Well once again it is good to see you today and we are continuing a series that we have been in for quite some time. It's really our summer series so we're gonna be in this through the remainder of the summer until the early part of August and it is entitled sinners like us.
Can we all say that together? Sinners like us and just because I do this from time to time look to your neighbor whichever one that's a really bad sinner and look to them and say sinners like you okay and this series some of you guys really took that literally and seriously and this series is really all about just sinners like us and and it's amazing to me when you read Scripture and if you're like me my story is I've grown up in church my entire life and so I've been around church and so I've been around it since I was a kid and so I've learned all these different stories in Scripture and one thing that is amazing to me is how God goes after and not only just pursues them but uses very dysfunctional people how many of you are dysfunctional in here raise your hand okay that's all of us we're sinners just like all of these people in Scripture and sometimes if you're not careful and if you're young in here you might kind of think this way from time to time you might think that these Bible characters in these Bible stories they were just these super spiritual leaders and super spiritual giants and things like that and I'll just tell you this that they were sinners just like you and just like me and it is a reminder that God wants to save sinners like you he didn't come for the righteous he came for sinners he came for us and he not only saves us but he also uses us for his will and for his purpose and so so far in our series we've looked at Abraham we've looked at Moses we've looked at Rahab last week Pastor Bailey did a good job we looked at Samson if you remember and I chose him because I wanted the strongest man on our pastoral staff to really talk about Samson and so I chose Pastor Bailey because when I study Samson I just think he looked like Pastor Bailey that's just how I feel and so but he looked at Samson and then this week we will look at our next Center the life of Jonah the life of Jonah now out of all these Bible characters that we've been looking at throughout throughout Scripture are very familiar I get it and you guys know right when we put Jonah up there you immediately thought of something you thought of a fish you thought of a whale you thought of the flannel graph that you used to see in in Sunday school right and you thought about that and we know a lot about Jonah and so at this time if you want to go ahead and join me we're gonna be in Jonah chapter 4 today I'm gonna give you a lot of backstory on this before we jump into the text now I know you know the main objective of the story but I just want to kind of catch you up to speed so that you know exactly where we're going here but Jonah and way back in chapter 1 was commanded by God to go and speak a word that God was gonna give him for the people of Nineveh now the Ninevites they were the Assyrians and the Ninevites were terrible people so first of all the city of Nineveh it says in chapter 1 it was a great city it was a big city you learn throughout the book a lot of different things about the city of Nineveh and the city of Nineveh it was a large city I had walls around it in chapter number 3 it tells us that you could fit like three chariots on the wall at the same time and with showing us how wide the wall was that encompass the whole city it also tells us that it would take you about a three days journey if you were walking to get from one side of the city of Nineveh to the other it's a huge city but not only that the Ninevites were wicked people now when you hear that I want you to kind of just just picture yourself in the story for a little bit and God tells you to go to the most wicked cruel group of people that you could imagine in our world it'd be like this that God would say hey I want you to rise up and I want you to go and speak a word directly to the leaders of and I'm just going to throw one out there could be a bunch of different people to the leaders of Isis could you imagine that for a moment that's what the what the Ninevites were they were known for their cruelty they it was very regular for them to capture somebody and they would take their captives and many times they would just behead their captives right there they would also if if they took you and you maybe spoke maybe you're an Israelite and you believed in the one true God they would cut your tongue out and things like that they were terrible cruel awful people they were anti God they hated anything about the nation of Israel and anything about the one true God of Israel and those were the people that God told Jonah to go and prophesy against could you imagine that like that's the ones where you're kind of like okay anybody but that group of people so Jonah went didn't he no we know the story he fled he ran and before I know Jonah gets such a bad rap when we talk about Jonah I truly believe this if God told you to go to a people like that the majority of us in this room would have fled probably too or we'd have made excuses or we'd have said no you got the wrong guy we'd have done the same thing and so Jonah fled he fled to a place called Tarshish he jumped on a boat and he got to Tarshish Tarshish by the way or he was on the way to Tarshish Tarshish wasn't just up the street from where Jonah was Tarshish was like 1,500 miles away from from where from where Nineveh was it was a long ways away it was not even close he was planning to get as far away from this calling of God as he possibly could well he gets on the boat and he's going and all of a sudden while he's on the boat you know the story a great storm came think a hurricane type storm they weren't gonna make it they're out in the middle of the sea and they're out there and this massive storm came and so for all the different people