jonah

Haystack bible commentary

"Stacks and stacks of commentary...."

"The story of Jonah is controversial, but it's a foreshadowing of Jesus – and Jesus clearly spoke of it as being a real event in history," Driscoll stated, and explained in the beginning of a video posted on his website on Monday that many people wonder whether the story of Jonah is real or not.He also pointed out that some critics of the Bible also focus on the seeming implausibility of a grown man surviving inside a fish as evidence that the Bible itself is not trustworthy.
"This just shows you are all crazy," he said of what non-believers say to Christians about the story.
Still, Driscoll analyzed three possible explanations people have for how Jonah could have indeed survived inside a fish. The pastor offered that a minority believe that the biblical prophet could have found an air pocket or something along the lines and found a way to physically live through three days and three nights inside the creature – though Driscoll admitted that it seems "a bit far-fetched."

Read more at http://www.christianpost.com/news/mark-driscoll-3-ways-to-explain-bibles-jonah-surviving-inside-fish-171497/#HlJk35uRDEUpkKvi.99
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==Jonah 1:1-17:

Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying, 
2 “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry out against it; for their wickedness has come up before Me.” 
3 But Jonah arose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. He went down to Joppa, and found a ship going to Tarshish; so he paid the fare, and went down into it, to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.
4 But the Lord sent out a great wind on the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship was about to be broken up.
5 Then the mariners were afraid; and every man cried out to his god, and threw the cargo that was in the ship into the sea, to lighten the load. But Jonah had gone down into the lowest parts of the ship, had lain down, and was fast asleep.
6 So the captain came to him, and said to him, “What do you mean, sleeper? Arise, call on your God; perhaps your God will consider us, so that we may not perish.”
7 And they said to one another, “Come, let us cast lots, that we may know for whose cause this trouble has come upon us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah. 
8 Then they said to him, “Please tell us! For whose cause is this trouble upon us? What is your occupation? And where do you come from? What is your country? And of what people are you?”
9 So he said to them, “I am a Hebrew; and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.”
10 Then the men were exceedingly afraid, and said to him, “Why have you done this?” For the men knew that he fled from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them. 
11 Then they said to him, “What shall we do to you that the sea may be calm for us?”—for the sea was growing more tempestuous.
12 And he said to them, “Pick me up and throw me into the sea; then the sea will become calm for you. For I know that this great tempest is because of me.”
13 Nevertheless the men rowed hard to return to land, but they could not, for the sea continued to grow more tempestuous against them. 
14 Therefore they cried out to the Lord and said, “We pray, O Lord, please do not let us perish for this man’s life, and do not charge us with innocent blood; for You, O Lord, have done as it pleased You.” 
15 So they picked up Jonah and threw him into the sea, and the sea ceased from its raging. 
​16 Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly, and offered a sacrifice to the Lord and took vows.
17 Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.

​"The word of the Lord" is used seven times in the book of Jonah

 Jonah 2:8-9:
“Those who regard worthless idols
Forsake their own Mercy.  But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the Lord.

​Any time our deepest desire is for something other than God because we think that will satisfy or rescue us, a dangerous "soul idol" is forming. We may idolize the approval of people, our own comfort, or maintaining control. All of these things can become "idol lies," things we value more than God. We cling to those idols, and in so ding, as Jonah said, we 'forfeit the grace that could be ours."   --Dee Brestin "Idol Lies" p4-5

​​The doctrine of grace may be the hardest doctrine in the Bible to accept. It’s not that grace is hard to understand. We know what the word means. Our problem comes in the application. Grace asks us to accept two things we don’t want to accept:
1. There is nothing we can do to save ourselves.
2. If God doesn’t save us, we will never be saved.
Nothing more clearly summarizes the true meaning of grace than the simple phrase found Jonah 2:9, “Salvation is of the Lord.
That statement is both striking and humorous because it comes from the world’s worst missionary.

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