Only God

“But you, Lord my God, brought my life up from the pit.” Jonah 2:6

When God told Jonah to preach in Nineveh he refused and fled to a different city. And when we read this story we often see that detour as a failure and therefore a waste of time. When we make mistakes in life we often grow disheartened and discouraged. Maybe you are going through an ugly divorce. Perhaps a death in the family has caused you to sit in depression for many months and even years. It could be that you have been laid off from a job that you served faithfully in for many years and now you are wallowing in pity, too bitter to start over somewhere else. Maybe you made some huge mistake and you don’t see how you can ever bounce back or be used by God again.

It is interesting to know the people in Nineveh had a god that was half fish, half man. Have you ever thought that the reason Jonah was able to preach one sermon and an entire city fell to its face in repentance was because he came out of a fish’s belly? Imagine these people who worshipped a half fish, half man witnessing a huge fish coming out of the sea and spitting out a man onto the shore! 

Only God could orchestrate a failure to benefit others in that spectacular of a fashion! You may believe the lie that God cannot use you because you have failed but that failure could be the very thing that saves someone’s soul. The abuse you went through as a child could reach people that no one else could. The time that you spent in prison could relate to someone who thought they were worthless to this world. Your failed marriage could give someone hope that there is still a purpose and a plan for them after a divorce. Your business going bankrupt could help someone who is ready to give up on living. God wants hurting people to know that today is a new day and they can always begin again. His mercies are new each morning. God can use both your victories and your failures to minister to those without hope.

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