JONAH (insert Jane–and…YOUR name, perhaps??) RUNS FROM THE LORD
One day, while making my bed and having a conversation with God about how He wasn’t making it very clear to me what He wanted me to do, the strong impression came to me: “Read Jonah.”
Huh? Where did that come from??
I hadn’t been studying the Book of Jonah. Hadn’t talked about it with anyone. Hadn’t heard it preached about in so long I couldn’t even remember when it was—or even if I ever HAD heard it preached.
I wasn’t even sure I had actually ever read the book on my own. I just knew it was about a man named Jonah and about a whale that swallowed him whole. I didn’t know the details. If asked, I would probably would have said that it wouldn’t be “relevant” to me and my life.
So when I heard the “read Jonah” I curiously grabbed my nearby iPhone (aren’t our phones always nearby now?–as in, attached to our hand?) and put “the story of Jonah” in my search engine space.
What popped up was a black-and-white artist’s rendition of Jonah and the giant whale and these words underneath: “The Book of Jonah is one of the Minor Prophets in the Bible. It tells of a Hebrew prophet named Jonah, son of Amittai, who is sent by God to prophesy the destruction of Nineveh but tries to escape the divine mission.” (my underlined emphasis.)
I gasped.
And I quickly clicked my phone off and set it on the table next to the bed.
You know why?
Because the words: “tries to escape the divine mission” hit me like a ton of bricks.
A flashing, neon-light, ton of bricks.
Hit me right between the eyes.
Or more like a thud in my heart.
Oh, we know when God is speaking to us.
And clicking off the phone or closing our Bibles doesn’t take away the truth of it. When we know God is speaking, we just know it.
And, like Jonah, we can’t run from it.
We can try.
But it won’t work.
I knew I had been escaping (or trying to escape) a divine mission.
Why was I trying to escape it? Because I couldn’t understand it. Didn’t feel qualified to do it. Found it too difficult. I could name a thousand more reasons. And I had. To God.
And this was His answer to all of them with the nudge to read the book of Jonah: “You are trying to escape the divine mission.”
Why would anyone do such a thing?
I could probably give you another thousand reasons but the main ones for ME would be fear, performance anxiety, and that “don’t feel qualified to do it” reason.
Jonah had his reasons, too.
A couple of weeks after this incident with God while making my bed, I sat down to read the book of Jonah. (And, yes, I really did wait that long to read the Book of Jonah)
The very first caption on the very first chapter made me laugh: Jonah Runs From the Lord.
Jonah, Jonah, Jonah. What were you thinking? You can’t run from the Lord! Don’t you know that??
Oh.
Well…I’m different.
You, too?
We can successfully run from the Lord, right???
As I continued, I laughed out loud once again when I got to verse 3–the verse that follows the first two where God gives Jonah his assignment. Jonah hears the assignment and in verse 3 he does this:
Jonah got up and went in the opposite direction to get away from the LORD.
Oh my gosh, Jonah. This is embarrassing! Millions of people will be reading about your silly, willful disobedience for years to come!
But, of course, Jonah didn’t know that. He just wanted to escape the divine mission.
But why???
I read on.
Jonah went to great lengths to get away from God and the mission. Of course, running from the God of the Universe is impossible. But he gave it a valiant try, he really did.
He had a brilliant idea: “I know! I’ll buy a ticket on a ship and sail to a faraway place. Far, far from the Lord of the Universe! He won’t be able to find me there!” (my paraphrase).
Seems like ridiculous thinking but I’m pretty sure we get caught in our own version of that.
But, doggone it, God found him.
And God sent a violent storm that alerted the captain of the ship that something was amiss. (Jonah 1:4)
He and his crew prayed to all the gods they knew to try to get the storm to stop.
They threw cargo overboard to try to keep the ship from going under. But nothing was working. They were desperate!
They found Jonah asleep (asleep–still trying to escape by yet another means–have you been there??) and asked him to pray with them. (Jonah 1:5)
They then determined that he was the cause for the storm and they asked him who his God was.
Jonah was probably exasperated now. You know how you are trying to stay invisible, low-key, under the radar? I’m sure this is what Jonah was trying to do. But God was making this a bit impossible.
Jonah honestly answered their question: He said: “I am a Hebrew, and I worship the LORD, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the land.” (Jonah 1:9)
The sailors were terrified when they heard this. “Oh man, Jonah. Why did you do it?” They groaned. They GROANED! And were “exceedingly afraid.”
And they asked him what they should do to stop the storm!
He seemed resigned to the consequences of his big mistake of running from God and he told them they should just throw him overboard. (Jonah 1:12)
Can’t we wonder why he didn’t cry out to God to forgive him for the poor judgment and decision, repent, and vow to carry out the mission?
But, no. He asked to be thrown overboard.
Seems to me like he was willing to do just about ANYTHING to escape his assignment! Even DEATH seemed better to him!
The crew members wanted no part of that. They rowed even harder to try and get the ship back to land. But the storm was too much for them. They had a chat with God and let Him know that they weren’t fond of this “throw him overboard” idea and they didn’t want to die for it, but they seemed to have no recourse but to throw Jonah into the sea. (Jonah 1:13,14)
So they did. (Jonah 1:15)
And the storm stopped.
It wound down.
No! It stopped IMMEDIATELY! They had most definitely found the source of the problem.
And do you know what happened to those men?
It says in verse 16: “The sailors were awestruck by the LORD’s great power, and they offered Him a sacrifice and vowed to serve him.”
So here’s a case of God working something good through a bad situation.
And it shows how quickly these men responded to God.
But Jonah?
Not so much.
