Jonah – a Man With a Message Sample

Jesus and the Pharisees

The Pharisees and the teachers of the law were challenging Jesus. Even though He had been healing the sick, delivering people from darkness, and working many miracles among them, they didn’t believe He was the Son of God.

They didn’t acknowledge Him as the Messiah – the Savior sent from God to save them from their wickedness. Oh my, the very Son of God was speaking, and they wouldn’t listen to Him!

Despite the many wonderful works Jesus had done already, these hardhearted men tested him and asked for a sign just for them. Jesus rebuked them for their wickedness, “A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a miraculous sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”

Jesus was referring to his death and the three days spent in the grave before His glorious resurrection! Seeing their hardheartedness, and knowing they were not planning on turning from this wickedness, He told them: 

“The men of Ninevah will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now one greater than Jonah is here.”

You see, the Ninevites recognized the sin of their wickedness. They understood how very badly they had acted and when God spoke to them through Jonah, they quickly turned from their sin in repentance.

The Pharisees would not listen to Jesus. They would not repent. They missed the salvation that God was offering them through his Son, Jesus the Christ. They remained hardhearted and wicked.