God Sent a Great Wind

Jonah 1:4, 11-16

SUBJECT:  God’s Chastisement and Jonah

THEME:  Jonah’s experience teaches us how God uses means to chasten rebellious believers to turn our hearts back to Him. God in his sovereignty will use natural disasters and great wind storms in an attempt to persuade his people to repent and obey his will.

RELEVANCE: Chastening is any instruction, correction, teaching, rebuke or circumstances God uses to conform our hearts attitude and behavior to His will. In this account God sovereignly uses the natural element of the wind, which is related to Jonah’s circumstances to get this wayward prophet back on track. God still chastens His people today to keep us on track or to persuade us to repent and return to His will (Heb. 12:5-13; Rev. 3:19). Clearly, one goal of chastening is to bring about deep repentance—a change of mind and heart that results in a change of action or direction. A person who repents turns from his old ways to wholeheartedly commit himself to doing the will of God.  

INTRODUCTION:

No matter how you look at it, Jonah had rebelled against the Lord in a most flagrant manner. He had utterly refused to accept the missionary ministry to Nineveh; instead he elected a cruise in the opposite direction to Tarshish, a Pheonician colony on the southwestern coast of Spain about two thousand miles west of Israel. The last thing the wayward prophet wanted for the city of Nineveh was the mercy of Jehovah, so he rebelled rejecting God’s directive.  

Accordingly, the Lord has a way of dealing with wayward believers who insist on their way thus negating His will. God “sent out a great wind into the sea, and there was a mighty tempest in the sea, so that the ship was like to be broken” (Jonah 1:4). No doubt someone will insist that the Lord only “allowed” the great wind to come…in an attempt to vindicate or defend the notion that God is a “good” God. However, the statement of this Scripture is transparently clear. “But the Lord sent out a great wind into the sea…!” God is directly responsible for these developments in the light of His servant’s rebellion and willfulness. Yes, God “sent out” the great wind, which means he threw it down or hurled it far out there. Beloved, this was a deliberate and calculated attempt to turn this rebel, Jonah, around and set him back on track to reach a wicked people! God does not need to be defended on this point; His character is good, His actions are good and His motives are good. Why do we feel the need to defend Him concerning such passages?

MESSAGE:

God uses Great Winds to Chasten His Rebellious People (Jonah 1:11-16).

Beloved, it may not be an actual wind storm at sea for you and me, but God in his sovereignty over all things uses whatever means necessary to turn our hearts from rebellion back to Him. Obviously, he can use great winds and great fish, but he can use anything else he deems fitting to get our attention and redirect us in his will. So, God used a great wind, but why?

A.    To show Jonah how his rebellion negatively impacted innocent people (Vs. 11-13).

1.     I have heard people say in defense of their substandard Christian living, “I am not hurting anybody but myself” or “I am minding my own business, and what I do is no one else’s concern.”

2.     But this is not at all what God’s Word reveals; Jonah’s rebellion affected this captain and his entire crew and literally put their lives in mortal danger (1:11-17). 

3.     Often our sin does negatively impact others.

                                          i.     The Apostle Paul says to the Corinthians, “Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? ⁷ Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us: ⁸ Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.”^[1] (1Cor. 5:6-8)

                                        ii.     Leaven here is a picture of moral sin. The apostle is saying that if they tolerate a little moral sin in the church, it will soon grow and expand until the whole fellowship is seriously affected. Righteous, godly discipline is necessary in order to maintain the character of the church.^[2]

                                      iii.     Our failures to confront our sinfulness will certainly impact others in negative ways.

4.     Lot’s worldliness compelled him to move to Sodom where he eventually lost his spiritual credibility (Gen. 19:24-38), his two daughters were corrupted by that society, and he lost his wife to worldliness well before she turned to look back on Sodom. The Lord Jesus warned, “Remember Lot’s wife.”

                                          i.     Although Lot’s wife was taken almost by force out of Sodom, her heart remained in the city. This was indicated by the fact that she turned back. She was out of Sodom, but Sodom was not out of her. As a result, God destroyed her by turning her into a pillar of salt.^[3]

                                        ii.     We cannot afford to be so attached to possessions, luxuries and earthly comforts when commitment to Christ demands prioritizing eternal and spiritual realities over worldly things. Beloved, our worldliness will impact others. Often what we parents practice in moderation, our children will practice in excess!

5.     Acchan’s sinful greedy heart compelled him to take the gold and silver, but his entire family died with him as punishment for his sin (Josh 7:16-26). Clearly, our sins impact others!

                                          i.     Romans 14: 7-8, For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself. ⁸ For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord’s.^[4]

                                        ii.     The lordship of Christ enters into every aspect of a believer’s life. We don’t live to ourselves but to the Lord. We don’t die to ourselves but to the Lord. It is true that what we do and say affects others, but that is not the thought here. Paul is emphasizing that the Lord should be the goal and object of the lives of His people.^[5]

B.    To show Jonah how God could still witness to His power, nature, and character (vs. 14-15).

1.     God did not leave Himself without a witness because the natural world responded to His will and evidenced His awesome strength.

