SYMPATHY WITH THE MIND OF GOD AS TO HIS TESTIMONY
[p. 27] SYMPATHY WITH THE MIND OF GOD AS TO HIS TESTIMONY
Summary of Reading Jonah 1 and 2 This book helps us to see that God was not limited to Israel in Old Testament times, and we see here the way God educates His servants in order that they may be sympathetic with His mind at any moment. God turns Jonah’s self-will to account, and disciplines him, so that in result he goes to Nineveh as having passed through this peculiar experience. The book shows that he fell short in his sympathies with God, yet ultimately he went to Nineveh as a man who had been through death in figure.
The apostle had to tell the Jews that salvation was sent to the Gentiles and they would hear; (Acts 28:28). It comes to us through the true Jonah, the One who is in entire sympathy with God, who came preaching the glad tidings of peace to those who are near and to those who are far off. In such an One the gospel testimony has been presented to us.
The book gives us the foreshadowing of the gospel coming to the Gentiles through Christ. It is only a shadow, of course. Christ was the perfect Preacher. There are three great preachers in the Old Testament, Solomon, Nebuchadnezzar, and Jonah. Nebuchadnezzar preached to all his realm after his wonderful experience under the discipline of God. See Daniel 4:1. “Nebuchadnezzar the king, unto all people, nations, and languages, that dwell in all the earth; Peace be multiplied unto you”. Then he proceeds to outline what had happened to him and in the last verse says, “those that walk in pride he [God] is able to abase”. It is a wonderful message to send to all the inhabitants of the world by one who had been through things with God. A preacher is one who [p. 28] has gone through things with God. This is necessary if God is to be presented rightly. How much the great apostle of the Gentiles suffered in order that the compassions of God in relation to all men might be developed in his soul! The word says, “I will show him how great things he must suffer for my name’s sake”, (Acts 9:16).
When we extend the thought to Christ, what a sense we get of what He has gone through, as, after all, He is the anointed Preacher, and the principle that comes out in Solomon is that the preacher is king. It is not that the king is preacher, but the preacher is king. Solomon is the outstanding preacher of the Old Testament, he is called such. One who is king has access to all, has right of way. The book of Acts shows how the king has acquired right of way. Satan aimed at the twelve, and in connection with the persecution by Saul, the enemy made a great attempt to blot out the testimony. But the Lord came in as King, meeting Saul and breaking him down as he went out of Jerusalem accredited by the high priest with authority to imprison all whom he found “of this way”, as it says in Acts 9: 2. The Lord came in in authority and subdued Saul, so that instead of his being any longer an opposer, he is employed by the King to preach. We can reckon on the Lord in heaven making a way for the preaching. This is seen here in principle in the way God uses the elements, such as the raging of the sea; all is to the end that the preacher may go to Nineveh.
So one is able to lift up one’s head in the sense that the Lord is making way for us. “No one shall set on thee to hurt thee”, He said to the apostle in Acts 18:10. God saw to that; He guarded His servant. In Acts 16 we read that Paul and Silas attempted to go to Bithynia, but “the Spirit of Jesus suffered them not”. They must go this way, to Macedonia. “Assuredly gathering”, they say “[p. 29] that the Lord had called us for to preach the gospel unto them”; so that everything works for the accomplishment of the Lord’s will.
It is remarkable that Jonah complains. We read of another who went down to Joppa, Simon Peter, and who had to be called away in view of preaching to the Gentiles; and we see the same principle that comes out here in the course God took to bring him into sympathy with His own outlook. It is noticeable that while God uses the Jewish apostles there is not the same sympathy seen in them with the work of God as in Paul. Things were in Jonah’s favour, too. It is remarkable the sympathy the boatmen had with him. They tried to row to the shore, but God’s power was greater than their oars. He would see to it that His servant should go back. It is wonderful that it should pleased God to take up such as Jonah. He could have sent one of the angels, and the message would have been carried at once, but it must be by Jonah.
We were noticing last night in Nehemiah 9 how the priests and Levites speak to Jehovah, and address Him as “Thou art he”, or “the Same”. He had called Himself “I am” in committing Himself to them. He told Moses to tell Israel that He was “I am”, the existing One, and in Nehemiah they respond, saying, “Thou art he”. They had proved He was what He said He was. It is a God whom you have learned and proved that you present to others. Jonah had a great opportunity, because he had proved God in this wonderful way. He had been kept alive in the fish, and brought to land, and thus learned that “Salvation is of the Lord”, (Psalm 3:8). So it was for him now to present this. He would preach what was in his heart. So the power of God operates in you experimentally, before you can use it in service. Paul refers to himself as a vessel of mercy, the chief of sinners. And we are said to be [p. 30] vessels of mercy. We present what is in our hearts. Paul said to the elders of Ephesus, “I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God”, (Acts 20:27). He kept back nothing. Obviously Jonah kept back a good deal, but God would not be thwarted. “And should not I spare Nineveh”, He says, “that great city, wherein are more than six score thousand persons”. Jonah should have thought of them, “and also much cattle”. Jonah should have thought of the cattle. God had given him an opportunity of being sympathetic with all.
