Have you ever felt like you've blown it so badly that God couldn't possibly use you again?
Well, today on Insight for Living, Chuck Swindahl uses a story in the Bible to shatter that lie. Drawing from Jonah's dramatic rescue, plus compelling stories of other biblical giants, Chuck will celebrate this breathtaking truth. Our forgiving God specializes in second chances. His mercy isn't limited by your failures. It's as wide as the sea.
So, whether you're running from him, drowning in shame, or convinced you're beyond redemption, God is ready to transform your worst moment into your greatest comeback. We're engaged in an interesting study of a much maligned book. Ask most scholars in virtually any. High-ranking university About the book of Jonah or the story of Jonah. and you will hear laughter, if not literally you will hear it in the tone of their response.
But Jonah is no joke. It is a part of God's inspired word. Recorded and preserved. Therefore, considered as significant. as the writings of Moses.
Or the Psalms. Or the Prince of the Prophets, Isaiah. We turn to Jonah chapter 3. As we continue our journey with him, Part of it was treacherous. And ultimately he was rescued.
And now, having been rescued and safely if you will, deposited At the shore, Jonah hears the words of grace. Really, more specifically, they are words of mercy. As he is given A second chance. You'll hear those words as I read them from the New Living Translation. of Jonah chapter 3.
Verses one through four. Then the Lord spoke to Jonah a second time. Five. Get up. And go to the great city of Nineveh.
And deliver the message. I have given you. This time Jonah obeyed the Lord's command. and went to Nineveh. A city so large that it took Three days.
to see it all. On the day Jonah entered the city, He shouted to the crowds. Forty days from now. None of us. will be destroyed.
That, though brief and abrupt. And harsh. In less than 10 English words. Really less than that in Hebrew. Is the message from God to the people?
of Nineveh. You're listening to Insight for Living. To dig deeper into the story of Jonah on your own, be sure to purchase our Searching the Scriptures Bible Study Workbook by going to insight.org slash offer. Chuck titled today's message, God of the Second Chance. There are so many things I love about our God.
I love it that he is so. Faithful. That he isn't fickle, he isn't moody. He isn't warm in the morning and then cools off in the evening. I love it that he is the same What does it say?
Yesterday. And today and forever. Theologians call that God's Immutability. He doesn't change. You can count on him.
Which brings up another reason I love him so. He's truthful. What he declared centuries ago. Holds true Even today. Trusting him is not a guessing game.
It's not hoping for the best. And that experiencing at times the worst. No. I can count on My God, to keep his word. He's truthful.
And I love it that he is so powerful. Powerful that there is no obstacle that can stand in his way. or hinder his plan. No weapon formed against him. can wound him.
No important individual can intimidate him. No force can restrain him. Our God is faithful and truthful, immutable. And powerful And so much more than all that. Causing us to stand in awe.
As we respect and worship Him, as we respect and worship no other, we reserve the word awesome for our God. He alone qualifies. as the awesome One. But of all these magnificent Attributes All these great characteristics of our God that make us love him so. There is one that always brings me to my knees.
And overwhelms me with gratitude. And it is that Our God is so merciful.
So merciful. He is full of grace. and mercy. Do you remember the immortal words? Of the prophet Jeremiah.
When I began to quote them, you will recall. You may not remember where he was. And but The circumstance in which he found himself which was so Depressing. The enemy had come in and taken his city. By siege.
And it lay in ruins. Jeremiah is walking Among the debris. And he is Old word, he is lamenting. He's grieving.
So he puts his words in a book. Only five chapters in length. Named lamentations While lamenting, he lights a torch of hope. As he recalls It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed. Because his compassions Fail not.
They are new, get this. Every morning. Every morning. Including This morning. His mercies are new.
This morning. One of my mentors for several years, Jay Dwight. Pentecost. Who is now gone to glory? But while on this earth and ministering in such an effective way, I remember his teaching.
That mercy is God's ministry to to the miserable. Isn't that good? Who hasn't felt miserable? at one time or another, don't answer out loud. It would be one great Statement in unison.
I have I've been miserable. I've made a miserable mess of my life. When I look back on certain things, I can only qualify as a person. Good at misery. Because I've created it.
So I need mercy. That's why it seems so meaningful to me. And to us. The Oxford-educated nineteenth-century hymn writer. Frederick Faber.
Put it in these words: there's a wideness in God's. Mercy. like the wideness of the sea. There's a kindness in his justice. which is more than liberty.
