Prayers of Jonah

Read:

Jonah 2:1-10

We have been looking at the book of Jonah. Jonah was a minor prophet with a major issue.

We have looked at several themes in the book of Jonah - Jonah’s nationalistic and bigoted attitude and Jonah’s God. Tonight I want to look at the prayers of Jonah.

Introduction:

Prayer is a huge part of a relationship with God. I find it fascinating that there is not a record of Jonah praying until Jonah 2.

We have a record of the pagan sailors praying in Jonah 1

We have the captain calling upon Jonah to pray - but no record of Jonah praying until now.

It is remarkable even how this passage begins. Notice the key phrase:

Jonah 2:1 - “THEN JONAH PRAYED UNTO THE LORD HIS GOD.”

Then! Then when??? After he has been in the belly of the great fish God prepared for him. It’s possible that he even waited three days to pray. I can’t prove that, but you could sure make a case for it.

That is an odd place to pray. A strange place to put a prayer closet.

Dr. Henry Morris (an American young Earth creationist, Christian apologist, and engineer. He was one of the founders of the Creation Research Society and the Institute for Creation Research. He is considered by many to be "the father of modern creation science." ) calls this passage: Jonah's Prayer in Hell

He goes on to say,

“It is noteworthy that Jonah prayed twice, once in the belly of hell, once in the belly of the fish. These do not refer to the same prayer. In fact, two different Hebrew words are used for "belly." When speaking of the fish's belly, the word meah was used, referring to any of the actual insides of the great fish. When referring to the belly of hell, however, the word was beten , a word which also means "womb" and, in fact, is translated "womb" more often than "belly." This seems to suggest that, when Jonah later emerged from the fish, it was sort of like a birth. In fact, Jonah was indeed a different man when he came forth from the great fish than when he was fleeing to Tarshish. Chapter 2 of the Book of Jonah evidently consists mainly of the prayer he prayed while in sheol, ...If we take it at face value,... it is clearly what Jonah prayed while his spirit was in sheol, then recalled later when his spirit returned to his dead body in the belly of the great fish. (Morris, Jonah, 58-59)

Dr. David Jeremiah notes on this: Jonah turned to (remembered) the Lord for deliverance, yet his subsequent behavior did not suggest that his attitude changed. When repentance is real, people have the same attitude about their sin as God does--”This was wrong”-- and they do an about face.

Herbert Lockyer says there are a couple of lessons to be learned from Jonah’s prayer:

God can hear and help no matter who we may be (Jonah 2:2)

I would add no matter where we may be:

Jonah 2:7-9 In these verses, Jonah is completing His prayer of remembrance, repentance, and thanksgiving after the Lord had brought his soul back from sheol and back to consciousness in his physical body, which had been resting in death in the belly of the great fish. This fish, which has been assumed here to be something like the great sperm whale, had presumably swallowed Jonah near the sea floor, about the time he lost consciousness and died.

Fleeing from God is one thing, being cast away is quite another. (Jonah 2:4)

The deeper the despair, the greater the deliverance (Jonah 2:7)

There is nothing like trouble to arouse us to our need (Jonah 2:7)

Now I would put it this way: You know - sometimes I believe the Lord sends hard times our way - to put us into our prayer closets. Now I don’t have any scripture to prove this, but I believe that.

Stubborn refusal to obey God does not pay (Jonah 2:8)

As he prayed, he recalled how foolish he had been in thinking he could escape the God of heaven and earth by trusting in a group of pagan mariners to take him far away from both Israel and Nineveh. These men all served various "lying abundantly clear when they could not answer the prayers of the sailors who had called on them to calm the terrible storm. Henry Morris

Gratitude must be practical. Pay as well as pray (Jonah 2:9)