True Compassion

Father, each of us know people who have a real problem with anger, and Father, we just lift them before you at this time.

Father, you know that there are some of us here who have great problems with anger,

and some of us, Father, who don't know that we have anger problems or anger issues at all,

and we ask that you, with gentle but loving power, make that clear to us.

But, Father, we also know that we often get angry, and sometimes we regret it, and sometimes we don't, but we should,

and we're just confused about anger.

We ask that you would speak to our hearts this morning.

You'd bring your word, your grace, your gospel to our hearts,

that we might live well in the face of injustice,

that we might live with anger in a way that is good for people and good for us and brings you glory.

And so we want to know your wisdom.

So pour out the Holy Spirit, and we ask this in the name of Jesus, your Son and our Savior.

Amen.

Please be seated.

If you Google this question about negative emotions,

and, of course, when you Google something, you always get the right answer.

But if you Google things about negative emotions,

on all of the lists that I looked at,

the first list that come up in every single case, anger,

is listed as one of the negative emotions.

In fact, it's often the first negative emotion which is listed.

But last week, I talked about how if the day ever came that in Canada,

every Canadian was doing a meditation technique,

or a type of meditation that meant that they didn't get angry,

or if every Canadian was in a type of therapy or counseling

which meant that they didn't get angry,

or if every Canadian was taking a drug that meant that they wouldn't get angry,

if in any one of those three situations or a combination of that day came

when something came that nobody in Canada or nobody in any country was getting mad,

getting angry,

that would be the day that tyrants and oppressors and abusers

would throw a party and dance a jig

because it would mean that they weren't being confronted ever

by the wrong that they were doing.

And so, the fact of the matter is that the Lord will never,

part of God's common grace is that God in his common grace

will never remove from human beings their sense of anger

because to do that, he'd have to destroy our sense of right and wrong.

Now, having said that, we all know that anger still is problematic in all sorts of ways.

Some of us get too angry.

Some of us don't get angry when we should because we've been so beat up.

Some of us get angry about the wrong things.

Some of us, anger becomes a type of an addiction, a type of habit.

And often, our anger leads to hatred.

And it's like a drug and it can do all sorts of harm.

But so, it's just complicated.

Anger is complicated.

Well, believe it or not, the story that we're going to look at is the book of Jonah comes to an end.

This book that was written over 2,700 years ago, almost 2,800 years ago,

this book that was written so long ago has such deep wisdom about anger.

So, it'd be a great help to me if you would turn in your Bibles to Jonah chapter 4.

Jonah 4 · chapter mention

Jonah chapter 4.

Jonah 4 · chapter mention

And we're looking at the fifth verse.

We've been preaching through the book of Jonah.

And as I've shared before, the way to look at the book of Jonah, the way to understand it,

as you're reading it, is to think of a Netflix series that had four or five episodes.

I've taken, in a sense, the fourth episode and turned it into two.

And, you know, if you see a good Netflix series from the BBC or from Germany or France or Belgium or something like that,

each episode tells a story.

But if you look at all of the episodes together, they tell a far more nuanced and interesting story.

And that's the way to understand the book of Jonah.

So, if you were making a Netflix special for it,

Jonah chapter 1 tells the story of God wanting Jonah to go to Nineveh,

Jonah 1 · chapter mention

the capital of the most powerful empire in the ancient Near East,

to go there and confront them.

Jonah doesn't want to do this.

He goes the opposite direction.

And that part of the story of Jonah, many people, secular people, people of other religions,

they know this part of the story.

It becomes clear that Jonah is the one responsible for the storm.

He's thrown overboard.

End of episode 1, great cliffhanger.

Episode 2, a great aquatic beast, just as Jonah's about to drown,

a great aquatic beast comes, swallows Jonah, and Jonah discovers that rather than being dead, he's alive.

Unfortunately, the good news, he's not dead, he's alive.

The bad news is he's in the intestines of a great aquatic beast.

And how he describes what happens, he does in the form of a prayer,

which is also a bit of a conversion prayer.

Him just being, in a sense, gobsmacked at the mercy of God and the kindness of God

and his trust in God that God will deliver him.

And episode 2 ends with Jonah being vomited by the great aquatic beast onto the shore.

End of episode 2.

Episode 3, he goes to Nineveh.

He proclaims the message.

He says, if you don't repent, you will be overthrown in the same way that Sodom and Gomorrah were overthrown,

completely and utterly.

And to his complete and utter shock and amazement,

well, not entirely, but to our shock and amazement,

Nineveh repents from the king right down to the lowest individual.

