Sunday, February 20, 2011

Unexpected Wisdom, Jonah

A very slow pace is what I'm taking with the book on minor prophets,Unexpected Wisdom. Jonah is the first chapter and I'm still pondering what all was verbalized. As I took a fresh, new look at this part of God's Word, I related. I wrote in the margin ~ "God calls me to places I don't want to go." Did Jonah not go because he was afraid or stubborn or did he just not want to go to a city of such awful people? Why don't I want to go?

Jonah was a prophet. Didn't prophets love God and want to follow the plan God had for them. Weren't they excited to take the news to others? (Notice in the text that Nineveh is referred to as a great city in 1:2, 3:1 and 3:3 - an exceedingly great city.) I could also ask those questions of myself. I really enjoyed this examination of self.

All of this reminds me of the two questions David Platt brings up in his book, Radical (you can ask for the first chapter to be emailed to you at this site) What is God saying and what do I do about it? It's an old predicament for humans. The author of Unexpected Wisdom, Dan Schmidt, describes submitting as "to listen and obey takes me outside myself, away from my own direction and into the realm of another. I relinquish control over my own destiny when I let another's words direct me. I am no longer my own master."

Can't wait to post about the next chapter ~ Habakkuh, Don't Fear the Dark...oh, so good!! peace to all.

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