There's a welcome for the sinner. And more graces for the good. There is mercy. with the Savior. There is healing.
in his blood. A wideness. Like the sea is wide. How powerful, how necessary is mercy. That's wonderful news for all of us to hear.
Because God's mercy has a wonderful way of covering over our shame. And offering us. Full forgiveness. Hear this. Listen to the hope in these words.
Strong encouragement. For the miserable to press on beyond the moment. You may have blown it. And you may feel like a failure right now. But mercy, says, now is not forever.
I've come. To help you back on your feet and say, with my arm around you, let's go on.
Now, I warn you: if you haven't learned it already, other people will not do that. You have the slightest mark on your record, they will not forget. They will remind you and others of that failure. And when your name is mentioned, they will remember the failure. You know what it says of our God?
As far as the East is from the West.
So far has he removed our transgressions from us. I love the story of the man who Had made a mess of his week and he came back and he Poured his heart out. It was a Saturday night, knowing Sunday was coming. He happened to be the preacher that next morning, and he said, Lord, Here I am. Again, with the same, same.
Sin to bring before you. And the LORD said to him, What sin? What a great reminder. If he has confessed that sin, it is removed as far as. East is from west.
With God. This is why I call Our God of grace, the God of the second chance. And third, And fourth. And would you believe 150th. and four million.
and 10 trillion. For as often as you fail, He is there. to hold you fast. And to take you on.
Now, the second chance, grace of God. needs to be understood.
So, allow me for a few moments before we look at how it. Became for Jonah a reason to go on. What it means is this. His understanding is limitless. He realizes that each one of us is far from perfect.
Oh, we may amass of A mighty fine resume, and we may have impressive credentials.
Some more than others. The God who looks beyond the surface Seeing the heart, reading the motives. Knowing the truth All of it. Has an infinite capacity. to forgive us.
At any moment of failure, Hear this. Because you will not hear it from others. Who will write you off?
Some will even blot you out of their family. If you make certain decisions. that go against the long standing family traditions. Especially in the realm of religion. But our God Our God is the best, remembering that we are but dust.
Remembering that we often refuse to obey him. offers us a second chance. A third chance. A lifetime of opportunities. to move on past.
where we are at this time. The beautiful thing about him, for this is what that second chance means. He will never blot you out of his family once you have entered. his family through faith in Jesus. You are in, and you are secure.
He has an infinite capacity to forgive us an infinite number of times. Where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more. He remembers Psalm 103, verse 14, that we are dust. And after we have refused to trust him. Along he comes.
graciously offering Another chance. It all begins with his understanding of us. God is never surprised that we fail him. though admittedly it grieves him when we do. Which brings up the subject of what it doesn't mean.
To say that God is the God of the second chance doesn't mean that He doesn't care. Any more than a father doesn't care that a son or daughter disobeys again and again. It doesn't mean that our resistance doesn't matter. He always longs for us to obey him. But there are occasions When we continue to do so, when he steps in, And according to Hebrews 12, verses 5 through 11, as a father disciplines his children, so the Lord disciplines those he loves.
And no suffering for the present time is joyous, but grievous.
So, while he forgives, there may be consequences. to our wrongdoing. Matter of fact, I find As I work my way through the scriptures, One person after another whom we would all say stand out as a significant character in the Bible? often being given a second chance. Turn back to Exodus chapter 3.
Let's make that Exodus chapter 2. The second chance is in chapter 3. But the failure is in chapter 2. the hero of of this uh Exodus story. is named Moses and in verse twelve of the second chapter of Exodus.
We read of Moses. Wrongdoing. 2:12 reads: After looking in all directions to make sure no one was watching. Moses killed the Egyptian and hid the body in the sand. You may not have known that Moses was first a murderer.
before he was a deliverer. in the Exodus. By the way, Stephen tells us in Acts chapter 7 that Moses at this time in his life is 40 years old. He sees an Egyptian taskmaster beating a fellow Hebrew. And Moses can't stand the the sight.
And he kills the taskmaster and And he hides the evidence. Pharaoh gets word of it and When he heard that that had happened, According to verse 15, He tried to kill Moses, but Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to live in the land of Midian. that would be in the Sinai region. of the wilderness. A rugged area.
The blazing sun. day after day, hot sands, and he's there. Hear this, for 40 Years. Forty years. Do the math.
He killed the Egyptian at age 40. He is in the Median desert for 40 more years. And then we read in chapter 3, Moses was tending the flock. of his father-in-law, the priest of Midian. He led the flock to the wilderness.
And came to Sinai, the mountain of God, and there the angel of the Lord. appeared to him. Listen to this second chance. Spoke in a blazing fire from the middle of a bush. Moses stared in amazement.
