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(This week’s devotions are based on Sunday’s message: Grace for All…Grace Pursues – LISTEN HERE)

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Jonah 2:8 “Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs.

Of all the parts of Jonah’s prayer, this verse jumped off the page. For a few reasons.

Why would Jonah make this statement?  Was this a self-reflective statement or was he reflecting on people with whom he had interacted?  Was it a reflection on the sailors who threw him overboard that tried crying out to their gods before turning to the Lord?  Was it a reflection of the wicked people of Nineveh who were throwing out the grace the Lord wanted to show them?  To be honest, I am not sure and could be all of the above.

Regardless of who Jonah had in mind, the statement is absolute truth.

Jonah finishes his prayer in this way:

         9      But I, with a song of thanksgiving, will sacrifice to you. 

         What I have vowed I will make good. Salvation comes from the LORD.” 

Jonah realized that other idols promised worthless claims.  The only God who not only promises but provides salvation from our sins is the LORD.  The LORD is the only one who is full of grace and abounding in love and faithfulness.

So why do we forfeit grace by clinging to worthless idols?

Who, me?  Yes, you.

Because we think that the idol to which we are clinging can provide what only the grace of God can provide.  What do I mean?

We cling to the idol of material wealth because we think that in it we find peace and security for life and the opportunities that life brings.

We cling to the idol of reputation and fame because we think that in it we find our identity and significance.

We cling to the idol of relationships and friendships because in them we think we find true love and care.

We cling to the idol of self-reliance because in it we think we find freedom and independence.

Perhaps we do…and then we don’t because we realize our idol has become worthless.  

The now late Christian pastor and author Tim Keller wrote in his book “Counterfeit Gods” that eventually everything that is an idol will let us down.  Wealth can be taken away, relationships broken, reputation ruined, friendships separated.

So as Jonah said, “Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs.”

Having no other gods other than the Lord is not just the first commandment, it is the foundation of life.  The Lord is the one from whom all blessings flow not material wealth, relationships, reputation, etc.  The Lord is the only one who is gracious and compassionate and slow to anger and willing to forgive, not a man-made god or man himself.

Too often I have forfeited the full experience of God’s love and grace because I have clung to worthless idols in my heart.  Lord forgive me.  Perhaps you can relate.

When we see it first in ourselves, we see it in the world around us that people are forfeiting grace because their fingers are clutching idols they think are of utmost value, but are worthless.

The grace of God turns us from that which is worthless to that which is worthwhile.

 

Apply: Get a copy of Tim Keller’s book, “Counterfeit Gods.”  Enjoy the work through his words for the Spirit of God to release your clutch on that which is worthless and strengthen your grip on that which is worthwhile.

Prayer: Lord, thank you for shifting my heart from the worthless idols I love to cling to to you, the only one who truly loves, forgives and shows grace.  AMEN.

Note: You can find a sermon series on Counterfeit Gods from 2021 on our CrosspointGTX1 youtube channel.  Here’s the link to the first sermon of the series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbdvMHxEJGo

(This week’s devotions are based on Sunday’s message: Grace for All…Grace Pursues – LISTEN HERE)

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Sometimes we identify the wrong issue and so solve the wrong problem.

The surface, visible determination may come to one conclusion, but digging deeper may provide the real motive and the real issue that needs to be addressed.

For example, a child who is not doing well in school may not have any cognitive challenges, but may have relationship challenges in the home.  Getting extra tutoring may help a little, but until the safety and security in the home changes, learning is always going to be a challenge.

So it is spiritually.  I recall a conversation with an individual who had been attending for a while.  After a few months, she said that she was no longer comfortable coming to our church.  I asked for a visit and she was willing to share.  As we talked she said that she wasn’t comfortable how much I talked about sin and the consequences of sin in my written devotions or in my messages.  After about 40-45 minutes of talking, I asked, “Every person has a teaching of Scripture that is perhaps more challenging than others.  We have touched on a resistance to God pointing out sin and having consequences for it.  Why do you think this is a significant and sensitive teaching for you?”

The individual started to tear up.  As she wiped away the tears she said, “I was never good enough.  I got more than straight A’s, never got in trouble, and yet my dad was never satisfied.  I could never please him.”

We hit the issue.  She was wearied by a father who told her directly or indirectly she wasn’t good enough.  She couldn’t think that her heavenly Father would do the same.  It was a joy to share God’s love in Christ that makes us perfect in God’s eyes.  Unfortunately she hasn’t returned, but it was a rewarding conversation none the less and I pray one that comforts her soul.