I suppose in coming to the point of paying his vow Jonah recognised he belonged to Jehovah, and would now yield himself to Jehovah; he would not allow his will to carry him away. It is like Romans 12:1, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable [or intelligent] service”. “Intelligent” would refer to what you have gone through. Christians do not make vows in detail, but you get the spirit of a vow in Christianity. The paying of a vow is very important. It is a question of whose I am. Am I wholly for God?
Jonah accepts the obvious judgment of God on him. The men would have rowed him to shore, but the waves were against him, and Jehovah knew that. God comes in when Jonah accepts this. No one is any good until he reaches this point; the judgment of God is accepted. What we see here is the righteous judgment of God on a man pursuing his own will; he must be cast into the sea; but when judgment is accepted, God comes in for him. When in a stormy sea it is well to come to it that God has a point to be reached, and the moment that is arrived at God comes in. The storm will arise and the waves beat until the judgment of God is accepted, and then it comes to light how God has [p. 31] been working to preserve the man. But primarily his will has to be broken. “Now the Lord had prepared a great fish”, the word says, “to swallow up Jonah”. What stupidity of infidels to say that the throat of the fish could not hold Jonah! If God prepared the fish, he would take care of the size of its throat.
God is in supreme control. He would bring up this wonderful product from the depths of the sea. Did the sea ever send out such a product before? Never! Think of the sea giving up such a person, a man who could speak as he did, a living man who could praise God. “My prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple”, Jonah says, and adds, “I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed”. The temple is before him. The Psalms, and this is one, give the great result for God, they are the outgoings of the heart of a man who knew God. Jonah thinks of the temple and of sacrifice to God. So in Acts 16 the prison is turned into a temple; the fish’s belly is turned into that here. Priestly exercises went on there. Jonah thought of God, and prayed to Him, and came to it that “Salvation is of Jehovah”. All this went on, and then it says, “The Lord spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land”.
One is reminded of Christ, Jonah’s great Antitype, where He speaks of God inhabiting the praises of Israel; (Psalm 22:3). From the depths of death He considered for God in His holy temple. What marks a priest, however dark the situation for him circumstantially, is consideration for God; and God’s answer to that is that He must bring that kind of man out of death, for He needs him here in the testimony; hence when we think of Christ, all the affections that clustered around Him as Man were [p. 32] operative in raising Him. He was raised by the Father’s glory. He speaks only to God, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” but He goes on, “Thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel”. That was God’s place There is no complaint, but priestly concern for God Then, after all is accomplished, He can say, “Father into thy hands I commend my spirit”. (Luke 23:46) Earlier He had said, “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do”. (verse 34) A priestly spirit is manifest all through His sufferings. The whole system of praise was present to His heart at that moment. In resurrection He brings in the assembly, not only that He inhabits the praises of Israel, but the assembly is introduced. We should not be satisfied with being preachers merely.
Let us be priests first. As to our order we are already priests, but am I a priest by intelligence? The Lord left a company of priests in the temple before He sent them forth as preachers. A stormy scene helps us; it is not against us; it is part of our education. There seemed no hope for Jonah, but God prepared a fish. Swallowing up is a very humiliating process. The ark of gopher wood which Noah made suggests dignity. Noah is in charge, and he goes in, then the others follow, but here the experience is most humiliating. Of Christ Himself it was said, “he was crucified through weakness”, (2 Corinthians 13:4). He was three days and three nights “in the heart of the earth”, (Matthew 12:40). What a solemn side this presents. The fish swallowed up Jonah. How admirably fitted this creature was to bring about the experience necessary for Jonah! “Out of the belly of hell cried I”, he says. It refers to the grave, I suppose. Then he goes on to describe his experiences. “Thou hadst cast me into the deep in the midst of the seas ... ... all thy billows and thy waves passed over me”, verse. 3. The waves of the ¶ Mediterranean were God’s waves, showing how creation is utilised by God for His discipline.
With a priestly spirit there is discrimination as to each feature of suffering. It is seen here in Jonah, and when we think of the Lord, everything was felt by Him intensely and perfectly.
The second message tells Jonah again to go to Nineveh. It would seem as if God said, ‘Now Jonah, I have not changed my mind’, and the use of the word preaching in chapter 3:2 would suggest something. God assumes now that Jonah is fitted so that there can be preaching. We are not told what it was to be; we only know what he said. With Christ everything was told out.