Father, each of us know people who have a real problem with anger, and Father, we just lift them before you at this time.
Father, you know that there are some of us here who have great problems with anger,
and some of us, Father, who don't know that we have anger problems or anger issues at all,
and we ask that you, with gentle but loving power, make that clear to us.
But, Father, we also know that we often get angry, and sometimes we regret it, and sometimes we don't, but we should,
and we're just confused about anger.
We ask that you would speak to our hearts this morning.
You'd bring your word, your grace, your gospel to our hearts,
that we might live well in the face of injustice,
that we might live with anger in a way that is good for people and good for us and brings you glory.
And so we want to know your wisdom.
So pour out the Holy Spirit, and we ask this in the name of Jesus, your Son and our Savior.
Amen.
Please be seated.
If you Google this question about negative emotions,
and, of course, when you Google something, you always get the right answer.
But if you Google things about negative emotions,
on all of the lists that I looked at,
the first list that come up in every single case, anger,
is listed as one of the negative emotions.
In fact, it's often the first negative emotion which is listed.
But last week, I talked about how if the day ever came that in Canada,
every Canadian was doing a meditation technique,
or a type of meditation that meant that they didn't get angry,
or if every Canadian was in a type of therapy or counseling
which meant that they didn't get angry,
or if every Canadian was taking a drug that meant that they wouldn't get angry,
if in any one of those three situations or a combination of that day came
when something came that nobody in Canada or nobody in any country was getting mad,
getting angry,
that would be the day that tyrants and oppressors and abusers
would throw a party and dance a jig
because it would mean that they weren't being confronted ever
by the wrong that they were doing.
And so, the fact of the matter is that the Lord will never,
part of God's common grace is that God in his common grace
will never remove from human beings their sense of anger
because to do that, he'd have to destroy our sense of right and wrong.
Now, having said that, we all know that anger still is problematic in all sorts of ways.
Some of us get too angry.
Some of us don't get angry when we should because we've been so beat up.
Some of us get angry about the wrong things.
Some of us, anger becomes a type of an addiction, a type of habit.
And often, our anger leads to hatred.
And it's like a drug and it can do all sorts of harm.
But so, it's just complicated.
Anger is complicated.
Well, believe it or not, the story that we're going to look at is the book of Jonah comes to an end.
This book that was written over 2,700 years ago, almost 2,800 years ago,
this book that was written so long ago has such deep wisdom about anger.
So, it'd be a great help to me if you would turn in your Bibles to Jonah chapter 4.
Jonah chapter 4.
And we're looking at the fifth verse.
We've been preaching through the book of Jonah.
And as I've shared before, the way to look at the book of Jonah, the way to understand it,
as you're reading it, is to think of a Netflix series that had four or five episodes.
I've taken, in a sense, the fourth episode and turned it into two.
And, you know, if you see a good Netflix series from the BBC or from Germany or France or Belgium or something like that,
each episode tells a story.
But if you look at all of the episodes together, they tell a far more nuanced and interesting story.
And that's the way to understand the book of Jonah.
So, if you were making a Netflix special for it,
Jonah chapter 1 tells the story of God wanting Jonah to go to Nineveh,
the capital of the most powerful empire in the ancient Near East,
to go there and confront them.
Jonah doesn't want to do this.
He goes the opposite direction.
And that part of the story of Jonah, many people, secular people, people of other religions,
they know this part of the story.
It becomes clear that Jonah is the one responsible for the storm.
He's thrown overboard.
End of episode 1, great cliffhanger.
Episode 2, a great aquatic beast, just as Jonah's about to drown,
a great aquatic beast comes, swallows Jonah, and Jonah discovers that rather than being dead, he's alive.
Unfortunately, the good news, he's not dead, he's alive.
The bad news is he's in the intestines of a great aquatic beast.
And how he describes what happens, he does in the form of a prayer,
which is also a bit of a conversion prayer.
Him just being, in a sense, gobsmacked at the mercy of God and the kindness of God
and his trust in God that God will deliver him.
And episode 2 ends with Jonah being vomited by the great aquatic beast onto the shore.
End of episode 2.
Episode 3, he goes to Nineveh.
He proclaims the message.
He says, if you don't repent, you will be overthrown in the same way that Sodom and Gomorrah were overthrown,
completely and utterly.
And to his complete and utter shock and amazement,
well, not entirely, but to our shock and amazement,
Nineveh repents from the king right down to the lowest individual.
