Recovery Devotional 332 The Burden of the Yoke

JMD Devotional 332 Jonah 2:10, 3:1-10 The Burden of the Yoke

2:10 And the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land.

3:1-10 AND THE word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach and cry out to it the preaching that I tell you. So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city of three days' journey [sixty miles in circumference]. And Jonah began to enter into the city a day's journey, and he cried, Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown! So the people of Nineveh believed in God and proclaimed a fast and put on sackcloth [in penitent mourning], from the greatest of them even to the least of them. For word came to the king of Nineveh [of all that had happened to Jonah, and his terrifying message from God], and he arose from his throne and he laid his robe aside, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he made proclamation and published through Nineveh, By the decree of the king and his nobles: Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything; let them not feed nor drink water. But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth and let them cry mightily to God. Yes, let every one turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands. Who can tell, God may turn and revoke His sentence against us [when we have met His terms], and turn away from His fierce anger so that we perish not. And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God revoked His [sentence of] evil that He had said that He would do to them and He did not do it [for He was comforted and eased concerning them].

God often sends us where we do not want to go, to minister to people that we do not like. If we forget who we are serving we will try to tailor our ministry to suit our personal taste and prejudices: but true ministry is ordained of God, and He sends us where we will. Jonah had a strong cultural bias against the people of Nineveh; but God had compassion on them and brought about a great revival. God, of course, knew that they worshipped a ‘fish god’; and that they would take seriously a man coming out of a great fish’s mouth warning of the judgment to come! Jesus’ yoke is easy; we make it hard when we judge people as being unworthy of the Gospel.

Dear God,

Help me not to be like the Clansmen who misuse Your Bible, vainly believing that You share their prejudices! Purge my heart of racial bias and animosity. Free me from only wanting to witness to ‘nice people’; the truly rotten dredge of humanity need You the most. May I not think that I am too good for Your work, too conceited for Your specific calling, too particular to condescend to any retched soul in need. God forbid! Transform my thinking, and give me a heart of compassion for the objects of Your mercy. Make me faithful to Your calling to be an effective witness for Jesus Christ. ANY mission that is from You is good enough for me!

Amen

All (but*) quotes are from The Amplified Bible, published by

the Lockman Foundation. (AMP)

Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation

*New International Version (NIV)

Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society

**Scripture taken from The Message. Copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group. (Eugene Peterson's easy-to-read, contemporary Scripture translation)

I originally produced these blogs between 2006 and 2007, which were then published in my book, JMD Recovery Devotionals. In 2010, I am sending these out to a few people as I review them and see if my point of view has changed.

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