The sign of Jonah confirms God’s truth.

 

Sermon for Trinity 21, October 17, 2021

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.  All who do His precepts have good understanding.  Amen.

Matthew 16:1-4  The Pharisees and Sadducees came to Jesus and, as a test, they asked him to show them a sign from heaven.  ²But he answered them, “When it is evening you say, ‘It will be fair weather because the sky is red.’  ³In the morning you say, ‘It will be stormy weather today because the sky is red and threatening.’  You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times!  ⁴An evil and adulterous generation seeks a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah.”  He left them and went away. (EHV)

The sign of Jonah confirms God’s truth.

Dear children of the living God,

            How do you know?  Prove it to me!  Unless I see it with my own eyes, I will never believe!  How numerous are the objections to the truth of God’s word!  At the same time, all objections are really one and the same—they are all a simple rejection of God Himself.

Living as a Christian in this world sometimes feels like what I assume salmon feel like when they are returning to the spawning beds from which they came—fighting against every force of nature just to get back home.  The current rages against them.  It is uphill all the way, and just as you near the finish line, the bears and predators are lined up to grab and eat you.

Jesus must have certainly felt that way.  Wherever He went during His days of ministry on earth, He ran into opposition.  Even some of those who came to Him for help and healing had their doubts.  In desperation, one man brought his son to Jesus and pleaded, “If you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.”  “If you can?!” Jesus said to him.  “All things are possible for the one who believes.”  The child’s father immediately cried out and said with tears, “I do believe.  Help me with my unbelief!” (Mark 9:22-24)

The most troublesome for Jesus, of course, were the leaders of the Jews who simply rejected Him no matter what they saw.  After observing Jesus perform countless miracles and healings, and seeing the crowds put their hope in Jesus, the Pharisees and Sadducees came to Him with their arrogant demand that He “show them a sign from heaven.”  And this wasn’t the first time they insisted that Jesus dance to their tune.  However, the problem wasn’t that the evidence of who Jesus is, and what He came to do, wasn’t obvious.  The problem was their disrespect and disbelief.

Much like the Pharisees and Sadducees, so many learned people of our day consider themselves too smart to believe in Jesus as Lord and Savior.  Human beings have mastered so many skills, and we are able to control so much in our world, that many people assume there is no higher power than the human race.  The so-called elites of our educational institutions take great pride in their imagined concepts of our origins.  Our political leaders are confident they can predict meteorological conditions and events decades in the future.  Men and women puff themselves up imagining that they control their own destinies.

As I say this, of course, we all have to admit that these same tendencies afflict us as well.  We often make our plans without considering whether they are God’s plans.  We see horrible events take place and question why God allows such things to happen.  We may wonder why God doesn’t give us every trinket and pile of gold we might imagine we want, or why He doesn’t heal us immediately, as we would certainly prefer.  Therefore, it is easy for the world to fight against the Christian faith.  To be faithful to the Lord is to swim against the tide.  The truth is, we can’t do it on our own.

Jesus told those who defied Him, “You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times!  An evil and adulterous generation seeks a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah.”  It would be wise for each of us to consider how often we have demanded a sign from our Lord.  How often have we tried to make a deal with God?  How often have we questioned whether our Lord is truly keeping His promises?  How often does the devil get us even to question whether Jesus has truly paid for all our sins and opened the gates of heaven for us?  In reality, the truly honest sinner (if there were such a person) would have to admit to telling God something like, “Give me what I want, and I will do everything I am supposed to be doing already.”

Those leaders of Jewish society didn’t believe Jesus was the Christ or the Son of God.  They repeatedly demanded a sign from heaven to prove Himself, so Jesus had previously explained what would prove all things true.  He said, “An evil and adulterous generation wishes for a sign, but no sign will be given it except the sign of Jonah the prophet.  For just as Jonah was in the belly of the huge fish for three days and three nights, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.” (Matthew 12:39-40)  This sign is the fulcrum upon which every prophecy, promise, and proscription of the Scriptures is proven true or false.  Every word God has given pivots on this one point, this prophecy that Jesus would be in the grave and rise to live again on the third day.

