Jonah continued


 


Lets be honest, we are all Jonahs.  We know what it is to be thrown overboard; to be swallowed up until finally we surrender and admit that God's way is right.  You see, Jonah is ilustrative of how God keeps His own.  What a great doctrinal truth underlies this whole book.  I possibly shall be saying more about this than anything else-that God has a way of preserving His own.  In reformed theology we call  it 'the perseverance of the saints'.  Southern Baptists call it 'eternal security' and there is the cliche over there 'once saved, always saved'.  Fair enough.  I defend it.  Jonah is a proof of that.  God has a way of getting His way.

There is a song that we some times sing in the States and I suggest that this be our motto, that God does not compel us against our will but makes us wiling to go.  Now, I may be talking to someone who is truly converted to the Lord Jesus Christ but you are not living like it.  You lmay well be a Christian but one would hardly suspect it by the way you live.  And maybe you know what it is to be swallowed up and to be brought to the bottom of the sea and maybe God is still doing that with somebody.  Let me tell you; if you are a Christian, God is going to in out.  Do yourself a favour and quit fighting; come around.  The word of the Lord has come to you-you have run the other way.  Let God make that 180 degree turn in your life.  He will do it.  For God does that to His own.









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