Acts 16:22-26

22 “A mob quickly formed against Paul and Silas, and the city officials ordered them stripped and beaten with wooden rods. 23 They were severely beaten, and then they were thrown into prison. The jailer was ordered to make sure they didn’t escape. 24 So the jailer put them into the inner dungeon and clamped their feet in the stocks. 25 Around midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening. 26 Suddenly, there was a massive earthquake, and the prison was shaken to its foundations. All the doors immediately flew open, and the chains of every prisoner fell off!”

The Apostles Paul and Silas were beaten with rods, and then they were put in stocks in the inner dungeon, why? For faithfully serving God! Yet instead of moaning and complaining about the circumstances they were praising God. It’s easy to turn to God in the good circumstances but where do you turn in the bad? At this point many of us turn away from God but they turned to God and He was right there with them. He was there all along and He let everyone know it:  “suddenly there was a great earthquake; the prison was shaken to its foundations, all the doors flew open and the chains of every prisoner fell off “. When we go through adversity many of us think God has abandoned us, left us in the prison alone, but we are not alone He is right there. In your circumstances do you realize you are not alone, that God is with you? Do you see those around you that are in prison that need to be freed ,those who need to experience the power of God in their lives, the power to shake their foundation, to blow their doors off their hinges and lose their chains. Are you only interested in God coming to your rescue or are you interested in a greater rescue mission bigger than you?

Often God uses our circumstances to teach us, but the question we need to ask is: Are we learning the lessons? Paul and Silas had already learned their lessons and now we see them applying what they had learned to their circumstances. It’s not learned until it’s applied! What they learned:

• Regardless of the circumstances you can give God praise.

Paul said in 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18. “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”  Notice He did not say for everything give thanks, but in everything give thanks. Are you ready in whatever circumstance you are in to give God all the praise and glory?  Psalms 119:62 “I rise at midnight to thank you for your just regulations.” Are you ready do praise even in the middle of the night?

• Are you prepared?

“Around midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God”  Midnight is a milestone so to speak. The night is half over and with each minute we get closer to the dawn. The question we face is; can we make it until day break? The answer depends on what we do at midnight, what decision we make, and did we prepare while it was yet day? What will you do at midnight? Midnight is mentioned many times in the bible and it has a lot to do with being prepared.

Exodus 12:29

“29 And that night at midnight, the Lord struck down all the firstborn sons in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn son of Pharaoh, who sat on his throne, to the firstborn son of the prisoner in the dungeon.”

At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from firstborn of Pharaoh to the firstborn of the one in the dungeon. Only the ones who had applied the blood of the Passover lamb were spared. It’s not about position but preparedness.

The 25th chapter of Matthew talks of ten virgins that took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Five were wise and five were foolish. The foolish took no oil with their lamps. The wise took oil in their vessels for their lamps, they were prepared their vessels were filled.

Matthew 25:6-8

6 “At midnight they were roused by the shout, ‘Look, the bridegroom is coming! Come out and meet him!’ 7 “All the bridesmaids got up and prepared their lamps. 8 Then the five foolish ones asked the others, ‘Please give us some of your oil because our lamps are going out.”

Notice when the cry came, at midnight, and the foolish found their lamps gone out, they also found that they could not make it in on the other five’s oil. Is your lamp filled are you prepared for midnight? Just like those in Egypt when the Lord came and who were not prepared with the blood covering and died, so Christ is coming again and there will be those who are not ready who will be shut out!

Many of us don’t get alone with God and get filled up so in the midst of our trial, we find our lamp going out. Let me ask you, When the midnight cry comes has the blood been applied, has the Spirit been received, has the praise been offered? What will you do at midnight? What you do at midnight depends a great deal on what you do now. How we come out of a trial often depends on how we went in to it. Paul told Timothy to be a good soldier. Soldiers prepare for battle in time of peace, they practice they are prepared.  Will you turn to God or will you turn on God? Is it time to get alone with God?

