Thank you very much.
Thank you.
We'll lift our voices to the Lord this morning.
Hymn 159.
159.
Blessed be the name.
Hymn 159.
And we'll lift our voices unto the Lord this morning.
Hymn 159.
All praise to him who reigns above.
Hymn 159.
Lift it up on that first now.
All praise to him who reigns above.
In majesty supreme.
Who gave this time for man's sake.
His name above all names shall stand, exalted more and more.
At God the Father's own right hand, where angels most adore.
Blessed be the name, blessed be the name.
Blessed be the name of the Lord.
Blessed be the name, blessed be the name.
Blessed be the name of the Lord.
Redeemer, Savior, friend of man, what's ruined by the fall.
Thou hast been my salvation's plan, for thou hast died for all.
Blessed be the name, blessed be the name.
Blessed be the name of the Lord.
Blessed be the name, blessed be the name.
Blessed be the name of the Lord.
His name shall be the counselor, the mighty prince of peace.
Of all earth's kingdoms conquer, whose reign shall never cease.
Blessed be the name, blessed be the name.
Blessed be the name of the Lord.
Blessed be the name, blessed be the name.
Blessed be the name of the Lord.
And that's a good start to our singing this morning.
We want to go and ask the Lord's blessing on this service, so I ask Brother Alexander Washington to give us some prayer please.
Father in Heaven, we pray God that you please bless this service and please help us God to be able to praise your name.
And we pray God that you please fill past your answers with your spirit and help us to listen to the preaching of the word today.
In Jesus' name we pray, amen.
Amen, hymn 160, hymn number 160. Crown him with many crowns.
Hymn number 160, we'll sing it out on that first verse.
Hymn number 160, crown him with many crowns, the lamb upon his throne.
160, sing it out now.
Crown him with many crowns, the lamb upon his throne.
Mark all the heavenly and the proud, all music but its own.
Awake my soul and sing of him who died for thee, and there as thy matchless King through all eternity.
Crown him Lord of love, behold his hands and sigh.
Praise words yet visible above, in beauty glorified.
No angel in the sky can fully bear that sight,
but downward bends his wandering eye, and this the dream so bright.
Crown him the Lord of life, who triumphed for the grave,
who rose victorious to the sun for those he came to save.
His glory is now we sing, who died and rose on high,
who died eternal life to pray, and lives at death may God last.
Crown him the Lord of heaven, one with the Father known,
one with the Spirit through him given from yonder glorious throne,
to thee the endless praise, for now more us has died.
He thou, O Lord, through endless days adored and magnified.
And again singing.
All right, this is our announcements.
If you don't have a bulletin, slip up your hand nice and high.
We'll get to you with one.
On the inside we have our service time.
Sunday mornings at 1030 is our preaching service.
Sunday nights at 6.
Wednesday nights at 7 is our Bible study.
This week we will be in 2 Chronicles, chapter number 20.
We've got the soul-winning times listed there below,
as well as salvations and baptisms across the page.
Congratulations to the Juarez family on the birth of baby Winnet,
born Saturday, September 7th, 7 pounds 5 ounces, 19 inches long.
Got a great picture there, so be sure to congratulate them.
There is a maternity shower in honor of Eileen Urban,
and that is on Sunday, September 29th.
A catered lunch will be served.
Nurselings only preferred, and please RSVP to Mrs. Jenny Akinosho.
And then keep praying for our other ladies in the church that are expecting
that they'll have a safe and healthy pregnancy and delivery on the back.
We are taking portraits for the annual yearbook starting today.
And so the sign-up sheet is over here to my right,
and I know that those pictures have already begun.
And so if you have young children,
it's better if you get an appointment before the service,
and everybody else, please get an appointment after the service.
This year's background color is tan.
And so be sure to sign up for that.
I know it seems like there's a lot of time,
but you know how time flies, so you want to get in there,
get that slot that you want, get that portrait taken,
get those ensembles coordinated with that tan background.
And of course, this is for everyone.
We want everyone to participate, so if you're a single couple,
family, whatever your situation,
want to make sure everybody gets photographed for the yearbook,
you get a beautiful portrait.
That's what you get out of the deal.
You even get it in the high-quality electronic format.
We're not like those companies that hold back the high quality
and make you pay a fortune to print them.
You could print these things like just, you could print hundreds of them.
You could print thousands of them, right?
No one can stop you.
You could print them in any size.
Posters, you know, cardboard cutouts of your family, whatever you want, okay?
And so you get a beautiful picture,
but then we also all get to enjoy the yearbook with pictures of everyone,
and it's a good reference tool.
If you forget somebody's name, you can look them up.
You can use it as a prayer list.
It's a great way to just remember as the years go by.
All right, below that, we've got a soul winning trip up to the Navajo Reservation,
Friday, September 20th.
That's this Friday.
Leaving in the morning, coming back Saturday evening.
It will include recreation at Canyon de Chez, which is a world-class destination, literally.
And then below that, we've got some other upcoming events.
The Missions Conference, that's a big one.
It seems far away, but it's going to be here before we know it, November 6th through 10th.
And so you can just obviously go about your normal life as usual
and just pop in for evening services or Saturday, Sunday, whatever you're available for.
Or if you want to come for the whole thing, we're going to have stuff going on.
All day Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, whatever you're able to participate in is great.
And then below that, there's also a missions trip to Jamaica coming up November 28th through December 7th.
You can ask Brother Raymond Cooper about that, and you can ask Brother Segura about that
if you need any details or questions answered about that.
That's about it for announcements. Let's go ahead and sing our next song.
All right, you should find the insert in front of your hymnal with the hymn, Be Thou My Vision.
If you don't have an insert, you can raise your hand. We'll sing it on that first verse together.
Be thou my vision, O Lord of my heart.
Not be all else to me, save that thou art.
Thou my blessed thought, by day or by night.
Waking or sleeping, thy presence my light.
