Jonah 1:17-2:10 Turning To God Have you ever felt like you had really messed up? Have you ever felt like you were about to drown beneath the overwhelming circumstances of life? Many of us fill our lives with so many stressful activities that we operate near the edge of burnout, as we try to handle these myriad issues on our own. All that is needed is for an unexpected event to push us past our ability to cope, and we can feel as though we have become overwhelmed and defeated. Shouldn t the Christian life be one of peace, joy, and victory over the issues of life? How can our peace and joy be so easily overturned? We find great words of assurance in God s Word, such as When you pass through the waters, I will be with you. When you pass through the rivers they will not flow over you. When you walk through the fire you will not be burned, for I am the LORD your God. 1 Yet, sometimes we feel like we are overwhelmed by the waves of life and are about to drown. What happened to God s promise? God has created each of us for a purpose. A true decision to accept the LORD in faith also involves seeking to be obedient to God, ultimately enabling that purpose to be fulfilled. Simply, if a decision for Christ is made, but that decision does not include a choice to follow Jesus and make Him the LORD of one's life, it is possible that no saving decision was actually ever made. One who has rejected the Lordship of Christ in their life is still lost and separated from God until they voluntarily choose to replace their own self as the center of the authority of their life with a full and obedient submission to the LORD. A call to Christ is a call to obedience to His will. Unfortunately, true obedience is not that simple. As obedience to God is predicated by a decision to make Him LORD, the life that follows that decision is one where the individual Christian is characterized by their continued desire for obedience. There are many worldly pressures that compete with a Christian s desire for obedience. What are they? We can probably list attitudes and actions that are motivated by pride, selfish desires, fear, and others. The label of "sin" can be placed on any attitude or action that comes between where God wants us to be, and where we 1 Isaiah 43:2.
are in any area of our lives. Consequently, any time a Christian succumbs to any of these worldly pressures, sin has entered that Christian s life. However, God is a God of grace and love. He is a God of new beginnings who will always reach down to us at our point of need to bring us new life. God is always ready to give us a fresh start with our past sins forgiven when we turn to Him in true confession and repentance. We often repeat the good news of salvation and are reminded that God touched our lives in a very special way when He reached through time and space to redeem those who place their faith and trust in Him. Those who responded to God's purpose are assured of an eternity that will never be separated from Him. Yet, when we repeat the good news of salvation, we often forget that the same promised relationship with God is offered to us as we grow in our faith. Like a father who is quick to forgive the errors of a beloved child, God is quick to forgive our transgressions when we go to Him in sincere prayer, confessing our sin, and turning away from it. Often we hold on to guilt over our past mistakes when God has already forgiven us. The good news of salvation also declares us free from that guilt. The good news of the gospel is good news indeed! When we leave the first chapter of the Old Testament book of Jonah, we find him in the midst of the sea, facing certain death by drowning, a circumstance he brought upon himself by his own poor decisions. Any study of the Old Testament book of Jonah will include attention to the sin in Jonah s life, its consequences and God's response to Jonah's repentance. When called upon to serve God in a very clear and specific way, Jonah willfully chose to go the opposite direction. The sin in Jonah s life was based upon his personal religious and social prejudice against non-jews, and in this case, particularly the nation of Assyria, and those who lived in its capital, Nineveh. Also, even though Jonah heard God's message directly, he did not have a close relationship with God. When Jonah tried to run from God, 2 he boarded a boat in an attempt to head out to sea for a destination that was to Jonah the end of his known world, a place that he believed to be far from the influence of the God of Israel. When God immediately sent a storm to stop the boat, (possibly even within sight of land), all of the sailors called out to their own gods, but Jonah was silent. In Jonah's response to the situation, there is no reference of his ever referring to anyone but himself, what he alone had done, and what the sailors could do to him to end the crisis. At the suggestion of Jonah, and only after exhausting every other alternative, the sailors threw Jonah into the sea, immediately ending the crisis for those on the ship. At no time 2 Jonah 1:1-16.
