Good News for Bad People

Jonah 3:1-10

Is there hope for bad people? What if they’re truly wicked? After World War II, at the Nuremberg Trials, many Nazi war criminals were tried and sentenced. Some of them accepted their sentence and were sorry. Hans Frank, called the butcher of Poland said in a low voice, “I beg the Lord to receive me mercifully. I am grateful for the good treatment I have received in prison.” But others refused to accept their crime. They said they were just following orders. Some were even defiant at their execution. Julius Streicher shouted, “Heil Hitler” as he was led up the steps. And then said to the crowds, “you will be hanged next!” They were truly wicked and unrepentant; while others were truly wicked but repentant. Is there hope for bad people? Yes - for those who repent! A wonderful story is told of forgiveness after World War II. 2 Christians were jailed in a Nazi concentration camp for helping Jews. One of the sisters died at the hands of the prison guards. But after the war, one of the prison guards repented and became a Christian. He asked the surviving sister for forgiveness. He said - “I became a Christian after the war. Your message on forgiveness touched me. I have always wanted to ask forgiveness of someone personally; so I ask you: will you forgive me?” At that moment, she didn’t want to, but she knew God had already forgiven him. When she decided to forgive, mercy surged through her and she cried - “I forgive you brother, with all my heart.” They hugged for a long time. Both were forgiven sinners. And she was no better than he. Is there good news for bad people? Is there forgiveness? Yes.

Today we see this good news in 3 points. Firstly, the good news from a threat of judgment. Secondly, the full repentance by bad people. Thirdly, the lavish mercy of a just God.

Firstly, the good news from a threat of judgment. In verses 1-2, God called Jonah a second time to go to Nineveh, a great city, to preach what God wanted him to preach to it. Nineveh was the capital of Assyria - a wicked and cruel empire. They had committed many atrocities. That’s why Jonah was called a second time. He didn’t want to do it the first time. He was called to preach against their sins - to say that God would judge them. But he didn’t want to. Why? The fact that God called him to do this showed there was a chance for mercy. If you wanted to punish someone, you don’t need to warn. Warning demonstrates mercy - a chance to repent. But Jonah didn’t want them to have the chance. He was still human. And the Assyrians were famous for their atrocities against others. They’d tear the skin from the prisoners’ backs while still alive. They’d drive wooden stakes through them into the ground, carefully missing vital organs, so they’d die slowly. They’d make them sit in wooden tubs with only their heads showing, and feed them until they’d swim in their own waste, only to be eaten alive by maggots below.

Who’d want to show mercy to them? But God called Jonah to threaten of judgment, verse 4 - “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.” This has always been the message from the start. Judgment unless you repent. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew word for repentance is used over 1000 times. In the New Testament, whenever anyone preached, it was about repentance. Both John the Baptizer and Jesus said - “repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Peter the apostle also preached - “Repent, and be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins.” God commands all people to repent - Acts 17:30 -“Truly the times of man’s ignorance God overlooked, but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent.” The message of the Bible is this - there’s judgment for our sins. But God shows mercy if there’s repentance. The fact that judgment was preached showed mercy.

And Jonah was to preach judgment. In verse 3, Jonah obeyed - he arose, and went into Nineveh to preach. He “preached unto it the preaching that God bid him,” verse 2. Meaning, he spoke the speech God spoke to him; he talked the talk that God talked to him. He transmitted God’s message simply and clearly - “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.” In Hebrew, they’re only 5 words. There was a target - Nineveh, the capital of the Assyrian empire. There was a threat - you will be overthrown. There was a time limit - in 40 days - 40 day! Not zeros days, but 40! This was the simple message - there was a threat of judgment. Why? Because they had sinned. God is a holy God. If he doesn’t judge, he wouldn’t be a just judge. Likewise, if a judge doesn’t give just judgment today, we’d all be angry. But this threat of judgment was good news.

