Jonah 3:7

Jonah 3:7 says, And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water:  There was not just a claim of repentance, but there was a total change in life.  It affected not only the people, but also their animals.  Nothing was to eat or drink.  I think sometimes today, we take repentance too lightly.  We want to repent without anyone knowing that we did anything wrong.  Repentance requires acknowledging that we have sinned and asking God's forgiveness.  It requires humbling ourselves and admitting that we cannot restore ourselves to a right relationship with God.  As long as we feel that our sin isn't really a big deal and that as long as we utter words of repentance God has to forgive us, I am not sure we have really repented.  Repentance should touch every aspect of our life.  I don't believe we can truly repent and stand on our own goodness.  Sinning against God is a serious thing, and repentance should be also.  Verse eight adds, But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands.  They were called on not just to show outward signs of repentance, but to change the very nature of the way they lived.  Repentance has to bring change, based on turning everything over to God.  We cannot feel that our sins are small and other peoples are big.  Any sin separates us from God, and we can only be restored to a right relationship with Him when we ask His forgiveness.  Nothing else should be of importance until this happens.  The outward signs are not enough until we call on God. Verse nine continues, Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger, that we perish not?  The king was hopeful that God would hear them, and that He would not destroy them.  We today know that as God's followers He is not out to destroy us, nor anyone else, but that doesn't make sin any less powerful.  We cannot effectively follow God with sin in our life, no matter how small we feel it is.

Jonah 3:4

Jonah 3:4 says, And Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.  Nineveh was a large city, and Jonah was but one man. Since he was God's messenger, though, he had no reason to fear.  I hear people today say that Jonah was bleached out very white while in the belly of the whale.  I personally don't believe that to be the case, since God prepared the whale to save him, and the Bible doesn't say anything about it.  Jonah was not sent to call attention to himself, but simply to proclaim God's word.  The city was put on a forty-day notice, and it was up to them whether to believe or not.  We cannot be that exact about the time, but we can tell the lost of the world that if they don't turn to God, they ultimately will be destroyed.  Verse five adds, So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.  Jonah didn't want to be there, and we find no evidence of his preaching being powerful, but the whole city believed God.  The people must have been convicted by the power of God, because from what we read about Jonah's message, he offered them no hope.  We today, when we are reaching out to the world, need to reach out to them with the message of repentance and hope, not with the message of destruction.  We are not called to judge and condemn the world, but to reach them with God's love.  The people of Nineveh did not say they had forty days, so there was no hurry.  They believed God and repented.  They humbled themselves before God, from the greatest to the least.  What a revival Jonah preached, but it wasn't Jonah's powerful preaching that made the difference.  It was the belief of the people.  God today can work through the simplest of messages, as long as it is His word being presented under His leadership and authority.  We simply have to obey His calling and proclaim His message.  God will bring forth the results.

Jonah 3:1

Jonah 3:1 says, And the word of the LORD came unto Jonah the second time, saying,  God never gave up on Jonah.  He still was speaking to Him.  We need to realize that God will always do all He can to protect us and when He delivers us from problems in this world, even those we create, we need to listen for His word to us.  We are saved and delivered for a purpose, and that is to serve God faithfully.  Verse two adds, Arise, go into Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.  God still had the same purpose for Jonah.  He was still to go into Nineveh and preach the preaching that God gave him.  All we today can do is proclaim the message that God gives us.  Jonah still had the same specific calling that he had before.  We today may run so long that God uses someone else to do what He had called us to do.  He would not have destroyed Nineveh without His message going out to them.  He will not destroy people today without His word going out to them.  If I run from God's call to go witness for several years, He would be a cruel God to just let those that I should have witnessed to die without hearing about His salvation plan.  Jonah was being sent to Nineveh not just for those of Nineveh, but so that he might grow in faith as well.  When we are sent to witness, and obey, we grow in our relationship to God, and to those around us.  We are taught compassion for them.  Verse three continues, So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the LORD. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days’ journey.  Jonah was through running from God and was now going to his mission field.  Jonah was one man, going to a very large city, that God had said was so evil He was going to destroy it.  When we look at the world today, does the task of reaching the lost seem overwhelming in this evil world?  We may ask what just one person can do, but we need to realize that as God's followers, it is what God can do through one person doing His will that is important.  It is not based on our ability, but on God's.  God did not send an army to Nineveh, but only Jonah, empowered by God's word.