The Lord knows our hearts and loves to get to the heart of the matter.  The issue for Jonah wasn’t the intimidation of Nineveh.  It wasn’t the storm on the sea.  It was the sinful nature lurking in his heart that didn’t want to do what God asked.  Like a 2-year old throwing a tantrum at having to pick up his toys, so our sinful nature throws a tantrum at what the Lord wants us to do.

As the Lord hurled Jonah into the heart of the sea and had him swallowed by a great fish, it was to save Jonah from Jonah.  If the Lord allowed Jonah to make it to Tarshish and beyond, the sinful nature in Jonah would have been emboldened to continue to defy the Lord.  The Lord cared too much about Jonah to allow this to happen.

So he rescued Jonah from Jonah.

Like all of us, the grace of the Lord turns us from our selves and our sinful desires to the Lord and his ways.  It’s a daily struggle…it will be today.  But perhaps the words of Jonah and the psalmist will encourage and remind us…the grace of the Lord is here to rescue me from me today!

Psalm 31 (David) In you, Lord, I have taken refuge;
    let me never be put to shame; deliver me in your righteousness.
2 Turn your ear to me, come quickly to my rescue;
be my rock of refuge, a strong fortress to save me.

Jonah 2:6  To the roots of the mountains I sank down; the earth beneath barred me in forever.

But you brought my life up from the pit, O LORD my God. 

 

Apply: Where and when does your sinful nature get the better of you?  Perhaps memorize Psalm 31:2 and use it to seek the Lord’s rescue from the temptations of your sinful nature!

Prayer: Lord, thank you for loving me enough to rescue me from me and lead me back to you.  AMEN.

(This week’s devotions are based on Sunday’s message: Grace for All…Grace Pursues – LISTEN HERE)

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Jonah 2:3      You hurled me into the deep, into the very heart of the seas, 

         and the currents swirled about me; all your waves and breakers swept over me. 

Jonah is praying to the Lord.  When he says, “You hurled me into the deep..” is he blaming the Lord or recognizing truth about the Lord.

What do you think?

There is no question that Jonah wouldn’t have jumped overboard by himself.  In Jonah 1 he recognized before the sailors that the storm was his fault.  After the casting of lots, Jonah was determined to be the one that was causing the storm by his running from the Lord.  And while he instructed the sailors to throw him overboard, he knew it was the Lord who hurled him into the depths of the sea.

Why was this important for Jonah to recognize?

Why is it important for us to recognize?

While the Lord isn’t the cause of evil, he allows times of testing to come into our lives to refine our faith and purify it for himself. While God can and does carry out punishment on evil, when he allows testing in the life of his child, it is a discipline to turn us back to him and strengthen our faith in him.

The Lord DID hurl Jonah into the sea because his heart was on the run from the Lord.  It really was the grace of God that allowed this crisis to occur to awaken Jonah’s heart to the heart of the Lord.  Jonah was running.  The trip into the belly of the fish stopped him.

Even for God’s people, the Lord does not promise a life without challenges.  But for the Lord’s children, the challenges are opportunities to solidify and strengthen our relationship with the Lord.  

King Solomon knew this as he wrote:

Proverbs 3:11 My son, do not despise the Lord’s discipline, and do not resent his rebuke, 12 because the Lord disciplines those he loves, as a father the son he delights in.

The psalmist knew this:

Psalm 66: 10 For you, God, tested us; you refined us like silver.
11 You brought us into prison and laid burdens on our backs.
12 You let people ride over our heads; we went through fire and water,
    but you brought us to a place of abundance.

The Apostle Paul knew this:

2 Corinthians 1:8 We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters,[a] about the troubles we experienced in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself. 9 Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. 10 He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us again.

And Jesus himself knew this:

Isaiah 53:10 Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the Lord makes his life an offering for sin, he will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand.

The Lord wants you to know this.  It is his love that “hurls us into the sea” so we might rely on him more, believe in him and come through our time of testing with a stronger faith and reliance on the Lord.

You may be “in the sea” right now.  Know that the Lord is there to see you through the time of testing to triumph!

 

Apply: Are you in a season of life where it feels like you are drowning in the sea?  What possibly is the Lord trying to mold in you and of you even as he permits this season of testing to occur?

Prayer: Lord thank you for even the challenges of life, for in them I turn to you more and learn to trust you better.  AMEN.

 

(This week’s devotions are based on Sunday’s message: Grace for All…Grace Pursues – LISTEN HERE)

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I have spent zero minutes in the belly of a fish.  The largest fish I have handled is probably a 4-5 pound northern pike.  I’ve seen dolphins in person and have watched killer whales at the marine parks.