Secondly, we see the full repentance by bad people. Jonah’s message was simple. And we see the reaction of the people. Jonah walked into this city - a city of 3 days’ journey - meaning it was large. But there was immediate repentance. He only entered it, on the first day - and when he preached this message of mercy, verse 5 says they repented. They didn’t say - “how dare you?” “We’re not that bad.” “We’re a great city!” They were not defiant but repentant. Verse 5 says, “So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.” Here we see the manner they repented. They believed God - meaning, they believed the threat of judgment. There was also grief. They put on sackcloth and fasted. Sackcloth was not a fashion statement. It was a symbol of mourning for sins. The fast - no eating or drinking - demonstrated sincerity and grief. It was also comprehensive - it was done by everyone - greatest to the least. Who were the greatest and least? Verses 6-8 tell us. It started with the king. The word came to the king. It reached out, touched him, and he was moved by it. He got up from his throne, took off his royal robes, put on sackcloth, and sat down on the ground. But not just him. Verse 7 - his nobles also did the same. They commanded all the people and the animals not to eat or drink. This showed that repentance was their only preoccupation. They didn’t work, trade, study, or tend to their animals. Verse 8 says they were all covered in sackcloth to cry to God in repentance. Comprehensive repentance - from the king to the community. But the repentance was not just an outward demonstration.

There was an inward humility. We see in verse 6 how the king repented - “For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes.” His robe was a symbol of his royalty. He removed it. He replaced with sackcloth - humility. His throne symbolized rule. He got off and sat in ashes. This means he sat on the ground - a place of lowliness. The ash could refer to the burnt rubbish - which is how they disposed of trash. He moved from the palace to the city dump. This showed his humility in acknowledging his guilt. His instruction to fast extended not to even tasting anything - not even sweat. And we know it was sincere humility because verse 10 says that God saw their work of repentance, that they turned from evil. There is no repentance except that which comes from the humble heart.

There was also change. Real repentance is obvious - no one has to question if you’ve repented. It will change the behavior. The king told them to repent in verse 8 - “let them turn (repent) every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands.” The king is not vague about what they needed to repent of - his evil way and violence of their hands. The repentance was general - evil way and it was specific - the violence of their hands. This was especially true of the king. Whenever a rebellion broke out in the Assyrian empire, the Assyrian kings brutally crushed it. In one of his expeditions, Ashurnasirpal II described how rebels were punished. They were flayed, impaled, decapitated, and burned alive - “I felled 3,000 of their fighting men with the sword. I carried off prisoners, possessions, oxen, and cattle from them. I burnt many captives from them. I captured many troops alive: from some I cut off their arms and hands; from others I cut off their noses, ears, and extremities. I gouged out the eyes of many troops. I made one pile of the living and one of heads. I hung their heads on trees around the city, I burnt their adolescent boys and girls. I razed, destroyed, burnt, and consumed the city.” This was the violence the king was guilty of. But the fact that the king would repent was amazing. You see, the Assyrians considered their kings as ruling with their god’s sanction. To rebel against the king was to rebel against the god Asshur. But if the king was to repent of this, he would be denying his god Asshur.

But why would God send a prophet to preach repentance to these bad people? He’s a merciful God. We see thirdly, the lavish mercy of a just God. Verse 3 says, “Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city.” Literally, Nineveh was a city great to God. Now, it’s not that God was impressed by its size or power, but rather, it was important to him. While there were other cities, this one was important to him. But God is a just God - he is angry against sinners. When the king called the people to repent, he said in verse 9 says, “Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger, that we perish not?” His reasoning for repenting? Who knows if God will turn and back down from his fierce anger? Literally, the burning of his nostrils. Make no mistake. God is just. He sees sin and is angry with it. If there was no repentance, there would be judgment.

But there was lavish mercy. Why repent? Because the king had hope. Yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. Yet 40 days! If God wanted to destroy, he would’ve just have destroyed. Why 40 days? It showed there was hope. And why send a prophet? If God’s purpose was to destroy, why send a preacher? Send an executioner. And because they did repent, verse 10 says, “And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.” God saw how they repented; and God repented - he relented. He turned away from the judgment he threatened. We must never forget that although the Bible says that God is angry with the wicked everyday, the Bible also tells us that God is love. That’s his character. God will forgive when we repent. But the truth is also that God is more ready to forgive than we are to repent.

