Storms Draw Us To God

Sometimes the only time we look up is when we’re flat on our back. That’s what Ian discovered. As an atheist he had turned his back on God, and ran away from Him his whole life. Ironically, all the great experiences he enjoyed (even as a rebel) were God’s gift to him, but somehow he never let them direct him to God. If anything, the joys of life outside of God only strengthened his sense of self-reliance. Then bad things happened. To start, the girl of his dreams broke his heart. But it was only when the venom of one of the world’s most poisonous creatures coursed through his veins that he found himself open to God.

Read Jonah 1:1-17.

God told Jonah to head toward Ninevah, but he turned around and went the other way (v1-3). He climbed on a boat headed for the idyllic island of Tarshish. Refusing God’s leadership over his life, he took his life into his own hands, which is always the path that leads to destruction. God loved Jonah too much to let him destroy himself by hiding out. He intervened by sending a big storm (v4). Jonah tried to withstand the storm in his own strength, but eventually even the unbelieving sailors were urging him to call on God (v6). Matters went from bad to worse as he was thrown over- board (v15).

Notice the point: God allowed Jonah to suffer because He wanted to draw him back to Himself.

God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks to us in our conscience, but shouts to us in our pain. Pain is His way of rousing a spiritually deaf and dying world. Many argue that a loving God would never allow suffering, but in reality God often allows suffering precisely because He loves us. He loves us enough to wake us out of our spiritual slumber, to draw us out of our destructive state of self-reliance, to a place where we yield to Him again, or like Ian, for the first time.

Have you ever experienced how hardships can awaken you spiritually? What hardships are you currently experiencing that might be opportunities to draw closer to God?