THE JONAH IN YOUR BOAT

 Dr D. K. Olukoya

Beloved, this week we shall be looking at a very serious message entitled, “The Jonah in Your boat”. It reveals the story of Jonah showing that men do not always want to do the will of God; a great tragedy indeed Jonah 1:1-17: “ Now the word of God came to Jonah, the son of Amittai saying, Arise, go to Nineveh that great city and cry against it; for their wickedness is come up before me. But Jonah rose up to flee unto Tar shish from the presence of the Lord and went to Joppa and he found a ship going to Tar shish. So he paid the fare thereof, and went down into it to go with them unto tar shish from the presence of the Lord. But the Lord sent out a great wind into the sea, and there was a mighty tempest in the sea, so that the ship was like to be broken. Then the mariners were afraid, and cried every man unto his god, and cast forth the wares that were in the ship into the sea, to lighten it off them. But Jonah was gone down into the sides of the ship, and he lay, and was fast asleep. So the shipmasters came to him, and said unto him, what meanest thou, o sleeper? Arise call upon thy God, if so be that God will think upon us, that we perish not. And they said everyone to his fellow, come and let us cast lots that we may know for whose cause this evil is upon us. So they cast lots, and the lots fell upon Jonah. Then they said unto him, tell us, we pray thee for whose cause this evil is upon us; what is thine occupation? And where comest thou? What is your country? And of what people art thou? And he said unto them, l am an Hebrew; and l fear the Lord, the God of Heaven, which hath made the sea and the dry land. Then were the men exceedingly afraid, and said unto him, why hast thou done this? For the men knew that he fled from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them. Then said they unto him, what shall we do unto thee, that the sea may be calm unto us? For the sea wrought, and was tempestuous. And he said unto them, take me up and cast me forth into the sea; so shall the sea be calm unto you: for l know that for my sake this great tempest is upon you (The men did not want to do what he said) Nevertheless, the men rowed hard to bring it to the land; But they could not; for same wrought, and was tempestuous against them. Wherefore they cried unto the lord and said we beseech thee, O Lord, let us not perish for this man’s life, and lay not upon us innocent blood; for thou, O Lord, hast done as it pleased thee. So they took up Jonah, and cast him forth into the sea; and the sea ceased from her ranging. Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly and offered a sacrifice unto the Lord, and made vows. Now he Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.”

God’s ultimate aim for mankind is that we must conform to the image of Christ and that at the name of Jesus every name must bow of things on earth, of things under the earth. And that every tongue should confess Him as the Lord. But the world is in a mess and men live and die without Christ. Some who had Christ lost Him and died without hope. The Lord’s Prayer says, “Thy will be done on earth as it is done in heaven.” Meaning that, God’s will is supposed to be done on earth always.

It is disastrous to rebel against the Creator. The Lord had no problem talking to the storm to be stirred up and telling the fish to swallow Jonah. Jonah should have known that before refusing to do the will of the Almighty God. Jonah like many of us, do not want to do the will of God.

A certain man called Brother Grand prayed for the will of God in marriage. He saw a very nice girl in the fellowship who was beautiful, had a good job and seemed to be okay generally. Brother Grand who wanted to serve the Lord as an evangelist felt that the woman was the kind of person he needed for a wife to help him in his ministry (This is why we preach at the mountain of fire and Miracles ministries that people should find purpose for their lives before praying for partners so that they won’t pick partners who will destroy the purpose of God for their lives) But the Lord told him that she was not his wife, and that his wife is a sister who normally sat at the back of the church; The Problem with that sister was that she had tuberculosis. Brother Grand then replied God, “No l am an evangelist and l move around a lot. This sister cannot cope she will soon die. The Lord said, “ I have spoken and will not repeat myself” He struggled with God like many people do before he eventually gave in to the will of God. He went ahead and married the Tuberculosis case. A week after their wedding, the nice girl whom Brother Grand wanted to marry just fell sick and died. Then he understood God. But for the tuberculosis girl that he married, it was as if their marriage was the cure that she needed. Immediately after their wedding, the tuberculosis vanished and she became a strong woman for God. So sometimes, what God will ask you to do, your body or flesh will complain and grumble. It may also be bitter but it would be the best thing for you. The Bible says, “There is a way that seemeth right unto man but the end therefore is death” (Proverbs 14:12) It is God that can see the end of anything from the beginning. There was another case of a sister in a church I used to attend many years ago. She cried to a certain man of God for a husband. The man of God had compassion on her and went to a mountain to pray for her. He prayed for seven days, came back and told her that her partner was the same brother God had revealed to her as husband. The only problem with that brother is that he had one eye. Then the sister said, “Well, if a one-eyed man is the best God has for me, l would marry someone else” So, she married one university lecturer who happened to be one of those who would come to church to clap and sing but never got born again. There are many people like that in the house of God. Another problem the man had was that he ran after anything in skirt. Unfortunately, after about five years of marriage with two children, the man died and that was the end of that marriage. The sister became so poor that the church had to be taking care of her and her children. There are many stubborn Christian like that, Jonah was a stubborn and rebellious prophet, His name means dove but his character and behaviour was the opposite of his name. So it does not matter whether you are named Samuel or Joseph and those who gave you the name could have good intentions, but if you are a disobedient person, God will not be happy with you.

