The Sign of Jonah

One day we'll see him face to face and we'll behold his glory at its highest point. Until that time, we have the Word of God. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 3, 18, that we all with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord are being changed from one level of glory to the next level of glory, even as by the Spirit of God.

And so when we look into the Word of God, we behold the glory of God. And when we see him for who he is, the children of God respond in a way that brings honor to the name of our Lord. If you had your Bible, turn with me to Luke chapter 11.

Luke chapter 11. Yes, we are back in the book of Luke. It's been a while since right before Thanksgiving. So it's been quite a while. And I resisted the urge to go back and review chapter 11 with you, the first 28 verses, and to go back into chapter 10 to get you caught up to where we were.

I really resisted that urge. And so I'm not going to do that today. In fact, we have a tape series called True Blessings from God, which is six tapes on verses 27 and 28 of Luke 11 that you can go back and review to get caught up to where we are in verse number 29 in the gospel of Luke. But we need to move forward. We are going toward the end of the ministry of Jesus. He's about to die. I know it seems like it's a long way away. And for us it is because we just take one paragraph a week and we've got to go all the way to the end of Luke.

And so it's going to take us a number of years to get to his crucifixion in Luke's gospel. But in all reality, in Luke 11, we are nearing the end of our Lord's ministry. He's already set his sights on Jerusalem. He's going there to die. And in the in-between time in his Judean ministry, we're able to see exactly what he now is saying and he is doing. And we've come to a point in the scriptures where we're able to understand Israel's response to the Messiah. The verdict is in. And the verdict is this.

We saw this in Luke 11, verse number 16, which states these words, verse number 15, but some of them said, he cast out demons by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons. That is the verdict in Israel. It's been spread by the religious leaders and the people now have bought into the party line and the answer to how it is Jesus does all this supernatural work, all this casting out of demons and walking on the water and raising the dead and causing the blind to see and the lame to walk. Well, they couldn't deny the miracles.

They were obvious. I mean, the blind guy was blind and now he could see. The dead man was dead and now he's alive. I mean, they couldn't deny the obvious, right? So what they did was attribute the works of Christ to Satan. That was their verdict. That's the conclusion they came to after two and a half years of ministry. And we saw last time we were together in Luke's gospel, that this is the exact same thing that happened in his Galilean ministry. Matthew chapter 12 talks to us about what took place in the Galilean ministry.

The same conclusion there is now the same conclusion in Judea. He does what he does by the ruler of the demons. That's how he does it. Now you would think that here is Jesus. He's in the Galilean ministry. He's preaching the gospel and the conclusion is, well, he does this by the ruler of the demons. You'd think that he would go to his father and say, you know, it didn't work in Galilee very well. Maybe we should tone down the message a little bit. Maybe we should tone it down in Judea because in Galilee it received such a bad reception.

I mean, the people there just, they thought I was Satan. Maybe father, we could, we could tone it down a little bit in Judea and not be as harsh and not be as straightforward and not be as pointed with the repentance thing and the self-denial thing and the taking up your cross thing. And maybe we could tone it down a little bit so the people in Judea will believe. That's what we do today in church, isn't it? We realize people don't want to hear that message. So we just change it around. It's like I was going home on Wednesday night from the church service and my wife said to me, she says, you know, honey, if you keep preaching that message that you preached tonight, you're going to empty the church.

She says, you just can't go around telling people that if they don't give glory to God, as Malachi 2 says, that God is going to take the dung from their sacrifices and smear it in their faces. That just doesn't win over the unbeliever very well. And if they're going to hear that message and come to our church, they're not going to stay very long. And I said, yeah, that's why people are leaving, I guess. I don't have any other reason. But the conclusion is, well, maybe we should tone it down a little bit.

Maybe it's just too hard for people to hear. And that's not what Jesus did. In fact, as time goes on in his ministry, he becomes more condemnatory in his message. He becomes more judgmental in his message, not less, more. And you know what the funny thing is about that? The harder he preached, the more judgmental he was, the more he condemned them, the more the crowds increased. It says in verse 29, and as the crowds were increasing, they were increasing. And look at chapter 12, verse number 1, under these circumstances, after so many thousands of the multitude had gathered together, that they were stepping on one another.

