Adding To Your Faith
Adding to Your Faith is all about helping you understand biblical principals and workshop biblical practices in a way that shapes and forms us into the image of Jesus Christ.
Adding To Your Faith
How Three Days In Darkness Reveals God’s Sovereignty ("2 Questions" Day 5)
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When he was thrown overboard, Jonah most certainly must have expected to die. Instead, God rescued him in a most unusual and most unexpected way. In this episode, Rachael and Matt share questions about Jonah and a great fish, while discussing observations about God's dramatic and unexpected intervention.
Click Here for week two homework sheet
BEFORE this episode: Complete DAY FIVE Homework (Jonah 1:17)
AFTER this episode: Complete DAY SIX Homework (Jonah 2:1)
Promise Of A Fruitful Life
SPEAKER_01Do you ever feel like your life just isn't as productive or effective as it should be? As followers of Jesus, we want our short time on earth to have eternal impact, but often we feel like we're falling short. The good news is that Scripture gives us a promise, a life that's never ineffective or unproductive in knowing Jesus Christ. In 2 Peter 1, we're told to build on our faith, adding goodness, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, mutual affection, and love. As these qualities grow, they keep us fruitful and effective for God's kingdom.
Meet The Hosts And Mission
SPEAKER_01I'm Matt Morrow, and my wife Rachel and I have spent nearly 20 years teaching God's word and walking with people in every stage of faith. Our passion is to see lives permanently and radically transformed by Scripture applied. Adding to your faith is here to help you understand biblical truth, practice it daily, and grow to look more like Jesus. We're glad you're here. Let's walk this journey together.
Method: Statement And Two Questions
SPEAKER_00Hi, welcome. I'm Rachel, and I'm here with Matt, and we are on day five of week two of our study in how to study the scriptures. And we are in the method of a statement and two questions, which is about as easy as it gets. So we are going to read Jonah 1, verse 17 today. And this is a working podcast. So I will tell you again if you have not spent some time in Jonah 117 with trying to write a statement and two questions. Pause this right now. Go back, get into the word for yourself, and then you can come and join us and we can talk about it together. But that's what we're going to do today is talk about one verse. One verse, two sentences, and uh not even two sentences in every translation.
SPEAKER_01That's right. I'm just looking at the ESV, but sure, you know, it could be just one sentence, but but I love I'm learning to love this method that we're using. And part of it is because you can have a lot of questions for a short piece of passage or piece of scripture. I mean, it's it and this is a great example of it. And, you know, we're we're we're going to be in this verse today, and of course, where we left off
Set Up: Jonah Overboard
SPEAKER_01yesterday. I'm gonna I'm not gonna go into that yet because I want to take just a moment and pray. Ask the Lord to to open our eyes and our hearts to the work that he's going to do here, and then we'll kind of recap where we were yesterday and what where it leads into this very dramatic moment that people know well. Even people who don't know the Bible know this moment pretty well. So we're gonna take a look at that. But before we do that, let's go to the Lord and make sure that we're that we're entering his word by his power and not ours. Lord, thank you so much for your word. Thank you for the book of Jonah, and just for the fresh way that you've given us an opportunity to to unpack that and to and to relate very personally, practically, and in an entirely relevant way to to a time and a place and a person who couldn't
Reading Jonah 1:17
SPEAKER_01be further from where we are in so many ways. But at the same time, Lord, you are always the same. And you have a character and nature that that is absolutely consistent. And as much as I wish that we were able to change our sinful ways, our ways are a lot like Jonah's ways. And so I just thank you for how you how you make this so relevant to our lives and you and you allow us to to grow from it. I I pray today, Lord, that you'll do that. Uh, that you'll go ahead of us into this, that you'll prepare my heart, Rachel's heart, the hearts of those who are coming alongside and working through through these these methods and and learning your word together with us. I just pray that you'll prepare our hearts to hear from you, that you'll that you'll incline our ears to hear your voice, the voice of your Holy Spirit as you speak, as you illuminate the the truth and the and the wonders of your word today. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
SPEAKER_00Amen.
