Today we have 243 days remaining until May 21, 2011. If you are wondering how long this period of time is or how quickly this period of time can go, the eight-month period of time from January 1, 2010 to August 31, 2010 is exactly 243 days, which is what we have remaining. So we see that from the beginning of the new year, it was not that long ago.
Maybe the children can remember what they did this past New Year’s Day. Maybe they remember looking ahead to their school year, which was last year, and then looking at the end of the year into summer and thinking about vacation.
It is all gone now. It is all past, and this is exactly what is going to happen with the next 243 days. It is going to go quickly and it will pass just as surely as these last eight months have passed.
After reading the “May 21, 2011 Judgment Day!” tract, someone wrote us and asked what I think is such a great question. This is all he said: “What does God want me to do?” This is a good question: “What does God want me to do?” He heard about Judgment Day being May 21, 2011, and this is an excellent response: “What does God want me to do?” What should I do with my time from now until then?
Well, I think that we find the answer to his question in the Bible. If we turn to Jonah 3, I think that this is an appropriate response for this question because the Ninevites were in a very similar situation as each one of us. God had sent Jonah to Nineveh and here is what happened. We read in Jonah 3:1-3:
And the word of JEHOVAH came unto Jonah the second time, saying, Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee. So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of JEHOVAH. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days’ journey.
By the way, “exceeding great” in the Hebrew of the Interlinear Bible literally reads, “Nineveh was a great city to God”; and, of course, if it was a great city to God, it was an “exceeding great city.” Why was Nineveh a great city to God? It was because He had much people there, and He will demonstrate this later on in the chapter.
Then we read in Jonah 3:4:
And Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
This is all of the recorded message that we have from Jonah. God did not indicate that Jonah said anything else; at least He did not record it. But from all we know, we could speculate that Jonah repeated this message, and he probably did. We could maybe say that he said some other things, but we cannot be sure. We do know that he said this, and what he said was very short and not too sweet. It was a little bitter. It was sweet because it is the Word of God, but it was also a bitter message containing information concerning two things: time and judgment. As we know, God has said in Ecclesiastes, “A wise man’s heart discerneth [understands] both time and judgment.”
If we look at this statement in Jonah 3:4:
…Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
The time reference is the forty days. Then what comes is the judgment that Nineveh will be overthrown.
This means, if they would have had a calendar like we have today, they could have marked forty days later and circled the date. Right? They could have circled the date. This would mean that they would have known the year, the month, and the day, and they would have known this precisely according to the information that God had given them through His prophet Jonah.
This is the exact same thing that we can do today. Has anyone done this on their calendar at home? Have you circled May 21 or indicated something about this date?
I saw a good calendar that someone had developed for the year 2011. He had all the days leading up to May 21. This date was basically highlighted. Then all of the days for five more months were in red. Then the calendar ended after October 21, 2011 because there will be time no more. There were no more days on the calendar, no more future days after that. This would be a good calendar to give out for the coming year. I might take his calendar to see if I can get this copied.
So we can go to our calendar and we can do exactly what the Ninevites could have done if they would have had calendars. We can know the very day. This at least shows us that God has set a precedent and that it is not all that unusual to know the very day. Right?
He did this with the Ninevites. Whom else did He do this with? He also did this with the people of the world of Noah’s day. God said to Noah, “Yet seven days and I will destroy the world with a flood”; and so Noah could have marked his calendar. Noah’s calendar was based on his own lifespan. It was in the 600th year of Noah’s life and on the 17th day of the 2nd month, which, as we have learned, will also be May 21. In the Hebrew calendar, May 21 is the 17th day of the 2nd month.
The first thing that we can see is God’s mercy and graciousness; and so by God’s mercy, we can see that God has worked this way in times past. He has set a precedent and a Biblical pattern, and He says that He will do nothing without first warning His servants.
Why warn His servants, the prophets? Why do this? He has promised to do this because they are prophets and they are to speak forth the Word of God. It is because they are watchmen and they are to blow the trumpet. They will, in turn, warn the world. Therefore, He does nothing without first warning His people, who then will warn as many as they can get the word out to.
