Love God Greatly - JonahSample

God is compassionate to us

I love how God shows what longsuffering is like when He deals with Jonah and his anger. Instead of lecturing him, He prepares an object lesson to help the prophet understand what has happened. 

For the second time, Jonah abandoned his place of ministry and questioned God´s will. He could have taught the Ninevites so much about the true God of Israel but he preferred to have his own way. He missed his blessings!

Here we have our Jonah out of the city, only to see if the repentance of the people of Nineveh wasn´t enough to avoid destruction. He was waiting for something to happen. And while he was there, in the sun, God prepared a plant to shelter Jonah as he waited, hoping that the city would be destroyed. 

Jonah was “a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways” (James 1:8 NKJV). “One minute he’s preaching God’s Word, but the next minute he’s disobeying it and fleeing his post of duty. While inside the great fish, he prayed to be delivered, but now he asks the Lord to kill him. He called the city to repentance, but he wouldn’t repent himself! He was more concerned about creature comforts than he was about winning the lost.” - Wiersbe, Warren Be Amazed.

Have you ever wondered what makes you happy? What makes you angry? Do you feel good when God makes good things for you and only you? Jonah´s problem was trying to do things his way instead of following God´s will. When we ignore God´s will, we can never be happy. 

Father, help me remember that You don´t deal with me according to my sins and You don´t repay me according to my iniquities. Even when I want to do life apart from You, You always find a loving and compassionate way of bringing me back. I praise You for Your mercy. Amen.