And what they do is they say, even though this is a message which seems that we have no hope,
we are going to repent of our violence, our evil, and our injustice,
and we are going to cast ourselves upon the mercy of the Lord
in the hope that he will have mercy upon us.
And God relents from his justice upon them,
which would then make you wonder why on earth could there be any episodes after that?
Well, the episodes after it go at a very interesting thing
because, you see, the fact of the matter is,
is that the Bible and the Lord is concerned not just with what we do,
but the motivation of what we do,
the motivation behind why we do things,
what we want to have happen,
is also very important in trying to understand what's going on in our lives.
And so what we looked at last week, the first four verses,
is this shocking thing that the reason that Jonah had run away from God
was because he believed that God was merciful and compassionate and all-powerful,
and that it might very well be that if he went to Nineveh
and proclaimed their need to repent, they might repent,
and if they repented, God might not destroy them.
And Jonah hated the Ninevites so much,
he didn't want them to be spared.
He wanted God to destroy them.
And we looked at that last week.
But now, and we looked at it, we talked about it in terms of mercy.
But if you think about it for a second,
and many people in the ancient world,
when they were reading this for the first time,
they would have maybe said,
well, one moment, before we go any farther,
I don't know if Jonah was wrong to be angry,
and I don't know if maybe God, the Lord was,
like maybe Jonah was right to be angry at what the Lord did,
and maybe what the Lord did was wrong.
Like, they are, you know, I don't know if I said this last week,
I've said it, you know, some other time,
and you might or might not remember it,
but the fact of the matter is that Nineveh,
the Assyrian Empire,
literally, literally practiced genocide.
They literally practiced genocide.
And in fact, about,
if this was written around 755 BC,
33 years after this,
Assyria would reinvade the northern kingdom of Israel,
take all of the people away
in bondage and slavery,
and the ten and a half tribes
that made up what was then known as Israel
completely disappeared from history.
Like, real genocide,
real, complete, utter, thorough genocide.
These were bad people.
And many people in the ancient world,
reading this in 755 or 722 or 700,
they'd go, I don't know, you know,
maybe I don't know about this story,
what's going on with this story.
So that's why the story continues.
The Lord is going to press in,
and we're going to see,
well, let's just see what happens.
Look at verse 5.
So remember, what's just happened is
Jonah blasts the Lord
and says, I'm so angry, I want to die.
He blasts the Lord.
The Lord asks him a question.
Do you think it's right for you to be angry?
Verse 5, Jonah responds,
in verse 5,
Jonah went out of the city of Nineveh
and sat to the east of the city
and made a booth for himself there.
He sat under it in the shade
till he should see
what would become of the city.
In other words,
Jonah hopes,
I've just given the Lord a blast
and I think I'm right
and I think he's wrong
and I'm going to give him a blast
and I hope I've changed his mind.
So I'm going to just sit out here,
still angry,
and I'm going to make something
so I have a bit of shade
and I'm just going to sit
hoping that the Lord changes his mind
and fire comes down from heaven
and completely obliterates
and kills all of the people in Nineveh.
That's where Jonah is.
Well, does the Lord change his mind?
Well, let's see what happens
in verse chapter 6.
There's sort of a surprising thing
that happens in verse 6.
Now, the Lord God appointed a plant
and made it come up over Jonah
that it might be a shade over his head
to save him from his discomfort.
So Jonah was exceedingly glad
because of the plant.
Now, just pause.
What's described here,
the word appointed is very important.
It shows the Lord being sovereign
over the world.
It's the Lord appoints
a great aquatic beast to it.
Just the perfect time swallowed Jonah
and he appoints the plant.
You're going to see in a moment
he's going to appoint a worm.
He's going to appoint a scorching wind
and it shows how the Lord is sovereign.
But what the Lord does here
is he causes a plant to grow
very, very quickly
and it would have been like a vine
that sort of entwined itself
over the booth
and it would have had
very, very large leaves.
So while the booth itself,
which would have just been made out of sticks,
wouldn't have provided very much shade,
all of a sudden with the leaves
it would have provided
very, very good shade.
I don't know how many of you
have been in a country
like Iraq or like Israel.
The heat is if you're,
I mean, not if you're down by the ocean,
but in where this is,
it's a dry heat.
And so when it's a dry heat,
it means if you're in the shade
and there's a breeze,
it actually can be surprisingly comfortable
even though the temperature
might be quite high.
And so the Lord does this.
And there's sort of an interesting thing
in the original language.
The language is that
when it says the Lord wants to save him,
what it's saying is that
the Lord hopes
that by cooling Jonah off,
he can cool off his anger as well.