The bush didn't burn up. Verse 4: When the Lord saw Moses come to take a closer look. God called from the middle of the bush, Moses, Moses, here I am, says Moses. And he says, don't come any closer. Take off your shoes.
You're standing on holy ground. Then the Lord told him, I've seen, verse 7, I've seen the Lord. The oppression of my people. And then a little further he says, now, verse 10. Go, I am sending you to Pharaoh.
You must lead my people out of Egypt. Second chance. Right there.
Now it didn't come quickly. Eighty years old. No, I'm not going to ask that. I was going to ask: how many of you are 80 years old? How would you feel hearing God's second chant saying, Now I've got a place for you in the main purpose of your life?
80 years old. Most people are looking for a rocking chair and a dog to train when they're 80 years old. looking for a back porch to sit on. Looking for a place to retire. Moses is just getting started.
And for 40 more years, he leads the Exodus. Right up to the edge of the promised land. That's a second chance. I kept working my way through the scriptures and I found the book of Judges. What an unusual book.
Keep turning, you'll locate it. I'm seeing little dust pockets come up from the pew as you get into Judges. When you get to chapter 14, you meet a man. named Samson. And Samson's biography takes you chapter 14, 15, and the climax is chapter 16.
For most of 14, 15, and 16, Samson is a womanizer. I called Samson a he man with a she weakness. All the way through his adult life. In fact, the first words you read from the lips of Samson, you can check it for yourself, are. I have seen a woman.
He messes around with women. Even after he has judged Israel for 20 years, he winds up. Laying in the lap of Delilah, and there he finally yields. And she is uh Crying those crocodile tears that he won't tell her the secret of his life. And he finally tells her and falls asleep and wakes up and finds That his hair has been taken from his head, and she has told her colleague the Philistines that that's where his strength lies.
And and they took him and they put him in a dungeon. And the first thing they did, not surprisingly, they gouged out his eyes. Enough lust for one man. You won't lust any further. And there he lives as a prisoner in the dungeon.
of the Philistines until the end of chapter sixteen. Where You can read it for yourself. He comes and they're going to make fun of him. He's going to be the The Hebrew clown in their midst, and they put him between the columns and the temple of Dagon. And he says, this one last time, may my life be avenged.
And what he should have been doing all of his life, and that's delivering the people from the Philistines, he kills more at his death than he did in all his life. Second chance. finally comes with his final breath. Samson at the end of his life. Over the next few days, we'll get some great encouragement as Chuck Smundahl continues to describe Jonah's redemption.
Chuck titled today's message God of the Second Chance. Here at Insight for Living, we know that sometimes your best learning happens when you're by yourself, reading the Bible and taking notes.
Well, we have an excellent Searching the Scriptures Bible study for this series on Jonah. This spiral-bound study workbook is perfectly suited for small groups or independent study. In addition, all nine of Chuck's sermons for this series are available on Audio CD or MP3. And you can purchase these resources today by calling us at 800-772-8888. You know, these daily programs and the study materials we produce are designed with you in mind.
In fact, Insight for Living Ministries wouldn't have a reason to exist if it weren't for listeners just like you. In that spirit, as you measure the value of Insight for Living in your life, would you be willing to reciprocate with a much-needed donation? Your gift will become a blessing to someone who hears this program and understands God's love and mercy as never before. When you make a donation today, we'll be saying thank you by providing a brand new booklet called Look Beyond. Will you focus on eternity?
It features the final sermon Chuck delivered to the congregation he shepherded for over 25 years, and he preached the message on the weekend of his 90th birthday. In his last sermon, Chuck reflected on the final word of the Apostle Paul, who in his letter to Timothy looked back on his lifetime of service to Christ, and he looked forward to eternity with him. These spirit-inspired words from Paul have implications for you and me, no matter what our age. To support Insight for Living and to request the booklet called Look Beyond, send your gift in an envelope addressed to us at Insight for Living. Post Office Box 5000.
Frisco, Texas 75034. You can also go to insight.org slash donate. Or call us at 800-772-8888. Um Do you feel like you've blown it? I'm Bill Meyer.
Don't miss Chuck Swindahl's message called God of the Second Chance Thursday on Insight for Living. The preceding message God of the Second Chance was copyrighted in 2018, 2019, and 2025, and the sound recording was copyrighted in 2025 by Charles R. Swindahl Incorporated. All rights are reserved worldwide. Duplication of copyrighted material for commercial use is strictly prohibited.