So after God moved Jonah to say, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown,” it goes on to say in Jonah 3:5:
So the people of Nineveh believed God…
The word for “people” is better translated “men.” Overwhelmingly, dozens if not several hundred times at least, this is translated as “men” in the Hebrew of the Old Testament. It is the Hebrew word ‘enowsh and it is the typical Hebrew word for “men.” In one place, this is translated as “persons” where we read that “Abimelech hired vain and light persons.” The word for “persons” is this same Hebrew word ‘enowsh. He would have hired men because he wanted soldiers and women were not soldiers at that time. This is the only other instance that I could see in the Interlinear where this word was translated in the form of “people.”
Also, remember what Jesus said in Matthew 12:41:
The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation…
He does not say “people”; He says “men,” but I am not going to say that only men were saved.
Again, it says in Jonah 3:5:
So the people of Nineveh [or the men of Nineveh] believed God, and proclaimed a fast…
The reason that this says “men” is because it would take some authority to do this and women would not have proclaimed a fast. It is the men of Nineveh who would have proclaimed a fast, but there are instances in the Bible where a fast is proclaimed that includes men, women, and children.
So God, for whatever purpose, is focusing on the fact that the men of Nineveh heard this and responded. We see that this was from the king on down and that a fast was proclaimed. But I would think that God saved all sorts of people, not just the men. There is no reason for why God would only save men, but it is the word “men” here in Jonah 3:5:
So the [men] of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.
Here we see one thing that we should do. Remember that the question was: what should I do? Or as the question was put: “What does God want me to do?”
Well, here in Jonah, we see at least five responses, five things that they did. However, I would not say that this is a formula. There is no formula. There are no one-two-three steps that we can take; however, these are things that the Ninevites did that we can learn from, as God moved them to take action after warning them of judgment. We know that if anyone responds in a God-pleasing way, it is because God moved in them “to will and to do of his good pleasure.”
Did the thief on the cross respond as the Ninevites did? In some ways, yes; but in other ways, no. God works individually with people. He works with one person maybe in a different way than He does with another.
But here we do see that the Ninevites had this response, and this was a pleasing response. It was a good response in this sense, but their response to what should they do, as they heard of Judgment Day for them and were made aware of the very day, in no way saved them. In no way did their response contribute to their salvation, but what it did was that it did not hinder God’s plan at all. This is the important thing. The important thing is that it did not stop God.
First of all, we read again in Jonah 3:5:
So the [men] of Nineveh believed God…
So this did not save them. It did not save them to believe God, but it is far better to believe God than to disbelieve God. This is because it is right there at that point that you can stop if you disbelieve God. If you did not think that there is any possibility of May 21 being Judgment Day, would you then move on to the next thing that follows? Would you involve yourself in a fast or sit in sackcloth and ashes? Would you cry mightily to God? Would you wait on Him? No, you would not do any of this, and yet God could still save someone who does not believe this.
The thief on the cross is a good example of someone who could not care less about the Gospel, and yet God still saved Him. God is gracious in this way, but it is not a positive thing for someone to disbelieve the Word of God and what He says in His Word concerning Judgment Day. There is nothing positive about this at all because they are actually placing themselves in a position where they are going away from God.
We know that God is going to save a great multitude. However, He is going to condemn far more, and He just might permit you to continue in unbelief. Therefore, it is not a wise thing at all to not believe that this is the date of judgment.
So let us just quickly look at the word “believe” in order to get something straight. We read in John 8:30, referring to Jesus:
As he spake these words, many believed on him.
This says that “many believed.” Okay, that is fine; however, this is not salvation because these exact same people had their “belief” develop into what Jesus said in John 8:47:
He that is of God heareth God’s words: ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God.
Why would Jesus say that they are not hearing Him when this began with them indicating that they “believed on him”? It is because intellectual belief is not what He is looking for. It is not ultimately what God is looking for.
