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Fish and Ships:
Our Purpose and His
Mission
Last week, we talked about:
1. how God desires to provide us
with direction as we head down
the path He’s prepared for us
2. the different ways that God
communicates with us
3. if God calls us to fulfill a task, He
promises to follow us through to
completion
4. listening and doing
• Our topic today: not only has
God prepared a path for us, but
He has created us with a purpose.
• Each tool is created for a specific
purpose.
“The word of the LORD came to
Jonah son of Amittai: “Go to the
great city of Nineveh and preach
against it, because its wickedness
has come up before me”. But
Jonah ran away from
the LORD and headed for
Tarshish. He went down to
Joppa, where he found a ship
bound for that port. After paying
the fare, he went aboard and
sailed for Tarshish to flee from
the LORD”.
Then the LORD sent a great wind on the
sea, and such a violent storm arose that
the ship threatened to break up. All the
sailors were afraid and each cried out
to his own god. And they threw the
cargo into the sea to lighten the ship.
But Jonah had gone below deck, where
he lay down and fell into a deep
sleep. The captain went to him and
said, “How can you sleep? Get up and
call on your god! Maybe he will take
notice of us so that we will not perish.”
Then the sailors said to each other,
“Come, let us cast lots to find out who
is responsible for this calamity.” They
cast lots and the lot fell on Jonah.
So they asked him, “Tell us, who is
responsible for making all this trouble
for us? What kind of work do you do?
Where do you come from? What is
your country? From what people are
you?”
He answered, “I am a Hebrew and I
worship the LORD, the God of
heaven, who made the sea and the dry
land.”
This terrified them and they asked,
“What have you done?” (They knew he
was running away from the LORD,
because he had already told them
so.) The sea was getting rougher and
rougher.
So they asked him, “What should we
do to you to make the sea calm down
for us?”
“Pick me up and throw me into the
sea,” he replied, “and it will become
calm. I know that it is my fault that this
great storm has come upon you.”
Instead, the men did their best to row
back to land. But they could not, for the
sea grew even wilder than before. Then
they cried out to the LORD,
“Please, LORD, do not let us die for
taking this man’s life. Do not hold us
accountable for killing an innocent
man, for you, LORD, have done as you
pleased.” Then they took Jonah and
threw him overboard, and the raging
sea grew calm. At this the men greatly
feared the LORD, and they offered a
sacrifice to the LORD and made vows to
him.” (Jonah 1:1-15)
• Why would God call Jonah – a
virtual nobody with an unsavoury
character from a rebellious nation to travel some 800 km to preach
against his sworn enemies?
• There had to be someone either
closer to Nineveh or with a more
fitting character for the call to fulfill
this task, right?
• There probably was someone else
but God does not abandon Jonah
and pass along the challenge to
someone else because God did not
create that person to fulfill this task.
• Jonah, son of Amittai was the tool
for this task, not anyone else.
• “[God] created my inmost being; [He]
knit me together in my mother’s
womb. I praise you because I am
fearfully and wonderfully made”.
(Psalm 139:13-14)
• God created you just the way you are,
intentionally, on purpose, and for a
specific purpose.
• “We are God’s handiwork,
created in Christ Jesus to do good
works, which God prepared in
advance for us to do”. (Ephesians
2:10)
• God’s got a unique task to which He’s
calling each one of you.
Jonah’s Calling
• Jonah is called to go to Nineveh, a
pagan city in a pagan nation, a city
threatened by the judgement of
God.
• He is to act as both God’s voice and
God’s presence in that city as He
declares God’s word to the
Ninevites.
• If Jonah fails to fulfill this mission,
then the people of Nineveh would
suffer calamity
Israel’s Calling
• Israel was to exist as a reminder of
God’s pre-eminence; in a world
under the imminent judgement of
God, Israel was to act as both
God’s voice and His presence.
• “Although the whole earth is
mine, you will be for me a
kingdom of priests and a holy
nation”. (Exodus 19:5-6)
The Role of the Priest
• A priest serves as an
intermediary between the rest
of the people of Israel and God
himself.
• Ancient Jews believed the
priests served as a conduit to
bring down and “direct” God's
blessing and influence into the
world.
• The people of Israel were chosen
and set apart by God’s sovereign
choice, to direct God’s blessing and
influence among all the people
groups, directing them in proper
worship and acting as
intermediaries of God Himself.
• The call was to go into the world, a
place of great paganism, a world
threatened by the judgement of
God and act as both God’s voice
and God’s presence in the world as
they declared God’s word to the
surrounding nations.
• If Israel failed to fulfill this mission,
then the nations of the world
would suffer calamity.
• But Jonah is not faithful to the call of
God; instead of Nineveh, he runs off
to Joppa and boards a ship for
Tarshish.
• Notice that:
1. God sends a storm Jonah’s way
2. Jonah finally begins to act as God’s
presence and voice in the midst of
calamity during the storm.
3. He speaks the very word of God to
the sailors
• Jonah cannot shake the calling put
on his
• His failure to fulfill his mission and
call on God’s terms has put others in
great peril, though.
Our Calling and Mission
• When God places His call upon
your life, He will see it through
to completion, sometimes even
in spite of our disobedience.
• Like Israel, we as the church –
the people of God – are called to
a specific ministry.
• “You are a chosen people, a royal
priesthood, a holy nation, God’s
special possession, that you may
declare the praises of him who
called you out of darkness into his
wonderful light.” (1 Peter 2:9)
• “God … gave us the ministry of
reconciliation: that God was
reconciling the world to himself in
Christ, not counting people’s sins
against them. And he has
committed to us the message of
reconciliation. We are therefore
Christ’s ambassadors, as though
God were making his appeal
through us.” (2 Corinthians 5:18-20)
• Just as both Jonah and Israel were
to enter their worlds as God’s
presence and voice to a people
threatened by God’s judgment,
preventing tremendous calamity
from befalling them, we are to do
the same in our world.
• “God always leads us as captives in
Christ’s triumphal procession and
uses us to spread the aroma of the
knowledge of him everywhere. For
we are to God the pleasing aroma of
Christ among those who are being
saved and those who are perishing”.
(2 Corinthians 2:14-15)
• The point: if you’ve placed your
faith in Christ, you stink like Jesus,
whether you like it or not.
• It’s up to us whether the fulfillment
of this calling will benefit us on a
personal level or not.
• If we resist like Jonah, any
development towards maturity that
might come because of God’s use of
us will be absolutely lost on us.
• Will you be obedient to God’s call
upon your life, extending God’s
blessing and word to the world
around you, and experience the
personal benefits that come along
with it, or will you in disobedience,
accomplish that same mission, but
miss on the personal blessings that
accompany it?
• The will of God will be
accomplished regardless of our
obedience – God is sovereign
after all - but whether we find
ourselves on dry land or sinking
beneath the surf as a result is up
to us.