Now the
LORD had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly
of the fish three days and three nights. Then Jonah prayed unto the LORD his
God out of the fish's belly, Jonah 1:17-2:1 KJV
A
great fish was already prepared and awaiting the appearance of Jonah! It’s
probable that this fish must have been tracking the boat for awhile under
guidance from the Lord waiting patiently for its prisoner!
How
obedient is that compared to Yahweh’s runaway prophet?! Why did Yahweh resort
to such a wonderfully spectacular and strangely exaggerated way to arrest Jonah’s
flight? He could have stopped Jonah even before he boarded the ship to
Tarshish!
Jonah
is being prepared inside the belly of the fish to go back and proclaim in the
house of the fish!
This
incident takes on a whole new and greatly significant meaning when it is made
use of by the Lord as He rebuked the Jewish leaders for seeking a sign...an
obvious affront, having witnessed all His works and heard all His words.
Because of their rebellion and hardness of heart there would be no sign given
them except that of the prophet Jonah. But he answered and said unto them, An evil
and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be
given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas: For as Jonas was three days and
three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and
three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh shall rise in
judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: because they repented at
the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here. Matthew
12:39-41 KJV
Jews
read the book of Jonah during the afternoon prayer service on Yom Kippur (the
Day of Atonement), the holiest day of their year. They completely miss the
significance of it all as Jesus announced it in another parable like statement
to them!
Jonah the prophet was wholly endorsed by Jesus who used Jonah to illustrate and typify his own death and resurrection!
As
far as Jonah and the world were concerned he was dead. He refers to his
incarceration as hell! In similar manner Jesus was in the place of the dead to
all intents and purposes dead to the world.
Did
you know that the early Christian believers used a fish drawing as a secret
sign of their allegiance? The Greek letters making up the word fish (I-ch-th-y-s)
were an acrostic for the sentence Iesous
Christos Theou Yios Soter which transliterated means Jesus Christ of God, Son, Savior.
Instead
of being the verbatim prayer apparently Jonah is rehearsing to his readers the
way he prayed while in the fish's belly.
He states that Yahweh heard him when he cried.
Jonah's
prayer from the fish's belly is based on the knowledge of God's mercy and
kindness. It is indeed remarkable that God's kindness and mercy are invoked for
his rescue but he is totally hardened against the lives of the inhabitants of
Nineveh.
What
was it that he remembered about Yahweh that caused him to be confident in
crying out to Him?
In
the fish Jonah would be totally disoriented but yet he says that he will look
again towards the temple of Yahweh. Was he anticipating God's mercy or was he
looking in his spirit towards the place where the presence of The Lord was?
It
appears that Jonah made a vow to do as God had commanded him if a merciful God
would deliver him from his prison. But I will sacrifice unto thee with the
voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the
LORD. Jonah 2:9 KJV
Ironic
that when Nineveh forsook their lying vanities and repented in sackcloth Jonah
was angry!
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