Today, I am reading and commenting on  Jonah 1-4 and Micah 1-2.

Usually when I read the book of Jonah I focus on Jonah and God’s message to us through Jonah, but today something else caught my eye.  Let’s look at this, God called Jonah to go to Nineveh and prophesy against it, sdo something and he didn’t want to do it. So, he went the opposite direction, because Jonah knew that if he went anywhere near Nineveh God would use him to accomplish His purposes.  There are some things in there that deserve a little attention, but I am not going to go there today.  What I want to focus on is what happened on the ship, and not the part we normally look at.  So, after the sailors threw Jonah overboard and the storm abated, they worshiped God and vowed to serve Him going forward.  Think about that, Jonah did not intentionally witness to those men.  He was not there because God sent him there.  Jonah was there running away from God, and God was STILL able to use him to reveal Himself to those who did not know Him.  Think about it: God can, and will, use us to make the world a better place, even when we are resisting Him.

In many ways the Book of Jonah is an excellent precursor to the opening of Micah.  When Jonah preached in Nineveh that God was about to bring judgement on that city, the people of that city repented of their sins in sackcloth.  They mourned their sinfulness and turned to God. When Micah prophesied about the judgement coming against Samaria and Jerusalem, the people of those cities told him not to say such things.  Then he says something I think we should take to heart: those who do what is right find his words comforting.  Think about that.  In the middle of his fire and brimstone message about the doom and disaster which are looming over the nation, Micah tells us that those who do right are comforted by his words, why?  Because his words mean that those who abuse others, who oppress the poor, who perform various wicked acts, will suffer for the suffering they have caused.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.