Because as we all know,
sometimes if things are just going wrong,
if you're a bit in pain,
you're more grumpy.
I shared last week,
I can get hungry
and not realize that
because I'm hungry,
I'm getting more grumpy.
Somebody in fact told me
there's a word for it,
hangry.
H before the word angry.
And so I can be prone
to being hangry.
And so there's a similar type of thing
that goes on here.
And then it says that
Jonah's exceedingly glad.
And it's a link
to what just happened
in the previous story.
Because if you go back
and read verse 1,
Jonah is exceedingly,
like just hopping,
unbelievably deeply
high level angry
that the Lord didn't destroy Nineveh.
And now that same description
of just unbelievably fever pitch,
but now he's happy.
He's happy over the plant.
And it's connecting the two stories
at the level of the original language.
So what's going to happen now?
Is Jonah in fact going to say,
oh yeah,
okay, now that I'm a bit cool
and there's a breeze,
I don't know,
yeah, maybe I have to tone down
my anger a little bit.
Maybe the Lord was right.
I'm a little bit too angry.
Well, let's see what happens.
Verse 7,
but when dawn came up the next day,
God appointed a worm
that attacked the plant.
Actually, in the original language,
if you use real technical language,
it's smite.
It's an old-fashioned word,
you know,
like he has a sword,
you smite,
he smites the plant.
And sorry,
I like old words.
I just,
for the three of you
out there in the room,
that's how you could translate it
who like old words.
We'll read verse 7 again,
but when dawn came up the next day,
God appointed a worm
that attacked the plant
so that it withered.
In other words,
it dies.
And when the sun rose,
God appointed a scorching east wind
and the sun beat down
on the head of Jonah
so that he was faint.
And he asked that he might die
and said,
it is better for me
to die than to live.
He'd said that before.
He was so angry,
it would be better for him
to die than to live.
He says that in the previous story.
But God said to Jonah,
do you do well
to be angry for the plant?
And Jonah said,
yes,
I do well to be angry,
angry enough to die.
That's what he says.
I probably should have said that
without a smile
to be really communicate the anger.
And just sort of pause there.
Earlier,
as I shared,
the same type of question
was asked in the previous story,
do you do well to be angry?
And it's very interesting.
In the original language,
it does something
which you can't really do in English.
There's many of you here
who speak multiple languages.
And you know how sometimes
it's complicated
to try to communicate something
in another language.
And that's one of these cases.
And really,
the question
could be understood two ways
or the same way,
but with two different senses.
Part of it is
just asking Jonah,
do you realize how angry you are?
Do you realize
how thoroughly,
completely consumed
you are with anger?
I've done counseling sessions
with people.
It's so,
like it's not funny,
but it is funny.
And I sit there
and they're across from me
and they're red.
They're red.
You can see veins
throbbing in their temples.
And they're either sitting there
grabbing the tape,
the arms like this,
or they're tapping furiously.
And I might eventually say,
do you think you,
like,
you're really angry?
I'm not angry.
They say in an angry voice.
And you can't even do any counseling
until you get them to realize,
one second,
just time out here,
you're angry.
You don't realize you're angry,
but you're really angry.
Okay,
and you can't have
any other conversation
about anything else
until the person realizes
how angry they are.
So this is like
a modern counseling question
that the Lord asks them.
First of all,
do you realize
how angry you actually are?
And the second sense of it,
it could also,
and some of your English versions
show the two different senses.
The other question is,
is it right that you're so angry?
Like,
do you think it's right
that you're so angry
over this?
Just this,
I know that,
you know,
in modern counseling,
you're not supposed to say,
you know,
make judgmental comments
about emotions
and all of that type of stuff,
but that's wrong.
It's just sometimes just wrong.
Sometimes it's very right.
You know,
a person has their emotions,
but sometimes you have to,
in fact,
in counseling,
you often go off,
you often use emotions
as a key
to figure out
what's actually going on
because emotions show
what we value,
what we think is important.
It reveals our moral order.
It reveals the idols
that we have.
That's what emotions
often reveal.
Or the good things,
not all bad things
because sometimes
it reveals a good sense
of,
a good way
of understanding the world
and they're very healthy,
but they reveal things.
I was just talking
to somebody
within the last couple of weeks.
This is a professional
and the court
had asked
that he do an assessment
of a person
around a particular issue
that was within
his medical area
of expertise
because it affected
whether or not
a certain type
of sentencing
was going on
and the person,
it was a very,
very serious offense.
It could mean
a long time
doing hard time
in jail.