Then John 8:48 says:
Then answered the Jews, and said unto him, Say we not well that thou art a Samaritan, and hast a devil?
They believed and then they were saying that Jesus was a Samaritan and that He had a devil. Therefore, this kind of belief is not salvation. Obviously, when people come to the point of saying that Jesus had a devil, they were never saved. It did not matter what they thought or what they professed with their mouths. A belief like this is not saving faith.
Go also to John 12:42. It says:
Nevertheless among the chief rulers also many believed on him…
Of course they did. Look at all of the miracles that Christ did. He raised the dead. He gave sight to several blind people. He gave the lame man legs. Repeatedly and all through His ministry, He did tremendous and mighty miracles.
The Jews knew that only somebody of God could do these things. Do you remember when Nicodemus, a Pharisee and a ruler of the Jews, came to Jesus by night? Did Nicodemus not say this? He said to Christ, “We know that thou art a teacher come from God. Nicodemus said, “we,” “we know”; it was not just Nicodemus. The rulers knew. They had to have known; but still, this just shows us the depths of pride within man that they valued their religious system more than they valued pleasing God Himself.
We continue on to read in John 12:42-43:
Nevertheless among the chief rulers also many believed on him; but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue: For they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God.
This just sums it up and tells us why. They valued synagogue membership more than membership in the eternal Kingdom of God. They valued what their spiritual leaders or their chief Levitical priest would say about them more than what God would say about them.
Another place that we can turn to where we can see that belief is not salvation is in the book of James. In this chapter, God is trying to teach us this very thing, that faith without works is dead, as it says in James 2:17:
Even so faith…
In this case, this is referring to a profession of belief. It continues:
Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.
Many people understand this a certain way and what they try to do is they try to support their faith by their works. Therefore, they do good deeds; they do works. In and of themselves, the works that they do could even be pleasing to God; for example, giving money to support the Gospel, sending out the Gospel in whatever way, sharing tracts. These are all good works; but the moment someone begins trusting in their work to any degree, then it becomes an evil work; it becomes an evil thing in God’s sight and God is not pleased with it.
So what is God saying in James 2:17:
Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.
Well, the next verse goes on to tell us, as the “man” here in James 2:18 that is speaking is Christ:
Yea, a man may say…
This is referring to Jesus. It continues:
Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith…
This is speaking to about two billion professing Christians in our day. Do they not all claim that they have faith?
Jesus is saying in James 2:18:
…Thou hast faith, and I have works: show me thy faith without thy works, and I will show thee my faith by my works.
He is saying that He has works, but it is not the works of man that He is referring to. The Bible tells us that “all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags” and that “man is not justified by the works of the law.” We are justified “by the faith of Christ.” Faith is a work, and so we could equally understand that we are justified by the work of Christ. We are not justified by our work in any way.
So Jesus is saying, “Okay, you have a profession of faith. You say that you are a Christian, but I am the One who did the work of paying for the sins of My elect people, of each and every one of them. So if you say you have faith but you lack the work that I did on behalf of My people, this means that your faith is in vain and it does not matter what you do.”
It does not matter because if Jesus did not die for your sins, then you have a vain and empty profession of faith. This is the whole idea of what God wants us to know about believing. Believing is a positive thing, but it cannot save anyone.
It goes on to say in James 2:19:
Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well…
See, it is a good thing. However, it continues:
…the devils also believe, and tremble.
The devils believe likewise. We read where the devils said, “I know thee who thou art, the Holy One of God.” Many times the devils recognized Jesus. That is belief. They knew who He was.
Why bring up the devils at this point? I am doing this because their profession of belief could never possibly save them, because Jesus did no works on their behalf. He did not pay for the sins of any of the fallen angels. Therefore, what the devils believe means nothing, does it? How much different are we than devils? They rebelled against God.