Be thou my wisdom, and thou my true word.
I ever with thee, and thou with me, Lord.
Thou my great Father, I thy true Son.
Thou in me dwelling, and I with thee one.
Be thou my battle shield, sword for my fight.
Be thou my dignity, thou my delight.
Thou my soul's shelter, thou my high tower.
Be thou me ember, O power of my power.
Riches I heed not, nor man's empty praise.
Thou mine inheritance, now and always.
Thou and thou only, first in my heart.
I, King of Heaven, my treasure thou art.
I, King of Heaven, my victory won.
May I reach heaven's joy, O bride and son.
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall.
Still be my vision, O ruler of all.
Amen.
Good singing, everybody.
Let's go in your psalm books now to hymn 138, hymn 138,
The Haven of Rest, hymn number 138.
My soul is that exile was out of life's sea.
So burn with sin and distress.
Till I've heard a sweet voice saying, make me your choice.
And I entered the Haven of Rest.
I bathed my soul in the Haven of Rest.
I'll sail the wide seas no more.
The tempest may sweep, for the wilds won't be deep.
In Jesus I'm safe evermore.
I yielded myself to his tender embrace.
And they take hold of the Word.
I better sell off, and I anger my soul.
The Haven of Rest is my Lord.
I've angered my soul in the Haven of Rest.
I'll sail the wide seas no more.
The tempest may sweep, for the wilds won't be deep.
In Jesus I'm safe evermore.
The Son of my soul sends the Lord in evil.
Has been the old story so blessed.
Of Jesus who's safe, so ever will have.
A hole in the Haven of Rest.
I've angered my soul in the Haven of Rest.
I'll sail the wide seas no more.
The tempest may sweep, for the wilds won't be deep.
In Jesus I'm safe evermore.
Oh, come to the Savior.
He patiently waits to sail by his power divine.
Come anchor your soul in the Haven of Rest.
And say my Beloved is mine.
I've angered my soul in the Haven of Rest.
I'll sail the wide seas no more.
The tempest may sweep, for the wilds won't be deep.
In Jesus I'm safe evermore.
Megan, sing it this morning.
All right, at this time we'll pass our offering plates around.
As the plates go around, let's turn our Bibles to Jonah chapter number two.
Jonah chapter number two.
As we always do, we'll read the entire chapter, beginning in verse number one.
Follow along silently with Brother Corbin Brock as he reads.
Jonah chapter two, beginning in verse number one.
Jonah chapter number two.
Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God out of the fish's belly, and said,
I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the Lord, and he heard me.
Out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou hurtest my voice.
For thou hadst cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas, and the floods compassed me about.
All thy billows and thy waves passed over me.
Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight, yet I will look again toward thy holy temple.
The waters compassed me about, even to the soul.
The depth closed me round about.
The weeds were wrapped about my head.
I went down to the bottoms of the mountains.
The earth with her bars was about me forever.
Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O Lord my God?
When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the Lord.
And my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple.
They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy.
But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving.
I will pay that that I avowed.
Salvation is of the Lord.
And the Lord spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land.
Amen.
Lord, thank you for allowing us to gather here today to hear your word.
Lord, I ask that you would be with Pastor Anderson and give him boldness to preach and fill him with the Holy Spirit.
Lord, open our ears and soften our hearts to hear your word this day. In Jesus' name, amen.
Amen.
The title of my sermon this morning is The Waters of Chaos.
Again, I'm preaching on the Book of Jonah.
I did a couple of sermons a couple of weeks ago, so I'm continuing to preach through the Book of Jonah here.
And this morning I want to talk about the Waters of Chaos.
Now, what does the word chaos mean?
Well, if you look up chaos in the dictionary, it says,
a state of utter confusion or disorder, a total lack of organization or order,
any confused disorderly mass.
That is what chaos is.
Now, keep your finger there in Jonah chapter 2 and flip back, if you would, to Genesis chapter number 1.
Genesis chapter number 1.
Of course, in the Book of Jonah, we started out in chapter 1,
and Jonah was given the commandment to go preach the word of God to Nineveh.
Jonah refuses to obey the word of God, and instead he gets on a ship,
sailing in the opposite direction from where God had told him to go.
God sends out this storm into the sea and is trying to basically get Jonah's attention
and chastise him for his disobedience.
And so there's a lot of water involved in the story, right, because he's out on the sea.
There's a storm in the sea.
Ultimately, he gets thrown into the water, sinks down into the water.
And so this morning, I want to preach about this idea of the waters of chaos.
Look, if you would, at verse number 1 of Genesis chapter 1.
It says, in the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth,
and this is the part I want to focus on,
and the earth was without form and void.
The earth was without form and void, which is another way of saying chaos, right?
There's no organization. There's no distinction.
It's just a mass of just, it's just water, right?
There's just nothing else.
There are no features of land or continents or any landmarks or geography.
It's just deep water all around.
It says, and darkness was upon the face of the deep,
and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the water.
So how is God going to bring order to this chaos?
Well, first, he says in verse number 3, God said,
let there be light, and there was light.
So number 1, he brings the light, but then number 2, look at verse number 9.
It says, and God said, let the waters under the heaven be gathered together
unto one place, and let the dry land appear, and it was so.
So God brings order to the chaos in two ways.
Number 1, by creating light, separating light and darkness,
and number 2, by creating dry land as opposed to the fluids,
the water of the sea that was just chaotic.
It's just a formless void of water.
Now, keep that in mind, and we're going to get back into Jonah now
with that in mind, this idea of the waters of chaos as at the beginning.
So look at verse number 11 of Jonah chapter 1.
Jonah represents the backslidden Christian who is not obeying the Bible.
He's not following the Bible, right?
The word of the Lord came to him, and he's not listening.
He's not doing what God has told him to do.
He's saved. He is obviously a prophet of God.
