“And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.” —Matthew 11:6

When Cindy and I first began dating back in January of 1996, I asked the Lord, “Is this the one I am going to marry?” It didn’t take long to figure that out. Less than a year later, we were on our honeymoon together in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. She was truly “the one.”

In Matthew 11, John the baptizer sent his disciples to Jesus asking, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?” From passages like John 1:29-36, we see that John had already clearly identified Jesus as the Messiah, yet he struggles to reconcile his present circumstances of being imprisoned to his Messiah-like expectations for deliverance. If Jesus is truly the one, why am I suffering here in a prison cell? Why isn’t Israel being delivered from political tyranny? Why isn’t Jesus doing more?

Like many others in John’s day, the understanding of the Coming One’s arrival was that the Messiah would bring blessing on those who repented and judgment on those who rejected him. John is not seeing this from his shadowed perspective. Unfavorable circumstances may tempt us to doubt that God is for us, but that doesn’t change his promises. Worldly cultures may push for us to deconstruct our faith, but that pushback never for one millisecond reduces the truth of Who Jeus is. Jesus has withstood such hostilities from anti-Christian societies for more than two millennia now—and the Gospel is still going strong in the face of such opposition.

Jesus’ response to John’s tension was a beatitude of mild rebuke. After giving John’s people a snapshot of how the kingdom of God was indeed advancing through displays of mostly humble acts of service rather than spectacular political revolutions, Jesus tells them: “Blessed is the one who is not offended by me.” John and his disciples must be open to God’s unfolding plan, that even though things don’t seem to be going their way, things are certainly going God’s way.

Blessed is the one who doesn’t fall backwards in the trials of life, but falls forward leaning into grace through every doubt, frustration, disappointment, and setback. Or as Charles Spurgeon said, “Blessed is he who can be left in prison, can be silenced in his testimony, can seem to be deserted of his Lord, and yet can shut out every doubt. John speedily regained this blessedness, and fully recovered his serenity.”

It’s okay John, Jesus is still the one and you are indeed going to experience resurrection life. Though your prison cell screams of abandonment, your chains’ scream of heartbreak, and your future calls you to drink a cup of suffering through martyrdom, God’s redemptive plan is still unfolding and nothing can snatch you from the palm of God’s hand. Your eternity is secure. You don’t need to go looking for another.

Beloved, let John’s good news be your good news no matter what struggles and challenges tempt you to deconstruct your faith. Think about that as you seek to abide in Him this week.

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, thank you for the good news we have in Jesus. All things will be made new and glorious in your perfect timing. Until that perfect reconciliation of everything in our lives, we trust you over our present circumstances and continue to rejoice in your unfolding plan of redemption. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Questions for Personal Reflection or Group Discussion:

1. What do you suppose John might’ve been feeling while in prison?
2. What are some major causes of doubt and the deconstruction of faith in our times?
3. What does this passage reveal about the finite perspective of our human understanding?
4. What does this passage reveal about the character of Jesus? What does it reveal about the good news of the Gospel?
5. What might perseverance in your faith look like this week?

The post Shall We Look For Another? appeared first on Jimmy Larche.

“and may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all…” —1 Thessalonians 3:12

It’s been said that John Wesley’s heart was “strangely warmed” in London but “set on fire” in Bristol.

This past week we did a sports camp at the very location in Bristol where Wesley erected a chapel and built a school in the mid eighteenth century. In the same field where Wesley and Whitefield used to preach open air to colliers (coal miners), we used the American pastime of baseball to demonstrate the gospel to young people. New methods, same message.

While there, I came across this John Wesley quote:

“Though we cannot think alike, may we not love alike? May we not be of one heart, though we are not of one opinion? Without all doubt, we may. Herein all the children of God may unite, notwithstanding these smaller differences.”

Paul’s desire for the Thessalonians was that the Lord would make them “increase and abound in love for one another and for all.” They were not a loveless church, but they still had room to grow in love.

Don’t we all?

Jesus spoke of the defining mark of his followers using this “red letter” statement: “By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). The Apostle John also emphasized this principle: “If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?” (1 John 4:20).

