A little girl was talking to her teacher about whales.The teacher said it was physically impossible for a whale to swallow a human because even though they were a very large mammal their throat was very small.The little girl stated Jonah was swallowed by a whale.The teacher reiterated a whale could notswallow a human; it was impossible.The little girl said, "When I get to heaven I will ask Jonah."The teacher asked, "What if Jonah went to hell?"The little girl replied, "Then you ask him."
How do you know the story of Jonah was real? All I can say is Jesus referenced him specifically in regard to being in the belly of the whale for 3 days. It doesn’t seem to be written like a fanciful story. I’m going with truth.
There are many parallels between Jonah and Jesus. I want to document below not a parallel of their whole lives, but a parallel of their “death” and “resurrection”.
Jonah 1:4-16
4 Then the LORD sent a great wind on the sea, and such a violent storm arose that the ship threatened to break up. 5 All the sailors were afraid and each cried out to his own god. And they threw the cargo into the sea to lighten the ship. But Jonah had gone below deck, where he lay down and fell into a deep sleep. 6 The captain went to him and said, "How can you sleep? Get up and call on your god! Maybe he will take notice of us, and we will not perish."
7 Then the sailors said to each other, "Come, let us cast lots to find out who is responsible for this calamity." They cast lots and the lot fell on Jonah.
8 So they asked him, "Tell us, who is responsible for making all this trouble for us? What do you do? Where do you come from? What is your country? From what people are you?"
9 He answered, "I am a Hebrew and I worship the LORD, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the land."
10 This terrified them and they asked, "What have you done?" (They knew he was running away from the LORD, because he had already told them so.)
11 The sea was getting rougher and rougher. So they asked him, "What should we do to you to make the sea calm down for us?"
12 "Pick me up and throw me into the sea," he replied, "and it will become calm. I know that it is my fault that this great storm has come upon you."
13 Instead, the men did their best to row back to land. But they could not, for the sea grew even wilder than before. 14 Then they cried to the LORD, "O LORD, please do not let us die for taking this man's life. Do not hold us accountable for killing an innocent man, for you, O LORD, have done as you pleased." 15 Then they took Jonah and threw him overboard, and the raging sea grew calm. 16 At this the men greatly feared the LORD, and they offered a sacrifice to the LORD and made vows to him.
In the beginning, God told Jonah to go to Nineveh and preach to them to turn from their self-destructive ways. The problem is Jonah’s people didn’t like the Ninevites. He would be all happy to let them be destroyed. He knew God’s power of changing minds and he knew that if he went there to preach, they would change. Jonah didn’t want that. So he goes to the port of Joppa and hops on a boat to Tarshish, which is the opposite way from Nineveh. He wasn’t running because he wanted to disrespect God. He was running because he didn’t want God to succeed in this task.
But then in vs. 4, a huge storm came and threatened to break the ship into pieces. Sailors that were used to storms were afraid of this one. Jonah on the other hand was in the bottom of the ship taking a nap.
This is where the 1st parallel comes in. Luke 8:22-25
22One day Jesus said to his disciples, "Let's go over to the other side of the lake." So they got into a boat and set out. 23As they sailed, he fell asleep. A squall came down on the lake, so that the boat was being swamped, and they were in great danger.
24The disciples went and woke him, saying, "Master, Master, we're going to drown!"
He got up and rebuked the wind and the raging waters; the storm subsided, and all was calm. 25"Where is your faith?" he asked his disciples. In fear and amazement they asked one another, "Who is this? He commands even the winds and the water, and they obey him."
A storm comes along on the lake. The disciples are scared because their boat is not big and if the storm is a decent size, they will tip over. Sounds like the sailors in the boat with Jonah don't it? But Jesus is asleep in the boat just like Jonah. Not knowing what to do, they run to the one who is acting differently. Jesus is calm. Jesus says faith in God will save you and calm the sea. Jonah tells the sailors to throw him overboard because his God is controlling the storm. In both instances, God is in control.
In Jonah 1:12 the sailors wanted to save themselves by praying to their false gods and throwing stuff overboard to make the ship lighter. In another sea story where Peter walks on water out to Jesus, as long as he keeps his eyes on Jesus he does great, but when he takes his eyes off Jesus and looks at his feet to “do it his own way”, he starts to sink (see Matthew 14:29-30). In Jonah 1:16, after the sailors throw Jonah overboard and the storm calms, the sailors are in awe and worship the true God. In Luke 8 they were in fear and amazement (sounds like awe) of Jesus and his control of the storm.
We now turn to Jonah 2:1-9. This is his prayer to God. It could easily be called a prayer of lamentation. “In trouble, deep trouble, I prayed to God.” (The Message).
1 From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the LORD his God. 2 He said: "In my distress I called to the LORD, and he answered me. From the depths of the grave [a] I called for help, and you listened to my cry.
3 You hurled me into the deep, into the very heart of the seas, and the currents swirled about me; all your waves and breakers swept over me.
4 I said, 'I have been banished from your sight; yet I will look again toward your holy temple.'
5 The engulfing waters threatened me, [b] the deep surrounded me; seaweed was wrapped around my head.
6 To the roots of the mountains I sank down; the earth beneath barred me in forever. But you brought my life up from the pit, O LORD my God.