It took him 3 whole days in the belly of a whale before he decided that, yea, maybe he should repent, worship God, and carry out the directive to warn the city of Nineveh. Even then, he didn’t have his whole heart in it.
So why was Jonah so opposed to being obedient to God?
The answer was really surprising to me! (Forgive me, folks, if you already know this story inside and out. For whatever reason, after being a Christian for over 40 years, I had never really studied this book! So, go along for the ride of what I learned! It was revelation after revelation for me. And although some of it was personal for me—what God wanted me to hear for my own situation—I think we can all glean something from the story of Jonah!)
So the bottom-line reason for Jonah not wanting to be obedient is that he did not want God to show mercy and forgiveness to all the people of Nineveh!
He was afraid that if he gave them God’s warning, they would repent—which means they wouldn’t “get” what they “deserved.” Wow!
The caption for the last chapter in my Bible says this: Jonah’s Anger at the LORD’s Mercy.
Oh my gosh, Jonah! This is getting even worse! And even more embarrassing! You didn’t want the people to receive God’s mercy and forgiveness?!! Wouldn’t that be something to rejoice about?
But, if we are all honest, brutally honest, we can probably think of some people we might be quite disturbed, and even angry about, if they repented and received mercy. It is definitely something that God has to give us supernatural ability and grace to do.
We can sound all pious about it—that we think it’s a beautiful thing—until it’s about…the man who raped you, the father that abused you, the co-worker who lied about you and you lost your job over it, the cons who hacked into your bank account, the husband that cheated on you, etc.
Mercy for THEM?
Ummm…How about justice?! (And there always is justice—but how and when its given isn’t usually up to us.)
Jonah’s story, if allowed, can reveal some ugly stuff in us–just as it did with Jonah.
I would imagine that Jonah might’ve been thinking: “Oh no. Not me. I want no part of helping those awful people receive Your mercy and forgiveness. If You plan on doing it, do it without my assistance.”
Even if we haven’t had someone personally hurt us to the point we would rather they didn’t receive mercy (though I think most of us have!), maybe we can understand it in a more general way—like all the politicians getting blanket mercy who have very negatively affected our lives.
The whole bunch in Washington D.C. receiving God’s mercy.
That might be our equivalent of Nineveh!
Read what Jonah says. This story just cracks me up! (Jonah does…)
This change of plans greatly upset Jonah, and he became very angry. So he complained to the LORD about it: “Didn’t I say before I left home that you would do this, LORD? That is why I ran away to Tarshish! I knew that you are a merciful and compassionate God, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love. You are eager to turn back from destroying people. Just kill me now, LORD! I’d rather be dead than alive if what I predicted will not happen.” Jonah 4:1-3
Jonah is FURIOUS over what God did.
In fact, he said he would rather die than to not see the destruction of Nineveh!
And in the middle of his tirade, He gives praise and honor to God about His character!
He knew that God wouldn’t be able to keep from showing His mercy if the people of Nineveh repented.
Which they did, by the way.
Every single one of them.
Even the king.
And the animals!
I love it where it says that God even cared about the animals!
But Nineveh has more than 120,000 people living in spiritual darkness, not to mention all the animals. Shouldn’t I feel sorry for such a great city?” (Jonah 4:11).
The animals even had to fast and wear garments of mourning. (Verses 7 & 8 of Chapter 3.) I’m not sure how the animals got involved with the sins of man–nor how they felt about fasting and wearing sackcloth!
I did personally receive insight into God’s mercy and of how important it is to rejoice over His mercy.
But this wasn’t the main message that I believe God was wanting me to receive from reading about Jonah.
The main message for me was at the beginning…and at the end.
The beginning was how Jonah was trying to run away from his divine mission.
Guilty! Me, that is. (And Jonah, too.)
And at the end of this book, it shows how spoiled and petulant Jonah was.
And how he was prone to extreme exaggeration about his circumstances.
Also, that he really wasn’t too interested in God’s mercy or His sovereignty.
He cared about his own life. His own comforts.
When he was comfortable with God’s good provision, he was grateful. When God removed the comfort, he wanted to die.
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. 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.
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. 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.
Then God said to Jonah, “Is it right for you to be angry because the plant died?”
“Yes,” Jonah retorted, “even angry enough to die!” Jonah 4:5-9.
Wow.
That’s all I have to say.
Wow.
Okay, I have more to say but that was my first reaction: Wow.
Embarrassing again, Jonah.
What a brat!
And soooo quick to go from a “Thank you, God” to a “I want to die because I’m so uncomfortable now.”
All due to his own physical comfort and discomfort.
God pointed this fact out to self-centered Jonah. “Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than 120,000 [innocent] persons, who do not know the difference between their right and left hand [and are not yet accountable for sin], as well as many [blameless] animals?” Jonah 4:11
That’s how it ends.
Well, I don’t know how pastors preach and teach this, but I know what God spoke to me about it:
Disobedience: we must be obedient to our divine mission because a lot of people’s spiritual futures are at stake. And we can’t run and hide from a divine calling—on a ship ride or to a remote cabin in the Great Smoky Mountains (that would be my escape plan!)
Selfishness: we can’t be overly obsessed with our own comforts–enough to get so angry with God that we want to die! We must know that God is sovereign—He allows the good and the bad–and we need to remain stable and fixed on our divine mission and calling through it all. And we need to know that God is loving and merciful and He will take care of us as we fulfill our calling.
Are you running from something?
A divine calling?
Maybe even a little mad about it?
If so, you might want to consider some whole-hearted repentance and obedience…
Then hide and watch as God works his wonders-—in and through you—as only He can.
LINK: What’s Your Excuse? What To Do When The Excuse Bag Is Empty.