2.     God wanted to show these mariners their need to fear the Lord (16), therefore He taught these pagans something about the “fear of the Lord” (Ps. 111:10; Prov. 14:26, 27; 15:33; 16:6; 19:23; 22:4).

C.    To correct Jonah’s rebellious attitude…. (Vs. 11-17).

1.     Jonah’s resentment and rebellion broke fellowship with the Lord. He brought these developments on himself when he departed from God’s will for his life. While we cannot live free of all troubles and challenges, some of the “winds” and storms we face are self-inflicted. That is correct, we invite the Lord’s correction through our carelessness and rebellion. In addition, the natural consequences of sin are a punishment in and of themselves.

2.     Tragically, the great winds did not produce the repentance God desired. Though the ship’s crew suggested something had to be done concerning Jonah in order for them to survive, Jonah’s response in verse 1:12 is absolutely shocking. He intimated that the only means of the sailors surviving was to cast him into the sea…since it was his fault they were in jeopardy. Though the sailors had suggested this, they were not ready to act on this notion of sacrificing the prophet. So, they worked even harder against the winds to bring the ship to safety, but they failed utterly. The great winds prevailed! Finally, accepting the apparent inevitable, they begged God to not hold them accountable for the death of Jonah, and they cast him into the sea. Instantly, the storm ceased from her ragging! What’s so tragic about that? Though Jonah had experienced all this trouble, fear and anxiety at sea, he still was not willing to go to Nineveh and preach God’s warning to them. He had not repented…he would rather have died first than to obey God!

                                          i.     What frightful bitterness and resentment is this! How stubborn can a human heart be to persist in such rebellion? What awful lying intoxication sin holds? Will we dare God kill us because we refuse to get right? Rational behavior is completely abandoned here.

                                        ii.     Beloved, this is jaw-dropping off the charts ridiculous! No wonder God had to turn up the heat and prepare a “great fish to swallow up Jonah.” There is zero repentance in this prophet’s heart at this time!

3.     But God initiated the process of restoration. In chapter 1:17, God prepared the great fish to swallow Jonah. This was an act of loving mercy on God’s part. He provided a means of Jonah’s safety, a means that brought him to repentance, confession, and to prayer. 

4.     God purpose for chastening His people is to produce righteousness in our lives: “... but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness.” “...nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.” (Hebrews 12:10-11)

5.     Many times we resent what God places in our pathway, but we need to see and consider His mercy, for He is working towards restoration. How far would Jonah have gone had it not been for the storm and the great fish?  How far would you and I have gone if it hadn’t been for the storms and the great fish (or whatever it was that God sent) into our lives?

6.     All things God bring to us, directly or indirectly, come for our good.  What kind of fruit did the chastisement of God produce in Jonah's life? It eventually produced repentance, and from a heart of repentance, Jonah sought the Lord in prayer.

CONCLUSION:

Clearly, Jonah’s experience teaches us how God uses means to chasten rebellious believers to turn our hearts back to Him. God in his sovereignty will use natural disasters like this great wind storm at sea in an attempt to persuade us to repent and obey his will.

What does all this mean for you and me? Honestly, we need God’s chastening—his instructions, corrections, teachings, rebukes or circumstances as he seeks to conform our hearts attitude and behavior to His will. We should appreciate His initiatives to convict us and bring about a godly sorrow. To our shame, we tend to persist in sinful attitudes and behaviors. We truly need the Spirit of God to deal with us fervently at times.

In our experiences, God will sovereignly use natural elements like the wind, or some other natural element related to our circumstances to get us back on track. He has used sickness, disease, financial straits, stock market crashes and even the death of loved ones to help us reconsider the course we have chosen. God still chastens His people today to keep us on track or to persuade us to repent and return to His will (Heb. 12:5-13; Rev. 3:19). Please do not miss this point: God’s corrective measures are acts of love towards his children. It is not because he hates us that he corrects us, but because he loves us. Clearly, chastening is designed to bring about deep repentance—a change of mind and heart that results in a change of action or direction. We have truly repented when we turn from our old ways to wholeheartedly commit ourselves to doing the will of God.  

A believer pursuing sin will experience God’s chastening. Although not all pain and suffering are related to chastening, certainly chastening can include pain, suffering, loss, and trouble. A believer who refuses the prompting of the Holy Spirit to repent and be transformed in character and behavior will experience a few semesters in “Whale University.” Jonah provides us with a great case study of how God in his sovereign love will use a number of means to steer us back to a lifestyle of obedience, submission, and conformity to His plan for our lives.

---

^[1] The Holy Bible: King James Version. (2009). (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., 1 Co 5:6–8). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.

^[2] MacDonald, W. (1995). Believer’s Bible Commentary: Old and New Testaments. (A. Farstad, Ed.) (p. 1760). Nashville: Thomas Nelson.

^[3] MacDonald, W. (1995). Believer’s Bible Commentary: Old and New Testaments. (A. Farstad, Ed.) (p. 1437). Nashville: Thomas Nelson.

^[4] The Holy Bible: King James Version. (2009). (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., Ro 14:7–8). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.

^[5] MacDonald, W. (1995). Believer’s Bible Commentary: Old and New Testaments. (A. Farstad, Ed.) (p. 1736). Nashville: Thomas Nelson.