"Drastic Measures"

"But the Lord sent out a great wind into the sea, and there was a mighty tempest in the sea, so that the ship was like to be broken. Then the mariners were afraid, and cried every man unto his god, and cast forth the wares that were in the ship into the sea, to lighten it of them. But Jonah was gone down into the sides of the ship; and he lay, and was fast asleep." Jonah 1:4,5

Jonah received the word from the Lord to go preach to Nineveh that they repent or He would destroy them. But instead of obeying, Jonah rebelled and tried to run from the Lord. He boarded a ship heading in the opposite direction of Nineveh. While he was on the ship a storm arose. The storm was so bad that the sailors were afraid, they cried out to their gods, they threw their cargo overboard, they bailed water out of the ship and were preparing themselves to die. The whole time this was taking place Jonah was sound asleep in the bottom of the boat. Jonah must have been pretty comfortable to be able to sleep through such a storm.

The Lord will send/allow a storm to come into our lives if we have reached a place where we are comfortable in our rebellion and disobedience to Him. When we get comfortable in our sins, He will cause a storm to begin to wake us up out of our comfort zone.

Does He do this for our destruction? Never. He does it because of His great love. Whom the Father loves He chastens. He knows that if we go in the wrong direction and we get comfortable there, it will lead to our harm. He sends it as a "wake up call" so that we will get up, face the truth and turn back in His direction.

Even though the Lord sent the storm to wake Jonah up, He also sent a big fish to save Jonah and keep him from being destroyed. The Lord is never out to harm us. He loves us so much that if He needs to, He will go to drastic measures to save us- save us from our rebellion, save us from sin, save us from destruction. The storm and the whale were drastic measures to reach this rebellious prophet, but they can never compare with the drastic measure the Lord went to when He sent His only begotten Son Jesus to die on the cross to save us and turn us to Him.

Have a great day. The Lord loves us so much that He will go to whatever measure He has to to wake us up when we have become comfortable going in the wrong direction.

For further reading:
Jonah 1
Hebrews 12:5-10
John 3:16
Romans 5:8

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Coffee Break is a morning devotional written by Lorraine Ezell
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