Have you ever lost hope? Everything in life, seemingly, closes in and culminates into one huge pressure of pain, despair and loathing. When your whole body feels as though you are under 200 feet of water, without air, and that pressure comes from within and from without. This was how Elijah felt at this moment of his life. He found the one and only bit of shade in the desert of his life, sat down under it and asked God to just let him die.
(Jeremiah 20:14) Yet I curse the day I was born! May no one celebrate the day of my birth.
(Jonah 4:8) And as the sun grew hot, God arranged for a scorching east wind to blow on Jonah. The sun beat down on his head until he grew faint and wished to die. "Death is certainly better than living like this!" he exclaimed.
Here are two more dark examples of life in the fast lane of serving God. Two men, just like Elijah, who grew bitter in their hearts because they didn't get God. Jeremiah just wanted to see Judah saved. He preached exactly what God told him too and all it got him was the prison cesspool. Jonah didn't want to see Nineveh saved but they repented and turned to God. Elijah's great victory at Mount Carmel was overcast with threats of death from one woman, Jezebel. All seemingly hopeless, helpless and lost. But God! But God! But God has a plan that is always greater in scope than we could ever imagine. Look at what God told Jonah. (Jonah 4:9) Then God said to Jonah, "Is it right for you to be angry because the plant died?" "Yes," Jonah retorted, "even angry enough to die!" (10) Then the LORD said, "You feel sorry about the plant, though you did nothing to put it there. It came quickly and died quickly. (11) But Nineveh has more than 120,000 people living in spiritual darkness, not to mention all the animals. Shouldn't I feel sorry for such a great city?" Do you think Jonah should have listened to God, gotten up and gone back into Nineveh and preached or was Jonah right in staying there swimming in his pool of self pity because God didn't do what Jonah wanted him to do? The book stops there and says nothing more about Jonah. Elijah left the cave and did what he was told. Later on he is replace by Elisha and taken up into heaven in a chariot of fire. Jeremiah is taken out of the prison cesspool, taken out of Jerusalem later on and never looses his properties or took any monetary losses when Jerusalem fell because they wouldn”t listen.
Mat 12:39 But Jesus replied, "Only an evil, adulterous generation would demand a miraculous sign; but the only sign I will give them is the sign of the prophet Jonah. (40) For as Jonah was in the belly of the great fish for three days and three nights, so will the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights.
Can you imagine where you would be today if Jesus would have told everyone to look for the sign of Jonah lying under that gourd plant and not getting up instead of the sign of Jonah coming out of that big fish. What if Jesus said I don't care what happens to the world I just want to die I'm so depressed and down about no one caring about me. They can just all go to Hell, I just want to stay in my tomb and feel sorry for myself. Do you think Jesus had something to be depressed about? But no! (Hebrews 12:2) Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. Jesus came up out of that grave with joy because of what was accomplished through His suffering and shame. Life can take a lot of swings at you and when it hits it can be painful. You can either lay there and mope or get up. You can make a lot of things your withered gourd plant and let it keep you down. But just as God talked about the bigger picture to Jonah let Him talk to you. Don't finish your book under the shade of a dead bush.
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