Jonah 2:6

Jonah 2:6 says, I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with her bars was about me for ever: yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O LORD my God.  Jonah was in about as hopeless a situation as a person could be.  He felt the whole world was bearing down on him.  Still, even in his situation, he said his Lord and His God had brought him up from corruption.  When we find ourselves in a seemingly hopeless situation in this world, do we acknowledge that God has already delivered us from corruption, no matter the outcome.  Remember, Jonah was still in the belly of the whale at this time.  We, as followers of Christ, need to realize that we are everlasting delivered already and to thank God for that daily.  Verse seven adds, When my soul fainted within me I remembered the LORD: and my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple. Jonah could in no way rely on his own ability to save himself, so he prayed to God.  We can never save ourselves today, but if we are followers of Christ, we have already come to understand that.  If we aren't, until we come to understand that, then nothing else matters. As followers of Christ, if we are out of His will, then we need to turn to Him again, and hopefully we will do it before we are brought as low as Jonah was.  Remember, he was still one of God's chosen people. Verse eight continues, They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy.  If we believe that there is any way we can save ourselves, then we are believing lying vanities.  There are those today who claim they do not need God's forgiveness but rely on their own ability to forgive and thereby save themselves, but in so doing, they cut themselves off from the mercy of God.  Verse nine states, But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the LORD.  Jonah acknowledged that salvation was only from the Lord.  He would sacrifice to God with thanksgiving and do what he had vowed to do.  We today need to acknowledge that Christ is the only way to salvation and serve Him with thanksgiving.  Verse ten adds, And the LORD spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land.  Jonah's prayers were answered, and he was returned to dry ground.  He still had the same mission.  We today, when we are restored to God, still have the mission of proclaiming His word.

Jonh 2:3

In Jonah 2:3, Jonah continued, For thou hadst cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas; and the floods compassed me about: all thy billows and thy waves passed over me.  From this statement, we can almost say Jonah was blaming God for his predicament.  He knew that the sailors weren't responsible.  Jonah acknowledged that God was still in control.  Even as he ran, even in the belly of the whale, He knew that God was working in his life.  Through all his misfortunes, God had not given up on him.  We today can take courage from the fact that no matter how bad things may seem in life, if we are truly followers of God, He will never forsake us.  That even includes when we are not following His will.  Verse four adds, Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight; yet I will look again toward thy holy temple.  Jonah, in one of the most hopeless places I can think of, still had hope in God.  Anytime we are out of the sight of God, that is out of His will, we may see a situation as nearly hopeless, but we need to realize that God is with us.  Even if we are firmly in God's will and the world seems determined to destroy us, we need to remember that God is with us.  We need to look to God through it all.  Verse five says, The waters compassed me about, even to the soul: the depth closed me round about, the weeds were wrapped about my head. I think we sometimes think of Jonah going straight from the ship to the being swallowed by the whale, but he says he was deep in the water with weeds wrapped around his head before the whale swallowed him.  We may not immediately be rescued when we have trouble in this world, but we are assured that God will make a way.  We never need to live life as though we are defeated.  God is with us if we are His followers.

Jonah 2:1

Jonah 2:1 says, Then Jonah prayed unto the LORD his God out of the fish’s belly.  After three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, Jonah decide to call on God.  I am not sure how long we may choose to rebel against God, but I do know that when we do, we will suffer spiritually until we call out to Him again.  God was saving Jonah during this time.  Had God decided to give up on Jonah, He could have simply let him drown.  Jonah was stubborn about being willing to do God's will.  Hopefully, we as His followers will not be the same way today, but if we are running from God's will, we can be certain that He will not be out to destroy us, but to protect us until we call to Him again.  Verse two adds, And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the LORD, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice.  Jonah finally realized that his only hope was to ask God for help.  Jonah may not have been concerned with the people of Nineveh, nor with the sailors that he put in danger, but he was finally concerned with his own life.  He discovered that he had not outrun God.  We today can be certain, even if we don't want God around, when we call out to Him earnestly, He will hear.  Until we are obedient to God in our own lives, we cannot be effective in reaching the lost world.  Jonah said he cried out of the belly of hell.  No matter how plush things may be, when we are running from the will of God, we are spiritually in hell.  We may not literally be in the belly of a whale, but if we are not with God spiritually, there is only one other place to be.  There are not multiple places to reside spiritually, only heaven or bell.    If we are out of God's will, we cannot think that where we are isn't too bad.  Though our ultimate destination is still heaven, if we are out of His will today we are choosing to live in a spiritual hell.

Jonah 1:17

Jonah 1:17 says, Now the LORD had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.  Jonah hadn't gotten very far in his attempt to run from God. God was already preparing for his rescue.  I always heard that Jonah was swallowed by a whale when I was growing up, and some people now say it wasn't a whale, but a great fish created by God just to rescue Jonah.  Still, in Matthew 12:40, Jesus calls it a whale, so that will do for me.  God can and does use ordinary things and ordinary people every day to bring people to salvation.  If we are running from His will, He is going to call us back and be at work to make a way for us to return.  It may not be an easy way in the eyes of the world, but it will be a way back.   I know all we have to do is repent, and we will be restored, but our attempt to run may have brought about consequences, and God will be at work to help us through those. Jonah was not in the sea because God wanted him there, but God was still at work in Jonah's life to save him.  Jonah had been asleep in the ship, and I wonder what he did for three days in the belly of the whale.  If we are running from God, I don't believe we can run farther than this.  Jonah had plenty of time to consider his actions.  We today may have to be brought very low to quit running from God, but as His followers, we need to realize that He will always be with us.  As Christians, we must remember that wherever we go, the Holy Spirit goes with us.  Even if we were to find ourselves feeling as hopeless as Jonah must have felt, God is with us forever.  After we accept Christ as Savior, not following God's will for our lives when He calls us to a specific task does not mean we are no longer His.  Jonah was still God's chosen spokesman to go to Nineveh, and God was still at work to get him there.