Dear friends, Jesus rightly refused to dance to the demands of His enemies.  Jesus didn’t have to make a deal with the devil in order to save us.  In fact, any slip up in doing exactly as His Father in heaven had instructed would have doomed all of us to destruction.  Therefore, from the moment of conception in Mary’s womb until He gave up His last breath on the cross at Calvary, Jesus did exactly as His Father willed, fulfilling perfectly every detail of prophecy, every mark and jot of the law, humbling Himself to live on our behalf without any error or fault, and finally, sacrificing His holy, precious life to suffer the shame of crucifixion in our place.

Here is the crux of the matter though.  If Jesus was not who He claims to be, there would have been no resurrection.  If Easter morning doesn’t happen exactly as God had foretold, you and I wouldn’t have a Savior.  Yet, Jesus’ resurrection from the grave on the third day after His certified death on that Roman cross is the absolute guarantee that everything Jesus promised is true.  The sign of Jonah confirms God’s truth.

All around us today, the currents of the world rush against us, and the predators of evil try to crush us in the pretense that Jesus couldn’t have risen from the dead.  Oh, some make other fantastical arguments against Jesus, but the true dividing point is His resurrection on Easter morning.  For you and me, this is the perfect victory and the perfect sign that life and salvation are now ours.

“Jesus lives!  The victory’s won!”  We sing it out boldly on Easter morning, but do we remember that good news when life feels hard?  We should!  And we should be glad! 

Naturally, our enemies do everything they can dream up to get us to doubt this truth.  However, Jesus’ enemies also did us a favor.  Those same men who demanded a sign from heaven, also demanded that Pilate put a guard at the tomb and seal the stone so that no man could steal Jesus’ body out of the grave and falsely claim His resurrection.  You might have heard—that didn’t work in their favor, because no one could stop Jesus from rising from the grave victorious over His enemies.  The victory was already won when Jesus declared from the cross, “It is finished.” (John 19:30)

The list of evidence in our favor is long.  Those guards posted at the tomb testified of Jesus’ resurrection.  The angel that rolled away the stone after Jesus had risen testified also.  The women who met Jesus outside of that empty grave testified that Jesus lives.  The disciples, who had walked with Jesus for three years and had seen the miracles and heard His teachings, met Jesus time and again for forty days after that Easter morning resurrection.  Even the enemies of the Christian faith admitted in the historical record that numerous people had seen Jesus alive, and that His followers were willing to die to hold to that claim.  No other person in the history of the world has had the impact on humanity that Jesus has, because The sign of Jonah confirms God’s truth.

“An evil and adulterous generation seeks a sign.”  Still today, countless men and women refuse to believe that the Bible is God’s Word.  What that really displays is unbelief in God.  Those who reject Jesus as the true Son of God and Redeemer of the world are idolators.  As long as they hold to those wicked beliefs, their destination is everlasting torment with the devil in hell.

At the same time, you and I can and should be confident in every promise Jesus made.  More than that, we need to make sure that those we love hear all that God has said about Jesus.  Our Epistle lesson this morning instructed us to use everything God has given us as a defense against the enemy and armament with which to fight.  The miracles Jesus did, as recorded by His followers, testify to the truth of what He has done for us.  The prophecies all point to Jesus as our Savior.  More than that, the Scriptures God’s Spirit has given us work saving faith in those of us who could never discover Jesus on our own.

Dear friends, Jesus declared again and again, “Be of good cheer; your sins are forgiven you." (Matthew 9:2 NKJ)  He said, “Be courageous!  I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)  He promised, “Surely I am with you always until the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:20)  And, “God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life.” (John 3:16) 

Finally, Jesus invites us to believe with our whole hearts every word the Holy Spirit has given to bring us faith and life, and against all the naysayers of the world, we have Jesus’ promise, “Yes, I am coming soon.” (Revelation 22:20)  He is returning to take us home with Him.

All of this is true: your sins are forgiven for Jesus’ sake, the Father has adopted you through baptism and the hearing of His Word, heaven is your home, and you will have life everlasting when you believe in Jesus.  All of this is certain and sure to give us hope that cannot be taken away, because The sign of Jonah confirms God’s truth.  Amen.

Now to him who is able to strengthen you— according to my gospel and the proclamation of Jesus Christ, . . . to God, who alone is wise, be glory forever through Jesus Christ.  Amen.