Obedience After Disobedience (Daily Devotional)

Shalom and thank you for joining us again this day to reflect, to meditate on God’s word. Through this week, we have been looking at an interesting series of examples of obedience. A couple of examples we looked at initially were Noah, Abraham and Mary who almost showed immediate obedience. We looked yesterday at Gideon and today, we look at Jonah who showed obedience after disobedience. Jonah’s journey is one that many of us probably can relate to at a personal level. God calls Jonah to preach to the people of Ninevah and we see that he runs away in the opposite direction. Jonah chapter 1, verses 1 to 3, ‘The word of the LORD came to Jonah, son of Amittai: “Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me.” But Jonah ran away from the LORD and headed for Tarshish.’ We see that Jonah’s disobedience was not because he didn’t recognize God’s authority but because he grappled with the thought that God would extend His mercy to a city that he felt was undeserving. Jonah’s flight was both not just a physical escape from God but also a spiritual retreat from what God wanted. However, the Lord in His endless mercy and wisdom sent a great fish to swallow Jonah and in the belly of the fish, we see that Jonah has an experience of reflection and repentance and after 3 days and 3 nights, Jonah was given yet another chance. God commands Jonah to come a second time and then he chooses obedience. Jonah chapter 3, verses 1 to 3 reads that, ‘Then the word of the LORD came to Jonah a second time: “Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you.” Jonah obeyed the word of the LORD and went to Nineveh.’ The change in Jonah’s heart is very evident in his actions. He went to Ninevah, delivered God’s message and led the entire city to repentance. What is the application here for us? Often our disobedience stems from personal feelings. Jonah’s initial refusal to go to Ninevah was rooted in his own prejudice and in his personal feelings against the city. We also, can be led by those feelings of bias or fear or jealousy and that can dictate our obedience to God but God is relentless in the way He pursues us. Inside the fish, we see Jonah repented and God redeems him. This is a reminder that no matter how far you and I run and how deep our disobedience may be, the redemption of God is always open. We see that obedience from Jonah’s life brought blessings. Jonah’s obedience led to the salvation of an entire city. Our obedience also can lead to many blessings in God’s kingdom. So, through the life of Jonah, let’s learn to trust and know that what God desires of us is good and keep our personal biases/ prejudices aside and take on what He wants us to do. Let’s pray together, Heavenly father, we thank you for Jonah and what he teaches us through his life. We pray that we wouldn’t be overpowered by our biases/ prejudices/ our own emotions of fear and doubt, but we would take on in faith and hope and assurance that what you have called us to do has far greater blessings. Thank you for bringing this to us, in Jesus’s name we pray, Amen.

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