By the way, some people try to say that God is not just, that He is not fair because He is going to destroy unsaved mankind. They wonder why He does not just save everyone. However, these same people are not upset over God’s destruction of the devils and all of these demons. They would say, “Good. I am glad. They deserve what they are going to get. Destroy them!” This is because they are guilty. After all, look at all of the misery that they have brought into the world due to Satan’s evil desire of wanting to be like God.
We have no pity for the fallen angels, do we? We do not think that it is a shame that God has not provided salvation for them. We really are able to look objectively and we are able to see that it is a right and a just thing for God to destroy all of the fallen angels, and yet we are not so objective when it comes to mankind. When it comes to mankind, we think that God is not fair and that He is not being just in destroying unsaved man. But no; it is the same thing.
We rebelled just like the angels did. If God destroys any person, He would be just to do so. But here in James, He is bringing up the fallen angels or the devils as an example because He provided no work on their behalf of any kind. Therefore, any fallen angel can say all day long that they believe, but it will not change their fate.
It is likewise with us. We can say over and over again, “I believe; I believe.” On that Day, many will say, “Lord, Lord!” This is basically indicating that they believe, but then they also go on to tell God about their works.
Look at Matthew 7. This is a passage that is going to take place very shortly. We read in Matthew 7:21-22:
Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name?…
This is a work. They continue:
…and in thy name have cast out devils?…
This is a work; and they continue:
…and in thy name done many wonderful works?
These works did not help them at all. They are left behind. The door has been shut and the cry is going out, “Lord, Lord!” But faith without “works” is dead. They are saying, “Here are my works; here is my faith!” However, they are not given entry into Heaven.
This was the same mistake that Cain made when he was trusting in his own works, whereas Abel’s works were righteous because it was the work of Christ. God makes a distinction between Cain and Abel and He will make a distinction between all believers on May 21, the true believers and the professing believers. This is why we say “true believers” so often. It is because there are so many who say that they are believers, and yet it is not true. God will make this known on that Day who really were His true believers.
Well, you see, this is one thing that we should do. We should believe that May 21, 2011 is Judgment Day. Believe it because it is. This is one good reason to believe this. However, people hem and haw, “I am studying the issue.” But while they are continuing to do something that they have been doing for who knows how long, while they are continuing to mull this over, how long are they going to take? It is like God said through the prophet Elijah, “How long halt ye between two opinions?”
This is exactly what is going on as they continue to study this issue and as they are continuing to be undecided. They just continue to say, “I am not sure.” But they are halting. They are doubting and they are not believing, but God says to believe.
We read in Mark 1:15:
And saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel.
Believe it! Repent and believe the Gospel. The time is here. How much more time do you want? Well, you have the reality of only so much time left. You may want a lot more time; but this is it, so believe it. This is a good first step in what we should do. We should believe it. This is because then the other steps that the Ninevites took, as God moved them to do so, can follow.
Unbelief is more than likely why people do halt between two opinions. They do delay. They do say, “What about 1994? Let us talk about 1994. It did not happen back then, and so why would it happen now?” You tell them and you lay it all out. You show them from the Bible how God has confirmed May 21, 2011 in a way that He never did in 1994. Then you tell them, “This is going to happen,” and they say, “Okay.” Then the next time you see them, they tell you that they are now undecided about another issue, like the five months, “I am trying to determine if this is literal or not.” So then you tell them how God has laid this out in the Bible, and they seem to listen and they seem to understand. But then there is another issue that comes up, because it is always something.
There is always something that is preventing them from believing this. This is because as long as they do not believe this, then, of course, they are not going to respond with a sense of urgency. They are not going to take action in the way that God moved the Ninevites to take action. This is one thing that we can see.
We cannot help it if we have doubts. This is true. If we turn to Mark 9, we find a good prayer in relation to this. This is the father of a child who had been afflicted for a long period of time. Let us start in verse 21 where Jesus is speaking. We read in Mark 9:21-24:
And he asked his father, How long is it ago since this came unto him? And he said, Of a child. And ofttimes it hath cast him into the fire, and into the waters, to destroy him: but if thou canst do any thing, have compassion on us, and help us. Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth. And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief.