SPEAKER_01So we
God Appoints The Great Fish
SPEAKER_01left off yesterday on on this kind of a cliffhanger, if you didn't know the rest of it, because what happened is that, you know, this the storm was raging over the sea. The the sailors didn't know what to do. Jonah finally, uh, you know, after some reluctance, Jonah finally says to them, Look, there's really only one way out of this. You're gonna have to throw me overboard, and then things will calm down. And they didn't want to do it. They they were like, I want a different way, if there's any other way. So they started rowing harder and they tried to do things to to to solve this problem themselves. And it became quite evident that they just weren't gonna be able to do that. There was no way to do it. And so they had kind of no choice almost but to do what Jonah said, and they didn't want to, and yet they threw him overboard, and the and the sea immediately calmed. And these men, this is what we're left with, these men responded to the power of God, both in the tempest and in the calm. They responded by sacrificing to the Lord and making vows. And that's where we left it yesterday. All we know about Jonah, if you haven't read ahead or if you haven't you know paid attention to the story for all these years, all we know about Jonah is that he's been thrown overboard and that these men have have turned or inclined their heart toward the one true God. And now, what about Jonah? So that's where we pick up now in verse 17. So, Rachel, why don't you read that one too? Are you in the NIV version today?
SPEAKER_00Uh I have ESV today.
SPEAKER_01So read that's what I that's the one I'm most familiar with. You go ahead and read.
SPEAKER_00All right, verse 17. And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.
SPEAKER_01That's it. You got questions? We're using the right method, right? Surely you have questions on this one.
SPEAKER_00And and you know, the statements are I think pretty pretty clear in this one. I mean the thing that stood out to me is the the Lord appointed the great fish.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. You know, that was the statement that I made that the Lord appointed the great fish.
SPEAKER_01The same Lord who sent the storm.
SPEAKER_00The same Lord who sent the story. We talked about that a few. The same Lord who came to Jonah and said, go to Nineveh. Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_01Right. And he sent this this great fish.
Rescue Through The Unexpected
SPEAKER_00And so I that was my first statement. And then of course, the questions that I had on that were one, what like what does that mean then about the Lord, that the Lord appointed a fish? Like, I don't know that I understand how that works. You see it in scripture where the Lord uses animals to fulfill his will. I think it's a reminder of the verse that says, like, the earth is the Lord and all that is in it. Yeah. And like everything else. I like in in this story of disobedience, right? Everything is like Jonah's disobedient. The the sailors are trying, but they don't want to do they don't want to do what God's calling them to do either. Like ever the fish obeys.
SPEAKER_01All of nature responds to God's voice and command. Except for us. Except for us. We're the ones who fight. We're the only ones who fight. So he appointed this great fish. Now, of course, when I grew up listening to this story and in the children's books and everything, it was Jonah and the whale. But it's not a whale, it's a it's a great fish. And I think that's important because one of the things that you'll that you you you would have a question about is like, well, where where was he all this time? Was he like deep? He probably was very deep in the water. Like there's like didn't even a whale would at least have to surface from time to time. And we don't think that's I mean, that's probably not what was going on here. I the statement, I mean the statement that I observed here was that God, this is the key, that God rescued Jonah in a most unusual and unexpected way. I mean, when we last left them, Jonah and the men on the on the ship, they I would say none of them expected this, right? This was a completely unexpected outcome. I've often sort of wondered, we talked about this earlier, I've kind of wondered, like, wouldn't it be I mean, these are sailors, so they they are in lots of cities. We know that later he actually does go to Nineveh, we know that, but wouldn't it be like crazy if these if a couple of these sailors were like in Nineveh one day and they see Jonah come walking down like what would they think? I mean, what would they think? They're unheard about it. Or heard about I mean just a most unusual and unexpected way. Everybody thought that was the end of Jonah, but the Lord intervened and in a way that nobody would have expected or anticipated.
SPEAKER_00And I think that is is your point that that it was a death sentence, yeah, right, but it r it ended in life unexpectedly by the power of God.