And what they do is they say, even though this is a message which seems that we have no hope,

we are going to repent of our violence, our evil, and our injustice,

and we are going to cast ourselves upon the mercy of the Lord

in the hope that he will have mercy upon us.

And God relents from his justice upon them,

which would then make you wonder why on earth could there be any episodes after that?

Well, the episodes after it go at a very interesting thing

because, you see, the fact of the matter is,

is that the Bible and the Lord is concerned not just with what we do,

but the motivation of what we do,

the motivation behind why we do things,

what we want to have happen,

is also very important in trying to understand what's going on in our lives.

And so what we looked at last week, the first four verses,

is this shocking thing that the reason that Jonah had run away from God

was because he believed that God was merciful and compassionate and all-powerful,

and that it might very well be that if he went to Nineveh

and proclaimed their need to repent, they might repent,

and if they repented, God might not destroy them.

And Jonah hated the Ninevites so much,

he didn't want them to be spared.

He wanted God to destroy them.

And we looked at that last week.

But now, and we looked at it, we talked about it in terms of mercy.

But if you think about it for a second,

and many people in the ancient world,

when they were reading this for the first time,

they would have maybe said,

well, one moment, before we go any farther,

I don't know if Jonah was wrong to be angry,

and I don't know if maybe God, the Lord was,

like maybe Jonah was right to be angry at what the Lord did,

and maybe what the Lord did was wrong.

Like, they are, you know, I don't know if I said this last week,

I've said it, you know, some other time,

and you might or might not remember it,

but the fact of the matter is that Nineveh,

the Assyrian Empire,

literally, literally practiced genocide.

They literally practiced genocide.

And in fact, about,

if this was written around 755 BC,

33 years after this,

Assyria would reinvade the northern kingdom of Israel,

take all of the people away

in bondage and slavery,

and the ten and a half tribes

that made up what was then known as Israel

completely disappeared from history.

Like, real genocide,

real, complete, utter, thorough genocide.

These were bad people.

And many people in the ancient world,

reading this in 755 or 722 or 700,

they'd go, I don't know, you know,

maybe I don't know about this story,

what's going on with this story.

So that's why the story continues.

The Lord is going to press in,

and we're going to see,

well, let's just see what happens.

Look at verse 5.

So remember, what's just happened is

Jonah blasts the Lord

and says, I'm so angry, I want to die.

He blasts the Lord.

The Lord asks him a question.

Do you think it's right for you to be angry?

Verse 5, Jonah responds,

in verse 5,

Jonah went out of the city of Nineveh

and sat to the east of the city

and made a booth for himself there.

He sat under it in the shade

till he should see

what would become of the city.

In other words,

Jonah hopes,

I've just given the Lord a blast

and I think I'm right

and I think he's wrong

and I'm going to give him a blast

and I hope I've changed his mind.

So I'm going to just sit out here,

still angry,

and I'm going to make something

so I have a bit of shade

and I'm just going to sit

hoping that the Lord changes his mind

and fire comes down from heaven

and completely obliterates

and kills all of the people in Nineveh.

That's where Jonah is.

Well, does the Lord change his mind?

Well, let's see what happens

in verse chapter 6.

There's sort of a surprising thing

that happens in verse 6.

Now, the Lord God appointed a plant

and made it come up over Jonah

that it might be a shade over his head

to save him from his discomfort.

So Jonah was exceedingly glad

because of the plant.

Now, just pause.

What's described here,

the word appointed is very important.

It shows the Lord being sovereign

over the world.

It's the Lord appoints

a great aquatic beast to it.

Just the perfect time swallowed Jonah

and he appoints the plant.

You're going to see in a moment

he's going to appoint a worm.

He's going to appoint a scorching wind

and it shows how the Lord is sovereign.

But what the Lord does here

is he causes a plant to grow

very, very quickly

and it would have been like a vine

that sort of entwined itself

over the booth

and it would have had

very, very large leaves.

So while the booth itself,

which would have just been made out of sticks,

wouldn't have provided very much shade,

all of a sudden with the leaves

it would have provided

very, very good shade.

I don't know how many of you

have been in a country

like Iraq or like Israel.

The heat is if you're,

I mean, not if you're down by the ocean,

but in where this is,

it's a dry heat.

And so when it's a dry heat,

it means if you're in the shade

and there's a breeze,

it actually can be surprisingly comfortable

even though the temperature

might be quite high.

And so the Lord does this.

And there's sort of an interesting thing

in the original language.

