God’s Redemption

Introduction

Background

God called Jonah to do something that seemed irrational to Jonah, and Jonah’s response was even more irrational. Jonah attempted to go 2,500 miles in the other direction, was dishonest with the people around him, experienced the judgement of God, and then was tossed over board by people who initially tried to save him.

God has compassion on the world, we lack compassion for the world. God does what is necessary to reveal our sins, not because He is against us, but because He is for us. He is long-suffering and patient with us so that we can know the truth, and so that we can understand Him better.

Chapter 1 ends with Jonah in the belly of that fish for three days and three nights.

Context

Chapter 2 picks up sometime in that three day period. A lot people look at that opening statement, “Then Jonah prayed”, like it’s saying that after the three days and three nights Jonah began to pray…but I think that Jonah was likely praying the entire time he was conscious.

Can you imagine…falling to the depths of the sea where the storm is raging and the sky is dark…you can’t see anything because the water is stirred, and then…all of a sudden, you are in a different world…you feel burdened, but protected. You feel vulnerable but unafraid. You feel punished, but you feel so loved…what a place to be…that’s where Jonah is in that fish’s belly.

Jonah prays…and his prayer is a prayer of lamentation that turns to thankfulness.

The place that Jonah is in, is not an unfamiliar place to you and me…we may have never been in the stomach of a fish, but we’ve been in places of deep mourning.

We’ve been in places where we failed in our responsibilities that God has given us…and we’ve been in the place where God has restored us. Our time in that place might have been more than three days…it may have been three years…and it might have been 30 years…but we have to know that in the trial of life, even the ones we bring on because of our rebellion, God has prepared His instruments to show us His redemption.

I. The Depths of Sheol

Jonah 2:1–2 NKJV

Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the fish’s belly. And he said: “I cried out to the Lord because of my affliction, And He answered me. “Out of the belly of Sheol I cried, And You heard my voice.

God’s Instrument

Discovering God

The Bible says that the wisdom of God is foolishness to the world. It also says that the ways of God are higher than our ways.

In my inexperience with faith, I thought that Christianity was all about the answers.

I think that it is important for us to know as much as possible about the Bible, I think it’s important for us to be well studied and to be prepared to show people truth.

When I was first saved, I fell in love with the ministry and the mission of what is called Apologetics. Some people think that means I walk around and apologize to people, but it is a term that means, “Defending the Bible”.

I certainly think that apologetics has its place…I think that it’s necessary that we have the philosophers and the scientists that work so diligently to give us the hard copy of what we place our faith in.

However, the only thing that philosophy and science can do explain what what we already know is true. Science and philosophy can’t create truth, the only thing they can do is affirm truth.

Whether or not we discover it has nothing to with how true something is…

Isaac Newton famously sat underneath an apple tree where he observed an apple fall to the ground. Now, Isaac Newton is the greatest scientist and philosopher to ever live…but as intelligent as he was…he didn’t invent gravity, he just discovered it’s existence.

When he saw that apple fall from the tree, he logically concluded that the earth has a gravitational pull.

God’s Miraculous Fish

In the same way…what we are observing in God’s Word is a fish that was able to swallow a man and keep him alive.

The reason that I bring up philosophy and science, is because philosophers and scientists have been wringing their hands trying to come up with a solution to explain how this is possible…but the problem is that they are working in the wrong direction.

Imagine if Newton looked up in that tree and saw those apples hanging there, and then he asked himself, “Now, how did that apple get from the ground to the top of that tree?”

That’s what’s happening when we try to figure out what type of fish it was that swallowed Jonah...we’re working in the wrong direction.

I believe the answer to our problem is found there in v. 17 of chapter 1

Jonah 1:17 NKJV

Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.

You see that, God prepared a great fish.

Instead of starting with the premise that God prepared a fish, we are starting with the premise that God used a fish that we are aware of.

First, we need to start with the reality that God created the ocean and the creatures that live there.

Second, we need to establish that Jonah was in fact swallowed by a fish, kept alive for three days, and spit out on land.

Third, we must understand that this is an abnormal encounter, something that hasn’t been explained based on any fish that we know of.

Finally, we can come to the logical conclusion that God prepared a specific instrument for this specific encounter.

We don’t have to know what fish it was for it to be true…in fact, this could have been the only fish of its kind…and if we never discover its fossils, that doesn’t mean it never existed…this fish is an instrument prepared by God for the work of God, and it can’t be explained by man.

Why does God work this way?

