Session 5 Jonah 1:15–2:10
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JONAH 1:15–2:10
MEMORY VERSE: JONAH 2:2
Heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis is attributed with the statement, “He can run, but he can’t hide.” The boxer who tried to outmaneuver Louis by staying away from him in the ring was eventually “found” and knocked out. Believers may try to use the same strategy with God, trying to run away from Him when we don’t want to obey. However, in the end we will learn what Jonah learned: we can never hide from God.
(In PSG, p. 46)
The context for the beginning of the book of Jonah is best understood in light of 2 Kings 14:23-27. The North-ern Kingdom of Israel was wicked and led by King Jeroboam II, a king who “did what was evil in the LORD’s sight” (v. 24). Nevertheless, God mercifully gave Israel victory over their enemies. He saw how bitter their af-fliction was and had compassion on them, even though they had not repented of their rebellion against Him. Jonah was the prophet who revealed God’s mercy and compassion for His wicked people.
The book of Jonah begins with a similar mandate from God to Jonah. God told Jonah to go preach to anoth-er wicked people, the people of Nineveh. Nineveh was one of three Assyrian administrative cities. The Assyri-ans were renowned for their brutality. For more than fifty years, they had been bitterly oppressive in their deal-ings with Israel. Therefore, when God told Jonah to go to Nineveh, he boarded a boat and fled to Tarshish in the opposite direction.
Nevertheless, God caused a tumultuous storm, threatening the lives of everyone on the vessel. At first, Jo-nah was oblivious to the storm and how his sin brought about potential harm to others as he had separated him-self from everyone else and fallen asleep in the lower cabin of the ship. While the sailors were fighting for their lives and calling out to their gods to save them, their captain woke up Jonah and urged him to call out to his god. The sailors were convinced that someone on the vessel had angered their god and caused the storm, so they cast lots to find out who it was. The lot fell on Jonah.
Then Jonah identified himself as a Hebrew who worshiped or literally “feared” the Lord but admitted he was fleeing from Him. Jonah’s introduction of himself was odd given that the person who truly fears the Lord obeys the Lord (e.g. Deut. 5:29; 10:12; Ps. 119:63). Then the sailors were seized by a great fear and asked Jo-nah what they should do. Jonah told them that if they threw him into the sea, it would calm down. As God’s prophet, Jonah knew that if he repented God would forgive him (Jonah 4:2), but Jonah preferred perishing in the sea over obeying God and going to Nineveh. What’s more, hesitant to take Jonah’s life, the heathen sailors demonstrated more of a concern for Jonah’s life and the Lord’s response to their actions than what Jonah did (1:14).
EXPLORE THE TEXT
15 Then they picked up Jonah and threw him into the sea, and the sea stopped its raging. 16 The men were seized by great fear of the Lord, and they offered a sacrifice to the LORD and made vows.
The sailors did all they could to get back to the shoreline and thus avoid responsibility for Jonah’s death by throwing him into the sea as he suggested. But they realized it was a lost cause. However, they did not want the Lord to punish them for taking the life of one of His servants. The power God displayed by sending the storm caused the sailors to fear Him greatly. Therefore, they cried out to the Lord and pleaded with Him not to hold them responsible for taking Jonah’s life, saying: “For you, LORD, have done just as you pleased” (v. 14). The raging storm and the lot that fell on Jonah was enough for them to conclude that Jonah was the object of God’s wrath and they could do nothing more.
The sailors recognized God's absolute power and sovereignty—truths of which God was in the process of reminding Jonah. Acting in accord with what appeared to be the Lord’s will, the sailors picked up Jonah and threw him into the sea. The sailors’ conclusion regarding God’s power and sovereignty was solidified by what happened next. As soon as they threw Jonah overboard, the sea immediately became calm.
The radical change from a raging, life-threatening storm to a suddenly calm sea must have been astounding to the sailors. In this shocking moment, they were again seized with a great fear of the LORD that led them to offer a sacrifice to the LORD and make vows to him. This is what the people of God, Israel, were supposed to be doing. In Psalm 116:17-18 the psalmist proclaimed: “I will offer you a thanksgiving sacrifice and call upon the name of the LORD. I will fulfill my vows to the LORD.” In Scripture, the fear of the Lord is a deep-seated reverence and awe for God that causes humans to want to honor Him at all costs and to avoid His loving discipline. It involves wonder, submission, obedience, worship, consideration, admiration, and love inspired by His eternal attributes and authority. These sailors demonstrated a true fear of the Lord while the prophet of the Lord, who claimed he feared the Lord, failed to show it. The sailors demonstrated more concern for Jonah than what the man of God showed for the people of Nineveh. It is a sad situation when unbelievers behave more godly than believers.