But how can God forgive their sins? I thought he was a just God? Shouldn’t these sins still be paid for? Yes. He’s not just a lavishly merciful God, but he’s also just - he must punish sin. There’s a fierce anger that must be satisfied. And the same good news for them is for all of us too. We can be forgiven. When we repent, that judgment which is rightfully ours is given to someone else. This is something Jonah knew. He said in Jonah 2:9 - “salvation is of the Lord.” God makes a way to save people who repent - who can’t pay for their own sins. They can escape God by running to him. He pays off the penalty himself. He faced the judgment himself. Hundreds of years later, God came in human form. Jesus Christ lived without sin. He died for all sinners who’d repent of their sins. And God’s judgment was poured out on him. So when Jesus came, he preached this repentance. If people admitted their sins with humility, and with genuine sorrow, specifically recounting their sins, and knowing the mercy of God to spare them, they could be saved. The atrocious sins of the Ninevites, and the sins of everyone who would repent, past and future were taken by Jesus when he died. They were paid for. The fierce anger of God, the burning of his nostrils, that immense rage was all concentrated on the Lord Jesus Christ, whose head, hands, feet, and side were pierced through by man, but whose spirit was crushed by the angry hand of God.

Today, there is a call to repentance to you. Friends that have not come to believe in Jesus, you, not Nineveh, are the target. The Bible says that you have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And your sins deserve judgment. Yes, you’re not as bad as the Ninevites. But they had more power than you. If you had the same opportunity, you’d carry out their atrocities too. What’s in them is in you. You have the sin potential for road rage, murder, theft. Gossip comes from a heart that seeks to destroy others. And there’s judgment for thought, word, and deed. And there’s a time limit. The Ninevites had 40 days - we may or may not have longer - but the Bible says every man is appointed to die one day - and after that there’s judgment. There’s a threat. And the penalty given by an eternally and infinitely holy God is eternal and infinite judgment. But this threat comes with an offer of mercy from God to you - that you would repent and believe in Jesus, so that he’d take away your sin and forgive you. But your repentance matters. Will you be humble to admit your sins? Will you specify them? Will you run to God’s mercy, to run away from God’s judgment? Will you admit you need a savior? Or will you be defiant?

To those of you who will believe and repent - I speak to you. You are a person, great to God. You are significant. He loves you and he is showing his mercy to you even in these threats. The Bible tells us that God is willing to show mercy to you when you repent. He says (Ezekiel 18:23) - “Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should die? saith the Lord GOD: and not that he should return from his ways, and live?” Whole nations have repented. Why not you? Jeremiah 18:7-8 says, “At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy it; if that nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them.” Your sins, he will take away. He has punished them in Jesus already.

A word to believers here. Never forget that Jonah was written for God’s people. They were in covenant with God, but they forgot to repent. Yet, this wicked pagan nation repented! What about God’s people? We’re not exempt from continual repentance. Mark Twain once said sarcastically about the church, “The church is a place where a nice, respectable person stands in front of other nice, respectable people and urges them to be nicer and more respectable.” But the truth of the matter is this - we’re not nice and respectable people. We’re sinners saved by grace. There once was a zoo that was well-known for having many animals. One day the gorilla died. To keep up appearance, the zoo hired a man to wear a gorilla suit. The man didn’t know how to do it and overacted. He got too close to the wall, tripped and fell into the lion exhibit. He began to scream, thinking he would die, until the lion said: “Be quiet, or you’re going to expose us all!” Dearly beloved, as believers - we don’t have to be afraid of being found out. We know we’re sinners - let’s just keep repenting of our sins, knowing that we have a merciful God who loves us. This is the good news for bad people.

1. The good news from a threat of judgment

2. The full repentance by bad people

3. The lavish mercy of a just God