Instead of preaching to the evil ones a message of repentance they instead demand their deaths. Jonah did this very same thing with the Ninevites. This fact is evident in the many conversations I have heard first hand either in person or over social media. This fact is evident in the so-called Evangelical Christian Right demanding a strong military in order to kill the terrorists. These actions are very much more of an emphasis over any cry regarding the need to reach these lost souls with the message of repentance.
They would, as Jonah, rather see the evil ones die than to come to repentance. They would rather see them die than to be saved by God. This is a big reason why the "Evangelical" label is one of hypocrisy in light of God's word.
God told Jonah to go and preach against the city for their wickedness. Jonah, knowing God, should have known that God was seeking repentance and souls to be redeemed back to Him. God desires this over utter destruction. Yes, this is true, even in the Old Testament as we saw with the outcome regarding the Ninevites.
Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry against it; for their wickedness is come up before me. Jonah 1:2
Instead of preaching repentance, Jonah preached judgement alone. A true message of redemption involves both judgement and repentance.
Regardless of the hell-fire preaching of judgment minus the message of the need to repent the people of Nineveh assumed that God desired repentance so they repented. Romans chapter 1 says that even without the clear preaching of repentance or the presence of God's written word people are without excuse because they were created to know better. God's creation all around the Ninevites was proof enough as to who God was and what He required in regards to their sin. The outcome with the Ninevites demonstrated this to be a spiritual truth, exactly in line with Paul wrote to the Romans.
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. 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. For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water: 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. Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger, that we perish not? And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not. Jonah 3:4-10
But Jonah had a desire to kill the evil ones over God's desire to save them. This is the same spirit and attitude that the so-called "Evangelicals" have today. This is why Jonah and many today are not truly evangelical:
But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry. And he prayed unto the LORD, and said, I pray thee, O LORD, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil. Therefore now, O LORD, take, I beseech thee, my life from me; for it is better for me to die than to live. Then said the LORD, Doest thou well to be angry? So Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city, and there made him a booth, and sat under it in the shadow, till he might see what would become of the city. And the LORD God prepared a gourd, and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shadow over his head, to deliver him from his grief. So Jonah was exceeding glad of the gourd. But God prepared a worm when the morning rose the next day, and it smote the gourd that it withered. And it came to pass, when the sun did arise, that God prepared a vehement east wind; and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah, that he fainted, and wished in himself to die, and said, It is better for me to die than to live. And God said to Jonah, Doest thou well to be angry for the gourd? And he said, I do well to be angry, even unto death. Then said the LORD, Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for the which thou hast not laboured, neither madest it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night: And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?
An emphasis needs to be placed on God’s words “And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand...?”
The Lord would rather none to perish so why are the so-called "Evangelicals" so eager for blood as Jonah was?
The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. 2 Peter 3:9
Where the terrorist demands blood outside of the will of God the self-professing "Evangelical" does just the same:
Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things. Romans 2:1
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