Hinge Verse--Jonah 2:6
Jonah was a prophet of the LORD during the reign of King Jeroboam II of Israel. According to our chart from the beginning of this study, Kings of Israel and Judah, King Jeroboam II was "badly behaved", and Jonah seemed to follow in the king's footsteps. Jonah received a very clear command from the LORD--
"Get up! Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it because their evil has come up before me." Jonah 1:2
Jonah's hometown was Gath-Hepher 2 Kings 14:25, where he likely was when he received his commission. Instead of going straight up to Nineveh, he went down to Joppa to buy a ticket for Tarshish. It was approximately 550 miles to Nineveh, and 60 miles to Joppa. So obedience may have seemed like the harder choice. But from Joppa to Tarshish was 2,500 miles! It was like saying now, "We drove from here to Timbuktu!" Jonah ran from God and His command in the opposite direction. He boarded the ship bound for Tarshish and
In another "But God.." moment,
the LORD threw a great wind onto the sea, and such a great storm arose on the sea that the ship threatened to break apart."
The sailors were afraid and started throwing stuff overboard. The captain went to look for Jonah and found him stretched out and sleeping. Jonah, who had already told the sailors he was running from the LORD, admitted he served the God of the heavens, who made the sea and dry land, The sailors knew this storm was a punishment on Jonah, however they rowed like everything to try to avoid catastrophe. They found out you can't outrun or outrow God, so they prayed for forgiveness instead of permission, and threw Jonah overboard. The LORD appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah, and he stayed in its belly three days and three nights.
Jonah's prayer from the belly of the fish is thankful, but not necessarily repentant. He's sorry he ended up inside a fish, but not necessarily sorry for the disobedience that took him there. The sailors threw him in the sea, but he knows it was God's punishment. He describes his surroundings--basically a watery tomb--and the helplessness he feels. In our pivotal verse, Jonah cries out to God from his hopelessness--
"To the roots of the mountains I sank down; the earth beneath barred me in forever. BUT you, LORD My GOD, brought my life up from the pit."
Jonah promises to fulfill his mission and vows that, however he might feel about the hated Ninevites--ultimately, salvation belongs to the LORD. (We will come back to Jonah tomorrow for the rest of the story.)
The USS Squalus was a US Navy submarine. In 1939, The Squalus was going through rigorous trials to prove sea-worthiness off the coast of New England. There were 59 submariners on board. It had been in the water for 83 days when the failure of a valve caused the ship to take on water and sink. The boat ended up in 240 feet of water. 26 submariners died in the initial flooding of the boat, and 33 survived. The survivors waited 39 hours to be rescued. Like Jonah, they felt helpless, trapped in their watery tomb. They sent up a buoy marker and waited. No one had ever been rescued from this depth. They considered a few methods of escape, but again, none of these methods had been tried at this depth. Some of the rescuers working from above heard some rhythmic tapping, and recognized it as morse code. Two messages came from the crew--"Cold but bearable", and "Is there any hope?" Over the course of 13 hours, divers rescued all 33 men. All the while, family and friends and fellow soldiers prayed from the shore. But God..
Jonah found himself trapped in the belly of a fish because of his disobedience. The submariners found themselves trapped in the belly of a submarine because of mechanical failure. All were helpless and losing hope. We aren't sure what happened to the sailors on Jonah's ship; we know some on the USS Squalus didn't survive. But God--Jonah called Him by name, Yahweh my God--He is sovereign. He governs over all things; He is in complete control. With Him alone, there is hope. He does all things well.
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