This would be an excellent prayer for us to make. “O Lord, I see what You are saying. I believe; but if I have any doubts, ‘help thou mine unbelief.’”
Again, just to reiterate this, belief will not save us. This is not going to save us. Belief is just a right reaction to the information that God is opening up at this time. We should believe it and trust it. The Bible says, “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart,” not 90% of your heart. No, we are to “trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.” Lean not upon your own questions and your own doubts.
We can pick something apart in a thousand different ways if we have a mind to. Could the Ninevites not have picked apart the message from Jonah if they would have had a mind to? Yes, they could have and in a thousand different ways.
It is really pretty simple. You just get that look on your face and you say, “Does anybody in the city of Nineveh know this man Jonah?” They would say, “No, he is a stranger.” Then you would ask, “Are you going to trust a stranger? Are you going to listen to a stranger?” “Okay, so he is a stranger. Where is he from?” Someone would say, “He is from Israel,” to which you would respond, “He is from Israel! He is from our enemy!”
We know that the Assyrians did have wars with Israel. From this point, you could work yourself and others up over this as you thought about the fact that he was an enemy, “He is an enemy. He is not for us; He is against us!” You could then travel along this track for quite some time.
Someone could also ask, “What about our own religious people? We have religious people here in Nineveh. Has anybody ever heard of what he is talking about, forty days and then we will be destroyed? Let us check with our own religious people. After all, we are just as holy as those Israelites. We have our own connection with God. We also have contact with God, and yet we have not heard anything in our religion about a coming Judgment Day.”
Anyone can go on and on and on if they have a mind to. Right? If you are of a mind to, you can pick apart any truth in the Bible, and people do this all of the time. For example, they do this to the doctrine of election. They also do this concerning the fact that Christ is God and the Father is God. How many people could go to the Bible and find verses that say, “God is one” and yet they find that the Father is talking to the Son. People say this all the time, “Are you trying to tell me that they are One?”
Well, if you want to think this way and if you want to be a critic and a cynic, if you want to doubt, then you can wind up doubting everything that you read in the Bible. Some people even doubt that it is the Word of God. If you want, you can go this way and you can pick it apart; however, not actually. You can only do this in your own mind. Likewise, we can do the same with May 21, 2011. We can come up with a thousand reasons not to believe.
All someone really has to do is go to their pastor and ask, “Have you heard about Family Radio? Have you heard about May 21, 2011?” The pastor will respond, “Do not listen to them,” and then he will give them a hundred reasons why they should not believe this. It does not matter if it is an elder or a deacon, the whole congregation will help them in unbelief.
You see, this is our problem. We have an “evil heart of unbelief.” Therefore, we cannot trust ourself. We cannot even trust any man. We are living in that time when the Bible says that “every brother will utterly supplant.” We only trust the Word of God, the Bible, and the Bible tells us to believe.
This is the first thing that the Ninevites did, so let us go back to Jonah 3:5 again. It says:
So the people of Nineveh believed God…
They did not believe Jonah. This does not say that they believed Jonah. This says that they believed God.
People say, “You believe Mr. Camping.” We hear this a lot. “You believe Mr. Camping because you listen to Family Radio.” No, we believe God. We believe God and God uses His servants the prophets. He first warns His servants the prophets and then He uses them. What does a prophet do? The prophets are all of God’s people and they are to declare the Word of God.
This is what God’s people are doing today. Family Radio is declaring the Word of God. Mr. Camping is declaring the Word of God, and we trust the Word of God that they are declaring because we have checked these things out and we have seen that these things are true and that it is going to happen.
It says in Jonah 3:5 again:
So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.
This is the second thing that God would have us to do. It is to allow this message to interrupt our life. The Ninevites had lives just like we do. They were people just like we are. They had plans. It is the nature of man to plan for the future, to think of what he is going to do; but God came with a message of “time and judgment.” Number one, they believed. Secondly, they did not continue on as normal.