The language is that

when it says the Lord wants to save him,

what it's saying is that

the Lord hopes

that by cooling Jonah off,

he can cool off his anger as well.

Because as we all know,

sometimes if things are just going wrong,

if you're a bit in pain,

you're more grumpy.

I shared last week,

I can get hungry

and not realize that

because I'm hungry,

I'm getting more grumpy.

Somebody in fact told me

there's a word for it,

hangry.

H before the word angry.

And so I can be prone

to being hangry.

And so there's a similar type of thing

that goes on here.

And then it says that

Jonah's exceedingly glad.

And it's a link

to what just happened

in the previous story.

Because if you go back

and read verse 1,

Jonah is exceedingly,

like just hopping,

unbelievably deeply

high level angry

that the Lord didn't destroy Nineveh.

And now that same description

of just unbelievably fever pitch,

but now he's happy.

He's happy over the plant.

And it's connecting the two stories

at the level of the original language.

So what's going to happen now?

Is Jonah in fact going to say,

oh yeah,

okay, now that I'm a bit cool

and there's a breeze,

I don't know,

yeah, maybe I have to tone down

my anger a little bit.

Maybe the Lord was right.

I'm a little bit too angry.

Well, let's see what happens.

Verse 7,

but when dawn came up the next day,

God appointed a worm

that attacked the plant.

Actually, in the original language,

if you use real technical language,

it's smite.

It's an old-fashioned word,

you know,

like he has a sword,

you smite,

he smites the plant.

And sorry,

I like old words.

I just,

for the three of you

out there in the room,

that's how you could translate it

who like old words.

We'll read verse 7 again,

but when dawn came up the next day,

God appointed a worm

that attacked the plant

so that it withered.

In other words,

it dies.

And when the sun rose,

God appointed a scorching east wind

and the sun beat down

on the head of Jonah

so that he was faint.

And he asked that he might die

and said,

it is better for me

to die than to live.

He'd said that before.

He was so angry,

it would be better for him

to die than to live.

He says that in the previous story.

But God said to Jonah,

do you do well

to be angry for the plant?

And Jonah said,

yes,

I do well to be angry,

angry enough to die.

That's what he says.

I probably should have said that

without a smile

to be really communicate the anger.

And just sort of pause there.

Earlier,

as I shared,

the same type of question

was asked in the previous story,

do you do well to be angry?

And it's very interesting.

In the original language,

it does something

which you can't really do in English.

There's many of you here

who speak multiple languages.

And you know how sometimes

it's complicated

to try to communicate something

in another language.

And that's one of these cases.

And really,

the question

could be understood two ways

or the same way,

but with two different senses.

Part of it is

just asking Jonah,

do you realize how angry you are?

Do you realize

how thoroughly,

completely consumed

you are with anger?

I've done counseling sessions

with people.

It's so,

like it's not funny,

but it is funny.

And I sit there

and they're across from me

and they're red.

They're red.

You can see veins

throbbing in their temples.

And they're either sitting there

grabbing the tape,

the arms like this,

or they're tapping furiously.

And I might eventually say,

do you think you,

like,

you're really angry?

I'm not angry.

They say in an angry voice.

And you can't even do any counseling

until you get them to realize,

one second,

just time out here,

you're angry.

You don't realize you're angry,

but you're really angry.

Okay,

and you can't have

any other conversation

about anything else

until the person realizes

how angry they are.

So this is like

a modern counseling question

that the Lord asks them.

First of all,

do you realize

how angry you actually are?

And the second sense of it,

it could also,

and some of your English versions

show the two different senses.

The other question is,

is it right that you're so angry?

Like,

do you think it's right

that you're so angry

over this?

Just this,

I know that,

you know,

in modern counseling,

you're not supposed to say,

you know,

make judgmental comments

about emotions

and all of that type of stuff,

but that's wrong.

It's just sometimes just wrong.

Sometimes it's very right.

You know,

a person has their emotions,

but sometimes you have to,

in fact,

in counseling,

you often go off,

you often use emotions

as a key

to figure out

what's actually going on

because emotions show

what we value,

what we think is important.

It reveals our moral order.

It reveals the idols

that we have.

That's what emotions

often reveal.

Or the good things,

not all bad things

because sometimes

it reveals a good sense

of,

a good way

of understanding the world

and they're very healthy,

but they reveal things.

I was just talking

to somebody

within the last couple of weeks.

This is a professional

and the court

had asked

that he do an assessment

of a person

around a particular issue

that was within

his medical area

of expertise

because it affected

whether or not

a certain type

of sentencing

was going on

and the person,

it was a very,

very serious offense.