And basically,
as he was sharing
this with me
and he was sort of
laughing about it
a little bit,
the person tried
to fake it
and they were doing
a terrible job
of faking it
and he eventually
just said,
okay,
you don't have
this condition,
you're just trying
to fake it.
And as they left
the room,
they were furious
with him
because they were
trying to manipulate
the medical assessment
so they could get out
of doing hard time
and he caught them
and their response
wasn't,
oh,
I'm so relieved
I don't have it.
No,
they were,
I won't say
all the different
F-bombs
and other types
of expletives
that they used
as they walked
out of the room
shaking with fury.
Sometimes what
we're angry about,
as we all know,
isn't right
and it's good
to confront them.
So here,
just to bring it
back to the story,
so what's happened?
God has had,
has shown mercy
to Nineveh.
They,
when they're,
they come face-to-face
with God,
their response
to coming face-to-face
to the Lord
is to say
that we're going
to stop acting unjustly,
we're going to stop
doing that which is evil
and we're going to stop
all of our habits
of violence
and we're going
to cast ourselves
upon the mercy
of the Lord
in the hope
that he will stay
his judgment
and the Lord sees it
and he does stay it
and Jonah,
who's not a Ninevite,
not an Assyrian,
he's furious
over this.
He's furious
and remember I said,
well,
maybe there's something,
maybe Jonah had,
maybe God's bit,
the Lord's a bit wrong
to show that
and maybe Jonah
has something right
but now this instance
with the plant,
the plant grows,
the plant dies,
Jonah's furious,
furious,
furious at the death
of a plant
and now the Lord
is going to ask
two very,
another very searching
question.
Remember,
he's already said,
do you think it's,
do you realize how angry
you are?
Do you think it's right
to be so angry
over the plant?
Is it right for you
to be so consumed
with anger
over the death
of a plant?
And Jonah's response
is,
I'm so angry
I could die
and then here's
how the Lord goes on
and the book of Jonah
is very interesting.
The only other book
in the Bible
is Lamentations.
It's the only other book
in the Bible
that ends with a question
and everything
in the book of Jonah
is leading
to these last two verses
where the Lord
is going to ask
a question
and here's how it goes.
And the Lord said,
verse 10,
you pity the plant.
The other way
you can translate
that word pity
is you have compassion
and want to do something
out of compassion
for the plant.
You pity
or you have compassion
for the plant
for which you did not labor
nor did you make it grow
which came into being
in a night
and perished in a night.
In other words,
if you know anything
about plants,
those are plants
that don't last very long.
They're very,
very transient.
Here's the big question.
Verse 11,
And should I not have compassion?
Should I not have pity
on Nineveh?
That great city
in which there are
more than 120,000 people
who do not know
their right hand
from their left
and also much cattle.
And that's how
the book of Jonah ends.
Shouldn't I have compassion
and pity on people?
Shouldn't I have that?
That's how the book ends.
Just as a bit of an aside,
did you know
that the same man
who was responsible
for the long, long, long,
most responsible,
humanly speaking,
for the long, long struggle
in England
to ban all slavery,
William Wilberforce,
was also the man
who started
the first in the world
Society for the Prevention
of Cruelty to Animals.
Did you know that?
The same man
who worked
to abolish slavery
set up an SPCA,
the Society for the Prevention
of Cruelty to Animals.
The Lord has compassion
on animals.
And if the Lord
has compassion
and mercy
to animals,
we should too.
We should too.
Just a bit of an aside
as a throwaway.
So,
let's,
how do we bring
this all home?
Remember,
I began by saying
that if the day ever came
that through counseling,
therapy,
meditation,
or drugs
that we no longer
experienced anger,
then the husbands
who abused their wives,
the employers
who abused their employees,
the tyrants
who abused their people,
they would be happy
if people no longer
experienced anger.
And so,
we realized
that you don't,
that anger
is a complicated emotion
and that we don't want to,
we don't want to get rid of it
I mean,
that actually
wouldn't really be wise
because anger
is connected
even if our moral order
and moral understanding
is all confused
and even deeply confused,
you'd think you want to change
the order of understanding
of what's right and wrong
but not ever get rid of that aspect
that when we see
great evil being done,
great wrongdoing being done,
great sin being done,
great injustice being done,
that the proper response
should be that we are angry
at the injustice
and the wrong.
So,
it's complicated.