Jonah had a reason to disobey God. He was a Jew and the Ninevites were the enemy of the Jews. So, he felt it was wrong for him to go and preach to them to repent. As far as he was concerned, they should perish. He did not want to go because he did not love them. Just like many people can do wonderful praise worship but cannot speak one word of love. Some can speak twenty thousand words in “tongues” but cannot speak one word of love to anybody.

The reason God cannot use some of us is because we lack love. Like Jonah, many who should go to Nineveh, have taken off Tar shish. The spirit of Tar shish has descended upon them. Jonah means dove but he did not act like a dove, he acted like a goat. There are many Jonahs who are goats. Jonah abandoned the divine destination for personal interest. He consulted flesh and blood before carrying out divine instruction. But Paul Said, “When God spoke to me, l did not consult flesh and blood” (Galatians 1:16) immediately you begin to consult flesh and blood they will react against any divine instruction you receive. There was once a man of God who was so great that when he stood preaching, an angel would be telling him what he would say. When the angel stopped talking, the man would keep quiet until the angel began to speak. He was an extraordinary minister. No sick person left his meetings without being healed except he could not get to the person. He used to pray for people until they carried him out on a stretcher because he would have worn himself out laying hands on people. But initially, he did not want to answer the call of God. So God said, Okay, if you do not want to go, you will see how l will deal with you. A great flood came and before his very eyes, his three children were drowned. He held on to his wife but the powerful storm came and tore off his wife away from his hands and that was her end. So, in one day he lost his house, wife, and three children. Then he was ready to answer the call of God. If the devil or a herbalist is against you, you can pray fire payers and be delivered. But when God is against you, there is no prayer that can help you. When the man eventually started the work, anywhere he went to preach, his message was “The way of transgression is hard” (Proverbs 13:15) The best thing is to depart from the way of the transgressors.

 Jonah even paid for his problem. He paid the fare that got him into trouble. He also put his companions into trouble. Meaning that a man could be the cause of the storm in her family. Likewise, a child. Such a person is the Jonah in the boat of his or her family. And God may be waiting for you to change or to throw you out.

Sometime ago, a woman who had stomach problem died before she could be brought to church for prayers. Her household enemies had finished her up before anything could be done. About a week later, her daughter of eleven came to me for prayers. She said she wanted to be saved. So she gave her life to Christ. She was taken through deliverance and during the deliverance, she confessed to witchcraft and that she killed her mother. She is now on the path to heaven now but her mother who was careless with her spiritual life went to hell fire.

One sinner in an environment can cause confusion for everybody just like Jonah gave headache to the poor mariners in the boat. And if they had not thrown Jonah out on time, that would have been the end of all of them. Jonah also wasted the property of those people because they threw everything into the water. Just like a sinner in a family will begin to sell their property. When all these problems were going on, Jonah was sleeping comfortably in the midst of the terror and the guilt. He ran from the presence of the Lord. So what happened? He was cast into the sea and then, there was calm.

WHAT IS THE JONAH IN THE BOAT OF YOUR LIFE?

1.     It is like that, which makes a person to run away from the presence of the Lord.

2.     It is the spirit of evil diversion.

3.     It is the spirit of disobedience.

4.     It is that which drags you into trouble.

5.     It is that which invites storms.

6.     It is that which invites divine pleasure.

7.     it is the spirit of slumber

8.     It is the spirit of the goat.

9.     It is the spirit of compromise.

Compromise is a very deadly enemy of Christians. Show me a backslider and l will show you a person who has been compromising for a long time. There is no such thing as sudden fall of a Christian. The individual would have been compromising little by little, until he or she finally falls away. He or she could attend one of these funny Bible colleges around and be given titles like reverend or pastor, whereas he is falling. That is giving oneself spiritual appellations without divine approval. It is the spirit of compromise that makes a person to keep silent when he ought to speak out because of fear of offending unbelievers. It is the spirit behind somebody who approves the wrong thing in order to appease friends. It is the spirit that tolerates sin because you do not want people to make you their enemy. Ask yourself this question, “ Is there any compromise in my life today?” It is important to pray the prayer of the Psalmist that says, “Search me o Lord, and know my heart today, if there be any unrighteousness in me, take away from me and show me the path of righteousness” It is a pity that many like worshipping a synthetic god, the god they manufactured by their own hands. They are worshipping a god manufactured by their brains.

