Great Depths September 9

Jonah 2:9

But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the LORD.

Well, three days have passed, and Jonah decides it’s time to pray. Three days of being in the stomach of a great fish. Great not only pertains to the size of the fish but also the age of the fish.

In verse 1:17, it reads: Now the LORD had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah.

It’s fair to speculate that this fish was ancient. Currently, the oldest Koi fish living is Hanako; Hanako was born in 1751 and is 226 years old!

Jonah’s disobedience did not catch God off guard. Jonah didn’t much like the people of Nineveh, he felt they belonged in hell, but God felt different. Imagine the hatred Jonah had for these people, so much so that he runs from God and catches the first ship out in the opposite direction, cast into the sea, swallowed by a whale, and three days later, he decides to pray!

I give it to him; he was stubborn, truthfully; I kind of respect that in a strange way, but what changed? His attitude, he makes a vow and then promises God that he will keep the vow. His vow was from complete anguish and surrender. He tells God, I will sacrifice with the voice of thanksgiving.

When you’re at your lowest depths in life, the most challenging type of praise that forces you to push all pride and anger away is a sacrifice of thanksgiving to the Lord. Then the Lord spoke to the fish, and the fish spit Jonah out.

Did you ever stop to think that the fish could have been off the shore for the last two and a half days?

Colossians 3:15

And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful.

He is: Elohim Shama

The God Who Hears

Blessing’s