Paul advocates for the Thessalonian Christians to show love to one another and to all. This love begins in the family of God, but it must go beyond. Jesus told us that our love is small and shallow if we only love those who love us also (Matthew 5:46-47).

Consider: Paul daringly set himself as a standard of love to be emulated. We should live such Christian lives that we could tell young Christians, “Love other people just the way that I do.” Think about that as you seek to abide in Him this week.

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, we love because you first loved us. Holy Spirit, empower us to grow in love for one another and all, that the name of Jesus would be glorified in us. Amen.

The post John Wesley: Abounding in Love appeared first on Jimmy Larche.

“For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age…” —Titus 2:11-12

She was his dearest teacher, the one who first taught John Newton spiritual truths. His mother, Elizabeth Newton, was the one who modeled godliness for him when he was a young boy. But her gentle nurturing was short-lived as she passed away at the age of 27. His seafaring dad took him to sea for months at a time where John learned the partying and hard-edged ways of the sailor life.

The young man turned away from his early moral teachings and became complicit in horrifying atrocities with the slave trade, until a maritime crisis in 1748 prompted him to pray, “My mother’s God—God of mercy—save me!” Sometime later, he experienced a spiritual conversion, and his life was dramatically changed. He later became a preacher, abolitionist, and hymn writer, of which his most famous was “Amazing Grace.”

John Newton later said of his mother, “My dear mother, besides the rains she took with me, often commended me with many prayers and tears to God; and I doubt not but I reap the fruits of these prayers to this hour.” John Newton would wander and rebel, but he couldn’t flee the prayers of his mother, or outrun her God. Eventually he would sing, “I once was lost, but now am found. Was blind, but now I see.”

When the Pharisees investigated the healing of a blind man whom Jesus had miraculously healed, they secretly aimed to scandalize Jesus and discredit the miracle (John 9:24). They found out that you can argue against a creed, but you can’t argue against a changed life! The former blind man wouldn’t go along with their smear job, instead testified, “One thing I do know. I was blind but now I see!”

Have you embraced the amazing grace of God in your life? Can you say today, “I once was blind, but now I see”? You don’t have to wait ‘til the ship is coming apart in a violent storm before letting Him rescue you from your own sin and rebellion. Nor do you need to wait until a later time to thank a person who has invested in your life, especially one who has prayed for you so often. How might God be writing His amazing grace upon the tune of your heart this week?

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, thank you for amazing grace… for saving a wretch like me. Thank you for those who have prayed for me when I couldn’t pray for myself, or was just too lost and blind to do so. Jesus, thank you for taking my place on that cross and dying for my sins so that I can be forgiven and have peace with God. Teach me to follow you daily. Amen.

Questions for Reflection and/or Group Discussion

1. In what way are people today spiritually blind?
2. Who did Jesus claim to be? (John 9:37) What did the blind man do when Jesus told him who He was? (v. 38)
3. According to Jesus, why had He come into the world? (v. 39)
4. How has Jesus’ healing of your spiritual blindness changed your life?
5. For what person, who is spiritually blind, will you pray that God would open his or her eyes?

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The post Encountering My Mother’s God appeared first on Jimmy Larche.

“Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.” —Ephesians 4:32

Have you ever found yourself bitter because someone else was given a second chance and you didn’t think they deserved it? The climax of Jonah’s story focuses on the prophet’s self-centeredness, deficiency of compassion, and his subtle hypocrisy.

We see that “it displeased Jonah exceedingly” that in the previous chapter, the pagans turned from their “evil” and God “relented” of the “disaster” he had threatened. The pagans are in harmony with God, but Jonah is not, as he alone is now characterized by disapproval of the outcome.

Usually a preacher is pleased when his audience repents, but in this last chapter of Jonah we see the opposite. Jonah was displeased that the Ninevites had repented and that God had shown them mercy. In fact, Jonah became exceedingly “angry,” as the language in the original Hebrew here is quite intense. Why would the preacher get so upset at the success of his own ministry?

When Jonah does finally express concern over something perishing, ironically it is a withered plant, not the pagan sailors or the 120,000 people “who do not know their right hand from their left”—an idiom for being morally unaware or spiritually lost. Jonah himself had called on the mercy of God and benefited from that mercy, but he resents that mercy when it is extended to others he doesn’t approve of. What if God treated Jonah the way Jonah wanted God to treat the people of Nineveh?