He's been a preacher, and yet, right now, he's not right with God.
He's not obeying the Bible, and this is a situation that many Christians
will find themselves in at some point in their lives, right,
where they get backslidden, and they're not living for God.
They're saved, but they're not living for God.
That's what Jonah represents in this story, okay?
God sends out this storm to prevent him from getting even further out of the will of God, right,
because he's trying to sail as far from the will of God as he can get.
God sends the storm to stop him, but Jonah is still unrepentant,
even on the ship as the sea is raging and the storm is raging.
Look at verse 11.
Then said they unto him, What shall we do unto thee that the sea may be calm unto us?
For the sea wrought and was tempestuous.
And he said unto them, Well, here's what I need to do.
I need to get right with God. Let's turn this ship around.
I'm going to pray to God and tell him I'm sorry, and then I'm going to do right now.
I'm going to go preach to Nineveh now.
He's not repentant. He's not sorry. He's not willing to change or do anything.
So instead, he says to them, Take me up and cast me forth into the sea.
He's saying, You know what? Just throw me overboard.
I don't want to take you down with me.
I'm not right with God. I'm fleeing from the presence of the Lord.
So you know what? Let me just do my own thing.
Just throw me overboard so that you guys will be okay,
because you're being punished for hanging around with me,
and I don't want you to be punished for hanging around with me.
So get rid of me. Throw me overboard.
Nevertheless, it says in verse 13,
The men rode hard to bring it to the land, but they could not,
for the sea wrought and was tempestuous against them.
You know, they don't want to throw them overboard,
but they have to throw them overboard, because otherwise they're all going to die.
So finally they throw them overboard, and then in verse 15 it says,
They took up Jonah and cast him forth into the sea,
and the sea ceased from her raging.
Okay, now if you would go to Psalm 107,
you can keep a bookmark or a finger in Jonah,
because we're going to be back there throughout the sermon.
But go over to Psalm 107.
What we see here is that God is not just going to let his children rebel against him,
with no consequences.
If you rebel against the Lord,
your life is going to be thrown into a state of chaos and confusion, okay?
Remember, what's the sermon called?
The Waters of Chaos, right?
We looked at the very beginning of the Bible,
how when God created the earth,
he first created it as just without form and void,
just totally covered in water.
No solid ground, no stability, no organization.
It's just dark, it's just wet, and there's just confusion, right?
But then God brings order to the chaos by saying,
Let there be light, dividing the light from the darkness, creating the dry land.
God's Word brings order and it brings stability to our lives.
And as soon as you start rebelling against the Word of God,
and as soon as you start becoming backslidden as a Christian
and not following the Bible,
your life is going to be thrown into a state of chaos and confusion.
And that's what we see with Jonah.
He gets on the boat, he's heading in the wrong direction,
and God sends the storm which brings the whole ship into chaos and confusion.
Here's another great illustration of this in Psalm 107, look at verse 23.
It says, They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters,
these are the exact kind of guys that are on the boat with Jonah, right?
These see the works of the Lord and his wonders in the deep,
for he commandeth and raiseth the stormy wind which lifteth up the waves thereof.
Now this is a beautiful poetic passage here in verse 26.
It says, They mount up to heaven.
Now what does that mean when it says they mount up to heaven?
What it's saying is that the ship is being rocked by the waves
to the point where the ship is lifted up into the air, right?
It goes up into the air, it mounts up to the heaven,
and then it goes down again to the depths, right?
As it's just being tossed by the raging waves of the sea.
And then it says this, their soul is melted because of trouble.
They reel to and fro and stagger like a drunken man.
Think about the guys that are on the surface of the ship
as the ship is being thrown around, thrown up, crashes down.
They are going like this all over the deck, like ahhh, right?
Like they're drunk, but they're not actually drunk.
They're totally sober, but it's because they're on a ship
that's being rocked and thrown around.
They end up staggering to and fro like a drunken man.
No direction or purpose.
It's not like, hey, I'm going to walk over there now.
Now I'm going to walk over here.
It's more just like ahhh, just getting thrown around, right?
This is a state of chaos, a state of confusion.
Then, oh yeah, and it says they're at their wit's end, right?
Meaning that nothing in their human logic or rationale,
they can't figure out a way out of this.
They can't logic their way out of it.
They can't come up with a solution because there is no solution.
They're at their wit's end.
They have no direction, no purpose.
They're just being tossed to and fro.
Then they cry unto the Lord in their trouble,
and he bringeth them out of their distresses.
He maketh the storm a calm so that the waves thereof are still.
Then are they glad because they be quiet,
so he bringeth them into their desired haven,
referring to the dry land.
They get back to shore.
They get to harbor.
Oh, that men would praise the Lord for his goodness
and for his wonderful works to the children of men.
If only people would just listen to God.
If only people would just read the Bible and believe what it says.
If only people would just listen to the preaching of God's word
and take heed unto it,
they wouldn't be thrown into the state of confusion that we see here
that backslidden Christians, that the ungodly,
that disobedient people get subjected to.
Whether it's Jonah on the ship with those sailors,
whether it's these men in Psalm 107,
we need to listen to what the Bible says, what God is saying.
We got to obey the Bible or our life is going to be thrown into a state of confusion.
There is a way which seemeth right unto a man,
but the end thereof are the ways of death.
Okay?
All of the drinking and the drugs and the fornication,
the party life, it is garbage.
It's meaningless.
It's pointless.
It's vain.
And your life is going nowhere if you go down that path.
You are going nowhere.
You have no direction.
You have no goal.
There's no point to it.
And you may think you have some goal about work or school or something.
Hey, one day you're going to find out that there's more to life
than just making money or work or school.
And you know what?
Also you're going to find out is that God can just take those things away from you like that.
And if you go down that path of the drugs and the alcohol and the partying
and the ways of this world and having fun and doing all these things
and not following the Bible's plan for your life,
you are heading for a state of chaos in your life.