on the boat they begin to just call out to their many false gods little G and they started saying hey you know different guides will have mercy on us stop the sea and they're praying and nothing's happening the storms just raging wild going nuts the winds are wild the rain is strong and they finally go to Jonah and they say of course if we've called out to all of our gods it has to be Jonah that's the problem on this on this boat and so Jonah admits that he had ran from God but he was a he was serving the one true God of Israel he says and for in chapter 1 verse 9 he actually says I'm a Hebrew and and he admits all of that that he trusts in the one true God of Israel and and so they end up long story they throw him overboard and while he's gone as soon as he gets thrown overboard this storm ceases and the Lord prepared a great fish to swallow him now I don't know what that fish was so we're not gonna spend a whole lot of time on that if it was a whale or if it was whatever you know my flannel graph when I was a kid said it was a whale okay and so I just think it was something it was a big fish obviously and it swallowed Jonah Jonah's in the fish for three days and so he's there and then eventually after he prayed the fish it says just spit him out of vomited him out actually which is really gross we're not gonna talk about that but it vomited out right onto the shore and there he was on the shore and it says in chapter number three of Jonah it says and the word of the Lord came unto him a second time aren't you thankful for second chances aren't you thankful that God doesn't just give you one chance on the minute you mess up he just leaves you know he gives you he is a god of the second and third and fourth and fifth chance many of us we have we've used a lot of those chances haven't we and God continuously pursues so he comes to him after the fish experience and he comes to him again and he says I want you to go to Nineveh when chapter number three Jonah finally I mean he just had this terrible experience of living in a in a fish and you can only imagine how terrible of an experience that was like I mean this past week we were at the beach in Florida and and it was this side note okay but and we were talking about Jonah so I have to say something about this if you didn't know this past week was the 50th anniversary of a very famous movie does anybody know what that movie was Jaws right and and so we watched this movie while we were at the beach we watched it on the final night because we had watched it earlier in the week my kids might not have gotten in the ocean and and things like that but we watched the movie Jaws and when they're kind of you know they cut the fish open the early one that they thought and all this crazy stuff pops out well that's kind of what I envisioned Jonah was like you know he's in there and all the different things that this fish had had kind of swallowed and ate Jonah is there terrible experience and so when God's word comes to him the second time Jonah's like man I ain't going back to the fish so I'm going to Nineveh okay and so he ends up going to Nineveh and he preaches in chapter number three verse four he preaches an eight-word sermon here's what it was he said this is all he said yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown and so he walked around the city preaching an eight-word sermon some of you wish your pastor would preach an eight-word sermon it's happening okay so don't get your hopes up don't amen that Lomax okay and here's the deal is he preaches eight words to them and it says in verse number five of chapter three here's what happened after Jonah's sermon it says in verse five so the people of Nineveh this is chapter three we'll get to chapter four in a moment it says so the people of Nineveh they believed God proclaimed a fast and put on sackcloth which was a sign of repenting and turning to God from the greatest of them even to the least of them we're not going to take the time to look at it but in chapter number three the king of Nineveh the king of this terrible wicked anti-god city actually led the entire nation it says later in chapter three that every man and beast would put on sackcloth I mean even their animals were getting right with okay that's a joke and so but it said every man and every beast will put on sackcloth and we will repent as a nation as a city back to God revival broke out in Nineveh it was awesome and the gospel was working Jonah's eight-word sermon work and revival break broke out everything Jonah feared wasn't gonna happen and so Jonah had to be excited about revival breaking out right I mean let's just be honest if revival broke out at any church in America do you think the pastor would be excited about it yes of course what pastor wouldn't want revival to break out and for everybody in here to be turning to God so much to the point that that our city and the leaders of our city turned to God well Jonah was not as excited as you would have imagined and that's where we pick up the story here in chapter number four it says this in verse number one this is right after the city of Nineveh repented they turned to God they heeded Jonah's eight-word sermon and then in verse number one of chapter four it says this but it they're turning to God displeased Jonah exceedingly can you can you imagine that like what why would Jonah be upset about them turning to God like who in the world you think you're bad in here you think you're a great sinner listen to Jonah and by the way Jonah here he's writing if you would like a biography or a story about his own life if I was writing a story of my own life this is the part that I'd keep out this is the part that I'm like man I don't want the whole world millions of people for thousands of years after my story and after I'm gone I don't want them to read this crazy story about how I didn't want to go to the Ninevites and proclaim what God told me to proclaim and on top of that I wasn't even