When Grace Gets Personal

Jonah was an Old Testament prophet (mentioned in 2 Kings 14:35) whose book has a unique feature. The message is in the experiences and story of the prophet himself. In this book, God’s grace is revealed to Jonah as well as the sinful people of Nineveh. Jonah ran from God’s call because he despised the people God loved. Yet God, in relentless mercy, pursued Jonah through a storm, not to punish him, but to reveal His grace and mercy. In a beautiful psalm of praise in chapter 2, Jonah expresses his gratitude to God and repents of his disobedience. Just like Jonah, we forget the depths of God’s grace and the forgetfulness shrinks our hearts for God’s mission. When we remember the grace of God, our gratitude grows, and God’s mission moves through us. The mission moves as gratitude grows.