It could mean

a long time

doing hard time

in jail.

And basically,

as he was sharing

this with me

and he was sort of

laughing about it

a little bit,

the person tried

to fake it

and they were doing

a terrible job

of faking it

and he eventually

just said,

okay,

you don't have

this condition,

you're just trying

to fake it.

And as they left

the room,

they were furious

with him

because they were

trying to manipulate

the medical assessment

so they could get out

of doing hard time

and he caught them

and their response

wasn't,

oh,

I'm so relieved

I don't have it.

No,

they were,

I won't say

all the different

F-bombs

and other types

of expletives

that they used

as they walked

out of the room

shaking with fury.

Sometimes what

we're angry about,

as we all know,

isn't right

and it's good

to confront them.

So here,

just to bring it

back to the story,

so what's happened?

God has had,

has shown mercy

to Nineveh.

They,

when they're,

they come face-to-face

with God,

their response

to coming face-to-face

to the Lord

is to say

that we're going

to stop acting unjustly,

we're going to stop

doing that which is evil

and we're going to stop

all of our habits

of violence

and we're going

to cast ourselves

upon the mercy

of the Lord

in the hope

that he will stay

his judgment

and the Lord sees it

and he does stay it

and Jonah,

who's not a Ninevite,

not an Assyrian,

he's furious

over this.

He's furious

and remember I said,

well,

maybe there's something,

maybe Jonah had,

maybe God's bit,

the Lord's a bit wrong

to show that

and maybe Jonah

has something right

but now this instance

with the plant,

the plant grows,

the plant dies,

Jonah's furious,

furious,

furious at the death

of a plant

and now the Lord

is going to ask

two very,

another very searching

question.

Remember,

he's already said,

do you think it's,

do you realize how angry

you are?

Do you think it's right

to be so angry

over the plant?

Is it right for you

to be so consumed

with anger

over the death

of a plant?

And Jonah's response

is,

I'm so angry

I could die

and then here's

how the Lord goes on

and the book of Jonah

is very interesting.

The only other book

in the Bible

is Lamentations.

It's the only other book

in the Bible

that ends with a question

and everything

in the book of Jonah

is leading

to these last two verses

where the Lord

is going to ask

a question

and here's how it goes.

And the Lord said,

verse 10,

you pity the plant.

The other way

you can translate

that word pity

is you have compassion

and want to do something

out of compassion

for the plant.

You pity

or you have compassion

for the plant

for which you did not labor

nor did you make it grow

which came into being

in a night

and perished in a night.

In other words,

if you know anything

about plants,

those are plants

that don't last very long.

They're very,

very transient.

Here's the big question.

Verse 11,

And should I not have compassion?

Should I not have pity

on Nineveh?

That great city

in which there are

more than 120,000 people

who do not know

their right hand

from their left

and also much cattle.

And that's how

the book of Jonah ends.

Shouldn't I have compassion

and pity on people?

Shouldn't I have that?

That's how the book ends.

Just as a bit of an aside,

did you know

that the same man

who was responsible

for the long, long, long,

most responsible,

humanly speaking,

for the long, long struggle

in England

to ban all slavery,

William Wilberforce,

was also the man

who started

the first in the world

Society for the Prevention

of Cruelty to Animals.

Did you know that?

The same man

who worked

to abolish slavery

set up an SPCA,

the Society for the Prevention

of Cruelty to Animals.

The Lord has compassion

on animals.

And if the Lord

has compassion

and mercy

to animals,

we should too.

We should too.

Just a bit of an aside

as a throwaway.

So,

let's,

how do we bring

this all home?

Remember,

I began by saying

that if the day ever came

that through counseling,

therapy,

meditation,

or drugs

that we no longer

experienced anger,

then the husbands

who abused their wives,

the employers

who abused their employees,

the tyrants

who abused their people,

they would be happy

if people no longer

experienced anger.

And so,

we realized

that you don't,

that anger

is a complicated emotion

and that we don't want to,

we don't want to get rid of it

I mean,

that actually

wouldn't really be wise

because anger

is connected

even if our moral order

and moral understanding

is all confused

and even deeply confused,

you'd think you want to change

the order of understanding

of what's right and wrong

but not ever get rid of that aspect

that when we see

great evil being done,

great wrongdoing being done,

great sin being done,

great injustice being done,

that the proper response

should be that we are angry

at the injustice

and the wrong.

So,

it's complicated.

