Get Up and GO!

"1 The Lord gave this message to Jonah son of Amittai: 2 “Get up and go to the great city of Nineveh. Announce my judgment against it because I have seen how wicked its people are.”
3 But Jonah got up and went in the opposite direction to get away from the Lord. He went down to the port of Joppa, where he found a ship leaving for Tarshish. He bought a ticket and went on board, hoping to escape from the Lord by sailing to Tarshish.

4 But the Lord hurled a powerful wind over the sea, causing a violent storm that threatened to break the ship apart. 5 Fearing for their lives, the desperate sailors shouted to their gods for help and threw the cargo overboard to lighten the ship.

But all this time Jonah was sound asleep down in the hold. " Jonah 1:1-5

God gave Jonah a mission. His mission was to go to the city of Ninevah and proclaim God's judgement on the people of that city. God knew that the people would repent and follow him. So did Jonah, and he didn't like that. Ninevah was an Assyrian city. The Israelites and Assyrians were enemies. So, instead of obeying God, Jonah went the OPPOSITE DIRECTION of where God wanted him to go. Ninevah was east, so Jonah went west. Not only that, he bought himself a ticket for a boat ride to take him as far as possible in the opposite direction. Jonah purposefully resisted, rebelled, and disobeyed God. As a result of his disobedience, the ship he was sailing on got caught up in a terrible storm. The storm was so bad that even seasoned sailors aboard that ship feared for their lives. And where was Jonah? Down in the hold, sound asleep.

Like Jonah, we also can resist, rebel, and even flat out disobey God. When we disobey, we are running in the OPPOSITE DIRECTION of His Will. Our disobedience does not void God's commands. Our rebellion in no way alters His Will. The sooner we realize that and obey, the better off we'll be. God's Will WILL BE DONE!

Our disobedience puts us in a very dangerous position, it puts us outside the Will of God. God will accomplish His plan. Whether we are participants or not is another story. If we are not willing and watching, if we are resistant, He can choose to pass us by and use someone else whose heart is willing and obedient. However, God can choose to use us anyway. If this is the case, He won't relent until we have responded in obedience. He can 'out stubborn' all of us combined! This is what happened to Jonah!

When we run away from God's Will, we not only endanger ourselves but others as well. Jonah's disobedience put the lives of the sailors at risk. We like to think that our sin only hurts us. However, our sin of disobedience can have a devastating affect on others, no matter how 'minor' we think it is. Our disobedience hurts relationships. First and foremost, it hurts our relationship with the Father, robbing us of the joy we have in Christ and convicting us of our guilt. It hurts our relationships with family, friends, and coworkers. If we fool ourselves into thinking that our disobedience will only affect us, then we are morons!

Jonah learned his lesson the hard way. We should learn from Jonah's experience and just do what God asks from the start. There is no way around it. We can not escape His presence, He is everywhere! So man up (or woman up). Then GET UP AND GO!

In His Love, Cathy