I mean, this is, this is quite astonishing. I mean, the opposite of what we believe to be true is really true. I mean, if you tone down the message, we think that the people will come and more will be receptive of the message. But with Jesus, the harder he preached, the more difficult the message, the bigger the crowds, the bigger the crowds. Isn't that amazing? They had heard about this Jesus. They marveled, of course, at his works because, I mean, he was the greatest show on earth. I mean, there was no greater show than Jesus.

I mean, after all, all the things that he did, I mean, they were overwhelmed by his power. And the Bible says that in Matthew chapter 7, there was never a man who spoke like this man spoke.

He spoke with authority unlike anybody else spoke with authority. He spoke with clarity. He spoke decisively because he was the son of God. He spoke the truth of God. And of course, time was short. He knew his ministry wasn't a long ministry. And so if your ministry is not a very long ministry, and you know your time is short, you want to make sure you get the truth accurately out to people because you don't know how long they're going to be around to hear it. So that's what Jesus did. He gave them the truth of the gospel.

And as he became more judgmental, as he became more condemnatory, there were some times, and they're going to be brief between here and the end. There were some times where there were some outcasts, there were some prostitutes, there were some drunkards, there was some immoral people that he demonstrated grace and mercy and love and overwhelmed them with his compassion. But those times from here on out are extremely rare and extremely brief because the verdict was in. He does what he does by the power of Satan.

And there will be times where he will take his men aside and he will instruct them and he will prepare them for future ministry, knowing that he's going to die and they're going to take over the reins of the ministry. So he's going to spend some time doing that. But by and large, his ministry is confrontational with the religious establishment and those that come to hear him speak. So Jesus says, this is a wicked generation.

That, by the way, is his final word on the generation. Three things we're going to cover with you this morning, the final word, the final warning, and the final witness. This is his concluding word, his final word on this generation. This is a wicked generation. And as the crowds were increasing, he began to say, in other words, he not just said this once, he would say it again and again and again. This was a repeated statement. It's similar to what he said in Matthew's account. Matthew's account is similar to this one, but it happens in Galilee, not in Judea.

This happens in Judea. But he said the same thing in Galilee that he said in Judea. And there he called them an evil and adulterous generation. Earlier in Luke 7, in Luke 7, I'm sorry, Luke 9, verse number 441, he called them an unbelieving and perverted generation. I mean, talking about somebody who, who really confronts the, the people around him and calls it like he sees it, that's what Jesus did. And he said, this is a wicked generation. Poneros, same word used to describe Satan as the wicked one or the evil one.

This generation has the characteristic of Satan. Now, isn't that interesting? They said he was a Satan, but he called them a wicked generation. This is his final word to the people of Israel. Now, think about this for a moment. We would understand if Jesus was here today and he called those of us in America, a wicked generation, we could understand that, right? I mean, there'd be no question about that. I mean, we almost flaunt our sin in America. We flaunt our immorality. It's on TV. It's on the internet.

It's in, it's, it's in our politics. I mean, we just flaunt all kinds of sin in front of everybody's faces as if it doesn't matter. And the, the, the ungodliness of our generation, the, the infidelity of our generation, the immorality of our generation is abundant. And if Jesus was to come to us and say, you know what, you in America in 2011, this is a wicked generation, we'd say amen to that, that this is a wicked generation. But the generation that Jesus is speaking to by human standards was a moral generation, a religious generation.

In fact, they were intense about their religion. They were committed to the law of God. These people in Israel were God conscious, always. God was uppermost in their thinking. They were a moral society, not an immoral society by human standards. They, they were fanatical about the law. I mean, they, they, they would, they were so fanatical about the law, they, they tied it around their head and hung the, the law of God before their eyes. He tied around their wrist. I mean, they, they would see themselves as a moral, religious, God-centered generation.

And here Jesus comes and says, you are a wicked generation. You know, that's not how you, you know, influence friends. That's not how you, you become the most popular figure around. He calls them a evil and wicked generation. They saw themselves as moral. They saw themselves as religious. And they found themselves in the most deluding position possible. So delusional they were that they were in a position that was damning to their souls. They saw themselves as good people, God-fearing people, religious kinds of people.

