- Pg. 90: “While we know from the rest of the Bible that changing social behavior is not sufficient for salvation, and that God cannot give final forgiveness without faith and an atoning sacrifice”
- Behavior modification is shallow
- Friend from ywam who preached love, through action, but removed faith
- pg. 94: “To work against social injustice and to call people to repentance before God interlock theologically.”
- Martin luther “How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A Just law is a man made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law”
- I have a dream speech he quoted the scripture from Amos 5:24 “Let God’s justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream”
- Why should we care where about social injustice? Not out of guilt or because you feel bad. Because God says he created us as equals. Where did this idea come from and why do people believe in it? Why do non-believers believe in this? We are obliged to desire what God desires. But wanting social justice alone is only half of what God desires, he wants all of you. He requires your faith.
- Pg. 100: Jonah was perplexed and was asking how can God promise his Israelites that he would accomplish his purposes through them. This was a theological issue. That he believed that mercy should not be extended to the evil gentiles.
- Jonah says in ch4, take his life away. He no longer has the desire to go on. He means that he has lost something that replaced God as the main joy, reason, and the love of his life. His willingness to throw away his life shows that he valued this one thing more. It was the highest love in his life. Yes, he had a relationship with God, much like us, he was a believer.
- Deep down in the belly of the fish, Jonah received a deeper understanding of his need for grace. However, everytime it seemed he had take God and his grace to the very bottom, it turned out that he needed to go deeper. [read p.109-110] What does it mean to get to bedrock in one’s heart??
- Recognize how we turn his blessings into ways of saving ourselves. Instead we recognize that we live wholly by God’s grace and learn to live and serve him just for who he is.
- Pg. 114 Jonah is like the ungrateful servant in Matthew (18:21-35) - I can relate to him
- We say…. ‘Serves them right’ ‘they deserve that’ - othering- detaching yourself from them, when really, you're no better since by grace you’re in your current position.
- P. 123 God had compassion on the Ninevites. He created them and loves them in the way we don’t know. Reminds me of my mom loving my brother even though he was rebellious towards her.
- Jesus is a weeping God of Jonah 4 in human form.
- God is Just + Loving...
- One of the main reasons that we trust God too little is because we trust our own wisdom too much (p.139)
- We go do things to make ourselves happy bc. We believe it’ll work
- Deep mistrust of God’s goodness and His word.
- Abraham’s son - take your son and walk up to the mountain and I will show you.
- One reason for storms in our lives is to get us to depend on God and discover his love and strength in ways we would never do otherwise. (p.143)
- Satan would be happy to let you have a charmed and prosperous life for many years so that you don’t see the truth until it’s too late
- But God he pursues after us, even when people blame and curse him out, he takes it all and still pursues us
- Western society clashes with Christian culture.
- Individualistic mindset - people dont want children bc they don’t know sacrificial love
- “The essence of salvation is God subsituting himself for man. Man asserts himself against God and puts himself where only God desrves to be; God sacrifices himself for man and puts himself where only man deserves to be. Man claims prerogatives which belong to God alone; God accepts penalties which belong to man alone - John Scott
- John Calvin’s emphasizes the doctrine of imago dei. That we should treat every human being as the ‘Lord’s deserves’
- The good samaritan
- James 3:9 ith the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God's likeness."
- 3I was a stranger and you did not take Me in, I was naked and you did not clothe Me, I was sick and in prison and you did not visit Me.’ 44Andthey too will reply, ‘Lord, when did we see Youhungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick orin prison, and did not minister to You?’ 45Then the King will answer, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me.’
- Evangelism + Doing justice
- It’s not necessarily “two wings on an airplane”. This analogy conveys the necessity for both, but it doesn’t say how one leads to another.
- When we give people things so they will turn to Christ, that means we’re doing good as a means to an end. It doesn’t go with Jesus’ teaching. (Luke 6:32-35 if you love those who love you) should give without expecting anything in return
- Also we should serve the needs of our neighbor even if they don’t share our faith (Luke 10:25-37 good samaritan - “lend to them without expecting to get anything back”)
- READ page 197-198 ***
- Martin Luther - epiphany with grace, Dietriech Bonhoffer, writing of cheap grace. Grace is powerfully. Understanding it moves you. It frees guilt and abolishes fear because we have nothing to achieve it, but we have it.
- “On the one hand, such a received identity sweeps aside our pride and humbles us. How can we feel superior to anyone else if our standing before God is only by grace’s riches at Christ’s expense?
- One may question why did God give and take away Jonah’s plant, the only thing he had? It’s because he didn’t realize the only thing he had was not the plant, but it’s God.
- Its like he was saying, do you not see that if you loved me more than anything else, you’d be truly free? Find your all in me
- This call is also directed towards us. It’s a painful process to know this and to actually live it out, but God says it’s the only path to true joy
- MY RECAP
- Point #1: Grace is the overarching theme of the book of the prodigal prophet. We read that Jonah was not tolerant of the grace that God showed these inhumane, undeserving sinners. While on the other, he himself deserved death because “ALL have fallen short of the glory of God”. Jonah failed to see that he sinned differently than the Ninevites, and required God’s mercy just like the Ninevites. (Parable of the ungrateful servant Luke 18:21)
- Question: How is your attitude towards God and to others?
- Entitlement? ACTS prayer (acknowledgement - who is God, who is man
- Gratitude should be an indication of your understanding of God’s grace
- Point#2: We discussed that social justice and preaching the Word are inseparable. When we give people things so they will turn to Christ, that means we’re doing good as a means to an end. It doesn’t go with Jesus’ teaching. (Luke 6:32-35 if you love those who love you) should give without expecting anything in return. Also we should serve the needs of our neighbor even if they don’t share our faith (Luke 10:25-37 good samaritan - “lend to them without expecting to get anything back”). We are to love and preach without expecting anything in return. Jesus did that for us - and we’re followers of Christ.
- Question: How are we doing this in our lives today? And how can we do this better?
- Point#3 On the last chapter, we discussed the sacrificial, substitutionary love. The Individualistic/consumeristic mindset bleeding into our Christian culture. However, the very nature of Jesus is others-oriented. He came to serve and not to be served. We call ourselves Christians aka Christ followers.
- Question: How are we doing this in our lives today? And how can we do this better?