It is sad but true that some of the practices that have been carried out by white men in the name of Christianity have now resulted into backsliding and witchcraft. Even all kinds of occult that black men are thrown away are now taking over the white man’s country. Yet some ignorant Nigerian preachers are now importing any things that cause backsliding and weak Christianity from the white man’s country. Recently, for the first time in my life a pastor with Tyson hairstyle. I was shocked because Isaiah 55:8:

“ For my thought are not your thought, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord”

How can you follow the tradition of the world and make God look less than He actually is. They update God to suit their own taste. They make God look like a liar. They make people feel that the kind of God that will they should search for is the God that will make them feel okay about themselves, the kind of God that will make allowances for their sins, and take excuses. They give people the idea that God is not a God of judgment and that He easily adapts to our own lifestyle and does not have any standard. They make God feels like somebody who delights in just the small attention we can give to Him on Sundays. They forget that the same God that sent Jesus was the one, who rained fire and brimstone on Sodom and Gomorrah, the same God who called Paul by the way, is the same God who sank Pharaoh in the red sea. They tell people to just choose the part of the Bible that they like and follow it. Whenever we try to modify God, we become idolaters. We make a fresh idol.

Unfortunately, many present-day Christians hate reading books that encourage self-sacrifice. They hate books on holiness. Many people rush to where Christianity is less demanding. The only difference between them and the worldly people is that they carry the Bibles and go to church on Sundays. Preachers are now de-emphasizing God’s attribute of holiness and righteousness and hatred for sin because they want crowd. They want to have many branches. Preachers are now trying to make the gospel more palatable for people. Instead of saying adultery, they call it extramarital affairs; Instead of saying that abortion is murder, they will say it is removal of unwanted child. They call gossip chatting. Homosexuals are called sexually confused men. I have seen people, describing even sin as self-expression. When somebody is promiscuous, and is messing around, they will say he is not promiscuous but sexually active. They change the language to make sin look light. They water down what God is saying so that the crowd will come and one percent of them don’t even know where heaven is, let alone planning to go. They play the kind of music they hear at disco halls in the church and dance the kind of dance they should have dropped in the world in the church and their spiritual power rapidly goes down. They preached the gospel that offers forgiveness without repentance, and offers heaven without hell. It is better to know about the two and choose where you are going. It is not right for us to trust the flesh. The bible says

“ Let him that thinketh he standeth take head lest he falls” 

(1corinthians 10:12). There is a possibility of falling, so don’t ever have confidence in the flesh. Don’t say: l can do what l want, go to where l want, do anything, No! Paul said, “We have no confidence in the flesh” The mature believer will always recognize that there is still a long way to go and that constituency is the mark of maturity. Consistency is when a Christian observes his quite time, prayers and Bible reading without interruptions. But somebody who does quite time on Monday and will not do it again until Thursday, is not serious yet. Apostle Paul warned against anybody thinking he cannot fall into temptation. For example, Moses spoke with God face to face but anger and pride dealt with him terribly. What about Samson? An angel prophesied his birth but he yielded to his natural desires of lust and fell. The man, who killed people with the jawbone of an ass and took the whole gate of the philistines away, became somebody who was grinding pepper in the camp of the enemy.

Peter discovered that self-confidence was his weakest area. He boasted to Jesus but could not cope. King David served the Lord faithfully for twenty years but he eventually committed adultery with Bathseba. So the weakest Christian is not in as much danger as those who call themselves strong Christians.

So, the Jonah in the boat of many may be fornication, adultery, abortion, family quarrels and argument, lies etc.

Once there is Jonah in the boat of your life, there will be storm outside. There will be powers rocking the boat of your life and until the Jonah is thrown out, the boat will continue to rock. And if you don’t get the Jonah out on time, God forbid, the boat may capsize and that would be the end. You will then end up in hell fire. Think about it. What is the Jonah in the boat of your life?

For any serious revival to happen, the issue of sin must be dealt with. Many people have never seen one single revival, everybody in town would talk about Jesus, it would then become an unusual thing for a person to say he is not born again. All the bars and brothels will close down. Churches would be filled to overflowing. Sinners would not need long messages to get born again. We will not need to cry out, “Be Healed” before people receive their healing. Everybody will be talking about God, and even the government will notice that something is happening. Until we deal with the issue of sin, we are still joking. There are lots of people now who jump out of churches to set-up their own ministries just because they are not broken enough to accept corrections. The spirit of disobedience is still reigning in their lives. And when you get to these their ministries, you find out that they are just wasting their time. Elisha got a double portion of anointing from Elijah, Most of these people who run away say, “ l am starting my own church” do not collect one quarter of the anointing of the person they had worked with so they are not able to do much.