So my qualifications to speak about the experience of one who survived three days and three nights in the belly of a fish or minimal.

But here’s what I do know…or at least safely imagine.  It was wet and slimy and dark with an air pocket to sustain life.

So in the dark, grossness of the belly of a fish Jonah prays:

2      From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the LORD his God. 2 He said: 

 

         “In my distress I called to the LORD, and he answered me. 

         From the depths of the grave I called for help, and you listened to my cry. 

         3      You hurled me into the deep, into the very heart of the seas, 

         and the currents swirled about me; all your waves and breakers swept over me. 

         4      I said, ‘I have been banished from your sight; yet I will look again toward your holy temple.’ 

         5      The engulfing waters threatened me, the deep surrounded me; 

         seaweed was wrapped around my head. 

         6      To the roots of the mountains I sank down; the earth beneath barred me in forever. 

         But you brought my life up from the pit, O LORD my God. 

 

         7      “When my life was ebbing away, I remembered you, LORD, and my prayer rose to you, to your holy temple. 

 

         8      “Those who cling to worthless idols 

         forfeit the grace that could be theirs. 

         9      But I, with a song of thanksgiving, will sacrifice to you. 

         What I have vowed I will make good. 

         Salvation comes from the LORD.” 

 

10 And the LORD commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land. 

 

I can only imagine the emotions, the panic, the desperation as the waters came around Jonah, as the fish came up to Jonah and swallowed him.  He didn’t know if he was going to live or die, but he cried out to the Lord.

In moments of great distress, it is natural for a person to cry out to God.  As some have said, “There are no atheists in a fox hole.”  When life is on the line we cry out to God.  God heard Jonah’s cry and listened and answered.  

Psalm 18:6 In my distress I called to the Lord; I cried to my God for help. From his temple he heard my voice; my cry came before him, into his ears.

God’s promise to his children is that he will hear and answer our cries of distress from the “belly of the fish” or whatever situation in which we find ourselves.

It doesn’t mean it’s the ONLY time to cry out to the Lord…but it is A time!

Apply: At times of distress it perhaps doesn’t seem like the Lord is hearing because his answer isn’t what we want.  Take time to determine how the Lord IS listening and answering.

PRAYER: Lord, thank you for listening to my prayers at all times, but especially in times of distress.  AMEN.

(This week’s devotions are based on Sunday’s message: Grace for All…Grace Pursues – LISTEN HERE)

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Jonah 1:17 Now the Lord provided a huge fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.

This is the event most memorable to us in the story of Jonah…being swallowed by a big fish. This brief narrative statement packs a lot of reality in it.

The event wasn’t random.  Jonah was surrounded by water, sinking to the depths with his life on the line.  His actions of running from the Lord would certainly have justified the Lord’s actions to allow Jonah to perish.  Yet…

…the Lord provided a huge fish to swallow Jonah.”

THE LORD PROVIDED.

The fish was unexpected.  Perhaps the Lord providing another boat to pick up Jonah would have been normal, or Jonah found a piece of floating log and clung on to it until shore.  Yet, the Lord provided at large fish.  

An unexpected gift of grace.

Perhaps it wasn’t what Jonah was expecting, but it was what Jonah needed.  The belly of the fish would be his home for the next three days and three nights.

It would have been easy for Jonah to complain of his circumstances, moan of the slimy, wet conditions of his room, and just demand a change in his situation.

But he doesn’t and it’s probably a good thing.  God has his attention.  And he realizes that he is alive in the belly of the fish because the LORD provided.

God is always ready to show his grace and sometimes it is shown in unexpected ways.  How many times have we planned a solution to a problem only for the problem to be solved a different…and better way.  Is it possible God provided the proper solution?

To be sure, God’s grace rescues us from even the most difficult situations, not always in the way we want or expect, but in the way that is best for us.

So for Jonah, the all-expense-paid 3 day/3 night stay in the belly of the fish was exactly what he needed.  God wanted his attention and still wanted to use him.

And for Jonah, the belly of the fish was the best place.

While I do not advise getting thrown overboard into the sea and waiting for a fish to swallow you, the Spirit of God provides this brief narrative to remind us that God in his grace provides not always what we expect, or what we want, but always what we need.

 

Apply: What “great fish” has God sent into your life to rescue you in an unexpected, yet grace-filled way?

Prayer: Lord, thank you for your love and grace that always gives what we need, even if it’s not what we expect.  AMEN

 

Read Jonah 2…the rest of the week will reflect on Jonah’s prayer.