The Sign Of Jonah And Jesus
SPEAKER_00And Jesus in the New Testament, when they ask for a sign, says that there will no there will not be a sign given to you except for the sign of Jonah, right? Which is Jesus going into the grave three days, three nights, three days and three nights, and then coming out alive. And obviously there are some parallels that Jesus is drawing between this story and that story and in the sentence of death.
SPEAKER_01Well, that was so one of my questions in this in the statements and questions, one of my questions was why didn't God just immediately you know rescue Jonah or let him die? Like one or the other. Like he could have he could have either, when he went overboard, just had that be the end of Jonah, or he could have had him immediately land on the water and just start walking away on the water or something miraculous like that. But he chose instead to have this great fish and play it out over three days and three nights, and and the question is why? Why, why would he do that? And there certainly are some types and shadows of the New Testament there, but but but there's there's purpose here, and really there's purpose in Jonah on this as well.
SPEAKER_00I think uh when you ask those why questions, and then when you continue reading, those are things that you can be watching for.
SPEAKER_01Right. And you're more alert to it because you've asked the question, because you've written the question down and you're just and you're just more alert to to what the answer might be.
SPEAKER_00And then, you know, one of the questions that I had is like what had would that
Wrestling With The Impossible
SPEAKER_00have had to have been like to be in the belly of the city.
SPEAKER_01That was my next one too.
SPEAKER_00We have the same question for three days and three nights. Like I I mean I can't even imagine what that must be like and if like what Jonah would have been thinking if he would if he thought he was being saved, or if he thought that he was just given an opportunity to you know, to to do to spend some time before his demise it like you know, you just wonder and my qu my question was related to that was I mean, how did he even survive in the belly of this fish for three days and three nights?
SPEAKER_01I mean, it's it's uh clearly gonna be pitch dark, it's gonna be in the depths of the ocean, there's no food, no water, the digestive system of the fish is working against him, I'm sure, the whole time. I mean, it's just it's just mind-boggling. So if you don't have questions here, yeah.
SPEAKER_00And I mean, some way that he knew he was in there three days and three nights. So we don't know if he knew that in real time, or if he knew what day he went into the water and what day he got out of the water.
SPEAKER_01And it almost certainly probably had to be something like that because I don't know how else he would know. You know, I I mean we unless the Lord's telling him along the way, which could be.
SPEAKER_00Um, you know, and so I mean I think that leads people because they try to to make sense of it. Uh the fish, like being a whale, makes more sense in some ways because the whale would surface, and you know, there would be some of that. You know, I a lot of people believe that this isn't a true story because this is impossible and doesn't make any sense, and so they dismiss it as as as being kind of like, yeah, like the folk tale or something. Yeah, and I think we have to be really, really careful with that, you know. I mean, I you know, I love those shows that that kind of dive into like the history of things in the Bible. Yeah. And there are some of them that that have natural explanations for the Exodus and the plagues, and uh, you know, any Sodom and Gomorrah, and they they can tell you all of these things that naturally must have happened to to make this happen.
SPEAKER_01And an unlikely combination of events that are possible, you know, with within that.
SPEAKER_00I do think that as Christians we want to be careful going farther than than scripture goes.
Sovereignty Over Nature And Miracle
SPEAKER_00Obviously, God uses nature, he appointed a great fish. Obviously, he's sovereign over it, but he is not bound by the natural world.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_00And when we try to bind him by saying this couldn't have happened unless these things were all true or this was all true, then I do think that we are in some ways minimizing the God who owns the earth and everything in it.
SPEAKER_01We are minimizing we would be minimizing him to think that. And and the other thing we'd be doing by thinking that is we would be believing something that is that is the opposite of what he has said about himself. Right. I mean, in his word, he has described himself as being sovereign over all of nature and and in fact the Lord of miracles that happen. And so so again, they're not it's not common, doesn't happen as an everyday occurrence, um, but there are there are miraculous things that the Lord does because he's God.
SPEAKER_00And it was by his power that he raised Christ from the dead. It was by his own power, and and it was by his own power that he preserved Jonah in the fish in the belly of a fish.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. So any other questions or uh statements that you jotted down here as you were kind of looking looking through this uh this verse, verse 17?