during this experience did Jonah show any evidence of repentance or turning to God for help. Jonah was so determined to disobey God's command that he was willing to drown in the waters of the Mediterranean Sea in order that the Ninevites would not receive a word from God through him. How many of us have turned our back to God s call at some time in our lives? How many are turned away right now? Will God be patient and wait for you, or will God give up and let you go your own way? Or, will God place some crisis in your path in order to gain your attention, giving you more recognition of your need to come back to Him, such as the opportunity he will give to Jonah? When we look at God s actions towards rebellious believers in scripture, we find that God is both patient, and proactive in seeking our repentance. Sometimes God will speak, send messengers, or manipulate circumstances to get the attention of the straying believer. God s response to the rebellious Jonah is one such example. Jonah 1:17, 2:10. But the LORD provided a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was inside the fish three days and three nights. 2:10 And the LORD commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land. There are very few people who have not heard the story of Jonah and the big fish. Most believe the big fish to be a whale, since we think of this as the only sea creature large enough to swallow Jonah whole and sustain his life in the interim. Some argue that it could not be a whale, because the scripture uses the word, "fish," and a whale is a mammal. However, this is a scientific discrimination that would not have been relevant to ancient cultures. 3 The Hebrew word used here to refer to the great fish is "dag," which is usually transliterated as "Leviathan" and is simply used to refer to a large sea creature. We do not know exactly what nature of sea creature seized Jonah from the ocean waves, but we know that something did. The creature was large enough to swallow Jonah whole without harming him, and had a mouth or belly that could sustain him for at least parts of three days. Once tossed from the boat, Jonah was doomed. No sailor was about to retrieve him from the sea and risk the recreation of the crisis that threatened to doom them all. Jonah was sure that he was about to die. By 3 This last argument is a typical interpretation error that arises when one tries to exegete scripture using English translations and modern language use, or apply modern scientific scrutiny to a setting where no such scrutiny existed.
running from God, Jonah found himself in the greatest crisis of his life. It started with a crisis of faith, and was culminating with a physical crisis. However, God intervened. God caused the Leviathan to rise from the depths of the sea and swallow him (or at least, hold him in its mouth). One important thing to note here is that God was in complete control of the situation. When we think that things are getting critical we often will remain oblivious to God s sovereignty. I would imagine that if you were to tell Jonah at this moment that God was in control he would not quite agree. Another interesting point concerning this story is how easy it is for children to believe it, and how difficult it is for science-oriented adults and scholars to do the same. Children and people of faith tend to readily acknowledge that God, who made heaven and earth, could easily cause a fish large enough to accommodate the rebellious prophet to be in the right place at the right time. God can, and will, use any means of His own choosing to accomplish His ultimate purpose. We see many examples of similar actions by God, actions that would use animals to save the life of a prophet: shutting the mouths of lions, 4 opening the mouth of a donkey so that it could speak, 5 summoning ravens to feed Elijah. 6 Even later in this book, God will ordain a plant to give Jonah shade, and a worm to eat the plant. Jonah was disobedient, and the leviathan was obedient. God used what to us are understood as miraculous means to accomplish his purpose, but because of His sovereignty over nature, there is no real miracle at all. These two verses, 1:17 and 2:10 are the first and last verses of the second chapter in the Hebrew text. For what purpose did God call the leviathan? The beast was ordained to save and to preserve Jonah s life. Though God may not have saved Jonah in a way that was very comfortable for him, God s purpose was fulfilled in a way that would best serve Jonah s needs. When God places events in our path that are intended to turn us back toward Him, those experiences may not always be pleasant. More often than not, the difficult experiences are consequences of our own making, and directly related to our rebellion. In Jonah s case, and typically of ours, he suffered a crisis that evolved from a little of both, though the storm and the fish were certainly God s doing alone. How long was Jonah in the fish? The scripture describes this as three days, roughly the same period of time between Jesus' death and resurrection. Because of this, the event has often been considered a 4 Daniel 6. 5 Numbers 2:28-30. 6 1 Kings 17:1-6.