If we look at Matthew 24, we read of the days of Noah. It says in Matthew 24:37-39:
But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.
What is wrong with eating and drinking? The Bible says that John the Baptist “came neither eating nor drinking,” and yet they said of him, “He hath a devil.” Then the Bible says that the Son of man “came eating and drinking,” and they spoke badly of Him. It was the same “eating and drinking.” There is nothing wrong with eating and drinking. We have to do this to live. But the point that God is making is that when the Ninevites fasted, they stopped eating and drinking. Instead, they allowed the message to interrupt their lives.
Likewise, it says again in Matthew 24:38:
For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark,
Is there anything wrong with marrying and giving in marriage? No, there is nothing wrong with this. God has established and ordained the marriage relationship, even though He did set some guidelines. If we are a believer, we are to marry in the Lord. We are not to divorce and remarry. There are guidelines within the marriage relationship, but there is nothing wrong with marrying and giving in marriage.
If you want to get married, that is fine. There is nothing wrong with this unless you are scheduling your wedding day for May 21, 2011, which happens to be on a Saturday. May is a nice month for weddings. However, if you have your wedding scheduled for May 21, this is a problem. You now have a problem because, first of all, all of the work and all of the preparation that goes into a wedding is what you are going to be focused on. Secondly, you have scheduled your wedding at the time that God is going to bring judgment on this world. This indicates that you do not believe, and so you need to go back to step one.
If you have plans for a future career, if you are making plans for college, if you are making plans for anything, like your retirement where you are looking off into the distance, and yet you are fully aware that God is indicating that May 21, 2011 is Judgment Day, then you do not believe. Maybe you even think that you believe this. Maybe you are not even doing this consciously; I do not know. Maybe you are even telling your children that you believe this; but when you are making plans for a future that the Bible tells us will not be here, then you are indicating that you do not believe it. Your children will see this and they will, of course, think, “If you do not believe this, why should I believe it?”
So from all of the people whom this message comes to, there needs to be a response to this. There needs to be action taken. Intellectual understanding does not mean anything. It does not mean a thing. According to Job 28:28, “To depart from evil is understanding”; and so this should certainly impact our lives in the things that we are saying and doing.
Look also at Luke 17:26-28. It says:
And as it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all. Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded;
It was life as normal, life as usual, which is the typical response from an unbeliever who will perish in the judgment of God. They do not take action. They just go about their daily business, which at any other time in history is perfectly fine. However, this declaration and this information requires and demands a response from the hearer. This is why a lot of people do not like this.
For centuries in Christianity, you could make a profession. It certainly appeared that this profession was all that was required of anyone. However, now God is requiring something from all people. The Bible tells us, “He hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world.” Because of this, it says that God “now commandeth all men every where to repent.”
To repent and to turn would be the third thing. I do not think that we are going to have time to get into all five things that I have to talk about. Number one is to believe it. Number two is that we have to let this impact our life. We cannot continue living out our lives as though we are living in the seventeenth century or the nineteenth century or the twentieth century. This is the last century, the last time for us. We are winding down and we need to have an appropriate response.
This is just like an individual who goes to a doctor and the doctor tells him that he has a terminal illness and that he is going to die. How does this person take this information? He may check things out thoroughly before he believes it. But then, since he has confidence in the doctors who have shown him the proof, he realizes that these things are so.
Will this person continue living his life just as he had in the past, or will this information change him? Will this information impact him to such a degree that he realizes that he does not have very long; therefore, everything he does, everything he says, everything in his life takes on increased value and meaning and the time becomes more and more precious? Time becomes more and more precious every day. It is a precious day of 24 hours.
So for someone to hear these things and to dismiss them, to ignore them and to just go about their life, we know that this means that God has not opened up their ears and their eyes. He has not given them spiritual sight and hearing. However, it is also unbelief. They just do not believe what they are hearing.
