The Evil Of Running Away From God - Jonah As A Case Study

1. Jonah's story, as told in the Bible typified what could happen to an individual who has made up his mind to always go contrary to God's purpose for his life.
   
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2. Jonah's story, as told in the Bible typified what could happen to an individual who has made up his mind to always go contrary to God's purpose for his life.

Reading through the Book of Jonah in the Bible, one could find out that his running away from the Lord started him on a downward path. Just in Jonah chapter 1 alone, he went down 5 times: (1) Verse 3, he went down to Joppa. (2) He got a ship going to Tarshish and went down to it. (3) The ship was in trouble with the storm but Jonah went down to its sides and was fast asleep - Verse 5. (4) In verse 15, the mariners threw him down into the sea for it to cease her raging. (5) Finally, he was swallowed down into the fish's belly. Jonah 1:2-3, 15-17; Acts 13:2; 27:18-19,38.

1. Running away from God is one of the major causes of depression. The initial command of God to Jonah was to "arise, go". But the response of Jonah was to " rise up to flee from the presence of God "and began his down ward descent/trend, Verse 3&10. Since his reason for fleeing was God's attribute of gracious, compassion, slow to anger and abounding in love.

Therefore, for him to "get back on the upward - track" again he would have to return to the Lord; and when he did, he found Him with His same attributes as had feared earlier.

We need to examine ourselves where are we heading to; downward or upward. Are we as individuals where God wants us to be? Is our next step in life taking us nearer to God or farther away from Him? Zeph. 3:2; Matthew 12:40-41.