JONAH commenced preaching and the result was remarkable and startling. The Ninevites believed God. It is so easy to read this statement without really noticing how remarkable it is. Think for a moment about the preaching of the Word of God today. Think of a preacher coming to a modern city. Even with all the means for publicity available today our expectations would be extremely modest. We would hope for some response, and if that response was 200 or 300 hundred believing the message we would be over the moon in our expressions of joy. In fact if there were only 50 who responded to the message we would be filled with joy. There would be no expectation that the whole population of the town would believe the message. We know the hardness of people's hearts. But what do we find here. We are told in the next chapter that the population of Nineveh was 120,000 people. The whole number were moved by the message of Jonah, from the king down to the most insignificant member.

Without doubt the response to the preaching of Jonah is truly remarkable. It can only be explained by the manifestation of God acting in sovereign grace. The fact is that such is the corruption within the human heart, and rebellion the strong emotion of the human heart, that the only way such a response to the message could have taken place is by the action of God sovereignly choosing to be gracious, and turn the hearts of the people to himself.

The message of Jonah, though we have only a heading of its content, is uncompromisingly one of condemnation, judgement and promise of punishment. Yet in this message God purposed to save all the inhabitant of Nineveh. When people speak dismissively of the revelation of God in the Old Testament as being an angry unforgiving God, it is because they do not see the hidden depth in this revelation. God terrifies not because he delights in human misery, but in grace and love to show people what they are like, and the awful end they are traveling to, so that they may plead for mercy with true sorrow for sin, and so find that God is merciful and full of compassion and kindness, and one who provides mercy for the true penitent.

Can we imagine any other message than the one Jonah preached having any effect on the people in Nineveh. Would they not have only despised as weakness and wishy-washy sentimentality the sort of message of love in God which goes under the title of Gospel preaching today. Let us now look at this response expressed in our text - “The Ninevites believed God”.

BELIEVED GOD.

It is so easy to pass over such a statement as this, but in reality it is pregnant with meaning.

Jonah was speaking the message but the Ninevites understood that it was God speaking. By this they believed that God was, that is existed, and took to heart that he was sovereign over all, because they believed that this threat was a real threat, and that God had power to execute it. The Ninevites took to heart that in 40 days their city would be devastated and all of them would perish. They were convinced of this and their action of proclaiming a fast and putting on sackcloth proclaimed their conviction.

They believed God, that is they believed God had spoken through Jonah, and that this message was the very word and mind of God. Here is the real nature of true faith. Here we do not simply have the expression that they believed in God as so many speak today, and which then makes no difference to their lives. They did not even simply believe that God existed, although this was included. They were conscious of the presence and nearness of God, and that he took account of the way they lived. They were convinced of God's purpose and became aware of his feelings towards them and towards their ways. They heard the message of judgement, and saw that God hated their way of life. There was fear and conviction that overwhelmed them.

All this is wrapped up in the words they “believed God”.

God has spoken today. His word is there to be read and heard. Many confess that they believe in God and many say they are Christians, but it is comparatively rare for people to believe God. To believe God is to believe he has spoken in the Bible, and that the Bible speaks his will and his thoughts and purposes. To believe God is to see the Bible as God making his interest in this world plain, and that he reacts in the way described in the Bible to us human beings and to the way we behave. To believe God is take seriously that we are God's creatures who he has created, and so we have an obligation to heed his word, and if we don't then we will be judged, and that we can't complain at the consequence of that judgement. To believe God is to take seriously that God has final authority over us, and that his power in almighty and in the end we will not be able to resist his will. To believe God is to fear him.

When we consider this, even in the church we do not see much of this conviction, for if we believed God then it would change the whole state of the church. Like the Ninevites we would act, proclaiming a fast and putting on sackcloth, if not actually, but in true sorrow and repentance of heart.

These days people seem to treat the Bible and God's word expressed there as an interesting book which holds valuable information which we are at liberty to pick and choose that which we approve of or we feel may be helpful to us. Even those of us who confess that the Bible is to us God's word and that it is our authority for life, still read it far too casually. To believe God, to believe he speaks in the Bible, is to come to the Bible each day with reverence and holy fear, and read it as if we are standing in the presence of God and he is speaking to us directly. It is as if being in the very presence of God we listen with holy fear to his commands, and his words, and receive them, and live by them, in total obedience and trust.

For us who are preachers this believing God is even more serious and profound. We come to the Bible not simply to understand its meaning, but in total submission to God, we read it, hear it, inwardly digest it, so that our lives are governed by it and our thoughts and ways reflect the mind of God. Further when we come to the business of preaching we seriously take to heart that we must come into the presence of God as we read the Scriptures, not simply to be able to expound the truth, but to hear the message from the Bible that God is telling us to speak on every occasion. Then when we have this message burnt on our soul, to faithfully proclaim it. We have no right to change it or water it down in order to please the people to whom we speak. Whatever the cost we must be faithful to God and hold back nothing he has given us to say.

THE RESULT OF BELIEVING GOD.

Only such believing in God is saving. We are told in Genesis 15:6 “Abraham believed the Lord, and it was credited it to him for righteousness.” We read this and it may not be clear what is being said here. Let us consider it afresh.

Abraham listened to God and believe God spoke to him, and believed what he heard was from God and that God was telling him what he was going to do, and that because God said it, it would most surely happen as God stated it. There was in this belief a submission to God and rest upon God, and receiving of God as God, creator and Lord, to whom Abraham owed allegiance. There is that wholehearted trust in the word of God because it is God who has spoken and who keeps his word.

In the case of Abraham the word he received was first a command to leave his country and to travel where God would lead him. He had to trust God because he was not told where his final destination would be. Then it was to believe God would give him progeny when humanly speaking this was totally impossible. Then it was to sacrifice to God the son on which all his hopes and trust in God was founded. In all this he believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness.

Because he believed God and followed God, this meant that he believed all the plans and purpose of God for those who believe are true and operated. Because of this he was counted righteous in God's sight, because in such belief in God he was placing himself in the service and protection of God, confessing his obligation to God, and bowing in submission before God, and depending on the graciousness and mercy of God. In himself Abraham was not righteous. He deserved only condemnation, but he placed himself in humble submission, confessing his unworthiness, upon God, and so God in mercy and grace made him a partaker of all his redeeming purposes in Christ, and so he benefited from Christ's righteousness imputed to him.

In the same way, though reacting to a different aspect of God's word, the Ninevites believed God. They believed God's threat, and accepted the righteousness of such a threat. They accepted that they deserved what was threatened. They turned to God and cried for mercy which cry was expressed in their action. They believed God in the fact that they accepted that their way of life and actions were unacceptable to God, and that these must change.

This is believing God. Whether such believing God is saving or not depends on how far it goes. In the case of the Ninevites it is plain that it went deep and was for them saving. God withdrew his threat. That generation of Ninevites at least turned to God in true repentance, and the whole life of the city changed.

Such believing God is not natural to fallen humanity, and when it happens it is a made possible by the sovereign grace of God alone.

CONCLUSION.

The great question is do we believe God? Do we come to the Scriptures as God speaking and do we hear God speaking to us? Do we receive his word with holy fear, and rest our souls upon his word with faith and obedience? Do we allow the Word of God to rule our lives? Do we reverence the Scriptures as the word of God, and come to it with eager desire to know God and his will for us?