“Then Jonah prayed unto the LORD his God out of the fish’s belly” (Jonah 2:1).
TEXT — Jonah 2:1-10
Message
Ivan Denisovich, a prisoner, endured all the horrors of a Soviet prison camp. One day, he was praying with his eyes closed when a fellow prisoner noticed him and said with ridicule, “Prayers won’t help you get out of here any faster”. Opening his eyes, Ivan answered, “I do not pray to get out of prison but to do the will of God”. Jonah, a reluctant prophet gave clear and revealing insights into what transpired between him and the Almighty God while he sojourned in the belly of the fish.
After refusing God’s assignment to preach to the Ninevites, he was cast into the sea by the crew of the ship he boarded to Tarshish, where he was eventually swallowed by a fish. While at the bottom of the sea, he said, “I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the LORD, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice” (Jonah 2:2). Apparently ending the standoff, Jonah, now under pains, surrendered, and desperately asked to do God’s will. Miraculously, he was vomited by the fish to commence his journey to Nineveh.
Prophet Jonah’s experience in the belly of the whale has many lessons for believers. No matter how serious your condition is, you can still pray and receive deliverance from God. There is no place too hidden, or any situation too hopeless for God to reach you. Some people contemplate alcoholism, drug addiction, or suicide when things go wrong and trouble looms.
The experiences of Jonah, Job, Jacob, and other pilgrims in Bible Day should encourage us to trust in God – the Source of true help. Life is full of challenging situations and circumstances that make people despair, but like Jonah, we should resolve to look toward God and pray. Definitely, He will show up.
Thought for the day
Prayer remains the only option when all else fails.
Listed among “500 most powerful people on the planet” by the Foreign Policy magazine in 2013, Pastor (Dr.) William F. Kumuyi is the founder and General Superintendent of the Deeper Christian Life Ministry (DCLM) headquartered in Lagos, Nigeria. DCLM started in 1973 as a 15-member Bible study group right in Kumuyi’s apartment at University of Lagos where he was a lecturer. His revolutionary Bible teaching on personal holiness and commitment to evangelism soon gained so much traction and resulted in a widespread revival.
2 comments
Lord! Help me to do your will in this troublous situation.
Lord! Help me to do your will in this troublous situation.
There are no “hopeless”situation,for with God nothing shall be impossible.