17 The LORD appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.
Life is a gift from God, and God is especially gracious to His people. When Jonah was plummeting down into the depths of the sea, God appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah and snatch him from the jaws of death. The Lord compassionately spared Jonah. God's compassion on wicked Israel proclaimed by Jonah in 2 Kings 14:23-27, His compassion on His unrepentant prophet here in verse 17, and His continued show of compassion going forward all have implications for the remaining narrative in the book of Jonah.
We must not overlook the irony in the narrative so far. The wind and the sea submitted to the Lord. The heathen sailors tried to save Jonah’s life, feared the Lord, offered a sacrifice, and made vows to the Lord. Even the great fish obeyed the Lord, saving Jonah’s life. However, Jonah, the prophet of the Lord—the one who knew Him like none of these others—disobeyed God. The wind and the sea and the unbelievers all demonstrated a higher regard for the Lord than what the man of God did. The remainder of the book of Jonah will show that everyone and everything in the story submitted to the Lord more than His prophet.
(In PSG, p. 49)
1 Jonah prayed to the LORD his God from the belly of the fish: 2 I called to the LORD in my distress, and he answered me. I cried out for help from deep inside Sheol; you heard my voice.
In the Hebrew text, Jonah 1:17 begins the next section of the story. This verse indicates Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. The next verse, Jonah 2:1, begins with “and then” in the original Hebrew text. In other words, Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights, and then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the belly of the fish.
The text does not say why Jonah waited three days to begin praying. Given the situation, one would think he would have started praying immediately. According to the “rule of threes” for survival, generally a person can survive three days without drinkable water. Could it be Jonah only began praying when he started dying? Jonah did not pray to the Lord when the pagan captain of the ship urged him to do so (1:6). Look at what it took to bring Jonah to his knees. The main point is God used Jonah’s time in the belly of the fish to bring him to his senses and renew his commitment as a prophet of the Lord.
The structure of Jonah’s prayer fits the form of thanksgiving prayers or psalms found elsewhere in the Old Testament: (1) a declaration that God answered his prayer for deliverance (v. 2); (2) a recounting of the distress (vv. 3-6a); (3) the divine rescue (vv. 6b-8); and (4) a vow to worship God (v. 9). In psalms of this type, the person delivered from dire circumstances not the result of sin would put the emphasis on the Lord’s graciousness to save. When this type of psalm comes from people whose sin got them into their dire situation, the emphasis is normally on the sin that required God’s gracious deliverance (see Ps. 32). In Jonah’s case, he recognized the dire straits he was in but did not utter any confession of his sin. On the other hand, when Jonah was in his most desperate situation, he cried out to God using phrases from God’s Word, demonstrating his trust in God (Ps. 139:8).
Jonah began his prayer by recalling how he called to the Lord in his distress and how the Lord answered his prayer. Poetically, Jonah declared that he cried out from deep inside Sheol, the place of the dead. In other words, Jonah was as good as dead when he lifted his voice in prayer to the Lord. His praying to the Lord demonstrated that he still trusted in God to graciously hear his prayer. The focus of the beginning of his prayer was on Jonah’s desperate need for deliverance and the Lord’s willingness to hear his cry.
3 When you threw me into the depths, into the heart of the seas, the current overcame me. All your breakers and your billows swept over me. 4 And I said, “I have been banished from your sight, yet I will look once more toward your holy temple.”
In verse 3, Jonah accentuated the sovereignty of God as he recalled what it was like descending into the depths of the sea. Though Jonah knew the sailors threw him into the sea, he recognized that in truth it was the sovereign hand of God that did it. Even the breakers and billows that swept over Jonah were God’s instruments doing His bidding, and for this reason as Jonah prayed to God, he called them your breakers and your billows (see Ps. 18:4-6; 42:7). In contrast to Jonah, even the waves and the billows of the seas were faithful servants of the Lord. As Jonah was thrust into the heart of the seas and the current overcame him, he recognized the Lord was ultimately in control of his life, whether he would live or die.
Descending into the depths of the sea, Jonah's initial thought was that God had completely rejected him, banishing Jonah from His sight. Jonah had wanted to run away from God’s presence, and now it appeared as if God was finally giving him what he had set out to do. One of the worst things that can happen to believers when they refuse to say to God, “Your will be done” is for the Lord to say to them, “your will be done.” Believers will always come to regret God’s allowing them to have their own way when they refuse to obey Him. Yet God sometimes does so to show us our need for Him, just as He did with Jonah.
Jonah’s initial thought was erroneous. God will never banish one of His children from His sight. Even though we may turn away from God, He will never leave us or forsake us. Believers are thinking unclearly when they think they can run from God, and they are prone to even more erroneous thinking when they try to do so. With this in mind, Jonah was able to dismiss his initial error, trust in His God, and know that he would once again be able to be in God’s presence and worship Him.