Isn’t it astounding that Jonah was so much like the prodigal son in need of mercy, but then later finds himself looking just like the self-righteous older brother in Luke 15:25-30, or the unmerciful servant in Matthew 18:21-35? I think there is at least one other semblance God wants us to apprehend in this lesson, and that is how sometimes our attitude can look a lot like Jonah’s. When I reap the benefits of God’s mercy but find myself wishing God’s wrath to be poured out on others, I look very much like that selfish prophet from the past. When I sing the praises of God’s amazing grace over my own sins, yet secretly wish that others pay the price for their sins, I share a similar hypocrisy with Jonah. When I find myself angry or jealous at the spiritual successes of others rather than rejoicing in what God is doing in them and through them… you get the picture.

The book of Jonah ends abruptly, as if the biblical author intended to create a tension with the cliffhanger. After Jonah’s complaint, God explains in verses 10-11 why it is silly for Jonah to care so much about a plant and so little about a city full of people—and that’s the end. We are left to make our own conclusions about the contrast between God’s grace and Jonah’s desire for judgment, and how we can look just like him when we are deficient in our mercy giving. Think about that as you seek to abide in Him this week.

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, you are merciful and gracious. Your loving-kindness has disrupted my life in so many good ways. Teach me to rejoice when that same mercy is given to other undeserving sinners. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Questions for Reflection and/or Group Discussion

1. When have you experienced a surprising, undeserved measure of God’s mercy in your life?
2. How did Jonah respond to God’s goodness to the Ninevites? (Jonah 4:1) What was the attitude of Jonah’s prayer? (vv. 2-3)
3. How did God deal with Jonah and what did God want Jonah to understand? (vv. 4-11)
4. Jonah wanted Nineveh, Israel’s enemy, destroyed. When have you wanted revenge rather than restoration in a relationship? What hard lesson have you had to learn from God?
5. What is one way you can extend God’s love and mercy toward others, particularly those who don’t deserve it?

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The post Self-Righteous, and Mercy Deficient appeared first on Jimmy Larche.

“For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.” —Matthew 12:40

The Pharisees were “fit to be tied!” That’s a southern expression used when someone is so angry that he must be tied up to restrain him from committing an act of aggression. Jesus had gotten under the skin of these religious hypocrites, and they wanted to fight back in more ways than one.

After Jesus “unlawfully” healed on the Sabbath and then freed a man of demonic oppression, the smug Pharisees accused him of doing the work of the devil by attributing it to Beelzebub, or “the prince of demons.” They necessitated a “sign” that Jesus was truly who he claimed to be. They demanded proof of his deity. But Jesus answered them:

“An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here.” —Matthew 12:39-41

The sign Jesus gave them was a picture of his death, burial, and resurrection, by pointing to the prophetic implications of the life of Jonah. Just as Jonah was hurled into the sea to appease the wrath of God coming upon others, Jesus would absorb the wrath of God on the cross for the atonement of our sins, and thereby fulfill the justice of God by paying the penalty our sins deserve. Just as Jonah spent three days in the belly of a massive fish that eventually released him, so Christ would spend three days in the heart of the earth. But death could not hold him. The grave could not contain him. His enemies could not defeat him.

Of all the countless miracles associated with the life of Jesus, there are none more significant than his resurrection from the dead as confirmed by over 500 eyewitnesses. Imagine having over 500 people testify in a court of law today and having all of their accounts perfectly harmonized without any inconsistencies. Most prosecutors today are brimming with confidence if they have just three or four corresponding eyewitnesses to their case. The resurrection had hundreds of witnesses, but the Pharisees were too stubborn, prideful, and arrogant to receive the salvation Jesus came to give them.

But there is another caveat Jesus gave to confront the callousness of the scribes and Pharisees. He told them “the men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation to condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah.” Remember those Ninevites that Jonah cared so little about—the “wicked” people that the renegade prophet didn’t think were worthy of second chances and the good news of God’s mercy? Well guess what? They repented. And according to Jesus, they will rise again to “condemn” those who reject the Gospel message.  

