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Introduction
There are many stories in the Bible that we may have learned as children, such as:
Noah’s ark
The walls of Jericho
Moses and the Red Sea
David and Goliath
…and Jonah and the whale
We are familiar with them because they seem like very good stories.
They captivate our imagination and Hollywood has wasted no time in turning many of them into movies.
However, we should not loose sight that:
They are real events
They are not fiction
They have been written for our instruction
Ultimately, these stories are not about the characters themselves but rather they are about God and his plan to save all those who would believe.
For the next four weeks we will turn to the book of Jonah.
This book consists of four chapters.
They are very short chapters and could be read, from start to finish, in less than 30 minutes.
Today we will consider chapter one where we first encounter God and his disobedient prophet.
We will consider:
God calls Jonah
Jonah tries to hide from the Lord
Jonah is swallowed by the great fish
I. God calls Jonah
I. Dios llama a Jonás
The Lord calls Jonah in .
The Bible does not tell us much about Jonah.
What we do know is he was a prophet in the southern kingdom of Judah.
God calls his prophet with a special purpose:
He is called to Nineveh.
Nineveh was the great capital of the Assyrian kingdom.
This was a very wicked kingdom that was a sworn enemy of the people of Israel.
They were a very wicked people and inflicted cruel punishments to those who they conquered.
They worshipped Dagon (the fish God, whose body was a body of a fish but the head of a man).
We are not given details of Nineveh’s sin that had offended God to the point that he was sending his messenger to proclaim his word.
Jonah has recieved his marching orders from God.
Prophets are expected to obey God’s orders.
They are God’s messengers and are guided by him to proclaim his word.
What will Jonah do?
II.
Jonah tries to hide from the Lord
II.
Jonás intenta esconderse de Dios
Jonah 1:3
When we read verse three we are expected to gasp.
We are expected to be astonished at the stubbornness of the prophet of God to disobey the God of the Universe.
God is sending his prophet to a rebellious and disobedient people.
Surely, God is sending him to call them to repentance.
And here we have God’s prophet attempting to hide from the presence of the Lord.
We are told twice that his is attempting to flee from the Lord.
Jonah is doing the impossible:
There is no where we can go to hide from God’s presence.
God is omnipresent - his presence is everywhere!
Does Jonah really think that he will escape God’s presence simply because he is far away from the temple of Jerusalem?
Does he really think that he can escape God’s presence because he is traveling in the opposite direction?
This is such a pathetic site to see God’s servant rebel against his God.
Let us always pray for those in leadership for there could be occasions where they are actually in rebellion against the Lord, fighting against his will, doing what God has not commanded.
Why would Jonah not go?
There is a very important reason why Jonah decides not to go, but we must wait three more weeks to discover that reason.
Chapter one does not focus so much on Jonah’s reasons for running from God’s presence and not going to Nineveh.
Rather it’s focus is on the consequences of his disobedience.
Sin has consequences.
Not all sin is equally consequential.
However, there are sins that can destroy our lives, our families, our reputation, our livelihood.
There are sins that only affect us and there are sins that affect all those who we love.
Jonah has secured passage on a ship going to Tarshish (which is in the opposite direction of Nineveh).
God will not be mocked.
Jonah has sown disobedience and he will reap God’s judgement.
God himself has sent the great wind such that the ship is now in grave trouble.
God is sovereign over the sea and the wind.
We may try to hide from his presence but God, who is in control of everything, will triumph over our disobedience.
The ship crew are terrified.
Verse 5 shows us how terrified they are.
How could Jonah sleep in such a time?
I think this scene shows us how hard and reluctant Jonah’s heart was to God’s will.
He surely was in a spiritual slumber to be walking away from the presence of God.
The entire ship crew is praying to their gods.
However, we know those gods are not real.
They are simply idols that cannot do anything for them.
The ship crew throw lots to see who could be responsible for this tragedy!
The lot falls upon Jonah.
Jonah 1:
Just as God controls the winds and the sea, so too he controls lots such that he made them fall upon Jonah.
Jonah has now been cornered by God.
He has no where to go.
He must now confess!
The ship crew immediately asks him about his identify, his origin, his purpose.
They want to know what he has done to have unleashed God’s wrath!
Jonah’s reply is astonishing:
Jonah 1:
He confesses that he is a Hebrew.
He is part of the people of God.
He is a member of the covenant people of Israel.
He says he fears/worships God! Really?
What an ironic response.
He was called by God to go to Nineveh and he went south to catch a ship away from Nineveh.
He was called to take God’s word to them and he is no attempting to hide from God’s presence.
How is is that he can profess to worship and fear almighty God?
We have all been in this situation where our behavior does not match our profession of faith, our baptismal vows, our faith in Jesus Christ.
We have all been guilty of saying to be a child of God and acting like an unbeliever.
There is only one solution to stop the storm.
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