2002-01-01
Good Morning Faithful Ones,
Today, the Lord leads me to begin looking at citations which reveal Him as Jehovah Shammah, the Lord is there. As with so many good things in our lives, we all have the tendency to take God’s presence for granted. I have faith that God doesn’t want us to do that, which is why I believe He has led me to this subject. As always, going through these Bible citations blessed me, as I hope it will you.
Our Lord knows that we are sometimes stubborn and foolish enough to turn Him down when He gives us an important assignment. We do this for a lot of reasons, such as not understanding its importance, fearing hardship or peril, God’s timing viewed as inconvenient by us, and others. Such was the situation that Jonah found himself in when God asked him to go eastward to Nineveh (Israel’s enemy, Assyria’s, capital city). Anyone who has read the little book of Jonah knows that Jonah’s initial reaction was to go westward by sea. God’s righteous wrath was aroused at this act of disobedience, so He caused a storm to come up which cast Jonah overboard followed by Jonah being swallowed by a big fish. From deep inside the fish, Jonah prayed to his Lord. JON 2: 5-7, “The water came over me and choked me; the sea covered me completely, and the seaweed wrapped around my head. I went down to the very roots of the mountains, into the land whose gates lock shut forever. But You, O God, brought me back from the depths alive. When I felt life slipping away, then, O Lord, I prayed to you and in your holy Temple You heard me.” How many of us have rejected or at least, postponed God’s call and found ourselves cast into a spiritual wilderness because we didn’t answer the call right away? While we can see there is punishment in this passage, we can also see God’s compassion. When will we realize that God really does know best? He knows potentials that He gave us to do things we could never imagine we could do. When we obey Him, we find out what they are and stand amazed at what He enabled us to accomplish. My writing you this many messages about God’s attributes and not yet being done can surely fit into this category. We should also ask ourselves why God has had to take us into our own version of the belly of the fish before we were willing to turn to Him. These are definitely questions to ponder.
Look how Jonah’s story unfolds. JON 2: 10, “Then the Lord ordered the fish to spit Jonah up on the beach, and it did.” Where was the Lord the whole time? Where He always is-in control and exercising that control with righteousness, compassion, and wisdom. Once out of the fish, Jonah finally obeyed the Lord. JON 3: 3-5, “So Jonah obeyed the Lord and wen to Nineveh, a city so large that it took three days to walk through it. Jonah started trough the city, and after walking a whole day he proclaimed, ‘In forty days Nineveh will be destroyed!’ The people of Nineveh believed God’s message. So they decided that everyone should fast, and all the people from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth to show that they had repented.” JON 3: 10, “God saw what they did; He saw that they had given up their wicked behavior. So He changed His mind and did not punish them as He had said He would.” This story has so many important lessons in it. Les Feldick has always said that the OT was directly mainly at the Jews, and he is right. However, he has also added, “with a few exceptions.” This is one of them. Bringing the citizens of Nineveh, who were pagans to faith shows us a foreshadowing of the fact that the truth of the Gospel would not only be for Jews, but would be for all who were willing to accept it, Jews and Gentiles [RO 1: 16]. Jonah’s initial reaction to God’s call is a good demonstration of how man is not always equipped to see the long term consequences for good of accepting God’s callings.
Jehovah Shammah, the Lord who is there, was on the job-just as He always is. If my experience from my own circumstances and from my understanding of the Scriptures is correct, we often do not know the full extent of the important assignments God gives us. For example, we can be sure that Abraham didn’t know when he was first called out of Mesopotamia that it was God’s purpose that he should establish a Jewish nation called to be “a light to the nations” [IS 49: 6] and “a nation of priests” [EX 19: 5-6 & 1 PET 2: 9]. Abraham simply had faith and followed God’s call. Abraham wasn’t perfect. We know this because he took his father, Terah, despite God’s instructions not to do this. That is why Abraham ended up tarrying in Haran (in present day Syria) until his father died, before God’s plan for him to go to Canaan could be carried out [GN 11: 31-32]. Abraham had no idea why it was important to God that Terah not be a part of God’s plan. From our hindsight, we know it was because he practiced idolatry and wouldn’t change. God knows the content of our hearts. He knows which one of us is open to Him and which is not.
I believe it is a very useful endeavor for us to examine our own lives to see God’s presence in them and those of others to see God at work in them. It will dawn on us just how consistent God’s presence, sovereignty, and compassion for us really is. Our Jehovah Shammah is there to bring as much good into our lives and teach us as much righteousness as we will allow. Meditate on these concerns today and take comfort in knowing that our Abba who loves each of us is there for us.
PRAYER: O Lord, Your knowledge and Your ways are so much higher than ours. There are truths that You understand that we cannot see. We are often stubborn and self-absorbed when You call us to a service that will not only further our sanctification but that will accomplish Your will. We confess to our foolishness and offer ourselves in humility to Your service. When Jonah disobeyed You, You showed patience and compassion toward Him. You knew that he would eventually turn to You, as he did. We implore You to show us the same patience and compassion. We dedicate ourselves to listening for Your commands and acting on them in the perfect timing You decree. We acknowledge that when we allow You to be the Lord of our lives, that You bless us by this. We also offer our praise and thanks that You are on the job guiding us, correcting us when necessary, always loving us, and granting us protection twenty -four hours a day, seven days a week. Dearest Lord, You are our Jehovah Shammah, always there for us. It is our sincerest hope that we will respond and always be there for You. Today we humbly offer You our worship, adoration, trust, obedience, loyalty, honor, glory, praise and thanksgiving. In Christ’s holy name, we pray; amen.
Tomorrow, we will continue looking at citations that reveal God as Jehovah Shammah, the Lord is there. Even those of us who have happy marriages as I do know that one’s loving spouse can’t be physically with us 24 hours a day. That is why it is so extraordinary that God is able to do this. Our always righteous and ever loving Deity is right there with us. We need never feel alone or abandoned, because of our Jehovah Shammah. I hope that kind of love that He shows gives you the peace and comfort that it gives me. Peter and I send you our love too.
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn