John 3:17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.
For the next week or so we’ll be looking closely at the life of Jonah the prophet. Jonah was told to “preach against the city of Nineveh”, that was in the ancient kingdom of Assyria. Nineveh was a major city on the banks of the Tigris River about 500 miles north and east of where Jonah was; located on a contemporary map in modern Iraq, about 300 miles north of Baghdad. Archaeologists have found the ruins of ancient Nineveh right outside the Iraqi city of Mosul.
When God said Nineveh was wicked, he wasn’t kidding. Nineveh was the capital of Assyria, the most powerful empire in the world in that day. The Assyrians had a reputation for cruelty that is hard for us to fathom. Their specialty was brutality of a gross and disgusting kind. When their armies captured a city or country, unspeakable atrocities would occur. Things like skinning people alive, decapitation, mutilation, ripping out the tongues, making a pyramid of human heads, piercing the chin with a rope and forcing prisoners to live in kennels like dogs. Ancient records from Assyria boast of this kind of cruelty as a badge of courage and power. Sad to say, the saying – “History repeats itself”, truly fits in this case!
So we ought to remember this context when we consider God’s command to Jonah, and the prophet’s response. Suppose God spoke to you today, “Go and preach the gospel to the Islamic State! Or go and preach to the Taliban!” Think you might respond, “Ahem God – they’re terrorists! Let’s nuke ’em; send ’em right where they belong!” But the heart of God is merciful. He wants to bring people to repentance so He can forgive, rather than bring judgment. He desires to save…even the most wicked and hardened individuals!
So here’s what I think: There’s a little Jonah in all of us and a whole lot of Jonah in most of us. We’re praying for the Christians fleeing Syria, Iraq, and Turkey – but what about the wicked terrorists who are killing, torturing, and persecuting them? Do you have an “Assyrian” in your life? Is someone truly worthy of your hatred? Rather than pray for him, you’d be glad for him to meet God face to face today? Our Heavenly Father rebuked Jonah the prophet for his own hardness of heart and lack of compassion. So the story of Jonah is about the heart of God, who desires all men to be saved. He wants us to have the same heart.
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[worthy_plugins_devotion_single_body]The children of Israel were delivered into the hands of the Philistines for 40 years for doing evil in the sight of YHVH. Then a wonderful event takes place: an announcement to a barren and childless woman that she will conceive and bear a son. The announcement is given by one who is called “malach-YHVH”, literally “Angel (of) YHVH. This messenger, in two separate appearances, reveals God’s commandments concerning the boy to be born. At the angel’s behest, the couple offers a sacrifice to YHVH, then they ask to be told his name.
This interesting passage speaks of a time when Israel had no blacksmiths to make weapons and was without any armament to defend themselves. The enemy had succeeded to disarm Israel by removing their weapons, and those who forged them! He’s attempting the same tactic today.
From the moment we were conceived we began aging, growing older by the day. We may slow down the physical aging process by exercising, eating right and other natural techniques – but we cannot ultimately stop it. This mortal flesh, our outer man, is “wasting away” and moving toward decay as we await the immortal bodies promised us in the Resurrection.
In his letter to the Colossians, Paul reveals the prophetic nature of Shabbat and the Biblical Feasts as “shadows of things to come”, whose substance is the Messiah Yeshua (Jesus). My study of the feasts therefore seeks to discover their relevance to the Lord, His identity, work, and purpose for my life in relationship to Him.
A few years ago, I was in a debate with an atheist who had a legal background, and the Lord gave me a revelation about the tactics of the enemy. At Yeshua’s first coming, his tactic was to destroy the infant before He could grow up; [Revelation 12:4-5]. After the Lord’s death and resurrection, Satan continued his direct assault by attacking the church through persecution, which lasted through the first three centuries. The tactics of the enemy were to destroy any “eyewitnesses” of God’s goodness.
An interesting parallel exists between these two passages of scripture: Isaiah 53:9 and Acts 3:15. Isaiah renders the “death” of the messiah in the plural form, “deaths” (“motav”). Acts renders the life of the Prince of Life as “lives” (“chaim”). Some scholars suggest that the plurality of the word death indicates a violent death this servant would suffer, and that making the noun plural is a way of emphasizing the terrible intensity of his experience. Jewish counter-missionaries suggest that the “death” in plural shows that the suffering servant is not an individual man, but a group of people, specifically the nation of Israel, thus denying that the passage refers to an individual messianic figure.
Proverbs says the “highway of the upright is to depart from evil”. It’s a highway — a way of life so to speak. And this proverb coincides with the central teaching of Yeshua (Jesus) — “Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand.” What does it mean to repent? The Greek Word is “metanoia” which simply means to change your mind about sin or to depart from evil.