Those demanding more signs that day were of the same crowd of which Jesus said, “corrupt tax collectors and prostitutes will get into the Kingdom of God before you do” (Matthew 21:31). God had given them an abundance of signs, and more signs on top of those signs, and yet they still rejected the most blatant sign of all—JESUS has conquered death, hell, and the grave.

CONSIDER: Jesus is the undisputed risen Champion, the living Son of God, presently seated at the right hand of the Father, and making intercession for you and me. If you are looking for a “sign” of His faithfulness in the face of sickness, suffering, betrayal, loneliness, depression, loss, discouragement, or failure, look no further than the Resurrection. He is alive and there is nothing, absolutely nothing, too difficult for Him. He doesn’t need you to convince Him that your needs are important, He simply longs for you to worship Him… and TRUST Him as your LIVING HOPE.

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, thank you for the greatest sign from heaven—a picture of Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection that will never grow old. Holy Spirit, thank you that the same power that raised Christ from the dead is now alive in me. You will continue to lead me in a triumphant victory over all that is in this world, to the glory and honor of Jesus, Amen.

Questions for Reflection and/or Group Discussion

1. In your opinion, what is the strongest evidence for God?
2. What did a hostile group of people ask Jesus to do? (Matthew 12:38)
3. What kind of people did Jesus say asked for additional miraculous signs? (v.39) How did Jesus respond to the request for a sign? (vv.39-40)
4. Why will the “men of Nineveh” be in a position to judge? (v.41)
5. How can you demonstrate the reality of the resurrected Christ in your life today? How should it shape your worship?

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The post The Sign of Jonah, Jesus’ Resurrection appeared first on Jimmy Larche.

“Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?” —Romans 2:4

A church was seeking a new pastor and had two different candidates each preach a trial sermon after assigning them the same topic and same text, in order to determine who would be the new pastor. The topic was “Hell.” The man who was not hired asked why and the chairman of the search team said, “You preached on Hell as if you were glad that people were going there, the other Pastor preached on Hell with a tear in his eye.”

Jonah wasn’t shedding tears over Nineveh. Last week, we saw how the God of “second chances” graced Jonah. The prodigal prophet’s journey from the pride of self-righteousness was a slow one, but it was God’s kindness that led him to repentance. Jonah would much rather worship a god of his own making—one who smites the bad guys (the wicked Ninevites) and blesses the good guys (the Hebrew people). Jonah wanted a nationalist god who simply protected his countrymen and punished the pagans, but when the real God—not Jonah’s counterfeit—keeps showing up, it frustrates the misguided prophet. We see this pattern throughout the story of Jonah.

“What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us,” wrote A.W. Tozer. Jonah had to be brought to the end of his self-made god, the god of self-comfort and ethnic prejudices, which he had constructed in his own mind. He had to surrender his life fully to the one true God, having learned the hard way that “God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him” (Acts 10:34-35), and that “The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance” (2 Peter 3:9)—including pagans and gentiles.

God had brought His reluctant prophet to repentance, so Jonah goes to Nineveh and declares God’s Word to them. Yet we still see a subtle tone of Jonah’s callousness at the ill fate of the Ninevites as he simply says: “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” We don’t see much compassion in his sermon. No hint of tears. There was no mention of repentance, of hope, or redemption in turning back to God, just an apparent declaration of doom on these infidels. But, once again, we see pagans demonstrating more sensitivity to what God is up to than the career clergy.

The people of Nineveh “believed God” and it had little to do with the skillfulness of Jonah’s street preaching (we still see his spiritual insensitivity in the next chapter), and a whole lot more to do with amazing grace. We see a marvelous display of the kindness of God leading them to repentance, as the king issues a proclamation of a national fast and commands the people to call on God and turn from their evil ways.

The king says, “Who knows? God may turn and relent and turn from his fierce anger, so that we may not perish.” The phrase “who knows” is an expression of hope. They had more room in their theological box for the possibility of what God could do than Jonah did in his little narrowly crafted theological box. God saw their repentance and relented of the disaster He intended to do to them.

