In the Belly of the Whale

Recently, the Lord prompted me to read Jonah again, so I did. It's not that long, and you could read it yourself right now in less than ten minutes. A lot of Sunday school teachers have turned it into a funny little tale with cutesy cartoon whales; and on the surface it seems like a story of rebellion and punishment. But that's not what these four little chapters are about.

It is about a man who had an earthly focus where God was dreaming much bigger. It is about a man who could not stop the wonderful plans God had for him, no matter how hard he tried to stay in his own comfort zone.

If you've ever struggled with selfishness or been motivated by your own comfort, this post's for you!

You know the story: God tells Jonah to go and tell the city of Nineveh to repent of their evil deeds, but Jonah refuses and runs the opposite direction, jumping on a ship to Tarshish, "away from the presence of the Lord" (1:3). This man was not just ignoring God, but intentionally and proactively running away from Him.

Before you judge Jonah, think about the times in which he was living. Ancient people were not concerned for social justice or world peace. Life, to them, was short, painful, and cheap. They didn't hesitate to kill people. Which was probably exactly what the Ninevites were doing. Imagine every kind of abuse that can be done to the innocent, and you probably have a pretty accurate picture of Ninevite culture.

So of course Jonah didn't want to go to a violent city and tell them they should "repent or be destroyed." He was picturing a less-than-receptive audience...rotten tomatoes would have been the least of it. But God is good: so He was concerned for innocent lives in Nineveh. And so, as Jonah fled the Lord, his ship was thrown into a violent storm.

The Bible says that Jonah's travel mates found him sleeping in the middle of the storm.

So the captain came and said to him, "What do you mean, you sleeper? Arise, call out to your god! Perhaps the god will give a thought to us, that we may not perish." And they said to one another, "Come, let us cast lots, that we may know on whose account this evil has come upon us." So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah. Then they said to him, "Tell us on whose account this evil has come upon us. What is your occupation? And where do you come from? What is your country? And of what people are you?" And he said to them, "I am a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land." Then the men were exceedingly afraid and said to him, "What is this that you have done!" For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them (1:6-10).

Jonah (revealing his flair for the dramatic) instructs the men to throw him overboard to appease God and calm the storm. This alone shows a wrong attitude of God. Jonah believes that God demands his life as sacrifice because of his disobedience. Hear this, New Covenant believers: God does demand your life. But, like Jonah, you don't give your life as a waste, a final death, a punishment for disobedience; you give your life to follow a greater plan that God has designed for you. You trade it for something so much better than your comfort and earthly perspective.

The Bible says that the storm immediately calmed when Jonah was tossed overboard, but I believe that was not because God was "appeased", but because He wanted to protect Jonah. He is not an emotionally volatile God who flies off the handle when His children disobey Him; rather, He "hedges up their way" (Hosea 2:6) to prevent them from hurting themselves. (Kind of like a baby gate.) And so the sea calmed, and God sent a "big fish" (whale, whatever) to swallow Jonah--not to punish Jonah, but to save his life.

Remember, it was Jonah's idea to get into the boat in the first place, and Jonah's idea to be thrown overboard. God's only motivation throughout the whole story is to keep Jonah going in the direction He has appointed--His plan A for Jonah's life. If He hadn't appointed a whale to swallow him, Jonah would have drowned.

There's not really much else to do when you're stuck inside the stomach of a large animal except pray, which is what Jonah does. Funny enough, he doesn't really repent for running away, but he does thank God for his life. I think his biggest revelation inside the belly of the whale was this: that God is the designer of his path, and even his own attempts at suicide were not going to thwart God's plan.

How long does it take us to realize that? Usually we have to have a "whale experience," something that submerges us in our own helplessness. There was a transformation in Jonah's relationship with God in this moment. In the belly of the whale, Jonah finally came to grips with the fact that he wasn't wise enough or strong enough to run his own life. He declared, "Salvation belongs to the Lord!" (2:9). At last, he trusted the Lord with his physical life.

But his story wasn't over. After the whale vomited Jonah up, the Lord told him a second time to go to Nineveh.