What we think about,
if you think about it
in a second,
is we want something
to disrupt anger
but not eliminate it
in a way
which also eliminates
our sense of right and wrong.
we want to disrupt anger
in the sense that
part of the problem
with anger
for us human beings
is that anger
very quickly leads
to hatred
and that anger
quickly leads
to something becoming
like a habit of anger
that we can go to anger
to relieve stress,
that we can go to anger
to make ourselves feel good
and lose sense
of the other person
and so on one hand,
anger is connected
to a sense of injustice
and wrongdoing.
On the other hand,
there is something problematic
in terms of where anger
can go
and so,
you need something
to disrupt the anger.
But here's the problem
in our culture.
Most of our attempts
to disrupt anger
want to give evil a pass.
Most of our attempts,
in fact,
all Buddhist compassion,
at the end of the day
is indifferent
to whether or not
we give evil a pass.
The meditation technique
is to lose that sense of self,
to see yourself
distant from yourself
and so you can just observe
the wrong
that you've either done
that's caused the anger
or the wrong
that somebody else is doing
and it's in a sense
an attempt to desensitize us
to the wrongness
of what has been done.
A lot of counseling
and therapy
is really just get over it,
which means,
okay, yeah,
they've done that
and just get over it.
In a sense,
it's advice to give it a pass
and if you take the drug
so that you don't show anger
or anything that happens,
once again,
it's giving evil a pass
and so,
part of the complication
with this is
how do we actually
disrupt anger
so that it doesn't lead
to hatred,
it doesn't become a habit,
it doesn't become an addiction,
but how do we do that?
One of the reasons
we don't want to practice forgiveness
is that for many people
in our culture,
the way we understand forgiveness
is it's going to mean
giving evil and injustice
a pass
and one of the reasons
we don't want to do
some other things about anger
is because it's going to give evil
a pass.
So,
is there something
that can disrupt anger
that does not give evil
and injustice
a pass
or say
that it's not evil?
that's what the book
of Jonah
tackles brilliantly
at the level of the story
because if you think about it,
we looked at it last week,
there's three things
in the Bible
that disrupt anger
in a good way.
If you could put up
the first point,
that would be very helpful.
I had a hard time
wording this point.
I'm not really satisfied
with how I worded it.
I couldn't figure out
how to fix it.
You know,
you folks can tell me
how to fix it later.
It's the best I could do.
Only that which is rooted
in a just moral order
can disrupt anger
in a good way.
Only that which is rooted
in a just moral order
can disrupt anger
in a good way.
Now,
I'm not going to say much
about it this way.
There's in a sense
one of the ways
to disrupt anger
in a good way
or to start to heal
our anger.
And for those of us
who struggle with anger,
and you know who you are,
we know who we are,
part of what we have to do
is not just pray
that we won't experience anger,
but partly what we need to do
is first pray
that the Lord
will heal
our sense of right and wrong.
It happens in the story
in a very simple way.
Okay, Jonah, really?
You don't think people
are worth more than a plant?
Like, really?
Plants matter more
than a human life?
Really?
Like, what moral order
does that come out of?
People matter more than plants.
They do.
So partly the story itself
in some small way
is trying to help us
to shape,
to reconsider
our moral order.
And for some of us,
you know,
we can get angry
about lots of things.
We can get angry
at the fact
that we're not making
enough money.
And in a sense,
what that is trying
to tell us
is that having a lot
of money
is very, very,
it's right
to have lots of money
and it's not right
to have lots of money.
Or we can get angry
because we're just not
losing that weight
that we want to lose.
And the fact of the matter
is,
is that losing weight
is good
and having it on
is bad.
Or we can have,
we can get angry
that we're just not
putting on the muscle.
Or we can have,
it can have angry,
we can get angry.
Here's the thing.
It is not a virtue
to have more money
than somebody else.
Bay Street,
it's not.
It's not.
It's not a sin
to be low income.
It might be a sin
if somebody's doing something
to force you
to be low income
because they're ripping you off.
That can be a sin.
But it's not a sin
to be low income.
It's not a sin
to have a few extra pounds
or not have as much muscles
or not be beautiful.
Just to be plain.
Those aren't moral things.
Those are things
in our culture
we get all upset about.
And so part of our prayer
can be the healing
of our understanding
of right and wrong.
But the Bible here
is going to go
to something deep
and I want to spend more time
on something different.
There's three things
that the Bible talks about
that are rooted
in the moral order
when you understand it properly.
You see,
if something's coming out of the,
since if we understand
that anger
is connected
to the moral order,
you get angry
at injustice,
you get angry at evil,
you get angry at sin,
you get angry at that,
it's connected
to the moral order.