State of confusion.
Even if not physically, mentally.
You're going to be at your wits end.
You're going to be confused.
You're not going to have purpose in your life.
So Jonah, obviously when the storm came, he's unrepentant.
He still isn't right with God.
When the storm comes, he just says, well, just throw me overboard.
He's just kind of giving up instead of saying, guys, I need to get right with God here.
Maybe we can all pray right now and ask God to forgive me for being so stupid
and not going to Nineveh and not doing what I'm told.
But no, no, instead it's just, oh, well, just throw me overboard.
I'll take my chances in the sea.
I'll leave you guys alone.
Go ahead. Throw me overboard.
Whatever.
Instead of actually fixing the problem, he becomes self-destructive.
Self-destructive.
Throw me overboard.
Throw me in the water.
I'll just die then.
Whatever.
And you know when you see Christians who are backslidden and they're not living for God,
they're self-destructive.
And look, let's face it.
All of these lifestyles that we're mentioning, whether it be drinking, whether it be drugs,
whether it be gambling, whether it be fornication, they're all ultimately self-destructive.
It's a flushing of your life down the toilet.
It's a flushing of everything that matters down the toilet.
So because he is unrepentant, when the storm comes to the ship,
he ends up going deeper into the chaos of the sea.
Because if you stop and think about it, at least when he was on the boat,
yeah, he's reeling to and fro like a drunken man and he's getting tossed.
He's mounting up to heaven and then crashing down again with the boat.
But you know what?
At least he has some kind of a footing on the boat.
When he gets thrown out of the boat, now it's just water.
I mean, there's nothing solid, right?
Only Jesus can walk on the water, right?
To the rest of us, the water is just totally unstable.
So he goes deeper into the chaos of the sea when he's thrown out.
He's in the ultimate state of confusion.
Let's look at Jonah chapter 2 verse 3 and look at some key verses on this.
In Jonah chapter 2 beginning in verse 3 it says,
For thou hadst cast me into the deep in the midst of the seas,
which is kind of an ironic statement since he literally is the one who said to them,
Throw me into the water.
He chose to be thrown overboard, of course.
But he says, Thou hadst cast me into the deep in the midst of the seas,
and the floods compassed me about.
Now, compassed means surrounded me, right?
The floods compassed me about.
All thy billows and thy waves passed over me.
Look at verse number 5.
The waters compassed me about even to the soul.
The depth closed me round about.
The weeds were wrapped about my head.
Now, what does that mean?
The waters compassed me about even to the soul, right?
The idea here is that he is 100% surrounded by water,
but that the water has also begun to enter his body
to the point where now his life is in danger.
His soul is in danger of expiring.
He's in danger of death.
He's at the point of death.
I mean, he's under the water, and he's starting to take in water,
and he is drowning is what the Bible is basically saying here.
He's totally surrounded in water.
He's underwater.
He's drowning.
The weeds are wrapped around his head and so forth.
And, of course, we know from chapter 1
that's when he is swallowed by the whale, okay?
In this state of drowning, being underwater,
he gets swallowed up by the whale.
In a sense, the whale saves his life,
but in another sense, it really just keeps him alive
in a bad place, you know, of confusion, darkness, instability, and whatever.
So here are some things that characterize Jonah's plight here
in the depths of the sea.
Number one, what is Jonah experiencing
when he's down in the depths of the sea,
both outside the whale and inside the whale?
He's experiencing darkness, right?
There's no light underneath the water, right?
Only toward the surface of the water is there any light.
This is why, even though the sea is very, very deep,
the vast majority of sea creatures all live right at the top, you know?
If you go snorkeling or scuba diving or anything,
you know, you're going to be looking at all the wildlife
in that part of the sea where the light can still get through
because most creatures, plants, animals, and everything,
they need the light.
Once you go down into the depths where there's no more light,
there is very little life going on down there.
It's just salt water, right?
And then every once in a while, there will be some weird, like,
animal that has its own light bulb sticking out of its head or whatever,
right, and these kind of, like, ghoulish-looking, gross-looking fish.
They don't have to be good-looking down there to get a date
because nobody's looking, you know?
It's so dark and dim down there that nobody cares what they look like,
so they're super ugly and just reproducing anyway.
No trouble getting a girlfriend, no matter how ugly they are down there.
And then, you know, all kinds of strange things down there.
But the vast majority of life in the sea is all right at the surface
because that's where the light is, because you go down just a little bit lower
and you enter the twilight zone.
That's literally what it's called.
And then below the twilight zone, you get into just total darkness, okay?
And that's where it's just, uh, you're in the...
And so Jonah, when he goes down into the water,
he sinks down into the water, he is entering the darkness.
And obviously, I think it's safe to assume that inside the whale's belly,
it's totally dark in there, right?
That's definitely a place that the sun don't shine.
And so he's in there, darkness, which represents a lack of awareness,
a lack of knowledge. You can't see what's going on.
But number two, instability, right?
It's unstable. There's no solid ground.
He's not standing on the rock.
He's just sort of floating around and just being tossed to...
He has no control over his situation. He's unstable.
Confusion, right? Because if you go deep enough in the water,
you stop knowing which way is up.
And this is why, because when you're toward the surface of the water,
the tendency is for you to sort of float back to the top a little bit, right?
But once you cross a certain threshold, actually you will begin to sink.
So only toward the surface do you tend to float to the top.
You go deep enough, you know, maybe I...
Don't quote me on this, but I want to say maybe like 10 meters or something,
it starts to change and there starts to be more of a downward pull
than an upward pull, okay?
And so there's confusion about which way is up,
you know, what's going on.
And then number four, this is important, helplessness.
He is in a helpless situation.
Only God can get him out of this situation.
No one else. His intelligence, his skills, his athleticism,
nothing can get him out of the situation.
Only God can get him out of the whale's belly.
