Jonah

I'm away from home this week ... I usually travel with a few studies I've completed or that I am working on ... this time, for whatever reason, I did not. I came with a new book I am AFRAID TO OPEN, I came with my Message Bible, my Jesus Calling, the study "When Women Say Yes to God" ... and so far, I've just spent time in the Word and Jesus Calling ... and lots of talking about the Lord and His Word. This morning doesn't require a really early start and the Lord led me back to Jonah ... the last study I did. I hate getting a little older ... I used to have this amazing ability to recall what I have read ... I used to be able to take someone I speaking to back to what I read that spawned a particular thought ... and I hate beyond hate wondering if something that I've got as a thought is really a new thought or something that I read months earlier that has finally (as I used to so hatefully say to others) struck brain ... and I it's taken root in my heart. Nonetheless this morning as I started in Jonah I realized that the when the storm got all cranked up, they went to Jonah ... I remember when I did the study originally thinking, I wonder why Jonah told them who he was, what he did, where he was from ... if he was RUNNING??

I realized today in verse 6 ... the captain of the ship recognized that in the storm, he wanted Jonah praying to HIS GOD ... which at first glance, runs me right straight toward my question above ... WHY did Jonah brag about being a prophet?? But then I get down to verse 8 ... after the casting of lots ... the men want to know about Jonah ... what do you do? where are you from? what country are you from? who are your people?

Hold on ... how did the captain know?? If Jonah didn't tell them, how did they know?

Then I read on ... in verse 12 Jonah tells the men to throw him overboard but in verse 13 we see that is not the response of the men on the ship ...

they attempt with all they have to row back to shore.

REALLY??

They weren't Jonah friends? They hadn't known him long? Why didn't they just throw him overboard??

Okay ... maybe they knew he was a man of God now ... maybe it was fear of retribution ... but when Jonah himself encouraged them to dump him overboard, he'd sorta given them an out with God ...

I'm taken back to the fact the captain KNEW ...

and though we don't know for sure, what we do know is scripture tells us

Matt 7:16
By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?

Gal 5:22-23
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

Somewhere along the line, without saying who he is, what he does, where he's from, what his lineage is or who his God is ... Jonah had the mark of God on his life and people saw it!!

I have to wonder about myself ... I'm quick to say where I go to church, where I work, where my son goes to school, what I'm reading ... if I couldn't speak for a month like my sweet sister in Nicaragua ... would they know me by my fruits or is it simply because of what I say??

Lord let me be mindful of my actions today!!