Lessons Learned from Inside a Fish | Jonah 1:17-2:10
Have you ever been in a situation you did not want to be in? You wanted to be here, but you ended up there? A few years ago, I was in Thessaloniki, Greece, on a trip, and I had some free time, so I decided that I was going to venture out by myself. I wanted to see the famous White Tower and the Aegean Sea. It was a very hot summer in Greece, and there were tons of people out by the White Tower on the water. There was an old-looking ship on a dock, and a pirate guy was standing outside of it. He approached me and said, “Do you want to go for a ride of the sea for free?” So, being a little naïve, I said, “Sure, but what’s the catch?” He said, “All you need to do is buy a drink.” I said, “I don’t drink.” He laughed and said, “Just buy a drink.” So I went on board, bought a Diet Coke, and it started about amazing. But what was supposed to be an hour-long boat ride with about 150 people on this old boat ended up being over 7 hours stuck on this boat. The engine blew on the ship, and we were stuck about 300 yards from the dock. There was nothing I could do but wait and wait. It was 95 degrees. Very few people spoke English, and no one knew what was happening. I wanted to be back at the hotel in bed, but instead, I was stuck on the boat with 150 drunk, smelly, angry people. It is how I imagined hell to be: hot, stinky, angry, and confusing, with no hope of getting out. It was an experience I will never forget and a situation I did not want to be in. The only thing I could do was pray.
Jonah is in a place he did not imagine he would ever be. Sin had taken him far from where he wanted to be, and the only thing he could do was pray. The book of Jonah is not about Jonah, a Fish, or Nineveh. The book of Jonah is about God and his relentless pursuit of grace and mercy for rebels. In chapter 1, God calls Jonah to go to Nineveh to preach, and Jonah disobeys God and tries to run from Him but isn’t very successful. God sends a storm into Jonah’s life, not to pay him back but to bring Jonah back. Jonah is thrown overboard to die. Jonah ran from God because he did not have the heart of God, so God wanted to change his heart. Chapter 2 shows us how God’s gracious plan gave Jonah a new perspective to get him where he needed to be.