And so when you go and you preach the gospel, as Jesus did, he was preaching to people that were in the most dangerous position they could ever be in. And we've told you before, it is more dangerous to be in a moral religious system than in an immoral and irreligious system. Because the moral system, the religious system is the deluding system. It's the one that, that thinks you have gained a standing with God, that you have some kind of, of, of credence before God that you have done this and you have done that.

And God is pleased with you. And God wants to have you a part of his kingdom. And you delude yourself into thinking that, you know, I am a good person. I am a religious person. I do the right things for God. And he is pleased with me. But when you preach the gospel, the gospel message is you're a sinner. You are separated from God. You have nothing to offer God. And what you have offered him is as filthy rags. No matter how righteous you think it is, it means nothing to God. And you can't earn your way into his presence.

And that's Jesus' message. And you know what? They hated him because that was his message. They despised him because he preached that message. Way back when in Luke chapter 4, when he went to his own synagogue in his own town with his own people, his own friends, his own family, he preached the message of repentance, the message of the gospel. What was their response? We've known you from early childhood. And God's given you to us? Of course you're right. They were saying, is this not Joseph's son?

Who does he think he is coming into this synagogue and telling us that we are separated from the one true God that we say we adore and we admire? And they hated him so they took him to a cliff and they wanted to throw them off a cliff because they wanted to kill him. They wanted to kill him, the Messiah, simply because he preached the truth. But you see, they were in that delusional system that said, you know what? I love God. God loves me. I do good things for God. God is pleased with me. I'm not like the immoral person.

I'm not like the prostitute. I'm not like the drunkard. I mean, those are evil people. Those are wicked people. I don't cheat on my wife. I don't kick my dog. I go to church. I'm a good guy. I don't swear. I mean, I'm a good guy. That is the most damning position you could ever be in because you have diluted your thinking. But somehow you're okay. And you don't see your sin for how foul it really is. And that puts you, listen carefully, in an unredeemable position. An unredeemable position because you can't get saved unless you know you are a sinner.

You cannot gain access to God by anything you say or anything you do. You are separated from God and you have nothing to offer God. And unless you throw yourself upon God and His mercy, you will not be saved because salvation is of the Lord. That's why earlier in Luke's account, in Luke chapter 5, there was the conversion of Matthew the tax gatherer. Remember that? And Matthew followed him and gave his life to the Lord Jesus. In the first 29, Levi, Matthew, gave a big reception for him in his house.

And there was a great crowd of tax gatherers and other people who were reclining at the table with him. And the Pharisees and the scribes began grumbling at his disciples saying, why do you eat and drink with the tax gatherers and sinners? And Jesus answered and said to them, it is not those who are well who need a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. In other words, if you see yourself as a self-righteous person, you put yourself in an unredeemable situation.

You can't get saved because Christ came to call the sinner, not those who believe themselves to be righteous. That's why in the Matthews 5, 6, and 7, that great sermon on the mount, he said, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you see, because they had this moral veneer that says, we don't murder. We don't murder anybody. We never killed anybody. We don't commit adultery. That's not us. We're moral men. And Christ says, if you lust after women in your heart, you've already committed adultery.

If you hate your brother, you're already a murderer. You see, they saw themselves as morally good people because of their do's and don't lists that they accomplished each and every day. And Jesus went right to the heart of the matter. That's why he affirmed the fact that, look, on the outside, you're clean. He affirmed that in them. On the outside, you look good. On the outside, you look kind of pretty. But on the inside, you smell of dead men's bones. You're vile. You're wicked. You're evil. And you know what?

They hated him because of that. They hated his message. They hated everything about him. But they couldn't get rid of the fact that he was supernatural. So they came up with this idea that, well, he does what he does by the power of Satan. He's demonic. And that was the bottom line, the party line that spread through Galilee, that spread through Judea. And Jesus said, this is a wicked generation. The rich young ruler, what must I do to inherit eternal life? Jesus said, got to keep the commands. What did he say?

I've done all that. I've done all that. In fact, the summation of Israel's leadership is seen in Luke chapter 15. Remember the story of the prodigal son? Story about the young man who wanted his inheritance. He went on, he spent all that money, and he found himself at the end of his ropes. And what you have in Luke 15 is the real characteristic of true repentance. True repentance. True repentance has no agenda and makes no demands. That's the summation of the prodigal son. True repentance has no agenda and makes no demands.

