Mar. 23, 2022

“MAN ON THE RUN”

“GOD’S MERCY TOWARD JONAH”

 JONAH 2:1-10

Jonah’s prayer is special because it is largely based on passages from Psalms.

Jonah 2:2- Psalm 120:1

Jonah 2:3- Psalm 69:2,15

Jonah 2:4- Psalm 31:22, 5:7, 138:2

Jonah 2:5- Psalm 18:4-5, 69:2, 116:3

Jonah 2:6- Psalm 30:1,3

Jonah 2:8- Psalm 31:6

Jonah 2:9- Psalm 116:17, 54:6, 66:13, 116:14,18, 3:8

Jonah prayed knowing he was guilty of sinning against the Lord. Apparently, he knew God to be a God of mercy and grace. We are never beyond the reach of God’s grace, and Jonah teaches us that we should always trust God and pray to Him.

*Repentance:

From an experience of rebellion and discipline, Jonah turns to an experience of repentance and dedication, and God graciously gives him a new beginning.

Romans 2:4 “Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?”

Notice the stages in Jonah’s spiritual experience as described in his prayer:

1.   He Prayed for Help (Jonah remembers the past)

Jonah 2:1-2 “Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the fish’s belly. 2And he said:“I cried out to the Lord because of my affliction, And He answered me. “Out of the belly of Sheol I cried,
And You heard my voice.”

He prayer was born out of affliction, not affection.

Jonah was now experiencing what the sailors experienced during the storm: he felt he was perishing (1:6,14).

God heard Jonah’s cries for help. Prayer is one of the constant miracles of the Christian life. 

“He who has learned to pray,” said William Law, “has learned the greatest secret of a holy and a happy life.”

2.   He Accepted God’s Discipline

Jonah 2:3 “For You cast me into the deep, Into the heart of the seas, And the floods surrounded me; All Your billows and Your waves passed over me.”

It wasn’t the sailors who cast Jonah into the stormy sea, it was God. “You cast me into the deep… All your billows and Your waves passed over me.”

How we respond to discipline determines how much benefit we receive from it:

Hebrews 12:5-11:

We have several options:

*We can despise God’s discipline and fight: vs.5 “And you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons: “My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord…”

*We can be discouraged and faint: vs.5 “Nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him;”

*We can resist discipline and invite stronger discipline, possibly death: vs.9 “Furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much more readily be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live?”

*Or we can submit to the Father and mature in faith and love: vs.7 “If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten?”

*Discipline is to the believer what exercise and training are to the athlete: vs.11 “Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.”

The fact that God chastened His servant is proof that Jonah was truly a child of God, for God disciplines only His own children:

Vs.8 “But if you are without chastening, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate and not sons.”

3.   He Trusted God’s Promise

Jonah 2:4-7

Jonah was going in one direction only- down.

What saved Jonah? His faith in God’s promise. Which promise? The promise that involves “Yet I will look again toward Your holy temple.” vs.4,7. When Solomon dedicated the temple in Jerusalem, he asked God for this special favor:

1 Kings 8:38-40

Jonah claimed that promise, by faith.

4.   He Yielded To God’s Will

Jonah 2:8-9

2 Kings 14:25 “He restored the territory of Israel from the entrance of Hamath to the Sea of the Arabah, according to the word of the Lord God of Israel, which He had spoken through His servant Jonah the son of Amittai, the prophet who was from Gath Hepher.”

Jonah closes his prayer by uttering some solemn vows to the Lord, vows that he really intended to keep. Like the psalmist, he said:

Psalm 66:13-14 “I will go into Your house with burnt offerings; I will pay You my vows, 14Which my lips have uttered And my mouth has spoken when I was in trouble.”

Jonah promised to worship God in the temple with sacrifices and songs of thanksgiving.

Jonah couldn’t save himself, and nobody on earth could save him, but the Lord could do it, for “Salvation is of the Lord.” vs.9 This is a quotation from:

Psalm 3:8 “Salvation belongs to the Lord. Your blessing is upon Your people. Selah”

This is a central declaration throughout the Bible. How wise of Jonah to memorize the Word of God:

*Redemption:

Jonah 2:10 “So the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.”

*The Miracle- It was a “prepared” fish (1:17), designed by God for the occasion, and therefore it was adequate for the task. Jesus didn’t question the historicity of the miracle, so why should we.

*The Sign:

Matthew 12:39 “But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.”

Matthew 16:4 “A wicked and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign shall be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.” And He left them and departed.”

Luke 11:29 “And while the crowds were thickly gathered together, He began to say, “This is an evil generation. It seeks a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah the prophet.”

The “sign of Jonah” is seen in his experience of “death,” burial, and resurrection on the third day, and it was the only sign Jesus gave the nation of Israel.

Jonah was now free to obey the Lord and take God’s message to Nineveh, but he still had lessons to learn.