model, or archetype, of Jesus' experience in the tomb. According to Hebrew tradition, three days is not measured as 72 hours as modern science would do. Any part of a day is considered a day, so Jonah could have been swallowed on a Friday evening and released on a Sunday morning. Though barely over 24 hours, it is considered three days and nights since part of each is experienced. This is also consistent with the Hebrew description of Jesus three-day entombment. Why did it take the fish so long to release Jonah onto dry land? It appears that the boat was very close to shore, so the fish could have done the task in just a few minutes. The delay may have served a purpose much greater than simply salvation from death. The time in the belly of the beast provided a dramatic opportunity for Jonah to do some deep and significant soul-searching without the distraction of other events in his life. We can observe that this delay provided a period of time when Jonah could do nothing but consider his predicament. It may probably be assumed that spending three day s in a fish s belly is probably not very pleasant. Certainly, Jonah would have no idea of how long this experience was to continue until he would ultimately die of dehydration, suffocation, or some other malady. The odor that permeated his abode must have been unique. If the leviathan was a mammal, the heat would have been unsufferable. Also, the absolute and total darkness must have made the entire experience that much more difficult. The wide variations in air pressure would have been almost unbearable. What was happening to Jonah during these three days? Jonah 2:1-7. From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the LORD his God. 2 He said: "In my distress I called to the LORD, and he answered me. From the depths of the grave I called for help, and you listened to my cry. 3 You hurled me into the deep, into the very heart of the seas, and the currents swirled about me; all your waves and breakers swept over me. 4 I said, I have been banished from your sight; yet I will look again toward your holy temple. 5 The engulfing waters threatened me, the deep surrounded me; seaweed was wrapped around my head. 6 To the roots of the mountains I sank down; the earth beneath barred me in forever. But you brought my life up from the pit, O LORD my God. 7 "When my life was ebbing away, I remembered you, LORD, and my prayer rose to you, to your holy temple. What happened to Jonah when he hit "rock bottom?" Previously thinking that he was far removed from the influence of God, he found God there. He thought that by leaving the land, he would be leaving the presence of
God, and yet not only did Jonah recognize God's presence out to sea, but also deep in the belly of the leviathan. In his distress he called out to God and heard His voice. This immediately taught Jonah an important truth: God is omnipresent. God is fully present in all points within the universe, and escaping His sovereignty is impossible. Thinking he could hide from God by going to sea, Jonah found God in the "roots of the mountains." What happens to us when we hit "rock bottom?" Often we think that God is not there. We may, in our sin, turn our backs on Him, and in refusing to listen to the Holy Spirit's still-small voice, we firmly declare God's absence. We may cry, "God, where are you?" not recognizing that our own sin might be that barrier to our hearing from Him. We might be reminded, at this point, of the prodigal son, 7 who demanded his inheritance from his father, turned away from him and squandered it on selfish experience. When the inheritance was fully spent, he found himself working in pig pens, a place that would be the lowest possible experience for a Jew. While in the pig pen the prodigal "came to himself," and realized for the first time just where he was, and what the next step should be. In his case it was to return home to his father. Jonah is having a similar experience. His response is recorded here as Hebrew poetry, so you can expect to see a lot of repetition of ideas. (Hebrew poetry rhymes ideas rather than sounds.) We may suddenly observe a different Jonah than we saw just a few hours (or days) earlier. Rather than shake his fist at God and rebuke Him for his actions, what is Jonah s response? He (1) called for help, (2) listened for an answer, (3) assessed his situation, (4) expressed hope, (5) and acknowledged that God had saved him. Jonah clearly recognized what God had done, and why God had done it. Jonah fully recognized that the sin expressed in this experience was his own, and God was not (and never is) to blame for our despair. Often when we are wandering away from God, we will find ourselves in the pit of our own making, and hopefully at some point in that experience we, like Jonah and the prodigal, will "come to ourselves," and reach out to God for his mercy. At that point we have an opportunity to repent of our foolishness and hope for a renewed relationship with God in the future. Jonah's response is a valuable model for salvation from despair: 1. He called for help. God hates pride. This truth is literally stated in biblical scripture over one hundred times. Pride causes us to disregard our 7 Luke, Chapter 15.