What we think about,

if you think about it

in a second,

is we want something

to disrupt anger

but not eliminate it

in a way

which also eliminates

our sense of right and wrong.

we want to disrupt anger

in the sense that

part of the problem

with anger

for us human beings

is that anger

very quickly leads

to hatred

and that anger

quickly leads

to something becoming

like a habit of anger

that we can go to anger

to relieve stress,

that we can go to anger

to make ourselves feel good

and lose sense

of the other person

and so on one hand,

anger is connected

to a sense of injustice

and wrongdoing.

On the other hand,

there is something problematic

in terms of where anger

can go

and so,

you need something

to disrupt the anger.

But here's the problem

in our culture.

Most of our attempts

to disrupt anger

want to give evil a pass.

Most of our attempts,

in fact,

all Buddhist compassion,

at the end of the day

is indifferent

to whether or not

we give evil a pass.

The meditation technique

is to lose that sense of self,

to see yourself

distant from yourself

and so you can just observe

the wrong

that you've either done

that's caused the anger

or the wrong

that somebody else is doing

and it's in a sense

an attempt to desensitize us

to the wrongness

of what has been done.

A lot of counseling

and therapy

is really just get over it,

which means,

okay, yeah,

they've done that

and just get over it.

In a sense,

it's advice to give it a pass

and if you take the drug

so that you don't show anger

or anything that happens,

once again,

it's giving evil a pass

and so,

part of the complication

with this is

how do we actually

disrupt anger

so that it doesn't lead

to hatred,

it doesn't become a habit,

it doesn't become an addiction,

but how do we do that?

One of the reasons

we don't want to practice forgiveness

is that for many people

in our culture,

the way we understand forgiveness

is it's going to mean

giving evil and injustice

a pass

and one of the reasons

we don't want to do

some other things about anger

is because it's going to give evil

a pass.

So,

is there something

that can disrupt anger

that does not give evil

and injustice

a pass

or say

that it's not evil?

that's what the book

of Jonah

tackles brilliantly

at the level of the story

because if you think about it,

we looked at it last week,

there's three things

in the Bible

that disrupt anger

in a good way.

If you could put up

the first point,

that would be very helpful.

I had a hard time

wording this point.

I'm not really satisfied

with how I worded it.

I couldn't figure out

how to fix it.

You know,

you folks can tell me

how to fix it later.

It's the best I could do.

Only that which is rooted

in a just moral order

can disrupt anger

in a good way.

Only that which is rooted

in a just moral order

can disrupt anger

in a good way.

Now,

I'm not going to say much

about it this way.

There's in a sense

one of the ways

to disrupt anger

in a good way

or to start to heal

our anger.

And for those of us

who struggle with anger,

and you know who you are,

we know who we are,

part of what we have to do

is not just pray

that we won't experience anger,

but partly what we need to do

is first pray

that the Lord

will heal

our sense of right and wrong.

It happens in the story

in a very simple way.

Okay, Jonah, really?

You don't think people

are worth more than a plant?

Like, really?

Plants matter more

than a human life?

Really?

Like, what moral order

does that come out of?

People matter more than plants.

They do.

So partly the story itself

in some small way

is trying to help us

to shape,

to reconsider

our moral order.

And for some of us,

you know,

we can get angry

about lots of things.

We can get angry

at the fact

that we're not making

enough money.

And in a sense,

what that is trying

to tell us

is that having a lot

of money

is very, very,

it's right

to have lots of money

and it's not right

to have lots of money.

Or we can get angry

because we're just not

losing that weight

that we want to lose.

And the fact of the matter

is,

is that losing weight

is good

and having it on

is bad.

Or we can have,

we can get angry

that we're just not

putting on the muscle.

Or we can have,

it can have angry,

we can get angry.

Here's the thing.

It is not a virtue

to have more money

than somebody else.

Bay Street,

it's not.

It's not.

It's not a sin

to be low income.

It might be a sin

if somebody's doing something

to force you

to be low income

because they're ripping you off.

That can be a sin.

But it's not a sin

to be low income.

It's not a sin

to have a few extra pounds

or not have as much muscles

or not be beautiful.

Just to be plain.

Those aren't moral things.

Those are things

in our culture

we get all upset about.

And so part of our prayer

can be the healing

of our understanding

of right and wrong.

But the Bible here

is going to go

to something deep

and I want to spend more time

on something different.

There's three things

that the Bible talks about

that are rooted

in the moral order

when you understand it properly.

You see,

if something's coming out of the,

since if we understand

that anger

is connected

to the moral order,

you get angry

at injustice,

you get angry at evil,

you get angry at sin,

you get angry at that,

it's connected

to the moral order.

