Spontaneous acts of controlled synesthesia
Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?
Fear tells you what to think, truth shows you what is real.
Love is the truth.
Our present temporal life is the shadowed threshold of the greater reality.
My latest drawing comes at a time where I needed reminders of the support system I have in this adventure called life. The last week has been a constant barrage of taps on my shoulder, nudges at my side and smacks to the back of my head saying…..”I am here. I am for you.”
As David wrote; I shall not be afraid. What can man do to me? (Psalm 56) I will be confident. (Psalm 27)
Throughout this in-depth look at the book of Jonah, our primary focus has been on our own similarities to Jonah; his fear, his failure, his success and his pride. Jonah’s adventure serves as more than just a fantastical story that teaches us to faithfully serve our God, even when it seems illogical, it is a direct representation of the gospel. Even Jesus drew that parallel in his time walking the earth. Jonah was called to reach a people that had rejected his own, Jesus came to reach us when we rejected him. Jonah was thrown from the boat and swallowed by the sea for three days, Jesus was thrown from humanity and swallowed by the grave for the same duration. Jonah’s presence in Nineveh led the city to redemption, Jesus’s time on earth leads the world to redemption. Jonah and Jesus take separate paths from this point forward.
Jonah’s story parallels ours at many turns as well. Jonah was prejudiced toward a people who left scars of hate on his homeland, we (whether or not we’ll admit it) have the the same tendencies toward bigotry. Jonah came face to face with his fear and ran the other direction. Our society leans upon a “path of least resistance” philosophy; if it feels good, do it, if it doesn’t, don’t. Even when Jonah conceded and accepted his responsibility to reach the Nineveh, he did the bare minimum required by God and expected substantial reward for his efforts. Going above and beyond is a lost art in modern culture while entitlement thrives. We do the least required of us in our jobs, our homes, even our hobbies, then call foul when we a passed over for that promotion, when the chores aren’t done, or when someone else earns higher honors for doing better work. We are Jonah.
The parallels of Jonah to ourselves is not limited to the main character, we often share traits with Nineveh. Nineveh chose to live by their own rules regardless of who it hurt, many of us live in the same obstinate disobedience. Like Nineveh, we have a Jonah that will lead us to redemption in the person of Jesus. The decision to follow is ours.
Our directive is simple; get up. Go. Live so that you will be missed. Where should you go? Attack that area of your life you fear most, the sin you just don’t want to let go, the characteristic that is more comfortable to keep rather than change. Once you’ve conquered your own demons, lead others to conquer theirs.
“The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it’s indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it’s indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it’s indifference.” – Elie Wiesel, Romanian-born American novelist, political activist and Holocaust survivor.
Sometimes you are Jonah, sometimes you are Nineveh, sometimes you are both.
As we determined last week, the story of Jonah is the story of us all. We are each faced with forks in our road, moments where the decision you make forever impacts all those around you. Today, we shift our focus intrinsically and reveal what that means for you personally.
I called out to the Lord, out of my distress, and He answered me;
out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and you heard my voice.
For you cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas
and the flood surrounded me, all your waves and your billows passed over me.
Then I said, ‘I am driven away from your sight;
yet I shall look again on your holy temple.
The waters closed in over me to take my life;
the deep surrounded me, weeds were wrapped around my head at the roots of the mountains.
I went down to the land whose bars closed on me forever;
yet you brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God.
When my life was fainting away, I remembered the Lord,
and my prayer came to you in your holy temple.
Those who pay regard to vain idols, forsake their hope of steadfast love.
But I, with the voice of thanksgiving, will sacrifice to you;
what I have vowed, I will pay.
Salvation belongs to the Lord!
This was Jonah’s prayer as he breathed from the belly of the sea monster.
While the choices we make implement a butterfly effect that leaves unchangeable marks on the lives of everyone in its range, each decision leaves permanent marks on our individual lives as well. Though many leave their marks unnoticed, these scars forever map our journey through life. For better or worse, our choices trace the road we’ve chosen and serve as a guide to those who come after us.
Jonah’s decisions led him down paths where he was venerated and exalted by his peers to suffering and isolation where being cast into the sea was in the best interest of those closest to him. After running from the mission God set before him, Jonah found himself cowering beneath the deck of a fishing vessel while his new friends brave the wrath of the sea brought on by his disobedience. He finally concedes to God’s persistence and confesses his responsibility for the situation along with its remedy, removing him from the situation. His fellow sailors, quite reluctantly, launch Jonah into the raging water, all the time begging the God Jonah just tangibly introduced them to for mercy. Only then, when the environment created by his own choices becomes too overbearing, does Jonah cry out to God for help.