CONSIDER: When have you been guilty of seeing people beyond the reach of hope? In what ways have you made a god after your own image/liking/comfort? Have you been insensitive to the plight of lost souls or calloused to the fate of infidels? Where do you need to recover your “who knows” theology, and be reawakened to the God of wonder, Who is so much bigger than the finite deity we have constructed in our own minds? Whatever your need is in this hour, what might happen if you were once again captivated and marveled by “HIM who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think” (Ephesians 3:20)?

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, forgive us for making you small in our minds, finite in our theology, and anything less than omnipotent in your ability to save the “unsavable” and draw evildoers to repentance. Holy Spirit, touch our calloused hearts and make them tender with compassion and softened with your mercy so that we can be unadulterated ambassadors of the Gospel. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Questions for Reflection and/or Group Discussion

1. In your view, which culture, nation, or special interest group is undeserving of God’s mercy?
2. When have you experienced a surprising, undeserved measure of God’s mercy in your life?
3. How did the people respond to Jonah’s message? (Jonah 3:5) What did the king do? (vv.6-9) What action did God take? (v.10)
4. Why do you think that fasting might be a useful part of repentance?
5. What is one way you can extend God’s love and mercy toward others, particularly those who don’t deserve it?

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The post Making God in Our Image appeared first on Jimmy Larche.

“Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time…” —Jonah 3:1

They called him “Wrong Way” Roy. His gaffe on New Year’s Day, 1929, is often cited as the worst blunder in college football history. When Roy Riegels and his University of California team played Georgia Tech in the Rose Bowl, Riegels picked up a fumble and began to run in the wrong direction. Though he was only 30 yards away from the Yellow Jackets’ end zone, Riegels somehow got disoriented and sprinted in the opposite direction for 69 yards, which turned into a scoring opportunity for Tech.

During halftime, Riegels was humiliated and so distraught that he had to be pressed hard by his coach to return in the second half. Roy said, “Coach, I can’t do it. I’ve ruined you, I’ve ruined myself, I’ve ruined the University of California. I couldn’t face that crowd to save my life.” Coach Nibs Price responded by saying “Roy, get up and go back out there—the game is only half over.” And those Tech players might tell you that they had never seen a man play football as Roy Riegels played in that second half.

Jonah was a prophet of God, called with a specific purpose, who ran in the opposite direction of which the Lord had called him. Much more significant than humiliating oneself on a gridiron and disappointing a fickle fan base, Jonah put countless lives at risk, including 120,000 who were helpless and doomed apart from the message he was commissioned to bring them. Eternity hung in the balances. Jonah certainly blew it in the scheme of God’s plan for his life. He had failed the Lord, himself, and many others. The story would’ve ended there had his God not been faithful, good, and full of grace.

After being vomited by the great fish the Lord had appointed to swallow him, we see that “the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time.” Jonah had a head-on collision with a “second chance” God. He rose and went to Nineveh according to the word of the Lord, entered the city, and began his street-preaching ministry. Amazing things happened as the Ninevites believed God and called for a fast, from the greatest to the least of them.

Aren’t you thankful that we serve a God of second chances? We read a Bible chock-full of “second chance” stories. Abraham lied, yet still became the father of faith. Sarah laughed at God, yet still went on to bear a child at an unlikely age. Noah got drunk. Samson was immoral. Rahab had been a prostitute before a second chance landed her in the lineage of Jesus! David was an adulterer and a murderer. Elijah was suicidal. Peter denied Jesus before his second chance put him on a platform preaching the Gospel to thousands on the day of Pentecost.

Where have you gaffed it up for God? What have been your spiritual blunders or moral failures? When have you run from God in pursuit of your own comfort or selfish ambition? Have you been humiliated, disgraced, shamed, or judged as a failure by others? What if we pointed the arrow in a different direction: have you been guilty of judging others as unworthy of God’s grace and mercy—undeserving of second chances? Jonah’s rebellion speaks so loudly to our own failures, our own brokenness, our own prejudices, our own judgmentalism, and our own need to be rescued from ourselves. In Jesus, we have such a Rescuer.

In 1991, Roy Riegels was inducted into the Rose Bowl Hall of Fame. He wasn’t defined by one bad play, as humiliating as it was. Your story isn’t over either, because our God has a really good track record of turning second chances into stories of triumph. Think about that as you seek to abide in Him this week.