So maybe if there's something

that's also rooted

in the moral order,

it can disrupt anger

in a way that's actually

going to be good

for people.

And the Bible has three things.

This story only talks

about one of them.

One of them is forgiveness.

Second is mercy,

which we talked about

last week.

And the third is this,

compassion.

Compassion not just

as a feeling

but as an action.

In the Bible,

compassion is never

just a feeling.

It's something which leads

to benevolent,

caring,

charitable,

generous action.

It's not just a feeling.

It's something

you see.

You see,

how is it?

Well, here,

you can put up

the next point.

True compassion

is clear-sighted

about what is unjust

and or wrong.

True compassion

is clear-sighted

about what is unjust

and or wrong.

You see,

that's why

so many of the

meditation techniques

and therapies

and drugs,

they're amoral.

And they want to dull

the sense of right and wrong

for you to move forward.

But compassion,

real compassion,

I'll give you an example

in a moment,

is clear-sighted

about right and wrong.

Could you put up

the next point?

Help to nuance it a bit.

True compassion

does not do wrong

or act unjustly.

Injustice and evil

are never,

injustice and evil

are never compassionate.

True compassion

does not do wrong

or act unjustly.

Injustice and evil

are never compassionate.

I'm going to lose you all,

but I'm just going to say

one thing.

That's one of the many,

many, many reasons

why euthanasia

is wrong

and it's not compassionate.

To take the life

of an innocent human being

is never compassionate.

To use the power

of the state,

true compassion

does not do wrong

or act unjustly.

Injustice and evil

are never compassionate.

You think about that

for a second.

Imagine that Trump

loses the next election

and the day before

he leads office

all of his friends

who are in trouble

and going to maybe

go to jail,

he pardons them all.

Would you say,

oh, it's so wonderful

that Trump is compassionate?

No, you would not say that.

You'd say,

that dirty rat.

Showing compassion.

And you know what?

If the Canadians

had the same power

and Trudeau did it

in his last day of office,

you'd say the same thing.

You would.

It's not compassion.

Okay?

If a manager

treats you terribly

and you complain

over their head

and the boss

says to you,

I think with your complaint

they've suffered enough.

I'm going to show compassion.

You'd go,

that's not compassion.

That's not compassion.

And by the way,

here,

I'll throw out

all of these points.

I'm using the word

evil, wrong, and sin.

They're all the same idea

in the Bible.

I've just used them,

varied them

for a different effect.

Evil, wrong, and sin.

Evil isn't sort of

really bad wrong things.

Wrong is evil.

Evil is wrong.

Sin is wrong.

Sin is evil.

Evil is sin.

You get the picture.

Now,

you know,

one of the things

is that

the Lord is described

in chapter 4 earlier

as being slow

to anger.

Why?

Because mercy,

as we talked about it

last week,

which is also

rooted in a clear-eyed

understanding

of right and wrong,

in a sense,

disrupts the anger

of the Lord,

in a sense.

It's a different thing

because he doesn't

experience passion.

Here we see the same thing

happening with compassion.

Well,

how on earth

does this work?

And why is it?

I mean,

on one level,

at a natural level,

people do show compassion,

but on the other hand,

there's a...

Here,

let's just talk a little bit

more about compassion.

If you could put up

the next point,

Andrew,

that would be great.

You cannot act

compassionately

without bearing

a personal cost.

You cannot

act compassionately

without bearing

a personal cost.

Otherwise,

it's just a feeling.

Good example.

Let's say,

you all know

I love going

to coffee places.

I have a great affection

for baristas.

There's all sorts

of reasons for it,

but one of the things...

And the same thing

with people who work

at McDonald's

or Tim Hortons.

You know what?

These guys and gals,

they're making minimum wage.

They could maybe

be better off

on welfare.

But they work.

They work hard.

I really admire it.

I really do.

They get up,

especially those

who work in Tim Hortons,

they wear those

ugly uniforms.

You know?

Or Burger King.

Ugly,

ugly,

ugly uniforms.

They show up on time.

They do a hard day's work.

They go home.

You know what?

There's all sorts

of other things

they could do to be late.

I admire them.

I really do.

Anyway,

so let's say a barista,

I find out that

they're going to be moving

and I say,

you know what?

You can borrow my car.

Here's the keys.

You can borrow my car.

I'm not doing anything

with it all day.

You borrow the car.

At the end of the day,

if they're borrowing the car,

I get a call

and they've wrecked my car.

And I can smell alcohol

off their breath.

Now let me tell you,

you all know

that I'm very,

very,

very wealthy

because I drive

a 1998 Honda Accord.

