Reference – Jonah 1:1-17
– Jonah has a mission to accomplish. Jonah was commissioned by God to go to Nineveh to deliver a message.
He had good news and bad news as well (Verse 1 & 2)
– Jonah was not interested in obeying God/following God’s command. He instead headed to Tarshish. He was running away from God. When we disobey God, the extent of disobedience is very high. He went more than three times the distance in the opposite direction.
3 But Jonah ran away from the Lord and headed for Tarshish. He went down to Joppa, where he found a ship bound for that port. After paying the fare, he went aboard and sailed for Tarshish to flee from the Lord.
Jonah 1:3
Why did Jonah disobey God?
1. He knew going to Nineveh was a difficult mission.
2. They had their own problems in Israel & Nineveh was a bad place. The Ninevites were brutal people.
– When we run away from the Lord, we go down.
(Jonah 1:5)
– We are ‘Jonahs’ whenever we run away from our Christian mission. ‘Tarshish’ (the world, outside the Christian family) is where we are escaping to.
– The captain rebuked Jonah for his prayerlessness.
– God decided to send a storm to Jonah. God’s storm is meant to turn us around. The devil’s storm is meant to destroy us. We can also cause storms with our own actions.
– Whenever we rebel against God, it is no longer a private affair and it affects others.
– The sailors became believers because of God’s pursuit of Jonah (Jonah 1:15-16)
– God was not giving up on Jonah. The mission is not done yet. God is not done with us. We cannot escape God’s mission.