PRAYER

God, thank you for second chances. Because of your grace, our failures don’t have to define us. Our best days are still ahead of us because of you hold our future. Thank you for that assurance. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Questions for Reflection and/or Group Discussion

1. Do you have a favorite “second chance” story?
2. In what way did God give Jonah a second chance? (Jonah 3:1-2) What did Jonah tell the Ninevites? (v.4) How did the people respond to Jonah’s message? (v.5)
3. When have you experienced a surprising, undeserved measure of God’s mercy in your life?
4. Why do you think that fasting might be a useful part of repentance?
5. How can you express thanks to the Lord this week for all the love and mercy He has given to you and others?

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The post The God of Second Chances appeared first on Jimmy Larche.

“When my life was fainting away, I remembered the LORD, and my prayer came to you, into your holy temple.” —Jonah 2:7

When a humpback whale off Herring Cove Beach swallowed Michael Packard, it was utter darkness for the veteran lobster diver. “I was completely inside; it was completely black,” Packard said. “I thought to myself, ‘there’s no way I’m getting out of here. I’m done, I’m dead.’ All I could think of was my boys — they’re 12 and 15 years old.”

Can you imagine that feeling of despair? For Jonah, it was three days of utter and complete darkness. He had been guilty of judging who was worthy or not worthy of God’s grace. He would rather see his enemies perish than for them to experience mercy and forgiveness. So he “sailed” away from God’s mission and tried to do his own thing. It didn’t go well. God was faithful to send one crisis after another in an attempt to rescue Jonah from himself, reset his heart, and correct his vision.

In an incredible twist of fate, the drifting prophet now finds himself in a place where he needs mercy more than those he had denied mercy. Had Jonah been as desperate for those unlovable Ninevites as God was relentlessly desperate for him, he would’ve never been in this predicament. But now he is “bottomed out” and crying out to God from the reeking belly of a fish.

There is much we can glean from Jonah’s prayer of desperation. We see that he uses language from the Psalms, revealing that Jonah was a man who knew God’s Word, and knew it by heart, because there would’ve been no Bible and no candle in the fish’s belly. In order to survive the torture of a Nazi concentration camp, Corrie Ten Boom spoke of relying on the memory of scripture that had been stored in her heart. Don’t underestimate the importance of hiding God’s Word in your heart because you never know when your desperation will make you lean upon it more than your next meal.

We can also see how Jonah’s prayer reveals the way he interprets his circumstances. Jonah said to God, “For you cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas.” He doesn’t blame the sailors because he recognizes that God was working sovereignly through them. Joseph once told the brothers who had beaten and betrayed him, “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Genesis 50:20). There is nothing like a grim dark night of the soul to prune our hearts, humble us, retract those accusatory fingers we are pointing at others, and recalibrate our perspective. God’s ways are so much higher than ours (Isaiah 55:9), and we drift when we fail to trust His process.

But perhaps the most important lesson we can pull from Jonah’s prayer is the element of remembrance. “When my life was fainting away,” Jonah cried, “I remembered the LORD, and my prayer came to you…” (v.7). That remembrance of God’s character, faithfulness, and sovereignty over our lives can reset us with sincere gratitude, humble surrender (sacrifice), and renewed vows as we see in verse 9. At the conclusion of his prayer, the Lord spoke to the fish and it vomited Jonah out upon the dry land. His salvation was by grace alone, for Jonah had done nothing to deserve being rescued.

Consider: Where do you find yourself desperate right now? Financial hardship? Loneliness? Anxiety? Fractured relationships or family dysfunction? Disconnect with your spouse? Prodigal children drifting away from the Lord? Debilitating illness? Anger at the world? A deficiency of compassion or mercy? It is good to “remember” the heart of the Father and His relentlessness love for us. In the belly of a fish there isn’t much you can control, but you can still trust the heart of God even when you can’t see His hand. Because God is good, a fish’s belly doesn’t have to be a pit of despair but a recalibration of HOPE.

