YES LORD, BUT ACTUALLY... NO!
YES LORD, BUT ACTUALLY... NO!
Beloved Unchained Family, highly estimated friends:
Every time we ask someone about their favorite prophets of the Old Testament, the most common figures are Moses, Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Elisha and others who did awesome things during their time of service. But I have never seen someone say: “My favorite one is the prophet Jonah!”
The fleeing Jonah is like the “Ugly Duckling” version amidst the prophets, and not necessarily because he made some mistakes along the way, because all the other prophets had their share of flaws and errors as well, but Jonah’s story is strongly imprinted in our minds in a more negative way because throughout his ministry, he was always trying to say no, when the Lord was definitely saying yes.
Jonah was designated to deliver a specific Word of God in Nineveh, Assyria, but he changed the course of his trip and tried to escape to the opposite direction, far away, going to Tarsis. The curious fact is that in the beginning of his commissioning by the Lord, he did say yes and accepted the assignment, only to change his mind and vanish to the farthest possible location. The outcome of his saga is very well known: the Lord prepared his return in a very unconventional fashion and Jonah had to “ride back” in a very special and unexpected accommodation in order to finish his unfinished task.
We are all matching versions of Jonah, in so many ways. Talking about this very weakness of “knowing what to do but not willing to do it” - again, behavior inherent to all of us, the apostle James, when comparing the situation, challenges us to not be only “hearers”, but “doers”. In a similar thought-processing, the Apostle Paul also acknowledges struggling with this matter when he wrote that “what he wanted to do, he would not do it, but that which he did not want, that’s precisely what he would do.”
It is quite interesting to investigate a little deeper about Jonah’s motives. I believe the reason he deviated from his route was not that he deliberately wanted to rebel against God’s plan, but rather thought that he, Jonah, had a better plan, once he knew “God would change his mind about the Ninevites,” anyway. If we are honest, this pattern of thinking that our plans are better than the Lord’s is a very familiar idea in our walk with God.
On this volatility of our willingness to obey, the Lord Jesus told the story of a father who asked two sons if they could help him with a certain task. The first son said yes, but later did not do the task for some reason, while the second son said he would not do it, but afterwards ended up helping his father. According to the Lord, the second son acted better than the first, because at the end, obedience prevailed.
When we really meditate about these matters, a sense of awe and reverence should permeate our hearts. The apostle Paul makes a very solemn wake up call when he writes about that in the book of 2 Timothy 3:7 saying that there is a risk of us being “always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.”
Let us learn with our dear brother Jonah. May our yes be yes, indeed, and let us strive to be always ready to obey our Master, no questions asked.
Wishing peace, health and many blessings to your body and soul,
Pr. Joshua Mateíne