true and humble state, disavows God's sovereignty, and it destroys our relationship with God. Pride, when expressed in crisis, makes it very difficult to cry out for the help we truly need. Jonah's response was not one of pride, but one of recognizing the true lowliness of his state when compared to God's glory. When we recognize just how impotent we really are when we stand up to the glory of God, our appreciation of His sovereignty is clarified. The power of pride can simply melt away as we turn to God as a child in need of the resources of his father. 2. He listened for an answer. I once heard the statement, "When you are up to your neck in alligators, it is difficult to remember that your original purpose was to drain the swamp." The idea is simple: the stress of the moment can overwhelm the basic purpose of the hour. When in pain it is a simple task to focus on the pain, and that pain alone. The pain might be physical, or more than likely, emotional. It might be an uncontrolled anger towards another individual from a perceived transgression. It is at times like this that one needs God the most, and it is at times like this that one must be listening for God's voice. Certainly, we are not usually seeking for an audible statement, though such is certainly possible. Instead, we can listen for the Holy Spirit's gentle and peaceful truth that transcends the error of the moment as He speaks quietly through our soul, through our inner being. Listening for an answer involves setting asides one's own prejudices and one's own perceived solutions, and demonstrating a heart that is open to change, a heart that is open to repentance. 3. He assessed his situation. The implication here is that the assessment is honest. Where we might define the situation as, "Look what he did to me," the honest assessment may be, "Look at what I did to my self by my attitude of unforgiveness." Our assessment of crisis is typically self-centered and self-edifying. An honest assessment will involve recognition of our own imperfection, a review of how far from God we have wandered in order to get to the point of crisis. Obviously, Jonah had wandered far from God, not geographically as he had intended, but spiritually, separating himself from God by his sin. It is sin that separates us from God, and a true assessment of our life will illuminate that sin. 4. He expressed hope. If Jonah wrote these words, he certainly did so after the experience when he had the opportunity to write. However, the statements made by Jonah in this poem were created during the crisis, not after it. True hope is expressed when one trusts in God in the midst of crisis, rather than after the deliverance from it. Jonah, in the most critical situation of his life, recognized God's hand on his life, and did not lose hope, but even found a greater hope when he did recognize that God was
there. Often in the midst of crisis, we are so overwhelmed by its circumstances that we do not perceive any reason for hope. However, Christians can always recognize that God is sovereign, and that He works "all things for good for those who love him." 8 There is always hope for every individual who has turned their heart over to the LORD, Jesus Christ. 5. He acknowledged God as Savior. Jonah knew that God was the true source of his life and his deliverance. This is also true for us when we are in a state of crisis. It is thought that, since the prayer of Jonah is in a poetic form, he actually wrote these verses after the fact, and wrote them as a hymn. The first line of this hymn, verse 2, is structured in the typical form of an idea stated in two ways, and is a prayer that is appropriate for many people when they find themselves at the bottom of the pit. What does Jonah say in this verse? "When in distress/in the depths of the grave, I called, and you answered/heard my cry." What does this say to us when we experience such low times? These are times when we are powerless. Certainly, Jonah was powerless to affect any part of his salvation from this experience. For some, it is this feeling of powerlessness that drives them to the point of finally crying out to God. However, we know that at these times, God hears our prayers. God listens. Furthermore, God s plan will be accomplished, so it is up to us to be part of that plan, or continue in our misery. Jonah 2:8-9. "Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs. 9 But I, with a song of thanksgiving, will sacrifice to you. What I have vowed I will make good. Salvation comes from the LORD." When we stray from God, He requires more of us than simply confession and repentance. God has called us to a task: a life of obedience. Until Jonah was ready to complete that task, God would continue to deal with him, turning him in that direction. These verses show that Jonah was not only repentant for what he had done; he was also ready to respond to God in obedience. What kind of promises do we make to God when we are down for the count? Oftentimes people make vows like, "God if you get me out of this, I will." (fill in the blank.) What most likely happens when God finally does get them out of the problem? Often those vows are forgotten. Sometimes that may just be what God would prefer, when we promise to do something 8 Romans 8:28.