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, thank you that you never give up on us. Your unfailing love and relentless pursuit to rescue us from ourselves is our only refuge. May we be good stewards of the mercy and grace you have given us. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Questions for Reflection and/or Group Discussion

1. When have you found it hard to be merciful to others?
2. Once inside the fish, how did Jonah respond to God’s rescue? (Jonah 2:1-9)
3. What was Jonah’s attitude toward God? (vv.7-9)
4. How has God pursued you when you have drifted or tried to avoid Him? In what ways have you been, or not been, a steward of His grace?
5. When have bad circumstances turned out for your good? How do you want to thank the Lord right now for all of the remarkable ways He has delivered you?

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The post Mercy at the Bottom appeared first on Jimmy Larche.

“Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent.” —Revelation 3:19

It’s been over thirty years and yet I can still remember sitting in the Marion Regional Juvenile Detention Center like it was yesterday. My teenage incarceration felt like the end of my life at the time, but little did I know then it was just the beginning. As I wrote about in my book 13-Foot Coffins, God used those dire circumstances of getting locked up to bring me into a real relationship with Jesus and to be awakened to a whole new perspective and purpose in life.

Uncomfortable and painful circumstances are never meant to diminish us, but God can certainly use them to recalibrate us to what He is up to and what He is speaking into our lives. As C.S. Lewis observed:

“Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”

Jonah had been on the run from God. He put others at risk and failed to see the Ninevites through a lens of compassion—being worthy of his time and ministry. But God hurled a great storm upon the sea of Jonah’s rebellion and then He “appointed” a great fish to swallow up the renegade prophet. That massive aquatic beast was God’s megaphone to rouse Jonah, who was demonstrating tone-deafness to God’s mission and people who needed his ministry.

When giving attention to this dramatic story in the Old Testament, people often get sidetracked by the possibility of being swallowed up by such a literal marine creature and then surviving to tell about it. We don’t know exactly what kind of a fish this was. The Bible isn’t specific. Some scholars speculate it was a species of whale. To get stuck on this debate is to miss the main point, which is what we know unambiguously: God, Who is capable of doing anything that He wants to do in order to get our attention, sent a “lifeboat” fish to rescue Jonah from himself.

Jesus himself declared the veracity of Jonah’s story in Matthew 12:40, where he confirmed the account of Jonah being three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish. God loved Jonah too much to let him get away. The physical texture of what swallowed up Jonah is not as important as the fact that God “appointed” uncomfortable circumstances to stop Jonah in his tracks and to give him a chance to turn around, course-correct, and realign himself to God’s pleasure and purposes.

We are too much like Jonah. Too often we look at obedience through the lens of comfort, security, and self-preservation, rather than taking up our cross daily and dying to self. Whenever we default to “what’s-in-it-for-me” over servanthood sacrifices, we look a lot like Jonah. Yielding to individualism instead of togetherness with God’s family is very much a Jonah-like portrait. Whenever we find ourselves judging who is and is not worthy of God’s mercy and grace, we are sadly in the same boat as Jonah. It’s been inferred that Jonah may have spent time sulking in self-pity in the fish’s belly for a while before finally repenting and fully seeking God. Perhaps.

CONSIDER: God doesn’t give up on us in our nomadic selfish wandering. He loves us too much to let us sail off pleasantly into the sunset of our spiritual delinquency. He can and will appoint uncomfortable circumstances that may feel very much like the innards of a dark and smelly fish, but never with the intention of crushing us, but to rescue us from ourselves. God disciplines those whom He loves. When we sense that discipline, it is good to be reminded we are loved by the Father and take time to meditate on what He may graciously and patiently be course-correcting in us.

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, the fact that grace does not immunize us to your discipline is a beautiful token of your love for us. Give us the understanding to recognize your discipline, and the wisdom to seek you fully when you bring course-correction to our hearts. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Questions for Reflection and/or Group Discussion

1. When has God used uncomfortable circumstances in your life to bring about course-correction or a change in perspective?
2. Jonah was guilty of judging who was worthy or not worthy of God’s mercy. When have you caught yourself in this prideful posture?
3. In what ways can you relate to Jonah’s wandering ways? (Lack of mercy? Callousness? Individualism? Self-preservation? Other?)
4. Why is it important for us to be reminded that God disciplines those whom He loves? How is discipline attached to grace or mercy?
5. Is there a posture in your heart that needs to be realigned with the heart of God? Is there a particular sin or sinful pattern of which you need to repent?