God works this way because if it could be explained away by man then it wouldn’t be miraculous.

God does things that we cannot do because He is proving to us Who He is and who we are not.

So, the instrument of God is this great fish that God has prepared.

Something else I want you to see in these first 2 verses is God’s Affliction

God’s Affliction

Jonah says that he was in the belly of Sheol…

He is saying that he was in the belly of the earth, that he was experiencing death after being tossed into the ocean.

The affliction that Jonah was facing…the affliction that we all face is the affliction of death. It doesn’t matter what road a person takes in life, it all ends in death. Some tragically die young, some peacefully die old, but everyone is afflicted in the depths of Sheol.

Sheol is the realm of the dead.

When the world behaves like Jonah…when they reject God and they try to live their own way…they are hopelessly afflicted by death, and they go down into the belly of Sheol.

The Lord God brought this affliction on Jonah, not to harm him, but to save him…and that’s why, in v. 2, we also see God’s deliverance.

God’s Deliverance

As Jonah was floating down to death…while he was sinking to the belly of Sheol, swallowed by the world…Jonah cried out…and v. 2 says that God answered Jonah…v. 2 says that God heard the voice of Jonah.

This sets the tone of this prayer as a prayer of thankfulness.

Jonah is praying with an attitude of thanksgiving for everything that God has done to save him.

What exactly is God doing in Jonah’s life?

God is showing Jonah that he isn’t any better than the people of Nineveh.

God is revealing to Jonah what his life would be reduced to if he himself never received the grace of God. If he never received the same grace that was denying the people of Nineveh because of his hatred of them.

He was showing Jonah first hand the effect of never coming to faith in the Lord, and it is a life of affliction…

but when Jonah cried out…the Lord saved him.

And folks, that all people need to do, is cry out to the Lord for salvation…just simply yield to Him in surrender…just say, “Lord, I give up, you can have it all. I surrender all, Lord!”

That brings us right to our second point…”the depths of God’s faithfulness”

II. The Depths of God’s Faithfulness

God faithfulness is deeper than the deepest ocean. It goes beyond Sheol.

Listen to what the Psalmists says,

Psalm 139:4–8 NKJV

For there is not a word on my tongue, But behold, O Lord, You know it altogether. You have hedged me behind and before, And laid Your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; It is high, I cannot attain it. 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 Sheol, behold, You are there.

Jonah, because of this experience, because of this miraculous encounter with God, has come to a place where he understands that truth.

Jonah 2:3 NKJV

For You cast me into the deep, Into the heart of the seas, And the floods surrounded me; All Your billows and Your waves passed over me.

God’s Discipline

v. 3 tells us that Jonah has accepted that it wasn’t the sailors that threw him overboard, but that it was something God ordained.

God ordained this in the life of Jonah because it’s the only way we can learn…we are a stubborn people.

Charles Spurgeon says this,

The Spurgeon Study Bible: Notes Chapter 2

Most of the grand truths of God have to be learned by trouble. They must be burned into us with the hot iron of affliction; otherwise we will not truly receive them.

and Jonah does something that we fail to do…even in the storm, Jonah recognized that God’s hand was in it and that it didn’t happen by chance.

We do believe that God’s hand is in it when something good happens, but we rarely think that God’s hand is in it when something bad happens.

If we want to be thankful for God’s Faithfulness, then we need to see His hand in everything that takes place, not just the good things of this life.

God’s Promise

Jonah 2:4–7 NKJV

Then I said, ‘I have been cast out of Your sight; Yet I will look again toward Your holy temple.’ The waters surrounded me, even to my soul; The deep closed around me; Weeds were wrapped around my head. I went down to the moorings of the mountains; The earth with its bars closed behind me forever; Yet You have brought up my life from the pit, O Lord, my God. “When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the Lord; And my prayer went up to You, Into Your holy temple.

The key phrase is found in v. 7, where it says, “I remembered the Lord.”

This is Jonah claiming the promise that God has already given him in His word.

Now, we preach a lot against the “name it and claim it” doctrine…that is, we cannot manufacture the things of God. The reason that we can’t manufacture it is because God has already declared everything that He’s going to do.

When Jonah says “I remembered the Lord” it means that Jonah took the promise of Scripture, and prayed it, knowing that God would answer him.

What has God promised us?

Psalm 121 says He promises protection

Deuteronomy 4:29 says if we seek Him we will find Him

1 Chronicles says His love will never fail

Philippians 4 says that God will give us peace…

Now, here is the thing about promises…we have to trust they are true. Even when it doesn’t seem like it to us, we have to trust that God is keeping His end of the deal.

