The Lord gave this message to
Jonah son of Amittai: "Get up
and go to the great city of
Jonah; the reluctant prophet. I can relate to Jonah in so many ways, as I am sure many of us can. That is if we are honest with ourselves. The super-spiritual Christians will tell you that their walk is just one perfect agreement with the Lord after another, holding hands and whistling Amazing Grace until the second coming. There is no such thing of course as a super-spiritual Christian; just some who are less honest with themselves than others. I am but a sinner saved by grace. As my pastor likes to say -- this is just dirt talking to dirt. The glorious thing about admitting your frailties is that you are more honest to spot them and more willing to talk about them. So I can tell you when I read the key verses, which come from the beginning of the story of Jonah, I can see a lot of me.
Sometimes, I simply think I know better than the Lord. I do
not mean in some conscious conversation with myself, where I actually have to
say it like that. I mean through my actions, I clearly must think I know better
since I find myself often on the wrong side of a decision. That is where Jonah
finds himself eventually too. God shows us however the point of that decision.
God gives him a direct order. Go and preach repentance to the city of
Jonah had a reason to think he knew better beloved.
"My
thoughts are nothing like your thoughts," says the Lord . "And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. For just
as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts
higher than your thoughts. -- Isaiah 55: 8-9 (NLT)
Beyond anything we can imagine!
Realize that God is writing a grand story beloved and He has written in a part
for you and me to play. But He is the author. His story transcends our little
sliver of the tale. Jonah did not know that
Jesus turned to Peter and said, "Get away from me, Satan! You are a dangerous
trap to me. You are seeing things merely from a human point of view, not from
God's." -- Matthew 16: 23(NLT)
Seeing things from merely a human point of
view -- not from God's. This same dangerous trap is what Jonah fell into. You
see, Peter had a different ending for the Jesus story. Peter's ending had Jesus
delivering the Jews from the oppression of Roman rule. Peter could not see the
grander story God was writing where Jesus would deliver all of mankind from
their sins. All Peter could see was his little world and the problems he and
his people faced. To Peter -- they were the entire world but to God they were a
moment in time. A single page in the grand story. To Jonah, all he could see
was the evil nature of the Assyrian Empire. All he could see was the brutality
his people suffered under them. To God, a mere sentence in the grand story He
is writing. That is what it means to say that the ways and thoughts of God are
so much higher than our own. We simply cannot see what God is doing beloved.
That is why we need faith. That is why we must trust Him. When we cannot
understand His motives, we can always trust His heart.
The other thing I take away from the key
verses is there is always a ship leaving for Tarshish. The world and the devil
will always be willing to provide a way out of the will of God if we look for
one. So often we take the mere appearance of the ship as confirmation that our
rebellion is being approved of by God. When God gives us a direct command in
His Word, we do not need any confirmation of it. We do not need to pray about
it. God never contradicts His Word. But if we go looking for a ship to
Tarshish, more often than not we will find it. When we are going in the
opposite direction from God - the world or the enemy will be more than happy to
ease the way.
Where does this writing find you today? Are
you heading for the
Rev.
Anthony