excited when they turned to God here's why Jonah was upset is because truthfully and you know I growing up I just thought Jonah just ran from God's will that this was a God's will issue right it truthfully here's what I think Jonah was upset Jonah had seen what the Ninevites had done he had seen how terrible the Ninevites were and I truly believe the reason why he's upset here is because he didn't think that the Ninevites deserved mercy from God have you ever been there have you ever been there when you see God extend mercy to somebody and you wanted justice and you inwardly get upset about something or someone because God demonstrated mercy that's why Jonah's upset Jonah felt the Ninevites had done so much that they had to be too far gone there is no way that God's mercy could extend to such a people like the Ninevites so it displeased Jonah greatly he was very angry and then he goes on verse 2 so he prayed unto the Lord and he said I pray thee O Lord was not this my saying when I was yet in my country therefore I fled before unto Tarshish in other words what he's saying is he's praying to God and he's saying God this is why I didn't want to come here this is why I didn't want to go to Nineveh it's because they don't deserve it so I fled for I knew that thou art a gracious God I knew that if I went there you would experience you would give them grace and you would give them mercy because you're slow to anger and you're kind and repentance thee of the evil verse 3 therefore now O Lord take I beseech thee my life from me for it is better for me to die than to live I mean he's angry so much to the point that he was saying this this is what you kind of feel from this text he's so mad that he would have rather died himself than seen the Ninevites turn to God he would have rather given his life than for the Ninevites to experience mercy verse 4 then said the Lord does thou well to be angry God responded to him basically saying this have you any right to be angry Jonah you have a right to be upset at this you have a right to be mad at what happened in Nineveh so Jonah went out of the city verse 5 this is so interesting because like if you you know for us I want you to resonate with this story because here's what I'll tell you I've been around church my whole life and here's what church people are really good at we're good at hiding our true feelings right because good church people don't say what they really feel on the outside doing we keep those inside and so a lot of times we have a messed up heart but we look really good on the exterior and that's kind of what what Jonah was was doing here in verse number five is here he is he's mad at God and so he even his exterior struggling but he went out of the city in verse 5 and it said it he sat on the east side of the city and there made him a booth think a shelter over him and he sat under it in the shadow and listen that he might see what would become of the city like like here's here's what he's doing he goes out of Nineveh puts this shelter over him and here's the thing he sat there almost like you've pictured a hillside looking over at Nineveh and he's just kind of saying there this repenting thing it isn't gonna last and when they fall I'm gonna be here to watch it talk about such an evil mentality a self-righteous posture so he sat there watching in verse six God's still in this and what's amazing about our God is even when we've turned from God even when our heart is dark towards the things of God God still pursues us don't forget that don't forget that God will still pursue you even when you are running from him and that's what you see here he's angry if anybody doesn't deserve the mercy of God you would think it was the Ninevites but here when you read this story you're like I don't even think Jonah deserves the mercy of God right but God pursues him says God the Lord God prepared a gourd like a vine and made it to come up over Jonah that it might be a shadow over his head to deliver him from his grief so Jonah he was exceeding glad for the gourds now Jonah is like the most emotional person you could ever imagine okay and I don't know if if you have emotional people around you maybe you work with them or maybe they're in your house I don't know whatever but here Jonah is is dealing with all these different emotions up down up down I mean listen to this he runs from God he finds himself in a in a belly of a fish he prays to God you think he's gonna turn and goes to Nineveh and now they do exactly what God told them that they would do after his eight-word sermon and now he's upset and now he gets this gourd this vine over his head to kind of you know cover his grief and now he's happy again it's like constant up down and he made it to come so he's exceedingly glad of the gourd but verse 7 God also prepared a worm when the morning rose the next day and it smote the gourd that it withered so so God prepared the vine Jonah's happy God sent a worm to destroy the vine Jonah is now mad so verse 8 and it came to pass when the Sun did rise God prepared a Vahima East wind the Sun beat upon the head of Jonah I guess he was you know he must have been bald or something I don't know and that he fainted and he wished in himself to die once again so now he's like back into this terrible feeling I wish I could die and said it is better for me to die than to live God said to Jonah dust out well to be angry in other words do you have a right to be angry Jonah for the gourd and he said I do like Jane and Jonah's like I do Lord I have every right to be angry verse 10 then said the Lord now has had pity on the gourd for the witch thou hast not labored neither made us to grow which came up in a night and perished tonight literally a day goes by he's happy then he's upset and should not I spare Nineveh and here's the point that great city wherein are more than six score thousand per 120,000 people that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand and also much cattle