It throws itself on the mercy of another. And that's what the son did when he came home. And they threw this party, you know, the whole story of the prodigal son. It's really the story of two prodigal sons. And they throw this great party because there's this older son at home. And this older son is representative of the hypocritical Pharisees and scribes and leaders. And this son says these words. Now his older son was in the field. And when he came and approached the house, and he heard the music and dancing, and he summoned one of the servants to begin inquiring what these things might be.

And he said to him, your brother has come and your father has killed a fatted calf because he has received him back safe and sound. But he became angry and was not willing to go in. His father came out and began treating him. But he answered and said to his father, look, for so many years I have been serving you, and I have never neglected a command of yours. That is precisely the attitude of the hypocritical leaders of Israel. We have served you, the living God, and we keep every one of your commandments.

So Jesus affirmed the fact you're clean on the outside, but what's on the inside is filthy and dirty. See, they had this outward veneer of a reformation. That's why we talked about it at length way back in Luke chapter 11, verse number 24. It says, Christ says, he who is not with me is against me.

And he who does not gather with me scatters. When the unclean spirit goes out of a man, it passes through waterless places seeking rest and not finding any. It says, I will return to my house from which I came. And when it comes, it finds it swept and put in order. Then it goes and takes along seven other spirits, more evil than itself. And they go in and live there. And the last date of that man becomes worse than the first.

That is the nation of Israel. It's the man who says, look, he knows something's wrong. He knows that he's got to get things right. And so he, he, he's a drunkard. So he goes to AA and so he can get things together or he's, he has some sexual addiction. So he goes to some sex therapist and tries to get his act together. And, and there's some semblance of good and this demon leaves. But when he comes back, the man is, his house is clean. It's swept in order. Yet when he comes back, he comes back with seven other demons.

And that man state is worse now than it ever was. In other words, what Jesus says, there's this moral reformation on the outside.

You've cleaned up yourself. You pulled yourself up by your bootstraps. You say, you know what? There's something wrong with my life. I got to get it right. I got to get religion. I got to get Jesus. I got to go to church. And you go to church and you try to get things right. Or you say, you know what, honey, I want to make it work. I'm going to go to marriage counseling. I'm going to do all that you're trying to pull yourself up by your bootstraps, all doing something on the outside, trying to clean yourself up, but only open yourself for more of a demonic influence in your life.

You only delude yourself through moral reformation. These spiritual transformation from the inside out. And that's why, that's why to be religious and moral is the most damning position you can ever be in. That's why it's so important that in the church, you really preach a hard message because there's lots of people in the church that grew up in the church that grew up and think they are saved because they grew up in the church and they served in the church for many, many years. And they think that because they've grown up in the church, they've served in the church, that they must be saved.

Really? Those are the people that are going to hear, did we not prophesy in your name? Cast out demons in your name? Do many marvelous deeds in your name? Jesus is going to say, I'm sorry, I never knew you. Depart from me. Wouldn't that be just a horrible place to be? Having lived your whole life thinking you're saved, really thinking that you're saved, to die and wake up at the judgment seat of Christ to know that you never were saved and your soul was damned forever. Oh, that's just horrifying.

Horrifying. And Jesus was concerned about that. He was really concerned about that. So he says, the final word is given. This is the final indictment. This is a wicked generation. The crowds increased. They got bigger. He said, I want to let you know, you're wicked. You're evil from the inside out. And the crowd just kept coming. They just kept coming. Really? Or evil? See, they deluded themselves. There was this illusion that they had about themselves. You know, I guarantee that the church is made up of these kinds of people.

I'm convinced of it. That the evangelical church today is made up of these kinds of people. Because Jesus said that the tares will grow alongside of the wheat until the end of the age. And you can't tell the difference between the two. Excuse me. Until the end. So it's important to listen to what God says, right?

So he gives us this final word. Now, you think that if they were a wicked generation... Choked on my cough drop. If they were a wicked generation, that Jesus would be able to list their wicked acts. Don't you think? I mean, if we say today is a wicked generation in America, we could begin to list all the wickedness that we in America do. Right? We could do that. Jesus doesn't do that. Listen to what he says. He says, he began to say, this generation is a wicked generation because it seeks for a sign.