As you mature in your faith, as your relationship with God grows, you will develop a trust in Him that far exceeds any tough situation.

God’s Will

Jonah 2:8–9 NKJV

“Those who regard worthless idols Forsake their own Mercy. But I will sacrifice to You With the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay what I have vowed. Salvation is of the Lord.”

Here, Jonah is yielding to the will of God.

He is repenting from his idol worship…and his idols took the form of patriotism and self-righteousness.

But then, there in v. 9, Jonah makes a return…there is a “sobering-up” in Jonah’s life where he is coming back to the reality that God is a God of salvation, not only to those who are “perfect” but to those who are rebellious.

Jonah refused to go and preach to a rebellious nation, and in an act of ultimate hypocrisy, Jonah became a rebellious person. When God showed His mercy to the rebel Jonah, it was moment in time where Jonah remembered the grace and the mercy that God shows the entire world.

But notice what Jonah says his sacrifice is…his sacrifice is his thankfulness. He now has a heart geared towards thankfulness for everything that God has done in his life.

There in that belly of a great fish, after God had him tossed overboard, the only thing that Jonah can say is, “I am thankful, Lord.”

What is the will of God?

The will of God is that you live your life in thankfulness, being content with what God has supplied for you.

I think its a great thing to get promoted, to have a plan for a better financial future, to desire more for our kids and make sure that they are in a stable environment…but the only thing in life that really brings stability is thankfulness.

If you are only stable because of your job…there’s going to be a time when that job will be gone…can any of you paper mill guys say amen to that?

If you are only stable because of your relationships, there’s going to come a time when those get a little rocky…can any of my married folks say amen to that?

But, when you are stable because of a faith in Jesus Christ, you will never be moved.

Matthew 7:24–27 NKJV

“Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock. “But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.”

Psalm 1:3 NKJV

He shall be like a tree Planted by the rivers of water, That brings forth its fruit in its season, Whose leaf also shall not wither; And whatever he does shall prosper.

In your home, and in your life…what you need to be striving for is peace and contentment. Material things like cars and clothes wont satisfy…but having dinner around the family table will.

Jobs and promotions won’t last long, but showing your children how to have a bedrock faith in Jesus Christ will last an eternity.

That man or woman in your life will disappoint you, but Jesus never will.

We’ve seen Jonah down in the depth of Sheol…we’ve seen now the depths of God’s faithfulness…

III. The Height of God’s Redemption

Jonah 2:10 NKJV

So the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.

This is a humbling experience…because Jonah wouldn’t go witness to these pagans because they were filthy…and now Jonah is covered in the intestinal slime of a great fish.

When we rebel against God we bring humility to ourselves, but it comes in the form of redemption.

Church, God is not out to get us, He is out to redeem us!

So, first, think of the timeline here.

When we experience trouble in our lives, we say to God, “Fix this mess, and then I’ll get right with You!” Well, there we are again, looking at it from the wrong direction.

Instead, God says, “When you give up and submit to me, then I will begin to work.”

Second, think of God’s power here.

He commands the winds and waves, but He also commands the creatures of the earth. One day, all creation is going to worship God for the things that He has done.

Third, consider God’s miracle

This is an unexplained miracle, something that can only be true if God exists, that a giant fish was prepared, swallowed a man and kept him alive for three days, and then spits him out on dry land…what a mystery.

Finally, think of the imagery

Jesus says that an evil generation looks for a sign.

Matthew 12:39–41 NKJV

But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and indeed a greater than Jonah is here.

God was foreshadowing His salvation of man…that there would be a Man thrown into the depths of Sheol…that there would be a Man buried in a tomb that was prepared by God…and that there would be a Man that would come out of that tomb for the salvation of the world.

The Trials of Our Life Point to Jesus

Sometimes we get into a funk in our Christian walk and we think that we are just hopelessly walking through trial after trial after trial…but at the end of the story, everything that we have walked through ought to be pointing people to Jesus.

If we could just get people to understand that this life isn’t all there is, and that there is salvation in Jesus, we could see a move of God like Nineveh will see a move of God.

Conclusion

Church, are you thankful in your life?

When trials come, are you thanking God, or is everything “poor pitiful me!”

We have got to get to a place of contentment in our lives, we have to begin living for peace…and the only way for us to have peace in our life is to live in submission to God, no matter the command that He gives.