The book of Jonah is a story of a Prophet who tried to flee from his God-given mission and was taught many lessons in the process. As with everything else in the Bible, we as readers can also take some lessons from his story.
4 key lessons from the book of Jonah
- God is intentional about everything he does in our lives. Even the duration of Jonah’s punishment was intentional and served as a sign of Jesus’ sacrifice.
Matthew 12:39-40 ~ Jesus replied, “A wicked and adulterous generation demands a sign, but none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
- With God, there’s hope in every situation. Even though being in the belly of the whale was Job’s punishment from God, God still heard his prayer for relief and God eventually ordered the fish to spit him out (Jonah 2). This aligns with lamentations 3:31 that says nobody is abandoned by the Lord forever. As long as you breathe, there’s room for God’s mercy and help.
- Obedience to God can be costly but there is a greater reward. Jonah finally obeyed God and relayed his message to the people of Nineveh. Fortunately for them and unfortunately for Job, they repented of their ways and God changed his mind about destroying them. Job was furious because what he said didn’t come to pass. His reputation was at stake and his ego was badly hurt that he wanted to die. However, he failed to realise that his obedience saved over 120,000 people from destruction. There was a greater reward compared to the cost.
- God can be in the little things. When Jonah sat down to see what would happen to the City, the Bible says God made the plant grow there to shield him from the sun and God destroyed it too to teach Jonah a lesson. To Jonah, it looked like the natural order of things which didn’t require him to thank God for the plant even though he loved the relief it gave him, but God actively had a hand in it. Just because it seems natural doesn’t mean it wasn’t God.