What? Are you kidding me? They're wicked because they seek for a sign? That's what makes them wicked? Why is that? In this sense, because they were saying the reason we don't believe that you're the Messiah is because you haven't convinced us. That is, you need to be able to demonstrate to us in some supernatural kind of way that you are the Messiah. They were saying, it's your fault we don't believe. It's not our fault. It's your fault that we're not convinced. It's not our fault. You haven't convinced us yet.

Excuse me. You haven't done anything yet to prove to us you truly are the Messiah. They were blaming Christ for their unbelief. That's why they were a wicked generation. We're the godly ones. We're God's chosen ones. We're wise. We have discernment. We have spiritual insight. And our conclusion is, you haven't done enough to convince us. So, we don't believe. And it's your fault we don't believe. So, answer me this. What sign do you think would cause them to flip-flop in their beliefs? What sign could Jesus do, excuse me, that would cause them to say, oh yeah, you are the Messiah.

Sorry, we missed it. When you were walking on the water, we missed it. When you created food and fed 25,000, we missed it. When you took demon-possessed people and cast out demons and made them in the right, oh, we missed it. Sorry. Oh, when the dead guy was raised and he walked to give you, give him back to us. We missed that one too. Sorry, we missed the whole resurrection thing. I guess that wasn't a big enough sign for us. What sign could Jesus possibly do that would convince them that he was the Messiah?

That's why later in Luke 16, he was to the man in Abraham's bosom. They have Moses. They have the prophets. If they don't believe them, they won't believe the one be raised from the dead. If they don't believe what God's Word says, there is no miracle that's going to cause them to believe. See, it's the message that causes them to believe, not the miracle. And so, they were seeking a sign. It was almost as if they were taunting him. Remember back in Luke 11, verse number 16, and others to test him were demanding of him a sign from heaven.

They were mocking him. Show us a sign. Go ahead. What do you got? Do something to convince us. Try to convince us. And there's nothing that could convince them. You know why? Because John 15 says these words, If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin. But now they have both seen and hated me and my father as well. Do you know why they were a wicked generation? Because they were God-haters. That's why. See, how can the Jews be God-haters? Jesus said they were God-haters.

They hated me and they hated my father as well. They attributed everything I did to Satan. They did not believe that I was from God. They were God-haters. That's why they were a wicked generation. But you know what? Our Lord is full of grace, full of mercy, and God gives them a final warning. Listen to what it says. And as the crowds were increasing, he began to say, this generation is a wicked generation. Seeks for a sign, and yet no sign shall be given to it but the sign of Jonah. But, the great but-ologies of scripture, right?

But the sign of Jonah. He's going to give them a sign, not because they demanded it, but because he determined it from eternity past. He's not going to give them a sign because they demand, show us a sign. He's going to give them a sign because this is all part of the plan of his coming, his dying, his rising again. He says, this generation is wicked because they seek a sign. In other words, they're unwilling to believe what is so clearly before them. Yet, they're not going to get a sign, no more signs, but the sign of Jonah.

The sign of Jonah. This is the final warning to the nation of Israel, the sign of Jonah. What's that? Well, Matthew's account given in Galilee some months earlier, Matthew 12, verse 38, then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him saying, teacher, we want to see a sign from you. But he answered and said to them, an evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign. And yet, no sign shall be given to it, but the sign of Jonah, the prophet. Listen carefully. For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so shall the son of man be three days and three nights in the hearts of the earth.

Listen carefully. In Jewish vernacular, any part of a day is considered the day and night of a day. The Jewish Talmud reads this way. He says, or it says, any part of a day is the whole day. Just because it says three days and three nights doesn't mean it's got to be a 24 hour period or 72 hours. That's not what it says. Because it's based on Esther, the book of Esther, chapters four and five, where she said that she would go into the King after three days and three nights. And chapter five says that on the third day, she went into the King.

So in Jewish vernacular, any part of a day is considered the whole day, based on the Jewish Talmud, based on what they believed. Jesus says, the only sign they're going to give is a sign of Jonah.

What's the sign of Jonah? As Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the fish, so shall the son of man be three days and three nights in the grave or in the ground. You know the story of Jonah. He preached in the eighth century. Oh, by the way, he's from a little town right outside of Nazareth, just in case you were wondering about what the Jews said about any good thing coming out of Nazareth. They forgot that Jonah was from that area. Okay. He preached in the eighth century. He didn't want to go to those in Nineveh because they were wicked, immoral, idolatrous people.