what's amazing to me is the book just abruptly ends like it just it's over like Jonah I can imagine as he's writing this he's probably so discouraged by how he acted and how he behaved and as he's writing this and pinning these words inspired by the Holy Spirit of God he writes this and he's like man I've had enough of this I'm shutting the book this is over I can't imagine saying any more about this this story but it ends with like a question if you would is what's more important Jonah or the gospel going forward Jonah's comfort or the gospel going forward to the 120,000 people that don't know the right from the left who don't know who God is what is more important in this series you see here Jonah had a problem we know he ran from God we know he was he was selfish here and what I will tell you is this Jonah's number one problem and some of us we're gonna resonate with this here's what Jonah's number one problem was it was Jonah Jonah you see his number one problem was him was himself was his life he was upset about a plant he was upset about the mercy of God going to the Ninevites he cared about him himself and and for some of us this is our issue too you see Jonah cared about himself way too much that's some of our problem Jonah cared about his own comfort that's some of our problem Jonah cared more about his preferences his wishes his people and his convenience and for that Jonah learned some valuable lessons about what it's like to be about yourself too much and about being too into you and about being selfish and here's what I'll tell you because we're all guilty of this we can all kind of drift into a selfish life can't we a life where it's lived all about you a life where where everything revolves around you we can all kind of drift in this way if we're not careful and we forget our purpose for being here we forget the opportunities around us and we forget the grace of God in the mercy of God that has been bestowed upon us in the midst of our life and we can drift into a selfish life well that's what Jonah's problem was he had drifted and allowed himself to drift into such a life that life was all about him and what he wanted and not about what God wanted and there's three things in this text that I think we need to be careful about I would call them warnings and there's three things about Jonah's life that we need to really heed and listen to to make sure that we are not drifting in a selfish way like Jonah the first thing we see of Jonah's life is this Jonah had a very selfish prayer life Jonah had a very selfish prayer life and here's what I mean there's two prayers in this text they are really in the in the four chapters of the book of Jonah two prayers first one was when he I mean and he did God would call him and stuff like that but there's two times where he lifted his voice to pray to God the first one was in the belly of the fish if you remember back in chapter number two Jonah he finds himself in this belly of the fish and what's amazing is I think he was there for some time before he prayed and it not your life in my life sometimes we get ourselves into a mess sometimes we get ourselves into a struggle and sometimes we look at prayer as our last resort and not our first opportunity it should be your first step to everything in life but in in this situation Jonah finds himself in the belly of the fish he prays in other words what you see here is when life didn't go his way he wasn't praying on the way to Tarshish he wasn't praying on that boat he only prayed when life spiraled out of control and he didn't get his way and then the second time he prayed is here at the beginning of verse number four when when he realizes that the Ninevites repented and they turned to God and God had mercy on him once again Jonah didn't get his way and so therefore that led him led him to prayer listen you know what some of our problem is is we we pray only when things don't go our way like that's the some of you that's the and really some of us from time to time that's the only time we pray is oh no I didn't get the job that I wanted I better pray I didn't get the promotion I wanted so I better pray I didn't get the car that I wanted so I better pray I didn't get into the college that I wanted so I better pray my kid didn't do exactly what I wanted them to do so I better pray and what happens is if you're not careful you only go to God when things don't go your way and that was the issue with Jonah Jonah didn't have a regular consistent the Apostle Paul says in the New Testament he challenges us to pray without ceasing Jonah didn't have that type of prayer life no Jonah only went to God when things didn't go his way and for some of us that's our problem in life and so we use God almost like what I would call a vending machine right and so you just kind of give me give me give me kind of thing you know I'd encourage you to evaluate your prayer life hopefully you have one but I'd encourage you to not only make sure you have one make sure your prayer life is not all about you because if we're not careful here's what our prayer life is God fix this God do this God you know whatever and it's all about us and we never take the time to pray about the things that God wants to do around us or possibly through us and what you find here is Jonah he had a selfish prayer life but not only that number two what you find in Jonah maybe you resonate with this Jonah had a self-righteous mentality he had a self-righteous mentality in chapter 1 verse number 9 he says to the guys on the boat like I mean things are terrible he's running from God he's fled from God and in the midst of this terrible situation he has the nerve to stand up it's almost like on the boat you know kind of put it no I'm a Hebrew I'm an Israelite I serve the one true God of Israel what you find here with Jonah's life is that Jonah was self righteous that was his mentality that was his posture almost what you get from him is this idea I deserve mercy not