sort of buried all these powerful truths in his word and it's our glory to go discover them.

That was, that was right on his Proverbs 25, two, if anybody wants to look it up, but that's exactly it. Yeah. So I don't think it was just those eight words in English, at least yet 40 days and none of us shall be overthrown. Anybody's like, Oh, we cannot be overthrown.

Yeah. How are we not overthrown Jonah? And how are they saved? I mean, there is no message of salvation. There is no Redeemer.

There is no Jesus Christ. So, so how are they saved just by not being bad? Yeah. It's like, yeah, that's true.

It's like if someone comes in, it's like, is when you die, you are going to go to a real place called hell. It's like, is that it? How do I not do that? You're saved.

I don't want to do that. Yeah. Yeah. No, the, the message is Jonah, as he's walking around all bleached from top to bottom. Kind of crazy, but yeah, he's still got some weeds hanging up on his ears.

I feel like he might actually overthrow the city. Yeah. And really interesting as well. You know, many of y'all may have known about this, but that whole idea of fish, you know, among the Sumerian there, that, that logogram is what is known as, is Ninua, which is fish, which means there was another town with a similar name, Nina, which worshiped the fish goddess Nanche. And more than likely the people of Nineveh worshiped the same fish goddess.

Wow. So think for a moment, the symbol was a fish. According to a Greek historian by the name of Berossus, the Syrians had a myth that a half fish, half man, God called Oannes or Oanna had come up out of the sea and brought them wisdom, sciences, and art. And archeologists from the 19th century tell us that outside a large chamber in Nineveh, there was a bas relief of a half fish, half man being.

So this was not just yet 40 days and you shall be overthrown. No, the gospel was being demonstrated before their eyes and they trusted in the gospel, not of this man coming out of the big fish or the bas relief, but that all these things, whether from the Jewish world or people of Israel world or their own pagan world is pointing towards that fully God, fully man who's going to die for their sins and rise again on the third day. The fact that Jonah's name even sounded like the half fish, half God, Oanna. I mean, what's your name? Jonah.

Huh? What's your name? Is this the guy?

Is this him? He's like, no, let me tell you about the God that I serve that sent me to you. And he's coming and he's going to do for real what I just went through. And it's again, three days, three nights.

It's amazing. It's so amazing that God brings all of those factors together to meet the Ninevites where they are, to speak to them in a way that's going to resonate with them. And also it helps people understand that, you know, we have an idea that prior to the cross, people were saved because of good works. People were saved because they just looked at nature and said, Oh, there must be a God. And that once Jesus came, it's like, okay, all right, now we start again, hit the reset button. Okay. Click now come to Jesus.

No, right from the beginning of time, gospel was being preached in its own way, but it was still centered upon the dead burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. That's right. Amen. And I think one thing that, that helps me with, with Jonah is that when I go through hard times or when I go through trials in life and I look back to Jonah, I remember that, you know, he didn't do that. He didn't send that big fish to punish Jonah. Like, yes, it was discipline and he disciplines his children, but his goal wasn't to teach Jonah a lesson. His goal was to leave Jonah looking more like Christ. And so if I'm going through hard times or if you as a listener or we as Christians go through hard times, you know, the goal isn't to punish you or just to make you humble. It's to leave you resembling Jesus more because that's, that's what, that's what he did for Jonah. Like he came in, he came out looking crazy, but at the same time he spiritually looked more like Jesus.

And I don't know, that's an encouragement for me. Yeah. There's a, it makes Jonah, I mean that, that tiny little book in the Old Testament has such a deeper meaning behind it now because it's not just, Hey, this guy had a bad attitude and then he went and did what God told him to do. No, it's, this man was used as a picture of the gospel as, as an embodiment of what God was going to do and how people looked forward to the salvation that was going to come, the resurrection that was going to come. Jesus talks about the sign of Jonah. The people looked forward to the resurrection that was eventually going to happen. Wasn't that a thing that like, he's the only prophet that, that Jesus specifically mentioned or pointed to, or there's like a, there's like a thing. I don't, I can't remember what it was, but it was significant that Jesus said, just like Jonah.

No, the sign will be given, but the sign of Jonah. That's it. So, I mean, this book is powerful. It's, it's a visible demonstration of the gospel before it actually happened 2000 years ago. Wow.

That's amazing. A powerful way. And, and again, if you study history and I don't have time to get into all that, you know, even Assyria was in a sense, had God's hand upon it. And it talks about that in prophecy that how God will bring Assyria back and all that. So, there's a lot, so much in the Bible.

So much we can learn. Also pretty grateful for the fact that, you know, I don't have to get swallowed by a whale to be a sign of Christ. Yeah, I'm thankful for that. You know, cause, cause imagine if it's like, hey listen, in order to be a sign of Christ, to people like you, or in order to point people to God, you have to really like go through something like Job did or like Jonah did. It's like, because of Jesus, because of his work on the cross, because of the Holy Spirit, we can become like that sign of the gospel with, I mean, some heartache in life, some trials in life, but we don't have to go through this extraordinarily traumatic experience so that we can become a sign. Jonah was the sign pointing ahead.

It was like, hey, just like what happened to me, something greater and more powerful, more significant is going to happen. We're on this side, so we're like, hey man, look at the cross. Look at Jesus, look at the resurrection.

We just point back to what's already happened. And also be grateful because people like Jonah literally, you know, lived out the sacrifice, you know, by, I mean, imagine being swallowed by a good fish. I really don't want to imagine being taken to the way deep. I mean, you know, he doesn't have an oxygen tank on him, right? I mean, he doesn't have an oxygen tank that he can like get that good, good air. Imagine how much his head is pounding, how he is that pressure being under the water. Oh yeah. I mean, if you go down to the ocean floor, man, that's when that fish swam back up.

I mean, you hear about people who like ascend too quickly. They get the bins, all kinds of crazy stuff happening to them. I mean, Jonah probably encountered that. He probably went through all.

He was hurting, but he was hurting for sure. Yeah. I mean, maybe there's some broken bones. I don't know.

I don't know. So anyways, maybe not because if he's truly representing Christ, then his bones were not broken. So maybe no broken bones, just a lot of bruises. Some traumatic experiences for sure. A little PTSD going on.

Worse further away, but gets to become a physical picture of the gospel. That's it. Wow. If you guys enjoyed today's topic, if you have questions or suggestions for new episodes, send us a text at 252-582-5028, or you can visit us online at ClearViewTodayShow.com and you can partner with us financially on that same website. There's a button there where you can click to donate.

And if you do so, let us know in the comment box that you're donating to Clear View Today that lets us know where those gifts are coming from and helps us partner with you in the future. Amen. We got a quote coming in, well not coming in, but we found a quote from Donald Gray Barnhouse. The church was not left in this world to perfume the dung heap of fallen humanity, but to take out one by one those who will be saved from the coming destruction.

Love that. Donald Gray Barnhouse was a pastor of 10th Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. One of my favorite preachers. He was reformed and yet in a way, his theology was so widespread and he was an amazing man.

Brilliant. And he touched a lot of people with the gospel of Jesus Christ. And he was also mistreated because he was conservative. He stood on firmly on the truth in a time of all the neo-evangelicalism was happening.

And for that he was often mistreated, but he stood firm. What a great example for us. Amen. We love you guys. We'll see you tomorrow on Clearview today.