Jonah 1
Today we are reading another Minor Prophet book, the Book of Jonah.
To some people, both Christians and non-Christians, the accounts in this book seemed very “fairy-tale”, especially when it comes to the part where Jonah was being swallowed by a big fish (sometimes mistaken as a whale).
But this Jonah son of Amittai was a historical figure. (ref. 2 Kings 14: 25, Matthew 12: 39 – 41)
The story of what this prophet did is quite familiar to most of us, but let us read it again to see what teachings or even warnings we can harvest for our spiritual nurture.
Bible Passage: Jonah 1
Do We Doubt God’s Decision?
Can we override the will of God? This really sounds like a silly question isn’t it? Indeed it is a silly question, so is “Do we doubt God’s decision?”
But very sad to say, sometimes we do silly things, even things that displease God, without asking ourselves any questions.
Jonah thought that God must have made a mistake by commanding him to go to the wicked city, Nineveh, and to warn them of God’s impending judgment.
And without asking any question, he ran away from God. In doing so, he did not only run away from his responsibility as a prophet of God, but he had also overridden God’s will with his own.
There are many times that we did not even wait for God’s decision, but we went on to decide who will listen to the gospel and who will not. We thought some of the wicked/bad people whom we know would not want to receive the love of Christ; so we are reluctant to even talk to them about our faith.
And sometimes we are so adamant in doing something that we think is good for us, we just ignore the word/will of God revealed to us in the Scriptures.
God may not have judged us for our obstinacy immediately, but let us not wait for that to happen before we start to repent like crazy, let us learn from history, from what happened to prophet Jonah.
Trying To Hide From The All-Knowing God?
Prophet Jonah’s consequence for running away from God came almost immediately. A great storm pursued to him.
He went down to the lowest part of the ship (v5) to sleep, he might be thinking everything would be calm and quiet when he woke up.
But David revealed to us in one of his psalms,
Where can I go from Your Spirit?
Or where can I flee from Your presence?
If I ascend into heaven, You are there;
If I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there.
Psalms 139: 7 – 8 (NKJV)
There is nowhere we can hide from the All-Knowing God! If we realized we have done something wrong, we must do the wise thing, repent and truly repent from our hearts.
Little did Jonah know that the lowest part of the ship was not where he would be for running away from God, because the lowest point had yet to come, and that was in the belly of the big fish. This we will read in tomorrow’s chapter 2, where the belly of the fish, to Jonah, was like Sheol!
Let us not allow ourselves to plunge into the lowest part of our faith, for when a Christian is out of fellowship with God, it can cause a lot of trouble, not only to ourselves, but also to the people around us.
When the storm hit hard on the ship due to Jonah’s sin, the pagans on the ship were also affected. BUT! They knew how to cry out to their gods! Where was Jonah and what was he doing? He was sleeping in the lowest part of the ship!
Another irony surfaced when they found out from Jonah that it was due to him that the storm raged at them, and even after Jonah told them to throw him off the ship to calm the storm, the pagans did not consent to it. They tried to think of other alternatives instead of allowing a life to perish.
This is an irony because when God told Jonah of the impending judgment on the people of Nineveh, he did not care about their souls and ran away instead!
Jonah had totally gone against a prophet’s main purpose, and that was to act in the name of God to warn the sinners to repent.
Whenever I read about this account of Prophet Jonah’s response to God, I feel that I’m not very much different from him.
Today’s reading is a good reminder and warning to me, and I hope it can also be a reminder to you also.
May God guide and bless us with boldness in doing His will.
Shalom!
One Comment
PS
i wonder what vows did the men make after they offered a sacrifice to the LORD?
Hopefully they were vows to know this God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land and to worship Him only.
What’s on Jonah’s mind when he told them to throw him into the sea? Did Jonah think that he’ll die as a result?
May be yes, bec no worker of God is indispensible. Like the words of Mordecai to Esther
May be no, bec God had a mission for him and if God wanted him dead, God could have struck him the moment he paid the fare.(Jonah 1:3)
These are just hypothetical questions with no answer. And i don’t think an answer is needed too.
The event is recorded in the bible for our edification and admonition. And i think that there is a greater will of God which is beyond what i can fathom.
“…For You, O LORD, have done as it pleased You.” (Jonah 1:14)
for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure. (Philippians 2:13)
“Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” (Matthew 6:10)
God wills as He pleases. This is absolutely true. Who does He plant His will in on earth? In His people. In His children.
Sometimes i pray that Lord Jesus helps me to really be a vessel as He wills and not a broken vessel which keeps on rattling “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
If i keep on rattling only, what do i become? little serpent? “You will not surely die. You will be like God.”
Lord Jesus gives me life. He wills that i do live.