them I deserve grace not them and you know what I've learned in the church a lot of times we don't like to admit it because this would make us look like bad Christians on the outside but a lot of us on the inside this is how we feel you feel I've made good decisions I've tried my best so therefore I deserve mercy I deserve grace but God why on earth are you giving grace to the people out there why on earth are you giving grace that's why in churches a lot of times when people come in that don't look like us don't act like us don't dress like us don't whatever we begin to get at church people we get real uncomfortable because a lot of us have this problem here we're self-righteous we think because we look like the cookie cutter Christian and and everything like that that we deserve the mercy of God and they do not and that was Jonah's issue he felt because he's an Israelite think church person okay I'm a church person that person's done some terrible rotten evil things the Ninevites they were awful they were the worst people in the world that you could ever imagine and Jonah's sitting over here like man I'm an Israelite I'm a Hebrew like I deserve mercy because of the family that I was born in I deserve mercy because of the church that I grew up in I deserve mercy because of the decisions that I make or or I try to keep the law and so I deserve these things the Ninevites they're the last ones on the list of recipients for the goodness and grace of Almighty God you see Jonah had a self-righteous mentality and in the New Testament you kind of see this through a story that all of you are gonna be familiar with you remember the story the prodigal son we all know that story and here's what I'll tell you is the prodigal son is so important because it it's something that is a warning and a he does you have those two sons right the older brother right and you have the the younger brother and both of them kind of you know had issues and what I think God was trying to say or rather you know Jesus when he gave this terrible what he was trying to teach us is this idea of self-righteous okay there's two ways to reject God one is the Ninevite way which would be the younger brother way you're just gonna go and screw up your life and you're gonna make a mess of your life and you're gonna make terrible decisions and you don't care and you're just gonna do whatever you want and that's the Ninevite way that's the really terrible wicked evil type of way and that's one way to reject God but the story also shows us that there's another way that we reject God and that's the self-righteous way which is the older brother way we also reject God in different ways you go and mess up your life making terrible decisions but you that are self-righteous we also mess up our life we also mess up our life just like the older brother and what happens is is for us we might look really good and not make all these terrible outward decisions but on the inside we're just as wicked as the as the Ninevites here's what I want you to know is this is that when we come to the gospel we have to understand that the ground is level at the foot of the cross we have to realize there was a song saying in the church I grew up in the ground is level at the foot of the cross many of you probably heard it old gospel song but the point of that song is this is that when we come to the cross when we come to the cross and we're asking for mercy and we're asking for goodness and we're asking for kindness and we're asking for the grace of God to bestowed upon us here's what we have to understand the ground is level there's no difference between you than the person on the side of the street begging or whatever you think is a bad person or we'll go back to my earlier analogy there's no difference than you and Isis at the foot of the cross you see here's what you have to understand and this is hard if you've been around church your whole life this is uncomfortable for us because this is how we naturally drift that we deserve something here's what you got to understand the foot of the cross we all are equally undeserving of the grace of God you could say it this way we're all Ninevites at the foot of the cross we're all Ninevites Jonah us we're all sinners at the foot of the cross and God's grace and God's mercy and God's kindness it applies to all of us if we're willing to receive it you see don't drift into a self-righteous mentality but number three not only did Jonah had a selfish prayer life Jonah had a self-righteous mentality Jonah had a blurred view of his mission here on earth don't us priorities were out of balance I mean here in chapter 4 in our text I mean the ending is basically saying this Jonah I love this ending because he's just done and he says almost like like this like yeah I cared more about a plant then I did the thousands of souls that needed the mercy of God I cared more about the plant and the covering that it gave me the shield that it gave me more than I did the thousands of people that needed the mercy of God let me just say this before we criticize that because that's pretty low right it's pretty low but I'll tell you this I was thinking about this we care about a lot more things than lost souls in today's modern church think about some of us care way more about sports than we do lost souls some of us care way more about our comfort than we do lost souls some of us care way more about our our toys that we accumulate then we do our lost souls some of us care way more and there's nothing wrong with these things but some of us care way more about our family and and the comfort than we do our lost souls. Some of us care way more about money and what we can do than lost souls. Some of us care way more about career and advancing our career path than we do lost souls. In other words, whatever kind of resonated with you of what I named or there's something else maybe that I didn't name that you care more about than you do lost souls, that is your gourd.
