8.
A prayer of desperation. How confident was Jonah when he told the crew that the answer of a calm sea was to cast him into it. He obviously faced certain death for the waters were rough and raging. Then, to be swallowed by a great fish and be plunged into total darkness in its stomach. Jonah prayed (who wouldn’t). Jonah 2:1 From his prayer, which was most certainly a prayer of utter desperation, he anticipated an answer of deliverance. Jonah was for all practical purposes, dead. Yet, his spirit had not left his body. His experience was unique. The Lord gave him a special dispensation. The Lord at times allows certain situations to develop in our lives so that out of a spirit of anguish we might call upon Him. How pathetic that we allow ourselves to come to a place where prayer is the only escape hatch available. Jonah 2:1
In the fishes belly. The stench would have been horrible and nauseating. The amount of space limited. He was awash in the gastric juices of the fish. In verse five Jonah stated that he wore a turban of weeds, for the seaweeds were wrapped around his head. The condition in which he found himself was anything but comfortable. The Lord was really putting pressure on him. Let’s not wait for adverse circumstances to develop in our lives before we pray and make the necessary commitment to the Lord. Why wait until we are chastened to pray. Isa. 26:16
The prayer uttered by Jonah was not a silent prayer but a cry, a calling out loudly. A prayer of travail, and anguish. Imagine yourself in the same kind of a situation, how desperately would you react? It was a prayer born of adversity and great distress. The Lord did not put Jonah up in the best hotel in town but placed him in the most dire of circumstances. Jonah called it the belly of hell (sheol, the pit, grave or hell). He heard, the Lord heard him. In spite of the condition in which he found himself, Jonah was assured that his prayer had been heard and that the Lord would deliver him. Jonah 2:2 Note that twice in this verse he declared that the Lord had heard him. Truly, the Lord delivers us from all our troubles. Ps. 54:7
Jonah continued by giving us a running account of his emotions and reactions to his predicament. He was cast DOWN, by the Lord, into the deep, the bottom, the muddy place. The fish may well have been a bottom feeder and Jonah would have received the full benefit of the muck from the bottom. He felt himself to be in the very heart of the seas. He could hear the throb and roar of the surging waters and the surf. The flooding waters surrounded him, the billows and the waves passed over him. David, though not in the stomach of a fish, felt the same way as he faced the many difficulties of his life. Ps. 69:1-3 Men used of the Lord have great experiences, both positive and negative. Beloved think it not strange. 1 Pet. 4:12.