Sackcloth Saved the Day

My message today is out of the book of Jonah. There are great similarities between the days of Jonah and our day. Our nation today is as sin-laden as ancient Nineveh was, and Jonah was reluctant to preach God's message, and today we have more reluctant preachers who are not willing to preach God's message than we do obedient ones whose voices cry out in the ears of our nation, saying, yet forty days and America will be overthrown.

It may be forty days or four hundred days, but America is ready to be overthrown by an offended God who hates evil and who must punish sin. But there the similarities stop, for we as a nation refuse to repent and turn back to the God of the Bible. But I want us to see today how if a country were to heed the message in our passage today, that God could show mercy to us as well instead of bringing impending judgment.

My message today is entitled, Sackcloth Saved the Day, and my text is Jonah chapter 3. You may turn in your Bibles there now. Jesus validated the book of Jonah, and anything Jesus puts his sample of approval on, I certainly do as well. Listen, Jonah is not a fishtail of myth, but a real account of a wicked people who hearkened to the preaching of the word of God and repented of their wicked ways, and a merciful God showed mercy as he declared, and should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than six score thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand, nor their left hand, and also much cattle.

And God spared those hell-deserving sinners, because they paid attention to the preaching of his word, and obeyed it in a great national repentance, to where God was ready to overthrow the entire city, and destroy everybody in it, but he saw how they humbled themselves, and believed him from the king down to the beast, and Sackcloth Saved the Day. The book of Jonah should be preached in the ears of America today, as it is a portrait of America's only hope, which is revival, for if it is not revival, friends, it is sure ruin for America. When God said he was going to overthrow Nineveh, the word overthrow means to reduce to rubble.

America could be reduced to rubble any moment through a nuclear attack. I know old Jonah was reluctant to give the message to the people of Nineveh, because he was a religious bigot, but God overruled, and he had almost killed Jonah to get his attention, and even when the people of Nineveh repented, and averted total annihilation, Jonah sat angry, and was gloomy about the whole affair. Old Jonah had his spots for sure, but isn't it a marvel, friends, how God can use a servant of his spots and all? Well, here now is our passage from the word of God, as taken from Jonah chapter 3. And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, saying, Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.

So Jonah arose and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days journey, and Jonah began to enter into the city of days journey, and he cried and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown. So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed to 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 satin 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 anything. Let them not feed nor drink water, but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mildly unto God.

Yea, let them turn everyone 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. Listen friends, if ancient Nineveh, as wicked as they were, turned to God, and believed God, and repented of their evil ways, why cannot the once great nation of America do the same? America is a fallen nation.

It has fallen in its reputation with other nations. It has fallen morally. It has fallen financially.

And it has fallen spiritually. America is so debt ridden, and morally bankrupt, that any sudden catastrophe could be her final end. God has withdrawn his presence from America.

He is no longer prominent in the land, nor in the sanctuary. And yet the nation, and the church, remains proud, and self-reliant. And we today are in great need of someone like old Jonah, to preach to this nation, the preaching that God bids the preacher.

But most preachers today are reluctant to give that message for fear of their skins. So they preach nice little messages that don't offend anyone. And society crumbles all around us.

And the nation is in a tailspin of moral debauchery. Yet, there was a time in our land in the past, whereby the President of the United States did the very thing, that the King of Nineveh did. Listen to this account, taken from a newspaper from the year 1798, whereby it speaks of a presidential proclamation to the inhabitants of America.

Listen to this, friends. A discourse delivered in the First Presbyterian Church of Philadelphia, on Wednesday, May the 9th, 1798, recommended by the President of the United States, to be observed as a day of fasting, humiliation, and prayer, throughout the United States of America. Did you hear that, friends? The President of the United States, led the nation in a time of fasting, humiliation, and prayer, and ordered it to be observed throughout the whole country.

Imagine if our President did that right now. All hell would be popping. The atheists would be up in arms.

The liberals would be screaming. The media would be going bananas. But that is exactly what we need today, before this nation sinks into oblivion.

Listen, Mr. President. It's high time for you to call a meeting of your cabinet, and go get the generals at the Pentagon, round up all the senators, and gather in the rotunda of the Capitol, and take off your $2,000 suits, and $200 ties, and clothe yourselves with potato sacks, and burlap bags, and sit in ashes and repent, and lead this nation in a time of national repentance, before an offended God. And it is high time for the churches in the land to do the same for all the sleepy-headed pastors who are reluctant to preach the message that God wants preached, the message that calls sin black and hell hot, how it is a sinner's duty to repent, and if he does not repent, he will surely drop into hell, and suffer there for all eternity, that there is a Christ who was crucified on a bloody cross, and that cross was bloody because of our sins, and that same Christ died, and was buried, and rose again, and now sits at the right hand of the Heavenly Father.

He is a risen Lord, and every knee will someday future a bow to Him, and acknowledge Him to be King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and that God is sick and tired of His people not living for eternity, and not witnessing to lost souls, that the average church member hasn't shared his or her faith in years. It's all coldness, and deadness, and formality everywhere in the church today, and if His people don't turn from their wicked ways, and their indifference, and apathy, and turn back to Him, He will not stand idly by much longer without doing something about it. It's the church that is supposed to lead a nation, not the politicians, but the church quit leading years ago, and now the church just follows the world wherever she goes, and our young people are leaving the churches and droves, and turning their backs on the God of their fathers, and the entire nation is gripped with sensuality and immorality, and where oh where is the man who cries in the ears of the people to turn back to God, or you will see a side of God you are quite unfamiliar with.

The people in Nineveh were much wiser than us today. They actually believed God, and obeyed His commands. They humbled themselves, and turned from their evil ways, and sought the God of the Bible with earnest and sincere hearts.

But will we do the same today? Will we avoid sudden destruction? Or will we continue going on as things are now, and keep playing church, and hide our heads in the ground like ostriches, while souls slip into hell every second, and our nation grows more wicked and violent with each dawning day? Let me pray. Great God Almighty, you are the ancient of days. You turned from destroying ancient Nineveh, because they paid attention to your preached word.

Forgive us, oh Lord, for not doing the same. Forgive us for not even preaching your word. Forgive us for not living in obedience to your word.

And forgive us, oh God, for not caring enough about our once great land to do something about it. Forgive us for our apathy, our indifference. And forgive us, great God, for our self-sufficiency.

I pray, oh Lord, that in your wrath, you will remember mercy. Oh Lord, send a mighty movement of your Spirit into the land, and heal us. Grant us the grace of repentance as a church, and as a nation.

Wake us up before it's too late. Lord, you know, we are as wicked as the people of Nineveh, but we lack their repentant heart. Oh great God, send us that grace of repentance, so we too are not overthrown by your fiery indignation and judgments.

Have mercy, great God. Have mercy, I pray.