Only God can get him out of those depths of the sea.
So let's kind of look at each of these individually quickly.
Number one, darkness, right?
So Jonah, in the state of confusion, is experiencing darkness.
And again, remember, what are we even talking about this morning?
We're talking about when a Christian is backslidden,
when a Christian's not following the Bible,
when they're just living their life their own way and doing what they want
and just blowing off God's rules and God's guardrails and guidelines for their life
and just going out and doing what they want,
leaning on their own understanding instead of what the Bible says.
This is the state they're going to be in.
They're going to be in a state of chaos.
And what does that look like?
Number one, it looks like darkness.
Why? Because the Bible says,
Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.
God's word shows us the way forward.
And if you're not following the Bible, you're not listening to God's word,
you're in darkness, you don't know where you're going.
The Bible says this in Proverbs chapter 4 verse 18,
The path of the just is as the shining light that shineth more and more unto the perfect day.
So when you're righteous and following the Bible,
you're walking in the light and every day it's getting brighter
because you're learning more about the Bible,
you're reading more Bible, you're hearing the word of God preached,
you're applying things and everything becomes clearer and clearer
and you can see further off into the future
and you understand where you're going and why.
The path of the just is as the shining light that shineth more and more unto the perfect day.
Right? Until just that ultimate enlightenment.
The way of the wicked is as darkness.
And here's the key, they know not at what they stumble.
Right? The way of the wicked is as darkness, they know not at what they stumble.
Here's what that means, is that they keep screwing up their lives and they can't figure out why.
They don't know what the problem is because they don't know at what they're stumbling.
Right? They know that they're stumbling, they know that they're tripping,
they know that they're falling, they know that they're face planting,
but they don't understand why.
Because the word of God not only tells you the right way to live your life,
it also explains to you what goes wrong.
And it's funny when people are living a sinful and wicked life
and screwing up their life, they don't know why
and so then they just start blaming everyone else.
Right? They start blaming other people for their own stupidity
because they don't know why their life is so messed up.
And you know what? Sometimes they even possibly begin to blame God.
It's God's fault. You know the Bible says this.
This is one of my favorite verses in Proverbs chapter 19 verse 3.
It says, the foolishness of man perverteth his way and his heart freteth against the Lord.
Did you hear that? The foolishness of man perverts his way.
Right? Man's own stupidity screws up his own life
and then he frets against the Lord.
Like, God, why are you doing this to me?
When in reality it was his own stupidity who screwed up his own life,
he then starts saying, oh God, why did you do this to me?
Or, oh, it's my parents' fault.
Oh, it's these people. It's the church's fault.
It's this guy's fault. It's her fault. It's his fault.
No, you need to take responsibility for your own actions.
At the end of the day, every man is going to bear his own burden, the Bible says.
And look, we need to be a generation that takes responsibility
because I'm telling you, in this generation, everybody's a victim.
Everybody wants to blame someone else.
Everybody wants to point the finger at someone else, why they're not living for God,
why they're not in church, why they have this issue and that issue.
No, you need to take responsibility for your own life and your own actions.
You want to find who's screwing up your life? Go look in the mirror.
And so they don't know what they stumble at because they're in total darkness
and so then they just make stuff up.
But at the end of the day, though, the Word of God would tell you what the problem is
and how to fix it.
So number one, this chaos of the backslidden,
the chaos of those who are not living for God,
the chaos of those even who are unsaved, of course.
They're not following the Word of God.
It's darkness.
But number two, it's also instability.
Go if you would to Matthew chapter seven.
Matthew chapter seven.
You see, only Jesus can walk on water.
And to the rest of us, it's a very unstable surface, right?
There's no stability there, right?
You're not on the rock.
And Jesus, of course, gave the famous parable.
I'll start reading it while you turn there.
Matthew 7 24.
You see, the person who has their life founded on the Lord Jesus Christ,
founded on the Word of God, they're following the Bible.
They're following the Word of God.
All the storms and all of the rains and the winds and the floods
come crashing against them.
They do not enter that state of chaos or confusion or instability
of without form and void kind of life.
No, they stand firm because they're on the rock.
And they don't, oh, it's the wind, oh, the rain, the flood.
No, they're just like, I'm not going anywhere.
Because I'm on the rock of Jesus Christ and His Word.
Everyone that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not,
verse 26, shall be like an unto foolish man,
which built his house upon the sand, and the rain descended,
and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house,
and it fell, and great was the fall of it, and it's all the rains fall,
and it's the winds fall, and it's the storms.
No, it's your fault for building on sand.
Look, the Bible also, and this isn't in my notes,
this isn't really part of the sermon,
but just as I'm thinking about this subject in the Bible,
sometimes the Bible will actually use floods of water
as an analogy for ungodly men.
And it'll say like, you know, the floods of ungodly men overwhelm me
or something like that in the book of Psalms.
It's not in my notes, it just popped into my mind.
And here's the thing.
You know, when people attack you and people do wrong to you,
yeah, you know what, that can be hurtful,
but you know what, if you're founded on the rock, you're going to get through it.
You know what I mean?
When people revile you or say all manner of evil against you falsely for Christ's sake,
or if people harm you, malign you, lie about you, slander you,
attack you, steal from you, rob you, assault you, whatever.
You know, whatever those things are, you end up still serving God
if you're founded on the rock,
because you can withstand whatever life throws at you.
And God's not going to allow you to be tempted above that you're able.
And sometimes God will bring us to the brink of what we're able to handle.
But you know what?
He always provides a way for us to get through it.
He giveth more grace.
There's a way for you to stay standing in this life no matter what happens.
Okay?
And if you crash and burn in your life, and you're not going to church,
and you're not serving God, and you're not reading the Bible,
you're not just, you know what?
You're the problem.
Because you know what, if you're founded on Jesus, if you're founded on the rock,
even if your church let you down, even if your pastor let you down,
even if your friends let you down, whatever,
you know, at the end of the day, Jesus is never going to let you down.