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The post God’s Megaphone of Pain appeared first on Jimmy Larche.

“Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows.” —Jonah 1:16

There has been no shortage of talk around the idea of the church looking like the world, but we don’t talk too much about when the world looks more like the church than the church itself.

What a travesty when political alliances have more unity in their agendas than brothers and sisters in Christ do with the Gospel that has been entrusted to them. What about when “the lost” demonstrate more love and kindness to the marginalized than “the saved,” or when unbelievers show more hospitality to the downtrodden than do believers? (A sharp contrast Jesus illustrated in the story of the Good Samaritan.)

Jesus rebuked those hardcore Pharisees because their rigid devotion to scriptures was nullified by a spiritual blindness that was juxtaposed by the fact that tax collectors and prostitutes where entering the kingdom of God before them (Matthew 21:31). I’m remembering where Paul told Timothy that one who is negligent in providing for their own household is “worse” than unbelievers (1 Timothy 5:8), or when Jesus said the “sons of this world” are more shrewd than the “sons of light” (Luke 16:8). We have so many contrasts in scripture to when religious outsiders are looking more kingdom-friendly, kingdom-minded, or kingdom-principled than the insiders.

We see that contrast in the first chapter of Jonah’s story as well. Pagan sailors seem to have more sensitivity and awareness to things God is doing around them than does Jonah, who ironically is a “prophet.” They appear to have more diligence in wanting to save lives than God’s messenger, who has checked out of his missional assignment and doesn’t care all that much if the Ninevites perish without a shot at repentance. Jonah claims to “fear the Lord” (v.9), but his actions contradict his confession.

Charles Spurgeon once preached a sermon about the actions of the ship’s crewmen in this chapter. Just as the disciples did in the boat when Jesus calmed the storm (Mark 4:35-41), the shipmen around Jonah move from fearing the storm to fearing the Lord. Spurgeon described this process as an evolution of sinners being tossed upon the sea of conviction at the weight of their own sin to making desperate efforts to save themselves, to the sorrow or anguish of not being able to save themselves, to finding ultimate HOPE in the sacrifice of another on their account.

After Jonah was tossed into the sea, the immediate ceasing of the storm proved that Jonah’s God was not just real, but sovereign over all. In the most logical response to His supremacy, the crewmen “feared the Lord exceedingly,” offered a sacrifice of worship to God, and made vows to serve Him. Spurgeon went on to say:

“Brethren, I wish I had meet words with which I could fitly describe the peace which comes to a human heart when we learn to see Jesus cast into the sea of divine wrath on our account. Conscience accuses no longer. Judgment now decides for the sinner instead of against him. Memory can look back upon past sins, with sorrow for the sin it is true, but yet with no dread of any penalty to come. It is a blessed thing for a man to know that he cannot be punished, that heaven and earth may shake, but he cannot be punished for his sin.”

When I think of how Christ took all of my sins upon Calvary’s cross, how Jesus bled and died for my transgressions, the only logical response that is fitting is to worship and follow Him. There are times when we can learn important life lessons from “pagans,” and never more importantly than when they bring us back to humble repentance, confession of our deficiencies, and renewed vows of faithful service to the Lord. Think about that as you seek to abide in Him this week.

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, convict us of where our actions have contradicted our confession of beliefs, and in your grace teach us how to follow the way of Jesus in humility and faithful obedience. In His holy name, Amen.

Questions for Reflection and/or Group Discussion

1. When have you observed unbelievers looking more “kingdom-principled” or even more like Jesus than believers?
2. What can we learn from the irony of Jonah being a “prophet” (one who should be sensitive to the calling of God), while yet demonstrating such insensitivity to the Lord and callousness about the fate of others?
3. When have you been insensitive to the Lord’s calling on your life, or failed to consider the ways your disobedience affects others?
4. In what ways has the Gospel awakened your senses, illuminated your deficiencies, and caused you to worship God more intentionally?
5. Is the Holy Spirit prompting you to make any vows or renew any spiritual disciplines that would help you flesh out obedience in your faith?

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The post When Believers Must Learn From Unbelievers appeared first on Jimmy Larche.