I had a propane delivery this morning. The propane guy and I were talking about one of his friends who is going thru a difficult time, and he said, “Sometimes you just have to hit bottom before you can rise up.” This is a concept most of us have heard of before. The book of Jonah provides a great example of this for us in God’s word.
”So they picked up Jonah, threw him into the sea, and the sea stopped its raging. Then the men feared the Lord greatly, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows. And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the stomach of the fish three days and three nights.” (Jonah 1:15-17)
“All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” (Isaiah 53:6)
Jonah was running from God’s call on his life, and it was causing life to get very tumultuous not just for Jonah but also for the people around him (the men on the boat with him). When the men on the boat determined that it was Jonah who was the cause of their dire predicament, he told them to throw him into the sea and it would cause the great storm to cease. It works, and Jonah ends up in the belly of the great fish where he dies. The fish carries him away and spits him out onto dry land. God then asks Jonah to go to Nineveh and proclaim the word He has for them, Jonah goes to Nineveh, he preaches to the city, the Ninevites repent, and the city is saved. (short version of the story)
In the story of Jonah, we see a picture of ourselves running from God’s call on our life, and the impact our behavior can have on us and on the people around us. As an example, when we run away using alcohol or drugs (instead of a boat like Jonah did), we usually create a “storm” around us that affects the people in our life, and it can often kill us just as Jonah’s running from Nineveh caused his death in the belly of the fish. And like Jonah, often we don’t even care. Jonah was asleep in the boat during the storm, and often we are oblivious to how our “running from God” behavior is affecting the people around us. It doesn’t have to be drugs or alcohol, it can be running away to work, to sports, to buying things, to sex, to gaming, to entertainment, to spending too much time on our phones, to food, to gambling, etc. – it can be almost anything.
Ultimately our running from God’s call on our lives impacts Jesus. Because we have turned away from God and gone astray, our iniquity was laid upon Him, and He was crucified, suffered, and died in our place, that in Him we might have life by believing in Him. God is calling all of us to become believers in Jesus His son, that we might be born again and have life, true life, eternal life. Are you running from God’s call on your life? If so, in what way? What is God calling you to do? Who is being negatively affected by your behavior? What are you using as a way to run away from God’s call in your life? What do you need to stop doing? What do you need to start doing? What is something you can do this week to quit running from God? What can you do today to answer His call on your life?
If we run long enough, we usually end up in a fish like Jonah did. I encourage you to choose to answer God’s call now, before you are thrown overboard and take the hard way to Nineveh. You don’t always have to hit bottom to rise up. You can get to Nineveh by boat instead of by fish.
Lord Jesus, I come before you today and ask that You would show me what Your calling is on my life, and the ways that I am running from it. Show me what I am using as a means of escape and enable me to stop doing it and start going in the direction You are calling me to go in. Show me the people in my life that my storm has affected and what I should do to make up for the impact my behavior has had on them. Help me to not run away from the things in my life that You are calling me to do. I ask this in Jesus name, amen.
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