So if you're really founded on Christ and his word,
the Bible's always going to guide you to the next step.
I mean, look, I could be beaten and arrested and thrown, you know,
I'd still just be living my life according to God's word,
and I would still be on solid ground no matter where the world took me,
no matter where life took me.
In any situation, I could have stability in my life because I'm founded on the rock.
But when you are not founded on the clear,
and look, when we talk about being founded on the word,
I'm talking about the literal sentences that are in this book right here.
I'm not just talking about some abstract like word of God.
I'm talking about the word of God.
I'm talking about sentences and paragraphs and chapters in this book,
and you say, this is my world view, this is who I am,
this is what I do, this is what I don't do.
You know what?
That's going to take you all the way to the finish line, my friend.
You are founded on the rock.
But if you're founded on what's popular today, what people think,
public opinion, culture, American culture, Arizona law, United States law,
that stuff's always changing.
It can't stop changing.
The culture is going to keep changing.
Everything's going to change.
The Bible doesn't change.
Everything else is shifting sand.
If you're stuck on a certain church or a certain denomination
or a certain thing, you know what, at the end of the day,
those things ultimately end up changing.
Only a firm foundation on the word of God,
the literal written word of God right here,
that's the only thing that's really going to get you
all the way to the finish line.
And that's what the Bible's saying here.
So number one, we said darkness.
Number two, instability.
Number three, confusion.
Confusion, right?
I mean, look, you be confused.
If you're down in the depths, you don't know which way is up,
it's dark, you're confused.
Because I always thought, well, if I ever get in deep water
and I don't know which way is up and I get confused,
I'm going to blow bubbles out of my mouth and see which way the bubbles go.
Right?
And that's a tip that I read somewhere one time.
If you're underwater and you're getting tossed by the waves
and you're confused about which way is up,
because some people will start swimming down and drown
because they're confused, right?
So one way is you blow the bubble.
This might save your life someday, by the way.
You blow the bubbles and see which way the bubbles go.
Follow the bubbles.
But guess what?
When it's dark, you're not going to be able to follow the bubbles
in the dark because you're not going to see the bubbles
because you're going to be totally confused.
And you're going to have no orientation.
You're not going to feel gravity normally
because you're going to be in that zone
where you're literally switching from floating to the top
and sinking to the bottom.
Because like I said, this is just scientific fact,
when you're swimming in the water, if you swim down six or seven feet
and you just go limp, you're going to start floating back to the top.
But you go down deep enough and that will not happen anymore.
You go down deep enough and you will just start dropping.
And gravity will begin to pull you down again.
But what about the in-between phase
when you're switching from being pulled up to being pulled down?
You'll be in a zone where just you're not being pulled at all.
You're just floating around.
You're confused.
You don't know what's going on.
Let me give you, you don't have to turn there,
but I'll give you a few verses on this.
Job, chapter 12, verse 24.
He taketh away the heart of the chief of the people of the earth
and causes them to wander in a wilderness where there is no way.
Right?
A wilderness where there is no way.
What does that mean?
It's talking about a wasteland, a forest, a desert, and there's no path.
Right?
Have you ever gone into the woods and you're not on a path?
You're just bushwhacking through wilderness.
And there's no trail.
You're just kind of just making a trail, bushwhacking.
That's what he's saying.
God takes away the heart of the chief of the people of the earth,
meaning he takes away their good sense.
He takes away their brains and causes them to make these stupid decisions
that cause them to wander in a wilderness where there is no way.
There's no way.
You don't know what's the way forward.
Where's the path?
There's no trail markers.
I'm in the middle of the wilderness and I don't know where to go.
Every step I take could be taking me further away from the destination.
I'm swimming.
Maybe I'm swimming deeper into the water.
Maybe I'm not even heading for the surface.
I don't even know.
See, here's the thing.
When you are serving God, your life always has purpose.
And there's always a path.
And your life always has direction.
And you always know which way is up.
But, you know, you get outside of the confines of God's word and who knows?
Are you getting closer to your goal or further away from the goal?
Who knows?
You don't know.
They grope in the dark without light, the Bible says.
And he makes them to stagger like a drunken man.
I see a lot of these same themes keep coming up.
And then, fourthly, because we said, number one, darkness.
Number two, instability.
Number three, confusion.
Number four, helplessness.
Go, if you would, to Lamentations Chapter 3.
We're going to look at Lamentations 3 and Jonah 2.
We're going to kind of compare those two.
So if you want to put your finger in both places.
Lamentations 3 and Jonah 2.
Helplessness.
You see, only God can get Jonah out of this situation that he's in.
I mean, only God can save him.
He's way down in the water.
He's in the belly of the whale.
He can't get himself out.
He can't just climb out of this.
Okay?
Only God can get him out of the situation.
Now I want to show you a similar scripture in Lamentations Chapter 3.
It's very similar to Jonah Chapter 2.
It says in Lamentations 3, 54, waters flowed over mine head.
Does that sound familiar?
Right?
Because in Jonah it said, in verse 3, all thy billows and thy waves passed over me.
Waters flowed over my head.
Then I said, I'm cut off.
And again, in Jonah, then I said, I'm cast out of thy sight.
So do you see the similarity here?
In Jonah, he's saying, the billows and waves are rolling over my head.
And I said, I'm cast out of thy sight.
In Lamentations says, water flowed over my head.
I said, I'm cut off.
Very similar, right?
Verse number 55, it says, I called upon thy name, O Lord, out of the low dungeon.
Thou hast heard my voice.
Hide not thine ear at my breathing, at my cry.
Thou drewest near in the day that I called upon thee.
Thou seest fear not.
O Lord, thou hast pleaded the causes of my soul.
Thou hast redeemed my life.
Again, very similar to what Jonah says.
He cried to the Lord.
The Lord heard him.