Anyone who has ever struggled with a bad attitude or rebellion against authority can probably imagine the language that came to Jonah's mind in that moment. "Are you serious, God??" Because being in the belly of a whale is no joke. According to stories about modern-day people who have actually survived it, the experience leaves you hairless, your skin bleached white by stomach acid, your eyes more than likely damaged, and your sanity lost.

Jonah probably thought, after his disobedience and the physical side effects, he was in no shape to go and preach to the people.

How many times do we feel the same way? That we're not good enough, not strong enough, to do what God has asked because of our failures or sins?

Yet that's exactly the place where God wanted Jonah. As he walked into the city, declaring the wrath of God, people probably stared at him like he was a zombie, because that's what he looked like. His own disobedience had paved the way for their belief. His testimony was a sign.

Again, we know the story: the people repented, and God didn't destroy them. But still the story is not over. Because Jonah (naturally emotionally disturbed at this point) is angry that God doesn't destroy Nineveh. After all, he has just made a fool of himself, walking around, bald and bleached, declaring destruction. So he sits down to "see what would become of the city" (4:5). I can just feel his attitude at this point: "I'm just gonna sit my butt right here and wait for you to destroy this city!"--hoping against hope that God would do it, even though he knew He wouldn't.

What an earthly attitude. How many times do we want to see others fall in order to feel better about our own failures? In spite of everything, Jonah still wasn't getting it.

Jonah says to God, "Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live." And the Lord said, "Do you do well to be angry?" (4:3-4).

That question always hits me hard, because I can sometimes be dramatic like Jonah when my own earthly plans aren't fulfilled. I find myself having a terrible attitude. Nothing can please me. I complain about everything. And meanwhile God is asking, "Do you do well to be angry?"

Jonah apparently didn't learn his lesson well enough in the belly of the whale, because he gets even more dramatic. Even if he now understands that his death is under the control of God, he's still concerned about physical comfort while he's alive. To be fair, his body was probably not in the greatest shape. Even so, he was very happy when "the Lord God appointed a plant and made it come up over [him], that it might be a shade over his head, to save him from his discomfort" (4:6).

God doesn't want us to be in physical pain or anything. We have physical needs, and He cares for those. But I think sometimes we (especially in the Western world) become so consumed with our physical comfort that it controls every decision we make. When we start living our lives that way, there isn't much room for God to work, because our first concern is looking out for #1, not God's magnificent plans of cosmic awesomeness.

Well, to add insult to injury (at least in Jonah's mind), God destroys the plant, leaving Jonah to sit (where he has chosen to sit, mind you) in the sun.

"Do you do well to be angry for the plant?" God asks Jonah (4:9). "Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die," Jonah replies.

Whoah, cool it, drama queen. Jonah is full of brazen, teenage punk sass, but God has the last word.

"You pity the plant, for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?" (4:10-11)

That question ends the book of Jonah: why shouldn't God have mercy on people, whom He created and loves, people who don't understand that they are in sin? And if Jonah cares for the insignificant plant, why shouldn't he look outside himself to care about the things of God's heart? Jonah has no reply, apparently. There is no more to the book after that question mark. And I think there's a reason for that. God leaves us to answer that question: If you care for the insignificance of your own comfort, why do you not care for the greater plans that God has for the world?

God would never have sent Jonah to Nineveh if He didn't want to spare the city. Why do we believe that God is so ready to destroy us for disobedience, but reluctant to save and redeem?

Isn't the wisdom of God a wonder? Because I seem to recall another man who slept in the bottom of a boat during a storm; a man who woke and calmed the sea with only the sound of His voice. That man also willingly sacrificed his life to save others; but unlike Jonah, Jesus redeemed the whole world. Jonah was sleeping in the relief of fleeing (or so he believed) the presence of God, but Jesus slept because He lived in the presence of God and trusted Him with his life.

And by the way, Jesus spent three days in a dark, scary, torturous place, too--and He came out the victor. Jonah exalted himself and was made humble; Jesus humbled Himself and was exalted.

And that's the lesson of Jonah. God does not destroy; He redeems. Take heart in that promise.