So maybe if there's something
that's also rooted
in the moral order,
it can disrupt anger
in a way that's actually
going to be good
for people.
And the Bible has three things.
This story only talks
about one of them.
One of them is forgiveness.
Second is mercy,
which we talked about
last week.
And the third is this,
compassion.
Compassion not just
as a feeling
but as an action.
In the Bible,
compassion is never
just a feeling.
It's something which leads
to benevolent,
caring,
charitable,
generous action.
It's not just a feeling.
It's something
you see.
You see,
how is it?
Well, here,
you can put up
the next point.
True compassion
is clear-sighted
about what is unjust
and or wrong.
True compassion
is clear-sighted
about what is unjust
and or wrong.
You see,
that's why
so many of the
meditation techniques
and therapies
and drugs,
they're amoral.
And they want to dull
the sense of right and wrong
for you to move forward.
But compassion,
real compassion,
I'll give you an example
in a moment,
is clear-sighted
about right and wrong.
Could you put up
the next point?
Help to nuance it a bit.
True compassion
does not do wrong
or act unjustly.
Injustice and evil
are never,
injustice and evil
are never compassionate.
True compassion
does not do wrong
or act unjustly.
Injustice and evil
are never compassionate.
I'm going to lose you all,
but I'm just going to say
one thing.
That's one of the many,
many, many reasons
why euthanasia
is wrong
and it's not compassionate.
To take the life
of an innocent human being
is never compassionate.
To use the power
of the state,
true compassion
does not do wrong
or act unjustly.
Injustice and evil
are never compassionate.
You think about that
for a second.
Imagine that Trump
loses the next election
and the day before
he leads office
all of his friends
who are in trouble
and going to maybe
go to jail,
he pardons them all.
Would you say,
oh, it's so wonderful
that Trump is compassionate?
No, you would not say that.
You'd say,
that dirty rat.
Showing compassion.
And you know what?
If the Canadians
had the same power
and Trudeau did it
in his last day of office,
you'd say the same thing.
You would.
It's not compassion.
Okay?
If a manager
treats you terribly
and you complain
over their head
and the boss
says to you,
I think with your complaint
they've suffered enough.
I'm going to show compassion.
You'd go,
that's not compassion.
That's not compassion.
And by the way,
here,
I'll throw out
all of these points.
I'm using the word
evil, wrong, and sin.
They're all the same idea
in the Bible.
I've just used them,
varied them
for a different effect.
Evil, wrong, and sin.
Evil isn't sort of
really bad wrong things.
Wrong is evil.
Evil is wrong.
Sin is wrong.
Sin is evil.
Evil is sin.
You get the picture.
Now,
you know,
one of the things
is that
the Lord is described
in chapter 4 earlier
as being slow
to anger.
Why?
Because mercy,
as we talked about it
last week,
which is also
rooted in a clear-eyed
understanding
of right and wrong,
in a sense,
disrupts the anger
of the Lord,
in a sense.
It's a different thing
because he doesn't
experience passion.
Here we see the same thing
happening with compassion.
Well,
how on earth
does this work?
And why is it?
I mean,
on one level,
at a natural level,
people do show compassion,
but on the other hand,
there's a...
Here,
let's just talk a little bit
more about compassion.
If you could put up
the next point,
Andrew,
that would be great.
You cannot act
compassionately
without bearing
a personal cost.
You cannot
act compassionately
without bearing
a personal cost.
Otherwise,
it's just a feeling.
Good example.
Let's say,
you all know
I love going
to coffee places.
I have a great affection
for baristas.
There's all sorts
of reasons for it,
but one of the things...
And the same thing
with people who work
at McDonald's
or Tim Hortons.
You know what?
These guys and gals,
they're making minimum wage.
They could maybe
be better off
on welfare.
But they work.
They work hard.
I really admire it.
I really do.
They get up,
especially those
who work in Tim Hortons,
they wear those
ugly uniforms.
You know?
Or Burger King.
Ugly,
ugly,
ugly uniforms.
They show up on time.
They do a hard day's work.
They go home.
You know what?
There's all sorts
of other things
they could do to be late.
I admire them.
I really do.
Anyway,
so let's say a barista,
I find out that
they're going to be moving
and I say,
you know what?
You can borrow my car.
Here's the keys.
You can borrow my car.
I'm not doing anything
with it all day.
You borrow the car.
At the end of the day,
if they're borrowing the car,
I get a call
and they've wrecked my car.
And I can smell alcohol
off their breath.
Now let me tell you,
you all know
that I'm very,
very,
very wealthy
because I drive
a 1998 Honda Accord.