that sounds penitent to us, but is not really the task to which God has called us. However, it is often possible that we truly do know what God wants us to do, and in turning back to Him, He wants us to set ourselves to that task, not some meaningless penance that we think is appropriate. Usually such penitent acts are meant only to make us feel better, and are not related at all to God s call on our lives. I am reminded of the movie, "The Mission," 9 wherein Robert De Niro plays a medieval Spaniard Jesuit assigned to minister to a tribe of pagan South American Indians. In the screenplay he kills his brother in a duel over the love of a girl. Then, in the aftermath of his guilt and depression he decides that the appropriate penance is to take all of his weapons and armor, weighing several hundred pounds, and carry them on his back as a burden to the top of a high cliff where he would then dispose of them, never to use them again. In the process of the climb he endangers his own life, the lives of those with him, and in so doing, he abandons the very purpose that God had called him to. This misdirection ultimately destroys his influence with other Jesuits and he is unable to protect the native Indians from attack and destruction by more conservative members of the Jesuit order. It is a very depressing movie, and it reveals the depravity that accompanies selfinflicted penance. God does not want us to punish ourselves when we sin. God wants us to experience the peace and joy of His forgiveness. We do not always know the appropriate response to our acts, only God does. Jonah s promise is much more appropriate. Rather than saying, "If you, then I " Jonah states that he will worship God, give to him the sacrifice that He requires, and continue in obedience to Him. We find that turning to God always comes back to the "O" word: obedience, turning to God as LORD as well as Savior. God does not want us to punish ourselves. He wants us to come home. Sometimes we may remain in rebellion to God because we are unable to determine the appropriate punishment for our disobedience. Again, God simply wants us to come home. Rather than dwell on ourselves, or dwell on our predicament, God would prefer that we dwell in Him and let Him deal with those issues. Service to God is motivated by awareness that the grace of the one true God is the only means of salvation, and by personal gratitude for that grace we can: 1. Turn Loose of anything that is hindering us from joining God in His mission. 2. Turn Back to God in those areas that we are running from Him. 9 Bolt, Robert. (1086). The Mission. Directed by Roland Joffe, Produced by Fernando Ghia and David Puttnam, released by Warner Brothers.
3. Turn Down any excuses to evade our responsibility to share Christ with the world. 4. Turn Away from selfish pursuits and indulgences that prevent us from sacrificially investing more of our resources for God s kingdom. 5. Turn Up the volume. Listen to what is happening around us, so that we can be more sensitive to the needs of those around us, and so that we can be a part in meeting those needs. 6. Turn Over a new leaf and let God use us in a long-term or short-term missions venture. This is the very definition of repentance: turning away from our selfcentered will and turning to God. What is our reward for obedience? It is when we are in an attitude of obedience to God that we will truly experience the peace and joy that God has promised us as we experience His love for us, and share that love with others. During our lives we may find ourselves overwhelmed by our circumstances. We may feel the burden of guilt over our past or present sins. We can always remember that God is a God of new beginnings. He always provides forgiveness for our guilt and comfort in our circumstances. That truly is good news.