5 The water engulfed me up to the neck; the watery depths overcame me; seaweed was wrapped around my head. 6 I sank to the foundations of the mountains, the earth’s gates shut behind me forever! Then you raised my life from the Pit, LORD my God! 7 As my life was fading away, I remembered the LORD, and my prayer came to you, to your holy temple. 8 Those who cherish worthless idols abandon their faithful love, 9 but as for me, I will sacrifice to you with a voice of thanksgiving. I will fulfill what I have vowed. Salvation belongs to the Lord.
In verse 5, Jonah went back to the moment he plunged into the raging sea. Initially, the waters engulfed him to the neck, then they overcame him as his head sank beneath the surface. Jonah recalled the horror of his experience as he descended to the bottom of the sea and the seaweed wrapped around his head, compounding the helplessness of his situation. It appeared all hope was lost and Jonah was sure to drown.
The meaning of the phrase to the foundations of the mountains is uncertain. It only occurs once in the Old Testament. Within the immediate context it probably refers to the bases of mountains that extend to the bottom of the sea. On the other hand, Jonah saw his descent into the depths of the sea as his path to death and was convinced he had passed through the gates that separated the earth from the underworld of death, Sheol. Jonah thought his death was certain and there was no turning back, as his hope of survival had vanished. However, it was at that point that the Lord his God saved Jonah from the pit of death.
From the time Jonah decided to board the boat and head to Tarshish until this point in his fleeing from God, he had been going in the wrong direction. But God snatched Jonah from certain death and raised him to the life God had for him. This was Jonah’s turning point. The God whom Jonah thought had banished him mercifully and graciously reached down and saved his life.
There was still much room for spiritual growth in Jonah’s life, as the remainder of the book of Jonah demonstrates. Yet in his most desperate moment, Jonah remembered the only One who could save his life. He turned back to the God from whom he had previously chosen to flee. He turned back to the Creator who sovereignly controls all of His creation. The prophet of God remembered that only God could lift him up from the gates of death (see Ps. 9:13). In the Old Testament, the word remember often carries the idea of acting on the basis of knowledge. When Jonah remembered the LORD, he cried out in his despair to the God whom he knew to be compassionate. When he did this, the Lord heard Jonah’s prayer and was ready and able to save His wayward prophet.
The meaning of verse 8 may be understood in at least a couple of different ways. First, Jonah may have been disassociating himself from the majority of his fellow Israelites who betrayed the Lord and their covenant with him by worshiping idols. This was alluded to in 2 Kings 14:23-27. In other words, Jonah was saying, “I’m not like them.”
Another way of understanding verse 8 is that Jonah was saying those who worship worthless idols (literally “empty breaths,” like a puff of breath that appears and suddenly disappears on a cold morning) will discover their idols are worthless in desperate times. Jonah could have had in mind the sailors on the ship who were calling out to gods who could not hear, could not answer, and could not save (see Jonah 1:5).
What happens to idol worshipers contrasts with what Jonah knew—those who cry out to God to save them will not be disappointed. God always shows Himself worthy of our devotion and worship.
In contrast to those who worshiped idols, Jonah experienced the power of God to answer prayer and to save him from the clutches of death. Therefore, he would worship the Lord with thanksgiving. Furthermore, Jonah would keep his vow to the Lord. Verse 9 does not explain the vow Jonah was promising to keep. It is possible Jonah was promising to worship the Lord once again after having attempted to flee from His presence. More likely, Jonah was promising to keep his vow to serve the Lord as His prophet.
10 Then the LORD commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.
After Jonah’s prayer, the LORD commanded the fish to vomit Jonah out onto the dry land. The language of His people being vomited out is found in warnings of God’s judgment of His unfaithful people (see Lev. 18:24-28). We should not assume God commanded the fish to vomit Jonah on dry land because Jonah repented of his sin. Jonah cried out to God in his despair, and as an act of gratitude he promised to do what the Lord had commanded him. God showed Jonah compassion even though Jonah never actually confessed or fully repented of his sin. The prophet’s words and actions going forward attest to this.
(In PSG, p. 53)
God’s Purpose of Grace
Believers may fall into sin through neglect and temptation, whereby they grieve the Spirit, impair their graces and comforts, and bring reproach on the cause of Christ and temporal judgments on themselves; yet they shall be kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation. (See 1 Kings 8:33-34; 1 John 1:7-9.)
Use other Scripture to help understand a Bible passage.
Compare and contrast David’s prayer in Psalm 32 with Jonah’s prayer in Jonah 2:1-10. What are the similarities between these two prayers? What are the significant differences between them? What can we conclude about the heart of Jonah in comparison to the heart of David in these two prayers?