Do you love a good story? I know I do. I can remember the very first book that I read that didn't have pictures in it. The schools used to have a program, I don't know if they still do or not, probably not. But they used to have a program called Scholastic Reader. And every so often the teacher would send home with us this little catalog of books that we could order. Of course, I would pester Mom and Dad for them to order me a book. And the very first book I can ever remember reading came from that catalog. There was a book that you can still get today; I checked, just Friday, to see if it's still available. It is, it's still available through Scholastic Services, by the way. It was, I did a little research, it was an award winning book. It was written in 1963. A movie was made about it a few years ago, which didn't nearly do it justice. But the book is called 'A Wrinkle in Time'. Perhaps you've read it. If you haven't read it, I would encourage you to read it. You say, "Well, I'm a, I'm an adult". It's okay. It's a great story. It's a great story. 'A Wrinkle in Time'. I still remember Meg, the main character, I still remember the cover of the book. I read that book over, and over, and over, because it was such a great story. And still today, I love to read great stories. And there are some great storytellers out there. I've read every 'Jack Reacher' novel. I set my yearly calendar by the publication date of the 'Walt Longmire' mysteries, comes out every September. I preorder it as soon as I can, so that it ends up on my porch and I read it in about a day and wish September would come around again. Craig Johnson, he's the author of the 'Longmire' mysteries. He's a great storyteller, the finest non fiction, fiction excuse me, the finest fiction...fictional paragraph I ever read was written by Craig Johnson. I read most of the Harry Bosch detective novels I've read most of the Digger Graves books written by Jonathan Gilstrap. I just love a great story. But those are all works of fiction, but there's something that I like even more than fiction, and that's biographies. The finest book I've ever read outside of the Bible is a book called 'Unbroken', which is the life story of Louis Zamperini, if you even if you don't like to read, you need to read that book. I read the biographies of President Truman, President Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, who is an utterly fascinating man, do yourself a favor and read about Churchill. President Lincoln, President Washington, I've read the biography of Steve Jobs. Which is the saddest biography I've ever read in my life. I've read of the biography of the genius of Albert Einstein and learned what a moral failure he was. I've read the biography of George Whitfield. I would say that the the biography of George Whitfield is the second best biography I've ever read. I've read the biographies of Jonathan Edwards, I've read the biographies of Charles Spurgeon. If I haven't, I'm very close to of having read all of the biographies of the good Dr. Martin Lloyd Jones. And the lives of all these men, they were great stories. I mean, really, who doesn't love a story? We read stories to our kids and now we read stories to our grandkids. Why? Because we all love stories. And even as adults, we love stories. Now the stories for adults nowadays, unfortunately, primarily come through TV. I mentioned the show 'Lost' last week. Up to the last episode, that was great storytelling. Perhaps the greatest TV show of all time was '24'. Now, that was storytelling, right? We never outgrow our love for stories. Stories are powerful. Stories have the power to inspire us. Stories bring back pleasant memories of days gone by. Stories entertain us and most importantly, stories have the power to teach us. That's why Jesus told so many stories. Do you realize that somewhere between 60 and 70% of the Bible is stories? Think about that. 60 to 70% of the Bible is made up of stories, and the Bible contains the greatest stories. Why? Because the Bible is a book about God, and who's greater than God, and what can be a greater story than the story of God. God is the hero of the story. God is the hero of the Bible. You and I are not the heroes of the Bible. The Bible is not about us. What we see about us in the Bible is not pretty, it's not flattering, it's rather embarrassing. But everything we see about God is great, and glorious, and wonderful, and grand, and marvelous.

