Sovereign Over The Nations: In a fallen world, it's only natural to see people outside our tribe, people, language, or nation as our enemy. But is that how God sees them? In Jonah 3, God is a God of second chances, giving grace and mercy, to both Jonah and the people of Nineveh, the enemies of Jonah's people. Why? Because God is sovereign over the nations and He is sovereign to save. Recorded on June 19, 2022, on Jonah 3, by Pastor David Parks.

This message is part of our "Sovereign to Save" sermon series from the book of Jonah in the Bible. Jonah's story is well-known both in and outside the church for his encounter with the great fish. But Jonah is really about the incredible heart of a sovereign God to save even his enemies.

Sermon Transcript

This whole past year, we’ve had the annual theme of our preaching ministry of The Greatness of God. After today, we only have one more week of this theme before we start our new theme of Learning the way of Jesus. Truthfully, I can’t wait to start this new theme. But we still have two more chapters in the story of Jonah in our Sovereign to Save series before we’re done with this theme. And we’ve said, the basic story of Jonah is well-known in and outside the church. But when you dig into what it actually says, you find a God who is sovereign, with divine power/authority over all. In Jonah, we see that this is a very good thing, because we find the great compassion and love of God, even for his enemies, and we see the lengths he goes to save them. Our God is sovereign to save. Last week, Kyle preached on the fact that God is sovereign over the deep, over even the worst times in our lives, and he often uses those dark/uncomfortable times to prune us for our good. Today, we finally get to Nineveh (after Jonah ran hard away from his calling) and we’ll see that God isn’t only sovereign over his people — God is sovereign over the nations, God is sovereign over all people, but again, with a heart to save. If you have a Bible/app, please open to Jonah 3.

Jonah 3:1–10 (NIV), “Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: 2 “Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you.” 3 Jonah obeyed the word of the Lord and went to Nineveh. Now Nineveh was a very large city; it took three days to go through it. 4 Jonah began by going a day’s journey into the city, proclaiming, “Forty more days and Nineveh will be overthrown.” 5 The Ninevites believed God. A fast was proclaimed, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth. 6 When Jonah’s warning reached the king of Nineveh, he rose from his throne, took off his royal robes, covered himself with sackcloth and sat down in the dust. 7 This is the proclamation he issued in Nineveh: “By the decree of the king and his nobles: Do not let people or animals, herds or flocks, taste anything; do not let them eat or drink. 8 But let people and animals be covered with sackcloth. Let everyone call urgently on God. Let them give up their evil ways and their violence. 9 Who knows? God may yet relent and with compassion turn from his fierce anger so that we will not perish.” 10 When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he relented and did not bring on them the destruction he had threatened.”

If you haven’t been with us, let me give you a little recap of the story so far. About 2,800 years ago, Jonah was a prophet of Yahweh God in the northern kingdom of Israel during a time of crisis for his people. The Assyrian Empire was the most powerful nation on the earth at the time. They would eventually conquer pretty much everybody before the rise of the Babylonian Empire. But they were on Jonah’s doorstep and were a real threat to him and to everyone he knew and loved.