Series: When God Isn’t There Week 9: Safe in the Dark
JONAH 1:1. Jonah was not only trying to escape the presence of God, he was trying to run from the will of God.
We don’t get to decide when God is absent or present.
Neither the steps of your feet, nor the sin or your life can move you one inch away from God’s love if you are in Christ Jesus.
Don’t forget: when Jonah told the sailors to throw him overboard, he knew nothing of the fish that would swallow him. Jonah was resigning himself to death. Jonah sought death as a means of complete absence from God.
Jonah fled in fear & disobedience. He asked to be tossed to his death out of guilt & defeat. JONAH 1:12. When those storms come, it’s easy to think the only way things will calm down is if we just give up.
Encountering the inescapable presence of God as a guilty sinner can cause us to consider terrible things, for our guilt is terrible.
JONAH 1:17. God often arranges our circumstances to be what is needed for us to best experience His presence—even if that experience feels like absence or darkness.
The light of God’s closeness can cause the darkness of His absence.
Sometimes when God draws close to provide for us, it throws us into darkness.
PSALM 39:13.
The darkness is the presence & provision of God. The darkness of our souls may be the very means by which God rescues us. The darkness is safe because it keeps us from leaning upon ourselves.
The darkness is safe because it moves us toward God & His plan, even if we are unaware of it.
MATTHEW 12:38-40. The sign of Jonah is the resurrection of Jesus from the grave.
The hope we must cling to through the dark nights of our souls must not be just to escape. It must be to remain in the divine Light no matter how hard.
Our assurance does not come from how we feel.
We often believe that whatever we feel is true.
This is where the good news of the sign of Jonah comes in: salvation is not based on our assurance but on Christ’s resurrection.