7 "When my life was ebbing away, I remembered you, LORD, and my prayer rose to you, to your holy temple.
8 "Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs.
9 But I, with a song of thanksgiving, will sacrifice to you. What I have vowed I will make good. Salvation comes from the LORD."
Jonah cries out to God. He is going down and feels death’s grip around him. Through 6a, Jonah says he is going down to the depths as deep as he can go, “to the root of the mountains”. Basically, he felt he was thrown into Sheol and the keys were thrown away never to be released. Total despair.
Jesus has similar concerns, but he is quicker to turn around. Before Jesus is taken into custody (knowing full well what is about to happen) he goes into the Garden of Gethsemene to pray. He takes the three disciples that have been closest to him, Peter, James and John, to pray for him in this time of struggle.
Matthew 26:36-44
36Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to them, "Sit here while I go over there and pray." 37He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled. 38Then he said to them, "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me."
39Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, "My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will."
40Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. "Could you men not keep watch with me for one hour?" he asked Peter. 41"Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak."
42He went away a second time and prayed, "My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done."
43When he came back, he again found them sleeping, because their eyes were heavy. 44So he left them and went away once more and prayed the third time, saying the same thing.
In despair and agony he asked God to “take this cup from me”. He knew what was coming. The pain. The rejection. The death. The end.
Just like Jonah though, Jesus knew this was his destiny. God’s plan, God’s world, God himself is bigger than us. We may think we know the end game, but God has other ideas. Read vs. 8 in the Jonah passage again.
vs8 "Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs. "
Jonah is specifically talking about Ninevah. Those who worship hollow gods, god-frauds, walk away from their only true love. They are so lost they cannot see the grace that is available to them, that has saved me in this sea. That whale was God’s grace, and Jonah accepted. Jesus also accepted with “…thy will be done.”
3 Days
Jonah 1:17 17 But the LORD provided a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was inside the fish three days and three nights.
For three days Jonah was in the nasty muck of whatever the whale swallowed. I’m sure it felt like death. When you read the prayer again in Jonah 2, you see that Jonah was also stuck in the mire of his own disobedience. Jesus though was obedient (not happily of course) and went to his death and was dead 3 days.
Matthew 12:39-40 (as well as other passages such as John 2:19)
39He answered, "A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a miraculous sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. 40For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
The “heart of the earth” can be translated (maybe transliterated is better” as Sheol which is OT for the place between heaven and hell. Read the story about Abraham and Lazarus and the chasm between them when they die. It can also be translated as where the sin is (maybe hell). The heart of man is where sin resides according the bible. The heart of the earth would be where sin resides after death…Hell. Jesus could not resurrect himself. He had to rely on God 3 days later to bring him back from the dead.
He took on all the sins of the world and was dragged down to the depths. This makes me think of the movie The Mummy 2, where at the end the bad guy is pulled down by all the demons. I can’t find a video of that though.
Jesus and Jonah die. They are dead for 3 days. Then in Jonah 2:10 the fish spits him up on the beach. In John 21:4 Jesus is on the beach cooking some fish. I love being on the beach, especially in the morning when the sun is just coming up. It’s peaceful, like everything is new.
The whale for Jonah was grace that saved him. The fish Jesus was cooking was a gift (isn’t that what grace is) given to the disciples when they made it to shore. The result is the same. Both Jesus and Jonah are changed people and they are changing people. The disciples (and all the people for 40 days that see Jesus) change their lives to follow the risen Lord. The Ninevites believe this guy from Joppa who normally would not want anything good for them. He must be sent from God. Their hearts are turned and moved to repentance.
WHATS DIFFERENT??
OK….what’s different between Jesus and Jonah? That’s a good question and there is one HUGE answer.
Jesus willingly went to save those who were on the path to destruction. Jesus looked upon Jerusalem with a breaking heart with sorrow because of all the lost people he could see. Jonah went to Ninevah because he was told to go. Jesus came to this world because he wanted to. All of Nenevah (the text specifically mentioning the King) repented and asked God for forgiveness (see Jonah 3:6-7). Change at Nineveh was top down. Change for the people Jesus dealt with was bottom up. The poor, rejected, ugly, unreligious are the people accepting the free gift of seeing the Kingdom of God.
That’s where we are today I think. The “elite” class (not all of them of course) are so caught up in their high and mighty knowledge that they can’t accept the reality of God.
Isaiah 55:7 "Let the wicked forsake His way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return to the Lord; and He will have mercy on him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon. For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts."
Something I heard the other day was “faith is doubting your doubts”. Our doubts (not believing what has been presented to us) holds us back from faith. The people who saw Jesus had doubts about him. They had heard all this before from different groups. But there was something different in this man. They doubted their doubts and came out on the other side much better.
That’s what I want you to do today. Doubt your doubt about a big fish swallowing a man and then spitting him up on land. Doubt your doubt that “those people” can change. Doubt your doubt that you can change. And doubt your doubt that this man Jesus is something different. He is. That faith will set you free.