And he knew, he knew, this is so funny because we don't know this, but he knew that if he preached the gospel to a bunch of immoral, idolatrous people, they'd repent. He knew that. We don't know that. We think, well, they're not going to get saved. We're going to preach the gospel. They're not going to get saved. Really? No, they're not going to get saved. But Jonah was the opposite. He was a prophet of God. And he knew that if he preached the gospel to this, these Ninevites, they'd repent. They'd get saved.

And in Genesis chapter three, that's exactly what happened. You know, he repented. I mean, he, he didn't want to go there. He sort of went on a trip going the opposite direction from Nineveh. And, you know, you know, the Bible says Genesis, sorry, Genesis chapter one, that he had to pay his own fare.

That's because he went the opposite way of God. When you go God's way, God pays the fare. When you go the opposite way of God, you got to pay your own fare. And so, you know, he had paid his own fare. And of course, you know, the story about how the storm came on the sea. And Jonah says, I'm the guy. And they threw him overboard. And the great sea monster swallowed him. And they're saying, you know, he was spit up on the city of Nineveh, the shores of Nineveh. He preached the gospel. People repented.

They got saved. They really repented of their other sins because he preached to them the truth of the gospel. Here's the point. Those in Nineveh were not religious. They were irreligious. They were not moral. They were immoral. And they got one prophet to come and preach the message. They didn't have anything about the written word of God in their possession. But one message came, one prophet came, preached the message about the gospel. And at the same time, he told them about what took place in his life.

How do we know that? Well, the Bible says these words, for just as Jonah became assigned to the Ninevites, how did he become assigned to the Ninevites?

Unless the Ninevites knew what took place in Jonah's life. Just as Jonah became assigned to the Ninevites, so shall the son of man to be to this generation. In other words, here was one prophet with one message and one sign and a whole city repented of their sins. Here's the Messiah with message after message after message after message and a plethora of signs and nobody's believing. Nobody's believing. Or very few of them are believing because we know from Luke 13, the questions asked are there only a few being saved because there certainly isn't many people giving their lives to the Lord Jesus.

And so Jesus says, the sign of Jonah is the sign of the resurrection. The sign of the resurrection. See, Jonah became a type of Christ. He was analogous to Christ because here was a man with a great future, right? And what took place is that he was swallowed by a great fish as Christ was swallowed up in the grave. And here was a man set for certain death. Christ, he actually died. And as the fish spit him up onto the ground and he continued on with a great career, so it is with Jesus Christ. He was raised from the dead and his ministry now is greater than it ever has been.

He became a sign, a type of Christ. This was the only sign they were going to get, the sign of the resurrection. He told them this. He told this on several occasions. And remember what took place in the end of Matthew? They said, you know what? Put a guard at the tomb because he said he was going to rise again. So they put a guard at the tomb and guess what? He rose again. And what happened? They came back, the guards came back after what took place and he's gone. He's gone? Yeah, he's gone. Well, tell him this.

Tell him that the disciples came and stole his body. The disciples stole the body. And if the governor has a problem with this, we'll convince them that that's what took place. You can read about it in the book of Matthew. Wow. The sign of Jonah, resurrection. Sign of Jesus, Son of Man, the resurrection. It will be the final warning. He will be raised from the dead. But even in the midst of overwhelming evidence of his resurrection, they still believed a lie. And they conjured up a lie so others would continue to believe the lie.

From the final word to the final warning, you have a final witness. It says this, the Queen of the South, we know her as the Queen of Sheba, shall rise up with the men of this generation at the judgment and condemn them because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon. And behold, something greater than Solomon is here. The Queen of Sheba. It's modern day Yemen if you want to know where she was from. She traveled a long way. She had heard about the wisdom of Solomon. She wanted to know about the God who gave wisdom to this man, this king called Solomon.

So she packed up her gear. She traveled a long way to make this journey so she could sit at the feet of Solomon. You can read about it in the first Kings chapter nine.