WHAT IS SIN?

Sin is renouncing whom God made you. It is refusing the right of God to govern you. It is saying you do not care about what God is saying; you want to go your won way. It is disobeying God’s commandments. Sin prefers to please you than to please God. It is when the blessing and gifts of God do not move you. It is treating the Almighty with contempt. If you have never seen the great evil of sin, then you have not seen anything is stranger to God. The music of a sinner is, I don’t care what God requires. I must have my own way”. This is why after 400years of the Old Testament, God spoke to nobody. The first time he would send a prophet, after 400 years of silence, was John the Baptist. And when John the Baptist came, his message was pure and simple: Repent for the kingdom of God is at hand”. When Jesus too came, He cried out “Repent or perish”. When Peter too started to preach on the day of Pentecost, it was the same message of repentance.

Many People are not repentant. True repentance comes when you realize in your hearts the seriousness of sin, the seriousness of ignoring the claim of God and defying his authority. True repentance is when you have hatred and deep sorrow for sin. It is an acknowledgment of your sin before God, and a complete forsaking of it. Not like Lot’s wife who was told to flee and escaped for her life, for God was going to destroy the city, and she could not get herself from that city. Her physical body was out of there but her spirit was still inside. Lot’s wife is now in hell fire. That is why Jesus kept saying, “Remember Lots’ wife”

It is only repentance that can make God to pardon us. If you find someone who keeps repenting of the same sin, it is not certain whether the person ever repented in the first instance. This is why repentance is a great weapon in spiritual warfare. When you beg for divine blessing without true repentance you are only trying to sow seed in a land you have not cleared.

We need to carry out diligent and prayerful examination of ourselves. What you find in most churches now is fake repentance. People only repent because they are afraid of punishment, not because they hate sin. People look sober during a message, go home quietly, but by next morning, the effect is worn off and they go back to their old ways. People may be deeply moved when they hear the word of God or during prayers. They may even cry and go home determined that they would change yet they go back to their sins.

Beloved, all those cries of “O Lord, l want to change” and each drop of tears will stand on the day of judgment and testify against many. You may have humbled yourself before God for a time, yet remain the slave of lust. It is possible that a person may be attending powerful church and still be a smoker. Such a person is lost completely. Some too come to services looking like angels, but when you see them in the street, they are just like masquerades. They are lost.

Beloved, can somebody in the light please somebody in the darkness? Are you looking for the approval of man instead of looking for heavenly approval? Does it really matter what people are saying about you? It is what heaven says that is important. If heaven says you are bad, you better change. If people here are saying you are ugly but in heaven, angels are rejoicing about, then you are in order. A person may be afraid of hell fire but not afraid of committing sin. This is why we find some people who have cried, “ O lord, l want to change, l want to repent. Please help me” The next minute, they are falling into fornication again. A person may hate to go to hell fire but yet may be running as fast as he can get there unconsciously. Many church members will backslide if they hear that hell fire no longer exist.

Do not confuse the fear of hell with hatred for sin. Confession of sin too is not repentant. Many have gone for confessions, while their partners in fornication and adultery were waiting for them outside the church. If you do not resist sin, and turn away from it, then your repentance is fake. Repentance signifies a change of mind.

Nowadays, there is no longer godly sorrow for sin. The wet eyes are gone; people commit sin and ask God to forgive them with dry eyes. True repentance is turning away from your sins and forsaking them. It is making peace with God and taking sides with God against yourself. True repentance must be entire repentance. You cannot have some darling sins in your life; that is the ones you like committing, the ones which you are saying nobody can change. Throw out the Jonah in your boat today and your life will never remain the same.

PRAYER POINTS

1.     l pursue, overtake and recover my blessing the enemy, in Jesus name.

2.     Let the Holy Ghost fire destroy every foundational problem, in the mighty name of Jesus.

3.     Every limitation placed upon my life by household wickedness, be destroyed in Jesus name.

4.     Let every hand be removed from the affairs of my life in the name of Jesus.

5.     Every thing done against my life under the devil’s anointing be neutralized inn Jesus name.

6.      Every parasitic enemy, be paralyzed, in the name of Jesus.

7.     Satanic banks, release my properties in your hand, in the name of Jesus

8.     Every evil vessel dispatched against me, l command you to crash, in the name of Jesus.

9.     Anything in my life that will take away heaven from me, remove it Lord, in the name of Jesus.

10. I cast away every spiritual Jonah from the boat of my life, in the name of Jesus.

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