Jonah 3:10, 4:1, 5-8

3:10 When God saw what they had done and how they had put a stop to their evil ways, he changed his mind and did not carry out the destruction he had threatened

1This change of plans greatly upset Jonah, and he became very angry. 2 So he complained to the Lord about it. 5 Then Jonah went out to the east side of the city and made a shelter to sit under as he waited to see what would happen to the city. 6 And the Lord God arranged for a leafy plant to grow there, and soon it spread its broad leaves over Jonah’s head, shading him from the sun. This eased his discomfort, and Jonah was very grateful for the plant. 7 But God also arranged for a worm! The next morning at dawn the worm ate through the stem of the plant so that it withered away. 8 And as the sun grew hot, God arranged for a scorching east wind to blow on Jonah. The sun beat down on his head until he grew faint and wished to die. “Death is certainly better than living like this!” he exclaimed

If I were to tell you that people have disappointed me at times throughout my life you wouldn’t be surprised. As a matter of fact, you probably can recall times of disappointment in people. It’s simply not uncommon in this life for people to fail to meet our expectations. Sometimes people disappoint us unintentionally, while at other times our disappointment is the result of a person’s character flaw. Either way we have all been there, we have all experienced disappointment.  But what if I were to tell you that God has, at least on occasion, disappointed me? Would you think I was mad, that I’d lost my mind, that I was a bad person for even suggesting such a thing? I’m not saying that one is justified in being disappointed with God, but I believe that if we are honest, most of us would have to admit that there have been times when God didn’t respond like we expected Him to and we were disappointed.

Jonah was God’s reluctant and rebellious prophet, even when he finally agreed to deliver God’s message of judgment to Nineveh, he was terribly disappointed with God’s handling of the Ninevites.  If we are willing to look closely enough, we may find shades of our own attitudes in this account of Jonah. So what led to Jonah’s disappointment with God?

• Jonah was committed to his will not God’s

The fact is Jonah wasn’t unconditionally committed to God’s will. He had his own ideas about how God should handle the Ninevites. When it didn’t turn out that way, when he didn’t get his way it made him mad.

•             Jonah Was Displeased. Jonah 4: 1 “But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry.”

God had just spared the lives of over 120,000 people, and Jonah was exceedingly angry about it, most preachers would be overjoyed to see such an overwhelming response to their message, but not Jonah.

• Jonah had a heart issue, he had a bad attitude

There are times in our lives when we too need an ‘attitude adjustment’. Jonah appoints himself as theological advisor to the Almighty, and makes it clear that he is out of sympathy with divine policy. He engages in a sit-down strike outside the city limits, separating himself from the people and God. Talk about an attitude, so how does God give us an “attitude adjustment”?

1. He asks us challenging questions. (v.4)  “Have you any right to be angry.”

God is challenging Jonah’s perceptions.  Atitude change begins with asking, Do I have a good reason to feel this way? Should I be thinking like this? Should I be acting like this?” Many times if we are truly honest and let our emotions step aside for the sake of truth we’ll find that we shouldn’t have the attitude that we do.

2. He gives us challenging experiences. (v.6-8)

God delivers a practical object lesson consisting of a plant, a worm, and a wind. He uses circumstances to expose Jonah’s sinful rebellion, his misguided heart attitude, and his warped value system. So God causes a vine to grow to provide Jonah with some needed shade (vs 6). Jonah’s reaction “Jonah was very grateful” This is the first time Jonah is happy! He wasn’t happy when God commissioned him to preach to Ninevah; he wasn’t pleased when the sailors were converted in ch 1; and he was far from thrilled when a pagan city turned to God. Jonah is selfishly pleased that God is finally doing something for him, his joy is in his own comfort, not that of others. Destruction finally comes, but not upon Ninevah, a hungry worm arrives and eats the plant, which had become very important to Jonah. Now we might say, wasn’t Jonah’s bad attitude caused by the experience? I don’t think so; God saw what was inside Jonah and knew what Jonah’s attitude was. God simply put Jonah into a place where he was exposed and the attitude became exposed as well. Isaiah 16:7 ”Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.”

Like Jonah there are times when we need an attitude adjustment and God allows us to go through an experience that exposed our attitude so it can be dealt with. We say that people or situations make us angry yet the anger is in us and the situation just brings to the surface what was lurking underneath. We are like the skunk that gets stepped on, the bad smell comes from inside us, we want to blame the circumstances but the circumstances just exposed what was inside us!

The ending may seem abrupt and unresolved, and we might like to know how Jonah responded, but it’s not important to know what he said or did. Jonah’s missing final answer isn’t an oversight or the result of our lacking the last page of the manuscript. Jonah’s not the main character here, God is. We’re left with an intentional, powerful statement concerning God’s grace. Rather than show us Jonah’s response, God invites us to respond. Will we show compassion, or will we run from our responsibility? As Christians, we’re compelled to care. God didn’t hang up on Jonah. Do we hang up on God when He doesn’t meet our expectations? Jonah cared more about personal comfort than an entire city! He was bothered by the hot rays of the desert sun, but could care less about the burning fire of hell that would fall on a city. What makes you happy? For Jonah it was a plant. What gives you great joy? When you answer that, you will discover where your heart really is. God cares about people. Is it time to get alone with God and get a heart adjustment?