The Lord saved him out of his distresses.
So what we see from both Jonah 2 and Lamentations 3, it's never too late for a saved Christian
to turn back to God.
To get right with God.
It's never too late, as long as you're a saved Christian and you're breathing air,
to get right with God.
To get back in church, back in the Bible, back out soul winning, back living for God.
God will hear you if you call out to him.
Right?
Even when people are in the lowest dungeon, like in Lamentations chapter 3, the lowest
dungeon and the dungeon begins to be flooded and the waters go over their head, if they
cry out to God, God can still hear them.
God's still listening.
Even when Jonah says, I'm cast out of thy sight, God can still see him.
Even through all that water, even through the darkness of the depths, even through all
that blubber of the whale, God still can see him and hear his cry.
And so even the Christian who is super backslidden in the depths of sin and despair, you know,
they can come back from that.
And here's the thing about that, is that actually, that's usually where they have to end up getting
before they come back, unfortunately.
Sometimes people have to hit rock bottom, like the prodigal son, where they're literally
starving to death, and then all of a sudden, now they get their mind right.
Now, all of a sudden, they're thinking straight.
You know, sometimes people do have to be swallowed by the whale.
I mean, wouldn't you think that the storm would be enough?
When he's in the ship, there's a storm raging, you think he'd be like, okay, this isn't going
to work.
We're not making it to Tarshish.
Maybe I should just do what I'm supposed to do.
But instead, he gets stubborn and he has to hit where he's got to go lower.
He's got to hit rock bottom.
People have to go sometimes to that lowest dungeon.
And they've got to wait until the water's over their head, but the good news is, when
they cry out to God, he will hear and he will restore you to dry land and daylight.
Right?
Back to what we talked about in Genesis chapter 1.
You know, in Genesis chapter 1, there's that initial primordial state of chaos, right?
The earth is without form and void.
Darkness is upon the face of the deep.
What does deep mean?
We're talking about water, the depth of water.
And that's why it says the Spirit of God moved on the face of the waters.
Primordial chaos was an earth covered in waters without form void, darkness upon the face
of the deep.
God brought order to the chaos by creating the light, separating the light from the darkness.
Now we can see what's going on.
When he causes the waters to be gathered together into one place so that the dry land appears,
now we know which part of the earth we're even looking at.
Because I mean, if the earth were just totally covered in water, you wouldn't be like, oh,
there's Arizona, there's Africa, there's Mexico, right?
But if we look at a satellite image of earth now, we could tell you there's Madagascar,
there's Europe, right?
There's Kamchatka, because I play Risk.
And you're going to know all these things, right?
Whereas without seeing the earth, meaning the dry land sticking out, you'd just be looking
at a ball of water and it would all just be confusion.
And if you were on the surface of that planet, it would be totally unstable.
You'd be confused.
And so that's what we see.
How did God bring order?
He brought them light and dry land, right?
And then what does he do for Jonah?
He brings Jonah to the light and to the dry land.
Because what does it say in verse number 10 of Jonah chapter 2?
The Lord spake unto the fish and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land.
And so now Jonah is on firm footing.
He's got stability in his life now.
He's got daylight.
He can see what's going on.
He can see where he's going.
He's no longer confused about which way is up and which way is down.
It's totally obvious to him now what needs to happen.
And then the word of the Lord comes to him a second time in chapter 3 and he has direction.
He's got firm footing.
He's got direction.
He's got purpose.
He knows what to do.
He knows where to go.
He's not just floundering in chaos.
A couple of last scriptures and then I'll be done.
We're going to look at Psalm 40 and then Psalm 130.
Psalm 40 and Psalm 130.
So we'll start with Psalm 40 verse 1.
I waited patiently for the Lord and he inclined unto me and heard my cry.
He brought me up also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay and set my feet upon
a rock and established my goings and he had put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto
our God, many shall see it and fear and shall trust in the Lord.
He said, look, when you're in that miry pit, when you're in the muck and the mire and the
mud and the seaweed and the water and the slop and you are in an unstable, confused
place, call out to God, get right with God and listen to the word of God.
Psalm 130, another famous verse, Psalm 130 verse 1, out of the depths have I cried unto
thee, O Lord.
Again the depths, right?
What are we talking about?
Over and over again.
Being in the water, being underwater, not having your head above water, drowning in
the depths, right?
It's a terrifying place to be, right?
Underwater, confused, thrashing around, waves crashing above your head.
You know, I don't know if anybody's ever had like a near drowning experience.
I can't really say that I have had an experience like that, but even just being in situations
that even hint at something like this is pretty scary.
You know, I remember we used to do a lot of river rafting and there were times that we
would ride different waterfalls and you know, the waterfall would kind of suck you under
and there's kind of that feeling of helplessness because you can't fight that current and you
got to just ride that thing out and we would go off some waterfalls that sometimes would
hold us under for about, you know, eight or 10 seconds.
And even though you know it's going to spit you out, it's a scary feeling.
Being held underwater by the forces of nature or just being out in the ocean sometimes and
it can get a little bit rough and so forth.
Like I said, I haven't really had a near drowning experience.
My dad had a near drowning experience that he would, he would talk about a lot because
it was so traumatic, but we were rafting down the Walker River in Nevada and he ended up
getting thrown out of the raft and some rapids and he got stuck under water and he was stuck
under some trees.
And so he's trying to come up from the water and the, the current is holding him in this
one place, but then the trees are keeping him from getting his head above the water.
So he's just, he's coming up and just hitting branches and I forget what the solution was.
I think he finally just had to bust through some branches and get a breath or something.
But you know, it was pretty traumatic, right?
Listen to me.
That is the kind of life you can expect to live as a Christian young person who goes
out and wants to live a sinful, worldly life, okay?
Or let's say you're a person who got saved as an adult and you've been living for God
for a while and you decide, you know what, I'm going to go back to my old way of life.
