Devotion 3: Trust The Power
Pastor Philip Piasecki
Kids naturally don’t do what you tell them to do. If only they could come out of the womb completely obedient, that would be the dream! Our youngest daughter, Eden, can just tell when we’re asking her to do something, and naturally, she knows how to quickly do the opposite. My older two kids caught onto this quickly and started using it to their advantage. If they want a hug from her they’ll say, “Eden, don’t give me a hug, don’t you do it,” and boom, they get their hug from her. It was pretty clever, but we had to quickly stop the kids from doing this; we didn’t want to create even more parenting problems for ourselves down the line.
The story of Jonah revolves around the questions, “Will Jonah listen?” and “Will the Ninevites listen?” Just like a child, we see Jonah doing the opposite of what God commands him. After Jonah tries to run from what God was telling him to do, he finally relents and preaches what I consider to be the worst sermon ever. God tells Jonah to preach repentance to the Ninevites, and the message he delivers is, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown” (Jonah 3:4). He doesn’t offer them any solutions or action steps, he simply tells them that in forty days they will be overthrown. Yet, the response from the Ninevites is nothing short of a miracle.
“And the people of Nineveh believed God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them…But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and let them call out mightily to God. Let everyone turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands. Who knows? God may turn and relent and turn from his fierce anger, so that we may not perish.” Jonah 3:5, 8-9
They believe God, repent from their evil ways, and God miraculously (through the worst sermon ever) spares their lives. Naturally, we can believe that people are not going to listen to us when we share the Gospel with them. We can treat them like our kids, expecting them to do the opposite, or we can trust in the power of the Word of God and share the message of hope with those around us. Jonah begrudgingly shared God’s message and God used it in a mighty way. This story always encourages me that God can use even me and my incoherent attempts at sharing the Gospel to save people. Like Jonah, God has commanded us to share our faith. Trust that through the power of the Holy Spirit working inside of you, God will use your words to impact the lives of those around you. There is power in the Word of God, trust it!
“For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” Hebrews 4:12