But the Lord sent out a great wind on the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship was about to be broken up.
Jonah 1:4
Let’s look at the background for this book of the Bible. Small children know the story of Jonah and the whale, and that’s what this book is about, that childhood Bible story. However, there’s more to the story than our childhood memories.
God spoke to Jonah in a unique way. He wanted Jonah to do two things: go to Ninevah, a large pagan city of that time, and call them to repentance. But Jonah didn’t want to go. He knew the people of Ninevah would mock him or worse, kill him. And the very worst was that Jonah wanted the Ninevites to be punished for their sin. So, he fled from God’s call to travel to Ninevah as he should have. Instead, he boarded a boat to go to Tarshish, a city that was considered the farthest ends of the earth.
We pick up the story at this verse. God stirred up a storm while Jonah was on that boat to Tarshish in direct opposition to what God told him to do. There was nothing wrong with the ship or the sailors on that ship, but Jonah was not supposed to be there. And it probably would not have been an issue if Jonah had traveled to Tarshish any other time, but he was not supposed to be on that boat.
Jonah disobeyed God’s calling on his life.
Let’s look at how this verse impacts our lives today. Whether we are talking about God’s calling on our lives or we are talking about things we are supposed to do in our lives not related to God, it all boils down to disobedience. When we are disobedient to God when he calls us to do something, many things can happen to us. Perhaps not as dramatic as Jonah’s situation, but there is a consequence to not heeding God’s call on our lives. Likewise, if we disobey authority figures in our lives, it has consequences. Those consequences can be anything from going to jail for rioting to losing our job for insubordination. Consequences are consequences, and they can take any form.
Loving his neighbors was not what Jonah wanted to do. He wasn’t called to like the Ninevites, he was called to love them by showing them their sin. And he paid for his disobedience. We all should strive to love our neighbors. From the grumpy guy down the street to the harried mother of five kids to the down-and-out street person that no one wants to see. We may not like any of them, but we are called to love them. God does and so should we.
God has called me to pray for friends, family and even people I don’t know. What has God called you to do?