I'm going to go back into the world.
I'm going to go back to the sinful way of life.
I'm going to leave my spouse.
I'm going to go out and pick up drinking again or drugs again.
This is the life that you can expect, expect to enter a world of confusion.
And you know what?
It doesn't matter how bad things are in your life.
At least if you can see where you're going, at least if you have a path forward, at least
if you know what's right and what's wrong.
You know what?
I would much rather be on a trail that I knew and understood, knowing that I had a long
hard way ahead of me, but at least knowing what that is, than to just be in a place where
it's just unknown.
You know, it's like when you're downloading a file on your computer, you'd rather see
it tell you, hey, it's going to be an hour and 47 minutes.
It's like, okay, whatever.
Then when it's just like unknown file size, unknown time remaining unknown, you know,
it's like, am I, I don't even know, am I even making progress?
Sorry.
I have to, you know, I have to get the, the, the, some of the computer geeks might not
be able to relate to all these like outdoor kind of illustrations.
So I'm trying to get on their level here, you know, with the download, but you see what
I'm saying?
What could be worse than the unknown file size and the unknown time remaining on the
download?
It's the not knowing.
And you know what?
There's a lot to be said for always knowing where you stand.
Good times, bad times, pain, comfort, joy, sorrow.
There's a lot to be said for knowing where you stand, what you're doing, where you're
going and why.
And living for God provides you that.
Out of the depths of I cried unto thee, O Lord, Lord, hear my voice.
Let thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications.
If thou Lord shows mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand?
But there's forgiveness with thee that thou mayest be feared.
I wait for the Lord.
My soul doth wait, and in his word do I hope.
My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning.
I say more than they that watch for the morning.
Again, darkness, profundity, right, being in the depths.
But yet the Lord is the answer.
He's the way out.
It's not too late as a Christian to get back on track, to get back in the game, serving
God, doing right.
Do not go into those waters, my friend, right?
Stay on the dry land.
Stay on the rock.
Do not get in that ship sailing away from church and the things of God and reading your
Bible and winning souls to Christ and doing all the things that you know that you should
be doing.
And look, obviously serving God can be difficult at times.
The Christian life can be difficult.
And obviously there are going to be good times and bad times.
But look, at the end of the day, though, if you go off that cliff, if you pull a Jonah,
if you go out and start rebelling against the Lord, I'm telling you, your life is not
going to get better, okay?
It might seem like that's an answer, that that's, you know, hey, I can just get on this
ship and go to Tarshish.
You're not going to Tarshish.
You will never reach Tarshish.
It's not like, hmm, Nineveh or Tarshish.
Those aren't the choices.
The choices are Nineveh or the depths of the sea.
Those are your two choices.
Nineveh or the bottoms of the mountains.
Those are your choices.
Okay, it's not Nineveh or Tarshish.
Tarshish is off the table.
Now look, you say, well, people go to Tarshish all the time.
Yeah, unsaved people.
Unsaved people live in Tarshish.
Unsaved people travel to Tarshish.
They vacation in Tarshish.
There's no issue.
You could get on a plane right now and literally fly to Tarshish, right?
But here's the thing.
If you're a saved Christian, God's not letting you go to Tarshish.
He is going to mess you up along the way.
And by the way, he's going to mess up all your friends too.
He's going to mess up the people who are hanging around with you.
And they're going to throw you overboard so that you can get even more messed up.
This is the message of the book of Jonah.
And we need to take it to heart as Christians and we need to make sure that we are firmly
established on the rock.
And look, this isn't some ethereal, vague sermon today.
This isn't just a platitude that I'm giving you of keep God number one and be all the
stuff found on the rock.
My friend, I'm talking about you better base what you believe, what you do, and what you
don't do on this exact book that I'm holding in my hand right here, the Holy Bible Authorized
Version in English right here for you.
This book is going to be a rock for your life.
I'm talking about, oh, what does the Bible say?
That's what I'm going to do.
Oh, what does the Bible say about that?
That's what I believe about that.
Oh, the Bible says not to do that.
I'm not going to do that.
Okay.
This is the way to have stability and light and a way forward in your life.
Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for the book of Jonah and the lessons that we can learn
from the life of Jonah.
Lord God, help us to avoid those waters of chaos, Lord.
We know that it's your will to bring light to the darkness, to bring dry land to the
watery abyss.
Lord God, help us not to willingly, after we've already been saved, after we've already
had our eyes opened, Lord help us not to stupidly and foolishly go back into the cesspool from
which we came.
Lord God, help us to not only be saved but also to live a life that is in accordance
with your word.
Thank you, Lord, that we can never lose our salvation and that no matter how far we go
from your will, no matter how deep into the water we sink, you will always hear us because
we will always be your children and we know that we are still saved and that no matter
what happens, it's never too late while we're breathing air to actually come back and live
a life that has value and in Jesus' name we pray, amen.
Take your hymnals, please.
Go to hymn 115, hymn number 115.
No one ever cared for me like Jesus.
Hymn number 115.
We'll lift our voices together on that verse.
I would love to tell you what I think of Jesus, hymn 115.
No one ever cared for me like Jesus.
There's no other friend so kind as he.
No one else could take the sin and darkness from me.
Oh, how much he cared for me.
All my life was full of sin when Jesus found me.
All my heart was full of misery and woe.
Jesus placed his strong and loving arms about me and he led me in the way I ought to go.
No one ever cared for me like Jesus.
There's no other friend so kind as he.
No one else could take the sin and darkness from me.
Oh, how much he cared for me.
Every day he comes to me with new assurance.
More and more I understand his words of love.
But I'll never know just why he came to save me.
Till someday I see his blessed face above.
No one ever cared for me like Jesus.
There's no other friend so kind as he.
No one else could take the sin and darkness from me.
Oh, how much he cared for me.
No one else could take the sin and darkness from me.
Thank you.