And nothing says
making lots of money
like driving
a 1998 Honda Accord,
which I got,
I think,
for $1,800.
But here's the thing.
It runs well.
Somebody totals
my 1998 Honda Accord,
I think I'd be lucky
to get $300
from an insurer.
and I will not be able
to replace my car
for $300.
So what do I do
to the barista?
And maybe I know
that that barista,
if I call the police,
you know,
and the insurance,
I decide I'm going
to just be justice.
You're drinking
and driving
and you wrecked my car.
There has to be
consequences for you.
That's justice.
But if I happen
to know as well
that, you know what,
they're going to start
a new job next week
and they need to be able
to have a driver's license,
if this comes out,
they might lose
their driver's license,
might lose their job,
might lose their opportunity
to no longer be making
$14 an hour
to start to move forward
with their life.
And I look at it
and I decide,
you know what,
I'm going to have
compassion on them.
I'm still out of car.
I'm out of car.
But I've acted
compassionately.
I haven't said,
oh yeah,
it's all right.
Yeah, go ahead.
Drink and drive.
Here I have a van
and a six-pack.
Go for a drive.
No.
I decide I'm going
to swallow it
out of compassion.
You cannot act
compassionately
without bearing
a personal cost.
And you can see
how compassion here
is still clear-eyed
about right and wrong.
It's based on
the moral order.
But I decide
I'm going to show
compassion to the barista
who's maybe heartbroken
over what they've done,
just pleading for mercy.
And I decide
I'm going to show
compassion.
I'm going to show
compassion maybe
because I,
for a whole,
I won't go into
the reasons for it,
but I do it.
It's going to glorify
the Lord.
It's good for that person.
And I'll get over
the finances,
but it's going to be
good for them
and it's going to also
bring glory to the Lord
that I'm going to
forgive them.
I'm going to forgive the debt.
If you could put up
the next point.
On the cross,
we see the Lord himself
bearing the cost.
We see the Lord himself
bear the cost
of showing you
compassion.
You see,
one of the things
about this whole story
with the book of Jonah
is there's a riddle
in this story.
And the riddle
in this story is,
you know what,
the fact of the matter is
is the Ninevites
have been doing
terrible, terrible,
terrible things
and it seems
as if they get off.
One of the things
to understand
about this story
is that when the Lord
shows compassion
in that particular case,
it doesn't mean
he drops the charges,
so to speak,
against the Ninevites,
but they're stayed.
By stayed,
it means
if you're charged
with an offense
and I wish we had Victor here,
I think I'm getting this right,
and they stay the charges,
it means they can still
be brought up.
It just means
you're not going forward
with the prosecution.
And at the same,
maybe that's Victor calling
to give us that I got that right.
And it's the same thing,
at the end of the day,
every single human being
is going to appear
before the judgment seat of God
and nobody gets away
with injustice
and doing wrong.
Nobody.
You and I right now,
whether we realize it or not,
the city of Ottawa right now,
every single person
walking around right now,
even though they might
laugh at God,
mock God,
hate God,
shake their fist at God,
intentionally do things
that are against God
just because they want
to give Him the finger
as many times as they want.
They might be doing evil
as much as they want.
They might lie,
cheat, steal,
commit adultery,
do all those things.
Every single human being,
in a sense,
the charges are stayed,
but not dropped.
And so it is with Nineveh
that we'll experience
the judgment of God
and every one of those Ninevites
will have,
by now,
appeared before
the judgment seat of God
and they will know
the Lord's justice.
He has compassion on them
for a season
that they might repent.
So there's a riddle.
But the fact of the matter is
is that you and I
have done wrong things.
You and I are enmity with God.
And what we see is
on the cross,
we see the Lord Himself
bear the cost
of showing you compassion.
To use the story
of the barista,
in the story of the barista,
I use myself as an example,
but at the end of the day,
if you look at it
from the Bible's point of view,
I am the barista
who took the car,
drank,
wrecked the car.
That's me.
And that's you.
Can you put up the next slide,
please?
On the cross,
the Lord dealt
with your wrongdoing
with perfect justice
and perfect compassion.
He dies in your place.
He takes your judgment
in your stead
because He knows
it will unmake you.
It's not a matter
that the Lord just says,
you know what,
George,
you're so cute,
I'm just going to pretend
you didn't do
those bad things.
It's,
George,
you've done,
this is the wonderful thing
about the cross
and the fact that God
is completely just
and knows every single thing
I've ever done.
Is it one of the reasons
that it can begin,
I can begin to change
my moral order
is that I understand
that God knows me perfectly.
