The prophecy of Jonah prefigures God's dealings with Israel, illustrating their future restoration and recommissioning as a priestly nation to witness to the world. The sermon traces Israel's original commission from Exodus 19, their disobedience akin to Jonah's, and their eventual repentance and restoration in the millennial kingdom as described in Zechariah 8. In that future day, Israel will fulfill their role as priests and ministers, converting the world as foretold in Isaiah 61, a transformation described as 'life from the dead' (Romans 11:15). The sermon concludes by emphasizing God's enduring love for Israel and the ultimate fulfillment of His plan for them to spread His truth globally, urging listeners to ensure their personal salvation through Christ.
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In the third chapter of Jonah, as in the previous chapters, we have sought to prefigure the dealings of God with his chosen people, the nation of Israel. After Jonah's restoration to the Lord and his return to the land, he was recommissioned of God to preach the message which God intended him to give at the first. His experience in this is a very clear type of Israel. Have you ever realized what God's purposes were for Israel at the commencement of the nation? Do you really know what God intended them to be for him within the world?
Permit me to read to you from the book of Exodus chapter nineteen verses five and six. where God commanded Moses to speak these words to his people Israel. Now therefore if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people. For all the earth is mine, and ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel. This was the commission that God repeated and stated regarding them, even again and again.
Even in Isaiah chapter forty-three, God said, Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord. For Israel was to be a priestly nation, ministering God's revealing and representing the only true God among the nations. This commission has never been fulfilled by Israel, as we all well know, because very much like Jonah's experience in chapter one of his book, the nation has been disobedient. However, when, like Jonah, Israel will ultimately turn to the Lord, when the veil of unbelief is removed from their hearts, when they cry out in genuine repentance in the midst of their distresses, the Lord will not only restore them to their land and nation under the coming millennial reign of their Messiah, but He will restore His Commission to be His witnesses throughout all the world.
This Commission will then be fulfilled in that future day. Now let me read to you the tremendous national change that will take place for the remnant of Israel when the nation is restored to the Lord. I read from Zechariah chapter eight, verses twenty through twenty-three. Thus said the Lord of hosts, It shall yet come to pass that there shall come people and the inhabitants of many cities and the inhabitants of one city shall go to another, saying, Let us go speedily to pray before the Lord, and to seek the Lord of hosts.
I will go also, yea, many people, and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem, and to pray before the Lord. Thus saith the Lord of hosts. In those days they shall come to pass, that ten men shall take hold out of all languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, We will go with you, for we have heard that God is with you. Permit me to present the tremendous and the radical change that will be involved when all the nations will reverse their attitude and their actions toward the nation of Israel.
Today the nations hate them, and the day is fast approaching, when the words of our Lord Jesus will be literally fulfilled concerning his people Israel. I quote them from Matthew twenty four in verse nine, where Jesus said of his earthly people, Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted and shall kill you. and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake. This unfortunately is the present attitude and the conduct of the nations, but a tremendous reversal is described in Isaiah sixty-one verses five and six, where the prophet foretells that the nations will be working for Israel.
Listen to the words, and strangers The prophet means, foreigners, shall stand and feed your flocks, and the sons of the alien shall be your ploughmen and your vine-dresses. In substance, the very nations that now seek Israel's destruction will become their servants in that coming day. Now someone may ask, what will Israel be doing then? Let me read on in Isaiah chapter sixty-one and verse six. God continues to say, But ye shall be named the priests of the Lord.
Men shall call you the ministers of our God. Ye shall eat the riches of the Gentiles, and in their glory shall ye boast yourselves. While in that coming day the nations will be servants to Israel, Israel will then accomplish God's will for them, becoming the priests of the Lord and the ministers of God. Now, like Jonah of old in our prophecy, they will proclaim the message of God in that coming day. And as Jonah was successful in converting and bringing the great city of Nineveh to the Lord in repentance, so Israel will be used to accomplish what has never been done before, the conversion of the world.
We have today and in other days past, many uninstructed and misguided Christians, sincere as they may be, who have been seeking the conversion of the whole world in our present age. This is without any scriptural basis. But in earnestness, We should be seeking the salvation of sinners, but let us not forget that worldwide revival and conversion is yet ahead, and God will do it through Israel, not through the church. And He will do it in that glorious coming kingdom of the Messiah when He is upon the earth, and the nation of Israel has been restored, has been recommissioned of God.
May I read or suggest the words that are found in Romans eleven fifteen, where the apostle Paul refers to the future restoration of Israel. And he declares the meaning of it is this, life from the dead. Now when Paul refers to the coming glory of Israel as life from the dead, what does he really mean? He means this, just like we have seen Jonah, They will return to the Lord as though from the dead. There will be the national resurrection of Israel, which is described in Ezekiel chapter thirty-seven, and the world will see a spiritual resurrected nation.
Then the message of this people will be empowered of God. They will turn the nations from spiritual death to spiritual life. It will also be light from the dead for the nations in that day. A nation of Jonah's will be spreading the truth of God throughout the world. Now let me remind you again, as Jonah preached the message of God throughout all the city of Nineveh, the day is coming in the millennial kingdom. that God will have a nation of Jonas spreading his truth throughout the world.
In that day will be fulfilled what the prophet Isaiah has written in chapter eleven and verse nine of his prophecy. The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. Beloved, what a day that will be. But now in closing, we wish to exalt the mercy of God, even today, through our Lord Jesus Christ, which will yet be shown to Israel. For regardless of their present condition, their perilous state amongst the nations, the nation of Israel is beloved of God, though hated by the world and Satan, they are the chosen of God, though despised and neglected of the nations.
They are cherished of God, though spurned and persecuted. But the day is coming when a godly remnant of them will thus be acknowledged by the whole world as being the priests of the Lord and the ministers of God. Please let me repeat it plainly. In the millennial kingdom, all the redeemed and restored people of Israel will be God's priests and His ministers throughout the whole world proclaiming its truth.
What a transformation that will be, particularly after so many centuries of being chastened by the Lord. But in that day they will, like Jonah, be successful for the Lord. They will disseminate God's truth over all the earth, and the knowledge of the Lord will indeed cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. God grant that that day may be very, very soon. But my beloved, may I ask the question, Are you saved? Are you sure that Christ is your Savior for today?
God calls through the gospel. Every man and woman, boy, you go to repentance and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Father, bless thy truth as we have covered it in the Savior's name. For his glory, amen.