Let us quickly go back to Jonah 3. After the people believed God, fasted, and put on sackcloth, we read that the king of Nineveh got involved. Then we read the decree of the king in Jonah 3:8:
But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands.
“Let them turn.” “Turn” is what “repent” means. Turn. Turn from the way in which you are going. What way are you going? Where are you headed? You are headed for destruction. Turn. Repent. Turn to God. Of course, of ourselves, we cannot.
When it comes to saving repentance, like saving faith, God does the work. It is God who does the work, but there is also an element of repentance that we do in response to the command of God. It is just like belief, even though belief does not save us. In this same way, the response of turning from our sins will not save us either.
The Ninevites knew this. After they took these steps, they said in Jonah 3:9:
Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger, that we perish not?
A good way of looking at this is the analogy that I have used before of the Gulf oil spill. If you remember, this oil spill went on through practically the whole summer. For quite some time, they could not stop the gushing of the oil into the water. The water was getting polluted and the sea life was dying. It was ugly and filthy. It got to the beaches and killed all kinds of animals. This was a good analogy of sin because sin is ugly and filthy and dirty, just like oil.
This relates to the problem that we have, which is that we have a source of sin that comes from our hearts. Then there comes the outworking of these sins, which we see in our lives. We see drinking, drugs, stealing, lying, cheating, killing, adultery, etc. These are all of the outworkings of sin in our thoughts and in our actions and in the things that we say.
For awhile, they could not stop the source of the oil spill and they knew this. What they did, though, was they cleaned up the outer contamination. They cleaned up the beaches. Wherever this oil was spreading, they were trying to get to it to get it out of the sea and to clean up the land areas that it was infecting. Yet all the while, they knew that it was still coming forth like a geyser and that it was still gushing.
This is our response of repentance. We clean up our life outwardly. Clean it up. Yes, throw away the cigarettes. Stop going to the bars. Get away from these things that we have been involved with that are sinful and evil, but do these things knowing that this is not saving repentance. Saving repentance is when the source is turned off, by God’s grace.
In the secular, physical world, God allowed this oil spill to happen, but they finally shut it off. This is the part that God has to do in our lives. He has to give us a new heart and a new spirit. However, there are two errors that people make.
In this analogy, they first of all think that cleaning up the beach is all that they need to do. “This is all that I have to do. If I stop these outward sins that are evident to all, to me as well as to others, this is salvation.” But, no, this is not. “All manner of evil” proceeds out of the heart. Until the heart is changed, we have not repented in a satisfying way. But who can change their heart? None of us can, and so we need God. As it says in Jeremiah 31, “Turn thou me, and I shall be turned…surely after that I was turned, I repented.” It is after God gives us a new heart that we have saving repentance.
So some people make the mistake of thinking that cleaning up the beach is satisfying repentance to God, when it is not. Then some people make a second error. They realize that there is a gusher, and so they think, “I am not going to do anything. I am not going to clean up anything. Why should I bother?”
Can you imagine if they had taken this position in the Gulf? What if they had waited until they had been able to seal off the oil well before they started cleaning up its effects? If they had done this, the situation would have grown worse and worse and uglier and uglier. Plus, there was no guarantee that they could even do this.
So this is also an error. It is an error to think, “I cannot repent.” Even though the truth is that we cannot repent unto salvation, you and I can crumple up the packet of cigarettes and toss them. You can and so can I. We can pray to God and then try our very best not to lie. We can turn from whatever sin there is.
God “commandeth all men every where to repent.” He actually commands us to “repent ye, and believe,” even though neither will save us. Neither will save us, but now we are getting in line with God’s will. We are going to God and we are saying to Him, “Lord, I believe that this is it. I know these things are not going to save me, but may You have mercy upon me.”
At this point, we are getting into the position that the Ninevites were in when they cried to God for mercy. We can maybe look at this another time. There are a couple of other things that we can do, that God permits us to do, all the while realizing that nothing we do, that no work we do could ever save us.
Let us stop here.