He knows every single thing
I've done,
every good thing
I should have done
but didn't do.
He knows all my thoughts,
all my motivations,
all of those things.
He knows it
from the moment of my birth
to the moment of my death.
He knows it all
and all
was dealt with
when Jesus died
in my place on the cross.
So if it comes
and it will come,
I have kids
and it comes up
that sometime
whether it's next week
or next month
or next year,
one of my kids
tells me,
Dad,
you did this to me,
you said this to me
five years,
ten years ago
and it has just,
it has been really hard on me.
Now it will be hard
to hear that
from my child.
I like the illusion
that I'm a perfect dad.
I try never to believe it
but I like the illusion.
I'm a fallen human being
like you.
But you know,
one of the things
I can do
is I can understand
not that it means
I get a pass
because the Lord
has forgiven me
but because I know
there is no evil
even in my past
that could be revealed
to me today
that the Lord
did not know about
when he hung upon the cross
and died for me.
That there's the possibility
that my identity
rooted in the cross
and Jesus
and what he's done for me
and the knowledge
of his love for me
that I can then
maybe have
the self-possession
to say
I am so sorry
I did that wrong to you.
Can you forgive me?
Can you pray
that I learn
how to do it better?
And I don't have to live
in the illusion
of my perfect life.
I can live in the reality
of his perfect compassion
and bearing the cost
of my sin
upon the cross.
I can live in the real world
because Jesus died
for me
bearing the cost
for him to show compassion
to me
in the real world.
If you'll put up
the final slide.
See the gospel
shapes you and me
to desire
a healthy conscience.
and to have
compassion
disrupt your anger
for the good of others
and for the glory
of the Lord.
It's not automatic.
But as the gospel
shapes you
as it grips you
as it molds you
as it forms you
as you think upon it
it will desire you
to have
a better sense
of right and wrong.
It'll give you
the sense of security
to look at
what's actually
right and wrong
without having to worry
that if I actually
acknowledge that
this is wrong
I have to say
that I did wrong
for a long time
and that's really
hard for us
but as the gospel
grips me
and shapes me
as it becomes
the air I breathe
and that on which
I stand
by which I understand
my identity
my past
my present
and my future
as that becomes
more real to me
who Jesus is
and what he did
for me upon the cross
there is the possibility
for me to look
at right and wrong
in a way
that does not
threaten my identity
and I can say
you know what
that's wrong
and that has
characterized me
for the last
20 years of my life
but it's wrong
and as my moral
order becomes
more healed
becomes healthy
and my conscience
becomes healthy
that will mean
my anger
becomes more healthy
but the gospel
does more than that
the gospel
shapes you
to desire
a healthy conscience
and to have
compassion
disrupt your anger
for the good
of others
and for the glory
of the Lord
I am a recipient
of compassion
a very deep
and total
and complete
compassion
that frees me
to begin
to live
eternal life
and if I have
known such
compassion
maybe I need
to show compassion
in this case
and I can call
out to the Lord
for what it's
going to mean
in terms of
forsaking revenge
for forsaking
what I might
like to do
in terms of
slander
or gossip
or hatred
or punching
or vengeance
or all of those
things
and I need to
swallow that
and I might
have to call
out to the Lord
Lord I think
you're calling
me to show
compassion
and that's a cost
I know you
showed compassion
for me
I don't know
how to bear
but Lord
I ask
I just
I know
that you are
calling me
for compassion
in this particular
case
Lord
I come to you
help me
to bear
the cost
to show
compassion
to this person
for their
true good
and your
great glory
let's stand
and let's
just pray
Father we
are so
grateful
that your
just anger
at the wrong
that each
one of us
has done
not that it
was disrupted
Lord but we're
using that
language that
forgiveness
mercy
compassion
your forgiveness
is perfect
your mercy
is perfect
your grace
is unfailing
your compassion
is perfect
as is your
justice
and that you
bore the cost
Father
without
injustice
becoming
justice
injustice
becoming
injustice
without
any of
that
happening
you
bore
the cost
paid
the price
to show
compassion
to me
Father
we are
so grateful
grip us
Father
with the
mystery
and the
wonder
of what
you did
for us
on the
cross
grip us
with that
Father
that it
might be
that upon
which we
stand
that upon
which covers
our head
that upon
which we
breathe
that which
pushes
and pulls
us
and shapes
us
to live
well
every day
with people
for their
good
and your
great glory
Father
we ask
in Jesus'
name
and all
God's
people
said
Amen