Repentace // Jonah's BIG problem

Repentance isn't a word we use much on a day to day basis. As Christians, repentance is when someone turns from the bad they are doing to try and live a life worthy of Christ.

If you aren't familliar with the story of Jonah it can be sumed up like this:

1) Jonah has a word from God telling him to go to Nineveh to save the people there.

2) Jonah disobeys God and gets on a ship that heads in a completely different direction to Tarshish.

3) Not long after boarding a boat to Tarshish God sends a big storm, which causes the men on the boat to throw Jonah overboard, only for a big fish to find him and swallow him.

4) Three days and three nights later Jonah repents and God commands the fish to spit Jonah back up.

5) Jonah gets another word from God to go to Nineveh and this time he actually goes.

6) When he gets there Nineveh repents and Jonah is quite upset about this.

And if thats not detailed enough for you feel free to read the book of Jonah here (It's only 4 chapters so it wont take long).

For now we'll concentrate on chapter 2 of Jonah.

This chapter is where we read Jonah's repentance to God. Instead of puting in a link for you to read it here it is:

"In my distress I called to the Lord, and he answered me.

From deep in the realm of the dead I called to help, 

and you listened to my cry.

You hurled me into the depths, into the very heart of the seas,

and the currents swirled about me;

all your waves and breakers swept over me.

Yet I will look again toward your holy temple.

The engulfing waters threatened me, 

the deep surrounded me;

seaweed was wrapped around me head.

To the roots of the mountains I sank down;

the earth beneath barred me in forever.

But you, Lord my God, brought me up form the pit.

When my life was ebbing away, I remembered you, Lord,

and my prayer rose to you,

to your holy temple.

Those who cling to worthless idols turn away from God's love for them.

But I, with shouts of grateful praise,

will sacrifice to you.

What I have vowed I will make good. 

I will say, 'Salvation come from the Lord.'"

You might think thats a long prayer, but Jonah was in the fish for three days and three nights. This was the last thing Jonah did when he was inside the fish (as in the next verse God commands the fish to vomit Jonah up) and it takes about 30 secends to read!

So one thing we can be absolutely sure of about Jonah's repentance is that it came slow.

The bible doesn't say what else Jonah got up to in the fish but I'm pretty sure he would have been trying to get out without God's help. But that isn't what saved him, prayer and repentance is what saved Jonah.

Jonah's repentance prayer, I've found, is split into three parts:

Part one is Jonah's recognition. This is where Jonah realises what he's done is wrong. This is verses 2-7:

"In my distress I called to the Lord, and he answered me.

From deep in the realm of the dead I called to help, 

and you listened to my cry.

You hurled me into the depths, into the very heart of the seas,

and the currents swirled about me;

all your waves and breakers swept over me.

Yet I will look again toward your holy temple.

The engulfing waters threatened me, 

the deep surrounded me;

seaweed was wrapped around me head.

To the roots of the mountains I sank down;

the earth beneath barred me in forever.

But you, Lord my God, brought me up form the pit.

When my life was ebbing away, I remembered you, Lord,

and my prayer rose to you,

to your holy temple.

Next came Jonah's actual repentance in verses 8 - 9:

Those who cling to worthless idols turn away from God's love for them.

But I, with shouts of grateful praise,

will sacrifice to you.

What I have vowed I will make good. 

I will say, 'Salvation come from the Lord.'"

And finally came Jonah's redemption in verse 10:

"And the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomitied Jonah onto dry land."

Recognition, Repentance and Redemption.

After reading the book of Jonah I've come to realise that Jonah was never actually in any real danger. Not when he was on a boat heading to be shipwrecked, not when he was thrown into the stormy sea, not even when he spent three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish! This is because Jonah was protected by God, and as shown in the book of Jonah, God didn't let Jonah come to any harm.

The only time that Jonah was in any real danger was when Jonah thought he could do things better his own way.
And that is still the same today, for all of us.

Proverbs 3:5 'Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding."

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Relationships // You've Got a Friend in Yahweh

What is a friend?
Someone you trust, someone you can go to when in need?
According to my phone, a friend is a person who is not an enemy or opponent and they are someone on equal standing with you. This basically means that the friend is no better or no worse than you are.