God provides the world with a fool-proof navigational system to guide us both day and night, which sailors on Jonah’s journey primarily relied upon. While the sun guides vessels during the day, patterns in the stars guide ships at night. Mediterranean sailors in 5th and 4th century BC used the constellation Cetus as one of their guides. Cetus, known today as ‘The Whale’, was once coined as ‘The Sea Monster’. Sailors who set off in the direction of Cetus were said to be “sailing into the belly of the beast”. The original Hebrew and Greek texts of Jonah use words which literally translate ‘great fish’ to describe the place Jonah found himself after he was thrown from the ship to Joppa. 4th century Greek translations change this word to Cetus. From that, William Tyndale gave us the English translation of ‘whale’ in Jonah’s adventure. Whether Jonah was swallowed by a literal fish or if we are reading sailors’ slang and Jonah miraculously survived three days on the open sea by God’s mercy, (having been tossed into “the belly of the beast”), I am not sure. Either interpretation makes Jonah’s story no less of a miracle, but I do find it interesting Jonah never thanks God for providing a fish to swallow him, but does express gratitude for protecting him from specific perils of the open sea (i.e. the waves and billows, the deep which surrounded him, the seaweed wrapping around his head).
Something else is missing from Jonah’s prayer, repentance. Not once does Jonah acknowledge his disobedience to God. His entire prayer is a cry for help to get him out of the mess he created. This arrogance is a place many of us will find ourselves, likely on more than one occasion. We become so invested in our own sin that, instead of taking responsibility for the circumstances we’ve created, we bathe in our refuse until the environment becomes too putrid to bear. Only then, whining out of our voluntary discomfort, do we cry out to God and beg for His intervention. In His unfathomable mercy, God will respond to our cries as a devoted father and pull us up from our filth, but his answer to our insatiable desire to return to the muck came centuries ago through His son, Jesus.
Jesus sacrificed himself so that we may find salvation though him, a way out of our cycle of failure and disappointment, but salvation is not a one-time deal. Salvation, embracing Jesus as your savior by committing your life to forever emulating his, is the kick-starter for your continual process of sanctification while you walk the earth. Christians refer to someone professing their faith in Jesus as “being saved”. I prefer the phrase quoted by Brennan Manning which was commonly used in the 1930’s, “I’ve been seized by a great affection”. Jesus died to save us from our sin, but he also rose so that we may be daily saved from ourselves.
I have been seized by a great affection so that I may show great affection. God loves in us what is not yet. We love in people what they already are: virtue, beauty, courage, and hence making our love self-interested and fragile. We must learn to love people as God does, empowering them to spread His love further.
May your choices map out a life spent in selfless love that inspires generations.
Today’s message at North Ridge began a study of one of my favorite stories in the Bible, that of Jonah. Chapter one dives right in to the story; Jonah is called to preach to the corrupt, and particularly hostile, Assyrian city Nineveh. The Assyrians were especially violent in their stand against anyone who questioned their lifestyle or belief system, inciting a slow, torturous death to any who opposed them. Jonah understood the gravity of God’s instructions, so he ran.
In creating the image to show Jonah’s calling, I focused on my own experiences of dread and fear of an impending event. My sons dread getting shots, merely mentioning the possibility changes their demeanor like cutting the lights off at night. Receiving the medication held in the syringe has positive results, but the pain the needle brings seems hardly worth it at the time. I remember the fear of bringing home a less-than-acceptable report card; or informing my parents of earning my first speeding ticket. I imagine this emotion of dread was exponentially amplified for Jonah the moment he heard God say the word, Nineveh. My goal was to capture that emotion in this image.
God’s words must have hit Jonah like a punch in the throat, then fell into his gut like a ton of bricks. The violently obstinate Assyrians in Nineveh, with their army, versus Jonah, the solitary minor prophet. I began by covering my page in charcoal and blending it smooth to represent the ominous nature of what Jonah was up against. The page is black, but for a small circle of white on the bottom right the darkness has yet to cover. Jonah must have felt like the small spot of light being encroached upon by the thick blackness of the society he must reach out to. Jonah felt no more able to do this than the white spot could removing the charcoal from this page on its own.
What I love about this image is it can be applied to anyone who has ever felt apprehensive; Noah, Moses, Jonah (or any other prophet) up to Jesus himself experienced this as it pertained to fulfilling God’s call. Anyone who breathes has felt this at some point in their lives.
How does this drawing strike you? Does it capture the weight of emotions you feel when you’re faced with a daunting task?
