True Hope Is Found in Christ Alone
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
True Hope is Found in Christ Alone Jonah and Micah February 2020 Day 1 Who are two people or groups of people that you would not want to go and share what it means to know Jesus with? Write why. 1. 2. Why do you share your faith? If you do not, why not? What is it hard for you to share your faith? Jonah was a prophet of the Lord. God called him to be his mouthpiece to the people. Jonah shared the Word of God regularly with the Jewish people – people who would have been receptive to his message and others who didn’t want to hear what he had to say. He spoke because that is what God wanted Him to do. The Lord asked Jonah to go to Nineveh. This would prove to be Jonah’s biggest challenge in his relationship with the LORD. He didn’t want to obey the LORD. He did NOT want to share God’s message with those people. Ask God to challenge you in your faith today. Read Jonah 1:1-3 What was a person from Nineveh like based on these verses? What was God’s attitude towards these people? How do we see that Jonah did not like what God wanted to do in the lives of the people of Nineveh? What does this say about his view on God? God called Jonah to be a prophet. God gave him words to say. Did Jonah deserve that office? What was he forgetting in how he judged the people of Nineveh? How does your attitude need to change when it comes to the salvation of the lost people God has put into your life? As Christians, we have experienced incredible grace and mercy. God sent Jesus to save us from our sin. We don’t deserve it and yet he chose us to be his children. Jonah forgot what he deserved for his sin – death and eternity separated from God, but God saved him. That grace and mercy needed to be in the front of his mind when it came to Nineveh. God’s grace and mercy need to be on our mind when we look at the lost around us. PRAYER – For a lost person in your life you are afraid to share your faith with. Day 2 What was the worst tragedy you have experienced personally or have seen in the life of someone you know? How did you react to that tragedy? How did others around you react to that tragedy? What do people think about God in the face of tragedy? When the towers fell in New York City it was surreal. Many people flocked to the church. People wanted to make sense of a senseless tragedy. People were angry at God. How could he let this happen? A loving God wouldn’t do this to people. This is not what we deserve. Yet there are others who totally trust in God and his plan – it is not easy, but they seek God to use them in ministering to others. Where would you fall? Ask God to use His Word to encourage and strengthen you today. Read Jonah 1:4-6 Jonah thought he had escaped God. How was he wrong in this attitude? How do we see God is in total control of all things according to these verses? How did the sailors react when they thought they were going to die? What would you say was the sailor’s belief about God? Read Romans 1:20. So what did the sailor’s know about God according to these verses? What do all men know? These hardened Pagan sailors pray during the storm. More than that, they encourage Jonah to pray hoping that one of them is praying to the God who is responsible for the storm that is upon them. They had the attitude that hopefully a prayer will stick. They did not realize that the problem lay in Jonah and his sin and rebellion. While the ungodly sailors were praying, Jonah was sleeping. How are you asleep in your faith while people around you are struggling to make sense of all the garbage in life? How is the church asleep? What can we do to engage our community with the Gospel? PRAYER – For open doors to share our faith personally and as a church. Day 3 Who is somebody you can go to in the time of tragedy, who you know will encourage and comfort you? Why. Who is someone you have you been able to encourage and comfort in a time of need? How did you encourage them? Sometimes we try to look the other way, so we don’t have to help a person in need. We are busy, don’t want to bother, the cost would be too much, it would be awkward. We have all kinds of excuses. Let us look at the next part of Jonah’s story. Ask God to help you hear and respond to his word today. Read Jonah 1:7-10 The sailor’s first prayed and called Jonah to pray. That didn’t work. The storm raged on. What did they do next? What does this show about the men’s desire to know the truth? How does God use this game of “chance” in the life of Jonah and the sailors? Jonah is a prophet who is supposed to speak the truth. How does Jonah momentarily assume his prophetic role to these sailors? What does he say? What is the sailor’s reaction to Jonah’s response? Why did they react this way? What did they believe about God to some degree? I am sure when Jonah initially told the sailors he was running away from God, it was a comment that just rolled off their backs and they went on with life. But with the storm threatening their boat and their lives, they have come to realize that there is a living and active God who gets angry and is in control of the weather. They have never experienced God in this way. They were terrified. Today, people don’t really become terrified with they think of God and all the bad things that happen around us. What attitudes or emotions do people show more when it comes to God and the bad things happening around us? What truths about God do you need to share with non-Christians in your life? PRAYER – That God would change the hearts of non-Christians around you. Day 4 Who is somebody you know that became a Christian? How did their life change as a result of knowing Jesus? How do you know if somebody genuinely knows Jesus and is walking with Him? Sometimes when we read Jonah, we get so focused on Jonah and his disobedience, on the Lord and his power in sending a storm and then a fish to swallow Jonah that we miss out on the faith journey of the sailors. These are men who were pagans, prayed to many gods only in the face of trouble. In our passage today we get to see how these men had come full circle and now embraced the LORD and who he is. Ask God to grow your faith today. Read Jonah 1:11-16 What did Jonah say the men needed to do to save themselves? Now earlier in the story these men might have jumped at the chance to throw this trouble maker overboard to save their skins. How do we see that God has changed their hearts in this ordeal? Would you say these men were now followers of God? Explain your answer. How do we see in this passage that this wasn’t some freak storm, but that God was in control of the storm? What does this say about God? What is the reaction of the sailors when the sea becomes calm after throwing Jonah overboard? Why do you think they reacted that way? What kinds of commitments do you think the sailors made to God? How do you know you are a Christian? What are 3 vows you made to God? Are you succeeding or failing? Explain. 1. 2. 3. PRAYER – For the conversion of someone who is not a Christian. Day 5 Where is the worst place you would not want to be for a weekend? Why? What would you do if you ended up in that place and were not able to leave? What would be your attitude? What would you do? What are some of the most important animals in the Bible? Balaam’s donkey, the donkey that carried Mary and Jesus in the womb, the dogs that were predicted to eat Jezebel, the dove in Noah’s ark and of course the fish in Jonah. You got it, we come to the whale (or fish) swallowing Jonah. Ask God to build you up n your faith as you read the Bible today. Read Jonah 1:17 Look hard at this verse. Write what comes to mind as you think of this verse. What do you notice about the things that you wrote down? Make some observations. What are some things we see about the character of God in this one verse? The burning question, was it a whale or fish? Explain your answer. What is significant about the amount of time Jonah was in the belly of the fish? Read Matthew 12:40 and Luke 11:29-32. How is the story of Jonah so much bigger than just Jonah in his own situation? How is Jonah pointing forward to Jesus Christ? What does this show us about the trustworthiness of God and His Word? Do you trust them both? Explain.