And nothing says

making lots of money

like driving

a 1998 Honda Accord,

which I got,

I think,

for $1,800.

But here's the thing.

It runs well.

Somebody totals

my 1998 Honda Accord,

I think I'd be lucky

to get $300

from an insurer.

and I will not be able

to replace my car

for $300.

So what do I do

to the barista?

And maybe I know

that that barista,

if I call the police,

you know,

and the insurance,

I decide I'm going

to just be justice.

You're drinking

and driving

and you wrecked my car.

There has to be

consequences for you.

That's justice.

But if I happen

to know as well

that, you know what,

they're going to start

a new job next week

and they need to be able

to have a driver's license,

if this comes out,

they might lose

their driver's license,

might lose their job,

might lose their opportunity

to no longer be making

$14 an hour

to start to move forward

with their life.

And I look at it

and I decide,

you know what,

I'm going to have

compassion on them.

I'm still out of car.

I'm out of car.

But I've acted

compassionately.

I haven't said,

oh yeah,

it's all right.

Yeah, go ahead.

Drink and drive.

Here I have a van

and a six-pack.

Go for a drive.

No.

I decide I'm going

to swallow it

out of compassion.

You cannot act

compassionately

without bearing

a personal cost.

And you can see

how compassion here

is still clear-eyed

about right and wrong.

It's based on

the moral order.

But I decide

I'm going to show

compassion to the barista

who's maybe heartbroken

over what they've done,

just pleading for mercy.

And I decide

I'm going to show

compassion.

I'm going to show

compassion maybe

because I,

for a whole,

I won't go into

the reasons for it,

but I do it.

It's going to glorify

the Lord.

It's good for that person.

And I'll get over

the finances,

but it's going to be

good for them

and it's going to also

bring glory to the Lord

that I'm going to

forgive them.

I'm going to forgive the debt.

If you could put up

the next point.

On the cross,

we see the Lord himself

bearing the cost.

We see the Lord himself

bear the cost

of showing you

compassion.

You see,

one of the things

about this whole story

with the book of Jonah

is there's a riddle

in this story.

And the riddle

in this story is,

you know what,

the fact of the matter is

is the Ninevites

have been doing

terrible, terrible,

terrible things

and it seems

as if they get off.

One of the things

to understand

about this story

is that when the Lord

shows compassion

in that particular case,

it doesn't mean

he drops the charges,

so to speak,

against the Ninevites,

but they're stayed.

By stayed,

it means

if you're charged

with an offense

and I wish we had Victor here,

I think I'm getting this right,

and they stay the charges,

it means they can still

be brought up.

It just means

you're not going forward

with the prosecution.

And at the same,

maybe that's Victor calling

to give us that I got that right.

And it's the same thing,

at the end of the day,

every single human being

is going to appear

before the judgment seat of God

and nobody gets away

with injustice

and doing wrong.

Nobody.

You and I right now,

whether we realize it or not,

the city of Ottawa right now,

every single person

walking around right now,

even though they might

laugh at God,

mock God,

hate God,

shake their fist at God,

intentionally do things

that are against God

just because they want

to give Him the finger

as many times as they want.

They might be doing evil

as much as they want.

They might lie,

cheat, steal,

commit adultery,

do all those things.

Every single human being,

in a sense,

the charges are stayed,

but not dropped.

And so it is with Nineveh

that we'll experience

the judgment of God

and every one of those Ninevites

will have,

by now,

appeared before

the judgment seat of God

and they will know

the Lord's justice.

He has compassion on them

for a season

that they might repent.

So there's a riddle.

But the fact of the matter is

is that you and I

have done wrong things.

You and I are enmity with God.

And what we see is

on the cross,

we see the Lord Himself

bear the cost

of showing you compassion.

To use the story

of the barista,

in the story of the barista,

I use myself as an example,

but at the end of the day,

if you look at it

from the Bible's point of view,

I am the barista

who took the car,

drank,

wrecked the car.

That's me.

And that's you.

Can you put up the next slide,

please?

On the cross,

the Lord dealt

with your wrongdoing

with perfect justice

and perfect compassion.

He dies in your place.

He takes your judgment

in your stead

because He knows

it will unmake you.

It's not a matter

that the Lord just says,

you know what,

George,

you're so cute,

I'm just going to pretend

you didn't do

those bad things.

It's,

George,

you've done,

this is the wonderful thing

about the cross

and the fact that God

is completely just

and knows every single thing

I've ever done.