That is your vine. And for us, just like Jonah, it seems silly, like a vine, you care more about a vine than you do the 120,000 people that don't know God and need a relationship with God and need the mercy and goodness and grace and kindness of God. Yeah, we care more, that seems silly, but I'll tell you this, our vines in today's modern church are all those things that I named, family, career, money, all those different things, that's your vine. And think about it, he cared more about those things than the mission of God here on this earth. And he was a Hebrew, he was an Israelite, which means that he should have, if anybody knew God's mission on earth, it should have been him. And in 2025, if anyone knows the mission of God here on this earth, it should be the church.
It should be you, it should be me. You see, the mission of God is simple. I mean, you see that way back in Genesis, in chapter three, when sin entered into the world, God, from the very beginning, he prophesized something that is so important. He says that one day, one day, Jesus the Messiah will come, and through his bruising, here's what's gonna happen, he will crush the enemy, and he'll fix the brokenness that came into this world. And so if you fast forward to the New Testament, Jesus comes and he dwells among us, John chapter one talks about that.
He dwells among us, and then he dies for the sins of the entire world. And just before he leaves, he tells his disciples this, why he's teaching them. He says this, just as God the Father sent me, I am sending you. Just as God sent me into the world, I'm now sending you.
You say, what is that? That's the church. That's the mission of God, to go around the world. That's the reason you're here. That's our purpose.
It's so that we can, what we've experienced, we've experienced the goodness, and mercy, and grace, and kindness of God. And because God bestowed upon us, to sinners like us, our mission should be to tell the world about the God that we serve. That's your mission. That's your purpose. But some of us get so wrapped up into comfort, and popularity, and all these different things, that we take those things, and that's the reason why we don't share the good news of the gospel.
I'd encourage you, think about the last time that you shared the good news of the gospel with somebody. Think about it. Right now, in your head, just think about it. If you're like, man, I'm having a hard time remembering, you got a lot of gourds in your life.
You got a lot of vines in your life that you need to destroy, and you need to ask God to send a worm into your life, to destroy every gourd that you have, so that you can see your purpose here on this earth, and be involved in the mission that God has entrusted, and called you to be a part of. You see, that's our mission. And you could say this, that the book ends kind of with this idea, this question, if you would. Do you care?
Like, that's almost what you get here. It says in verse 11, and should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than six score thousand people that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand, and all so much count. In other words, he's saying this. Do you care? Do you care that there are people dying and going to hell every single day, right here around us, and around the world?
Do you care? Or are you so wiped, or so enamored with the gourds of this life? You say, pastor, I wanna care. Well, we need to get right with God, and tear down all of the different gourds and things in our life that take the place of the mission of God. We need to ask him to tear all of those things down, so that we can understand that we don't deserve the mercy and grace of God, and neither does everybody else. And so because we've extended, or we've gotten grace and mercy, then I'm gonna take it, and I'm gonna share it with somebody else. You say, how do we do that? Well, I wanna tell you, just two quick next steps that you can do, is on your way out today, here's what some of you need to do, is you need to stop by the Welcome Center, and you need to grab what we call a gospel track.
I understand, if you're young in here, I don't know, I feel like tracks and stuff like that, like you say, what is a track? It's got the good news of the gospel in it. It's got the plan of salvation. And I understand, like growing up, we had them all over our church, and I understand, like not a lot of people carry them anymore, it's mostly of your older people. And here's what I'll tell you, some of you need to grab one of those.
And you need to start leaving it at the restaurants that you go to. And you need to start giving it to the people that you come in contact with, your neighbors and the people around you, so that you can be a part of the mission of God. Don't let comfort and popularity and all money and career and your busy schedule affect the gospel, or perhaps, like we just got these, some invite cards to our church, so that they can come here and hear the gospel.
They're really small and simple, and they're out in the Welcome Center. And listen, here's what I want you to know, is something like this is a way that you can tear down the gourds and start focusing on the mission of God in this life. But the question is, the difference that's gonna make from here sitting in a sea to what you do without there is this question, do you even care?
Do you care? Or are you just stuck in your own selfish prayer life, stuck in your own self-righteous mentality, and stuck in your own self? Remember, Jonah's problem was him. And for some of us, you're the reason, you're the one standing in the way of what God wants to do through your life. And that's what Jonah experienced. Let's be a part of the mission of what God has called us to do, because the goodness and mercy of God has come to us undeserving sinners like us. So why not go out and tell people about the mercy that they could experience in their life? Can we bow our heads for prayer?
