So…
Many years ago, a good friend dressed up
as the prophet Jonah for Halloween.
He went as the partly digested prophet!
He wore whiteface make-up, wore clothes
that had been soaked in bleach. His hair, which was naturally blonde, he had put
a product known as “sun-in” on, he wrapped himself in fake seaweed, and wore
the distinct perfume “eau de tuna”.
And as he approached a house he would
fall on his knees and hoarsely call out “repent”, and they would offer up all their candy! We all thought it was pretty funny!
But oddly it also made a rather obvious
point. Three days in the belly of anything is going to be a horrible
experience. Unless it appears, you are Jonah!
You see chapter two is all about Jonah’s
prayer, and Jonah’s prayer is a prayer of thanksgiving, for having been
swallowed by a whale of a fish!
How often do we think of our
circumstances as being bad, when in fact God is using them to save us from
something worse!
As I noted last week, I have no idea how
this story can be true. I am, or at least I like to think I am, a fairly rational
man of science as well as faith. I believe Jonah was in a very fishy situation.
But how biologically this can be I have no idea.
Animal stomachs are made to digest
things. Animal stomachs don’t generally have air in them. Jonah should have
been well-digested and nothing but bones after three days.
Instead, like Lazarus he is resurrected,
kind of.
It is possible, I suppose, that Jonah
was in fact an indigestible prophet, and the fish may have had a whopping belly
ache that resulted in Jonah being unceremoniously burped out with all that
uncomfortable air and bile. Gross! Imagine that coming up out of the waters off
shore of Nineveh, that great city.
But that isn’t even the most amazing
part of the story! It should be, eaten alive by a great fish, partly digested,
and then spit out.
The amazing part is that Jonah, the
weirdest of the prophets, saw his free ride to Nineveh in God’s fishy mode of
transportation, as God’s divine decision to save his sorry life!
The fish ride is not his punishment for
running away from God’s call to ministry. The punishment was being called out
by all the new disciples on the ship he was being tossed from as being
unfaithful to the Lord.
His punishment was the community of
faith cutting him loose, and starting him off right by dumping him in the sea
for God to deal with, where his journey into the depths of the sea to a very
untimely death was to begin.
That is…
Until God saved him…
By having him eaten!
How many of you have ever been in life
circumstances that you think really, well, suck/stink?
Life can be really, really hard. Your
car is broken and you have no way to get to work or school. The rent is due and
you have no money at all. Your job is a joke; you have mad skills, but no one
needs or wants them. Your relationships would make a great episode of The Jerry
Springer Show!
Is it possible, just asking, that you
are in the belly of the fish?
Think about it: it stinks, you are
slowly being digested, you are wrapped up in all kinds of problems that are
weighing you down, but…
Maybe, just maybe, God is in the process
of moving you from the wrong place to the right place.
Maybe, God is actually saving you from
circumstances that would have finished you off.
Maybe your wardrobe would actually look
better bleached and in tatters, just saying! And Jonah, seems to agree!
His prayer in chapter two is a prayer of
thanksgiving because it has become clear to him that the fish ride is better
than dying in the depths of the ocean, wrapped in the burial shroud of seaweed,
far from shore, far from God, far from everything he knows and loves.
And in the belly of the fish he becomes
convinced that God is going to save him.
“When I was in trouble, Lord, I
prayed to you, and you listened to me. From deep in the world of the dead, I
begged for your help, and you answered my prayer.”
Remember, he is in the fish when he
prays these words, believing and hoping that even though his circumstances seem
dire, he is now safe in God’s hands.
We too know some folks who are in dire
circumstances. Some of them live in the Carolinas. Ever heard of flood buckets?
We know some other folks who are in dire
circumstances. Their children are struggling with drug addiction. We are
offering NARCAN training.
There are folks who are in dire
circumstances. Their houses were scoured by mud and ravaged by rain in Texas.
We are working to send a team to fix a few.
We know some folks who are in dire
circumstances. Which is why, we who have been spit up on shore, are doing everything
we can to help them as they begin once again to live the life God has given
them.
How about you?
Doing the backstroke in the depths of
the sea? In the belly of one grand old fishy? Or are you one who having taken a
ride of a lifetime are now ready to be God’s person to bring hope and help to others?
May it be so. Amen.
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