November 29, 2022

Jonah 2  (HCSB)
Jonah’s Prayer
2 Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from inside the fish: 2 I called to the Lord in my distress, and He answered me. I cried out for help in the belly of Sheol; You heard my voice. 3 You threw me into the depths, into the heart of the seas, and the current overcame me. All Your breakers and Your billows swept over me. 4 But I said: I have been banished from Your sight, yet I will look once more toward Your holy temple. 5 The waters engulfed me up to the neck; the watery depths overcame me; seaweed was wrapped around my head. 6 I sank to the foundations of the mountains; the earth with its prison bars closed behind me forever! But You raised my life from the Pit, Lord my God! 7 As my life was fading away, I remembered Yahweh. My prayer came to You, to Your holy temple. 8 Those who cling to worthless idols forsake faithful love, 9 but as for me, I will sacrifice to You with a voice of thanksgiving. I will fulfill what I have vowed. Salvation is from the Lord! 10 Then the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.

Erin Robertson
“I know you are a gracious God/I know You’re slow to anger. But I misunderstood Your love/Forgive me, God, for running.” “Nineveh” by Brooke Ligertwood. There are few things harder for me than admitting I’m wrong. I can be stubborn. (If you ever meet my Mom, ask her about me holding my breath until I passed out as a toddler!) But God is gracious. He will forgive, but we have to ask. Did you turn away from God, doing that same sin you seem to be stuck in a loop doing? Verse 2 says Jonah calls “from the depths of the grave”. Guess what? God can still hear you from those places. Call out to Him. Repent of your sins. I’ll end with this St. Augustine quote- “There is no saint without a past, no sinner without a future.”