SPEAKER_00Those, you know, I always sometimes wonder about like the significance of three days and three nights, and you know, so I I kind of made a note like is that is that significant? Do I need to be paying attention that he was there three days and three nights?
SPEAKER_01Good. Well, so we we're gonna it's kind of a mean thing to do to Jonah, but we're gonna leave Jonah in the belly, but we're only gonna leave him there for one day because we're gonna come back tomorrow with the next verse. I mean, the Lord left him there for three, so so I think that's where we're gonna leave the story. I would I would say if you if you haven't read ahead, you have one more verse for this week in this uh workshop around this method of of a statement and two questions. If you are enjoying this and you're and the Lord is working in your studies and he's teaching you how to how to go deeper in the word and to hear his voice, I would encourage you to keep going. We're going to turn in in the next week's cycle, we're going to turn to another method. We're going to start teaching that as well and and workshopping it in another section of scripture. But there's no reason why you can't continue on in Jonah and continue to use two questions and a statement to
Why Three Days And Nights
SPEAKER_01just help go deeper into the word and better understand what the Lord has for you there. Don't you don't have to stop just because for this study and for this workshop and this podcast, we're going to move to the next method. If this is a method that's working for you and you like where it's taken you here in this study, keep going. That's the beauty of God's word. We want you to go deeper.
SPEAKER_00And keep going. Or you can put a pin in it for now and come back to it when you know when we're done with with this study. You can come back and pick Jonah up and hopefully by then have additional tools and in your belt to dive in to see what God's teaching us through through this short but very powerful book.
SPEAKER_01So we'll we will wrap up our time in the book of Jonah for this study at and this purpose tomorrow, and we'll do that turning over into chapter two, verse one, which is actually even shorter than today's passage was.
SPEAKER_00It's like a portion of a sentence.
SPEAKER_01It has a lot there too. There's a lot uh for you. If you can just continue to utilize that statement, two questions, it'll help help really clarify some things. It'll point you in the direction you would want to go
Keep Studying With The Method
SPEAKER_01in the rest of Jonah, and it will also help make sense of some of the questions that you had already to this point. That is, that'll be the case if we will surrender our hearts and submit to the Lord's leading on it. So, Rachel, why don't you lead us in prayer that that will happen and then we'll wrap up.
SPEAKER_00Most gracious Heavenly Father, we do praise you because the earth and everything in it belongs to you. We praise you that you can use all things, everything is under your sovereign control, and you can use all of it to accomplish your will. That there is nothing from the wind and the waves and the sea and the tempest to the fish in the ocean that are outside of your of your sovereign will. And Father, we just praise you that that is true, that we can know that we can rest secure, that we can rest confidently because we know that we that we
Closing Prayer And Next Step
SPEAKER_00serve the Lord who commands the fish in the sea. And Father, you demonstrate that all through your word, that you command everything. And so, Father, I pray that you'll just help us to take that truth and rest in it, that we'll know that you are, that you are sovereign, that everything belongs to you, and that we will grow, that we will just plant our feet on that truth, Father, so we will not be swayed by the winds and the waves of this world. And Father, I also just I just thank you that we know that you have a heart where you are saving and redeeming your people. And Father, we thank you that you didn't leave Jonah in disobedience and rebellion and that you are miraculously working things out to draw him back into intimate relationship with you. And so, Father, we just praise you that that also gives us, gives us pause and and gives us confidence because we know that you're the God who doesn't change and that you love us with the same zeal that you love Jonah. And so, Father, I pray that those truths will just wash over us, that we will plant our feet on it, that you will calm our fears and anxieties and and all of the things, Father, that that might cause us to waver because we know in whom we trust. And so we just ask these things in Jesus' name, amen.
SPEAKER_01Amen. So we will we will conclude this part of the workshop tomorrow. That'll be day six of the two questions and a statement uh portion of the of the study. And for that, we will be in Jonah 2, verse 1. I hope you'll take time there and you'll come back with a statement and a couple of questions, maybe more. More if the Lord leads, and uh we will explore those together as we walk this out alongside you uh tomorrow. So we'll see you and talk again tomorrow.