John 15: 15 - 17:

"I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learnt from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit - fruit that will last - and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. This is my command: Love each other."

Those of you familiar with the Gospel of John will know that this is Jesus talking. How great is this.

Jesus chose you.

He could have chosen someone taller, someone better looking, someone smarter but he didn't. He chose you! (And I don't know about you but I'd rather be a friend of Jesus than a few inches taller or a few grades smarter...)

He chose you, so that...

• You may 'bear fruit'.
• Whatever you ask for in the name of the Father he will give to you.

To 'bear fruit' is a strange phrase (bear fruit) but what does it really mean?

Basically it means to gain or to increase. And since we're talking about the bible and being Holy, Christ - like people this probably doesn't mean financial gain or financial increase (although, this in turn doesn't mean we all have to be poor and live of cold tin beans from Lidl). 

In regards to this verse to bear fruit could mean a wide range of things but it will most probably include spiritual gain or spiritual increase. (Which is better than money both in the long and short term anyway).

Whatever you ask for in the name of the Father he will give to you is a tricky one to try and explain. If you ask God for a bike or an iPad, you probably wont find yourself looking at Apple's latest product floating down from the sky right in front of your eyes. 

However having said that, God will provide all the things necessary for you to live, be happy and of course tell others about God. Another important thing to mention is that God lives in an eternal state, there is no 'present' for God - He is everywhere at every time (crazy, right). So if God has put you in a situation that you don't think is maybe fair or right for you remember: God could see the outcome of whatever it is your going through before it even started.

Going back to the verse we started with, where Jesus says 'I no longer call you servants', that word servant originally was slaves. That's a BIG jump. We've gone from slave to friend. Why? Well, it's not because of anything we've done. As Jesus describes in these verses it's because Jesus has made known to us (slaves) everything he learnt from God. And Jesus says because a slave doesn't know his master's business, we are now friends of Jesus. 

That's all that Christianity is, a friendship.
And that's flipping awesome.

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He Lives // My Favourite Verse

In the last chapter of John verses 1-14 (John 21:1-14 ) we read about Jesus' last encounter with humans before he ascended to Heaven.
In these few verses we see that these seven men decide to go out to fish one night. They spend the whole night out in the boat fishing and catch absolutely nothing.
Then, early the next morning Jesus was standing on the shore next to a small fire he built for the breakfast and asked the men "Friends, haven't you any fish?"

Now, I'm no Bible expert, but I think that Jesus, the son of God would have known that these men hadn't caught any fish. Jesus must have been there for quite some time anyway to have had enough time to build a small fire and get some bread and fish to cook on it. So my best guess is that Jesus knew that these men hadn't caught any fish - the reason why he asked them is clear in the next few verses.

The men reply with a simple no, then Jesus tells them to throw their nets over the right side of the boat.
Some of these men were disciples, some were fishermen, all of them were rubbish. These seven men spent all night in a boat trying to catch some fish and can't even catch one. Also, notice that none of them recognise Jesus straight away - it takes a miracle for them to realise it's Jesus talking to them.

The men throw their nets over the right side of the boat, with no questions asked and immediately their net is filled with 153 fish. It's full of so much fish in fact that the seven men on the boat don't have enough strength to pull the boat ashore.

The men row the boat back to shore to meet Jesus (who they finally recognise) and arrive to see that Jesus is standing there with a fire cooking some bread and fish. As soon as Jesus sees them he says "come and have breakfast."
These seven men spent all night not being able to catch any fish, then Jesus turns up, shows them the right way to fish. They catch 153 fish and Jesus brings his own fish just in case 153 wasn't enough!

This is one of my favourite passages of the Gospels.
These seven men had been fishing all night, then in the early hours of the morning Jesus performs his last miracle and gives them enough food to feed an army (or a small youth group).
Then, just as the sun was rising over the sea they all ate breakfast that Jesus cooked them, on the beach!
The Bible doesn't say what they talked about but I'm pretty sure whatever they talked about would have been amazing. When I was reading these verses three main things stuck out to me.
1) The men on the boat - like everyone else who's ever been alive - were rubbish.
2) Jesus was awesome.
3) I would have loved to have been on this beach eating breakfast and talking with Jesus just before the ascension.

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