And as she began to, to glean from him, this wisdom, the summation of her coming was this, blessed be the Lord, your God, who delighted in you to set you on the throne of Israel because the Lord loved Israel forever. Therefore, he made you king to do justice and righteousness. She knew about the sovereignty of God. How did she know about the sovereignty of almighty God? Solomon told her. How did she know about the righteousness of God and the justice of God? Solomon told her. This woman traveled a far distance.

She was a pagan woman who knew nothing about the Lord God of the universe, but heard about this king called Solomon who had all kinds of wisdom. So she went to Jerusalem to find out about this man's wisdom and where he received it. Once she heard what Solomon said, she believed in his God. She believed in the Lord God of Israel. One message, limited knowledge, she believed. And the Lord God says very simple, simply these words, she'll rise up with the men of this generation, that is you guys, at the judgment and condemn them because she came from the ends of the earth to hear wisdom of Solomon.

Behold, something greater than Solomon is here. On the day of judgment, she will stand up and she will condemn you because she was one who was a pagan Gentile woman who came to hear the truth, heard it once with no signs and believed. You have a plethora of signs with many messages and the law of God and you refuse to believe for one greater than Solomon is in your midst. That's the son of God, the king of wisdom who gave Solomon wisdom. Verse 32, the men of Nineveh shall stand up with this generation at the judgment and condemn it because they repented at the preaching of Jonah.

And behold, something greater than Jonah is here. Wow, what a message, a gracious opportunity that God gave the Ninevites. One prophet, one message, one experience and thousands upon thousands upon thousands repented of their sin. Israel had sign after sign after sign after sign and the list goes on and on and on and on and they refused to believe. They had someone greater than Solomon, someone greater than Jonah in their midst and they refused to believe him and his message. When this woman, this pagan Gentile woman would travel a far distance to hear one message, she was saved.

As opposed to you who have the great king of the universe in your midst and hear message after message after message and yet are not saved. Wow. He gives the final warning. These people in Nineveh, the queen of the south or the queen of Sheba, heard little but made the most of what they heard by repenting of their sin. It takes you back to verse number 28 of chapter 11, doesn't it? Blessed are those who hear the word of God and observe it. That was those in Nineveh. That was the queen of the south.

You know what Jesus did? He was so kind because he reminded them of their coming judgment. He reminded them of their judgment. On the day of judgment, she will stand up and condemn you. On the day of judgment, all the occupants of Nineveh will stand up. These immoral, irreligious, idolatrous, pagan worshipers, whom you despise because of your morality, because of your religiosity, because of your do-goodiness, you despise. Yet they, they repented. Yet they received the blessing because they believed in me.

And you didn't. You refused to believe. What do you believe? Where do you stand with the Lord God? Are you among those delusional people who think because you've been in church for 50 years, you've heard every message. You've heard all the good preachers. You've served in every capacity possible in the church. You've done all that. Have you deluded yourself into thinking because you were raised in a Christian family and raised in a Christian church and went to that church and served in that church that somehow you're saved because of that?

That doesn't save you. None of those works save you. And all these people in Israel, they were in the synagogue daily. They obeyed as best they could the law of God. They did it all. And yet they would attribute the works of Jesus to the work of Satan. And they would say in mocking terms, show us a sign. Give us a sign. Come on, convince us. Come on. Come on, Jesus. Convince us. Because we don't believe because you are not convincing enough. Really? And Jesus says, you are wicked because you want a sign.

And only an evil and adulterous generation seeks a sign. Yet you're not going to have a sign. I'm not going to give you one. But the sign of Jonah, the sign of the resurrection, the Son of Man will be raised. That will be your final warning. If you confess with your mouth, Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you'll be saved. Do you believe that? If you do with the mouth, confession is made into salvation. And with the heart, man believes into what? Righteousness.

There is a changed life because of the righteousness of Christ in you. Let me pray with you. Lord Jesus, thank you for this day. You are such an incredible God. The things you've said and how you've said them, amazing. We are so blessed to be able to read and understand your ministry and what you did. My prayer is for those here today who might have lived under the delusion that they're going to heaven simply because they are moral, religious people and not realizing that they truly are separated from God.

They are sinners and can do nothing to save them from their sin and desperately need to cry out to the Lord God as their Savior. I pray, Father, for the salvation of those among us who do not know you. Today would be the day of their salvation. In Jesus' name. Amen.