Wisdom 38 Jesus, Jonah and Judgment

Wisdom 38 Jesus, Jonah and Judgment

 We’ve spent a lot of time with Jonah. Hopefully we have been drawn into an atmosphere that spiritually discerns his plight. Jonah is the story of a man trapped in his aloneness that was not resolved. So, we are left with a frustrated man in another fish-belly conflict, attitude. Until we see Jesus arrive on the scene, the attitude or stronghold Jonah suffers from remains unresolved. Like all the major stories in the Old Testament, it remains unfulfilled until Jesus comes and resolves all incompleteness and conflict on the Cross.

 Jonah, caught in the belly of the great fish, became fully aware of what it meant to live alone in his body. His running away was really running away from himself which he found impossible. Jonah was consumed with the great fish of his past, his cultural and religious expectations, his fear of God and what he knew about God but couldn’t accept, His compassion. Jonah was driven by revenge against the Assyrians and the expectations that went with it. What right did God have to change His mind and forgive the Ninevites? Revenge is a cover for one’s frustration. It’s a Cain thing isn’t it?

 A sulking Jonah was not open to God’s love for everyone. That’s how deep his stronghold of hate for the Assyrians was. Nineveh was trapped in the same belly but in a different way. They just didn’t know it. Everyone, including its king, trapped in the great belly of aloneness because of its idolatry. Idols have no life thus no relational ability. Idols are inspired by evil spirits who themselves are ruled by the spirits of fear and pride under the direction of the evil one, satan. It is fear that causes one to hide in the belly of idolatry. Idolatry is anything outside of God that you allow to have power over you.

 Let’s step aside for a moment and look at idolatry. Take simple things like superstitions for instance. Superstitions, like carrying a rabbit’s foot or throwing salt over your shoulder if it has been spilled, or not walking under a ladder, or putting a horseshoe over a doorway, are idolatrous practices making a rabbit’s foot, a horseshoe and a ladder gods. You are actually allowing those things to have power over you, giving an open door to the spirit of fear. When you give anything material, organic or physical power over your choice and decision making, that is idolatry. How about some car or clothes or a home or a woman or man, a desire or a trophy, a job, money? How easy they slip into our purview of success and become gods.

 Further, there are no such things as luck or fate or karma. They are just man-made inventions to make you feel like you have an answer for experiences you don’t understand or that in some way they cut out fear and always look for a good outcome. Wishing someone good luck is self-serving. It’s used to make someone else feel good about you because you have wished them well. Fate is self-deceptive. It is a safe way to blame a non-existent idea for good or bad outcomes. Karma is the same when you feel someone got what they deserved for something bad they did. How many times have you heard, “What goes around comes around?” Really? C’mon!

 Never wish anyone luck or buy the superstitious stuff. How about this: “May the Lord bless your effort.” Offer others the promise of a blessing from God. If they have a good outcome it was about Him and if there is a bad outcome it was a learning experience that was teaching you to look to the Lord for a better way to accomplish a goal. Blessing, God’ touch, replaces luck, fate and karma. When you hear them, they are opportunities to share our personal testimony. How? That is up to you at those opportune moments to be conscious of the Holy Spirit to provide spiritual discernment and the necessary response.

 Now back to Jonah. Jonah believed in God, but he had to have his own way. His cultural conditioning, his aloneness and his attitude were driven by sin. Sin has no friend but temptation and the tempter who wields it. Once yielded to, it picks up steam and the supportive spirits ready to justify the pressure of giving into the desire of the moment. This sums up the reason Jesus had to come. It was to rescue mankind from sin’s self-destructive aloneness, ‘the belly of the great fish’ and restore the image of God through Him. He restores our mind, heart and spirit to be spiritual, personal and relational through faith in Him.

 All of us have some on-going fears and attitudes that are hard to shake, feelings that don’t seem to have an ending and ideas about God and people that need correction. In Jesus the Father has set the standard for personal relationship and its boundaries and their judgment. In Him He has given us the ability to judge our thinking, motivation and behavior and by His power, to change them. Of course, we will make mistakes. We don’t stop being sinners, but we know we are forgiven sinners. We have been given the gifts of repentance and forgiveness.

 However, there will be a final judgment for everyone. Only one sign will be given, the sign of Jonah (Mt.12:39-41). For those who believe in Jesus their judgment was the Cross and the shed blood of Jesus that saved them from their sin and its aloneness. For others it is all up to the Lord God. Those are the ones with whom we have been called to share God’s love. No one was made to live alone either in this world or the next, especially the next. Eternity is timeless and relational. You’ll either be with God and others in it or you will be alone in yourself forever. Let’s share with all the Jonah-like folks that cross our path. Pray the Holy Spirit will lead us to them, give us a discernment about them and offer them a relational path to eternity, the Lord Jesus.

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