So Jonah, as it is a book of the Bible, as it is a story, it is a great story. Unfortunately, the Old Testament is so neglected that many of these great stories get ignored, and the full impact of them we never experience. I want to apologize to you. If I had to do this over again, I would have preached the entire book in one message because a story is only about one thing. One thing. Say, "Why didn't you do that?" Because I didn't realize it till I got three weeks into it. Forgive me. Next week, I'll show you that one thing. And whether we realize it or not, Michelle could, and Victoria could validate this, stories share some common characteristics. Every story has a protagonist. The protagonist is the hero. Every story has an antagonist. That's the villain, that's the bad guy. Then there are what they call foils, f-o-i-l-s. Foils are characters in the story that aren't really the main characters, but they contribute some context, and some texture, and some color, and some depth to the story. As we read the story of God told in the book of Jonah, we need to understand that God is the protagonist, God is the hero, God is the good guy. Therefore, Jonah is the antagonist. He's the bad guy. He's the villain, if you will. Say, "Well, who are the foils in the story of the book of Job?" They would be the sailors, be the captain of the ship. It'd be the people Nineveh, it would be the king of Nineveh. They add some context to the story. They're kind of incidental to the story. Another thing that makes a story great is tension, its conflict. It's the tension, it's the conflict of the story that keeps you up at night, reading page after page after page, you just have to see how it's all going to work out. I have to be very careful when I read certain books. I have learned that I can't read on Saturday nights. You know why? Because I get so engrossed in the story that I want to find out who old Walt Longmire is going to arrest, amen? So I don't read on Saturday nights because I know that I'll stay up way too late and I won't be at my best on Sunday morning. Well, Jonah's a great story because it oozes with tension and conflict. And sadly, because we are so familiar with the story of Jonah, we've lost that sense of tension and that sense of conflict that exists in the story. This loss of the conflict and the tension deadens, lessens, the impact of the story that it has in our lives. But if we pay careful attention to the book of Jonah, we see that there's tension and conflict all the way through the book. The book of Jonah opens with tension. It opens with a conflict. The word of the Lord came to Jonah and gave him a direct command to go to Nineveh and call out against it. But Jonah had other plans. He would rather die than go to Nineveh. He would rather leave everything he loves. He would rather leave everything behind that he knows, then go to Nineveh. So he makes his way to the seaport of Joppa. He finds a boat headed to someplace called Tarshish. He buys a ticket he gets on board. The boat sets sail to a faraway destination where Jonah hopes that he can escape the presence of God.

And perhaps Jonah believed as many do today that just because the door was open for him to sail away, it was all right for him to head that way. See, Jonah made the mistake, that many continue to make, and that is making the mistake that is mistaking and open door as a sign of God's approval, even as a sign of direction from God. They mistake the open door as what the Puritans would call a Smiling Providence. The logic goes like this, the argument goes something like this. "Well, the doors open. It must be what God wants me to do." We've all been there. We've heard somebody say that. We've probably done it ourselves. Jonah couldn't believe his good fortune. He finds a ship that's going exactly where he wants to go, as far away as possible. The ship even had room for one more passenger. He had money in his pocket so that he could buy the ticket. Surely this must be okay with God. Surely this must be God's plan. Surely this is what God wants because look at how easily all the circumstances are coming together. Well as Jonah would soon learn, and as many since Jonah have learned, an open door does not necessarily signify God's will. An open door's not always God's stamp of approval. An open door is not an automatic green light from God. I have been in the ministry now for over two decades. I know I look much younger than that, but yep, it's true. And I can tell you, in all seriousness, I can tell you of families who just knew that it was God's will to take a certain job or to move to this state. It had to be God's will because it all came together so easily. One family specifically comes to mind. They continually assured me and assured themselves that it was God's will for them to move to another state. And despite all the counsel to the contrary, they made the move. "It was God's will, Pastor Craig, it's God's will, just know it's God's will." But it wasn't long before the husband and wife were divorced. The daughter's moved in with her boyfriend, children were born out of wedlock, and it was God's will? That was God's will? "But it is Pastor you don't understand all the right doors are opening. All the circumstances are coming together. The wind is filling our sails and the sea is so peaceful, this has to be God's will." That's what Jonah thought too, but be careful, just because the door is open, that doesn't mean it's God's will. That open door could very well turn out to be a t