Jonah 2
BLIND unbelief may at its peril hold that no fish ever made could have swallowed Jonah alive and whole, and that it is impossible for life to continue in any living thing after it has been swallowed. To the Christian all is simple, — “The Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah.” The Maker of heaven and earth and sea and land, and all that is on and in them is not restricted from designing and making a special monster for an occasion that calls for it, or causing one of the regular inhabitants of the sea to do this extraordinary service for Him. Also, be it said, that to deny the truth of the account of the great fish is to challenge the words of the Son of God in Matthew 12:4040For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. (Matthew 12:40).
It is good to see Jonah praying. He, we may be sure, had not prayed very much about the voyage that he undertook in disobedience, but now he prayed to the Lord, as it is said, his God, God whom he now knew as His own in a way he had not known Him before.
The apostle Paul, having learned by experience God’s sufficiency for all his needs, could say to the poor Philippian saints (chapter 4:19) “My God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.”
Jonah was however, a type or foreshadowing of the Jewish remnant of the last days, as he was also of the Lord when He was, as He said, “three days and three nights in the heart of the earth” (Matthew 12:4040For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. (Matthew 12:40)). Jonah’s strange experience was the result of his own sin, but Christ suffered only for others, for the sins of His people. Both were rejected, put out of the world, but for causes how vastly different!
As a type of the remnant yet to be, Jonah is seen to be an unfaithful witness for God, but preserved by Him, and presently to be brought out for His glory in the earth. In deep affliction because of their sins, they will cry to Him for deliverance, and will be heard (Psalms 42, 77, 88, 102).
Hell (verse 2) as has been remarked in another case is not the lake of fire; the marginal note in the King James Bible reads “or, the grave”, but this is not correct. When death occurs, the soul returns to God’s keeping. In John 5 the Lord tells of two resurrections, in one or other of which all will be raised who have died. One of these will include only believers; the other will include only the unbelieving. In Luke 16, the Lord has given a view of the present state of the departed, and we see that there are two classes there, the saved and the lost, though they are separated, and in widely different cases. When the martyr Stephen died, he prayed and said, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit” (Acts 7:5959And they stoned Stephen, calling upon God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. (Acts 7:59)), and the apostle Paul in Philippians 1 told of his pressing desire to depart (that is, to die) and to be with Christ. Jonah, however was not in Sheol, though brought down in the experience of his soul very near to death.
When his soul fainted within him, he remembered Jehovah (verse 7). Thus was God’s purpose to bless His servant attained. Then was it that prayer came up to God from him, and Jonah now adds his note of thanksgiving and “Salvation is of Jehovah.” When God is thus owned, He brings the tried saint out of his circumstances well-nigh overwhelming; the great fish that had been ordered to swallow him, is now commanded to put him on the dry land, and does so.
ML 03/07/1937