Is it one of the reasons

that it can begin,

I can begin to change

my moral order

is that I understand

that God knows me perfectly.

He knows every single thing

I've done,

every good thing

I should have done

but didn't do.

He knows all my thoughts,

all my motivations,

all of those things.

He knows it

from the moment of my birth

to the moment of my death.

He knows it all

and all

was dealt with

when Jesus died

in my place on the cross.

So if it comes

and it will come,

I have kids

and it comes up

that sometime

whether it's next week

or next month

or next year,

one of my kids

tells me,

Dad,

you did this to me,

you said this to me

five years,

ten years ago

and it has just,

it has been really hard on me.

Now it will be hard

to hear that

from my child.

I like the illusion

that I'm a perfect dad.

I try never to believe it

but I like the illusion.

I'm a fallen human being

like you.

But you know,

one of the things

I can do

is I can understand

not that it means

I get a pass

because the Lord

has forgiven me

but because I know

there is no evil

even in my past

that could be revealed

to me today

that the Lord

did not know about

when he hung upon the cross

and died for me.

That there's the possibility

that my identity

rooted in the cross

and Jesus

and what he's done for me

and the knowledge

of his love for me

that I can then

maybe have

the self-possession

to say

I am so sorry

I did that wrong to you.

Can you forgive me?

Can you pray

that I learn

how to do it better?

And I don't have to live

in the illusion

of my perfect life.

I can live in the reality

of his perfect compassion

and bearing the cost

of my sin

upon the cross.

I can live in the real world

because Jesus died

for me

bearing the cost

for him to show compassion

to me

in the real world.

If you'll put up

the final slide.

See the gospel

shapes you and me

to desire

a healthy conscience.

and to have

compassion

disrupt your anger

for the good of others

and for the glory

of the Lord.

It's not automatic.

But as the gospel

shapes you

as it grips you

as it molds you

as it forms you

as you think upon it

it will desire you

to have

a better sense

of right and wrong.

It'll give you

the sense of security

to look at

what's actually

right and wrong

without having to worry

that if I actually

acknowledge that

this is wrong

I have to say

that I did wrong

for a long time

and that's really

hard for us

but as the gospel

grips me

and shapes me

as it becomes

the air I breathe

and that on which

I stand

by which I understand

my identity

my past

my present

and my future

as that becomes

more real to me

who Jesus is

and what he did

for me upon the cross

there is the possibility

for me to look

at right and wrong

in a way

that does not

threaten my identity

and I can say

you know what

that's wrong

and that has

characterized me

for the last

20 years of my life

but it's wrong

and as my moral

order becomes

more healed

becomes healthy

and my conscience

becomes healthy

that will mean

my anger

becomes more healthy

but the gospel

does more than that

the gospel

shapes you

to desire

a healthy conscience

and to have

compassion

disrupt your anger

for the good

of others

and for the glory

of the Lord

I am a recipient

of compassion

a very deep

and total

and complete

compassion

that frees me

to begin

to live

eternal life

and if I have

known such

compassion

maybe I need

to show compassion

in this case

and I can call

out to the Lord

for what it's

going to mean

in terms of

forsaking revenge

for forsaking

what I might

like to do

in terms of

slander

or gossip

or hatred

or punching

or vengeance

or all of those

things

and I need to

swallow that

and I might

have to call

out to the Lord

Lord I think

you're calling

me to show

compassion

and that's a cost

I know you

showed compassion

for me

I don't know

how to bear

but Lord

I ask

I just

I know

that you are

calling me

for compassion

in this particular

case

Lord

I come to you

help me

to bear

the cost

to show

compassion

to this person

for their

true good

and your

great glory

let's stand

and let's

just pray

Father we

are so

grateful

that your

just anger

at the wrong

that each

one of us

has done

not that it

was disrupted

Lord but we're

using that

language that

forgiveness

mercy

compassion

your forgiveness

is perfect

your mercy

is perfect

your grace

is unfailing

your compassion

is perfect

as is your

justice

and that you

bore the cost

Father

without

injustice

becoming

justice

injustice

becoming

injustice

without

any of

that

happening

you

bore

the cost

paid

the price

to show

compassion

to me

Father

we are

so grateful

grip us

Father

with the

mystery

and the

wonder

of what

you did

for us

on the

cross

grip us

with that

Father

that it

might be

that upon

which we

stand

that upon

which covers

our head

that upon

which we

breathe

that which

pushes

and pulls

us

and shapes

us

to live

well

every day

with people

for their

good

and your

great glory

Father

we ask

in Jesus'

name

and all

God's

people

said

Amen