Bony Jonah

#Molinos #100DaysintheSecretPlace #OolaFaith #Jonah #spiritualjourney #endurance #FindingOola #OolaCreative

"Perhaps it will be your experience after you have decided to die to a more external life you will feel nothing is working in your favour. Do not be afraid. Any external efforts of piety, religion, or even self denial, will not work. Only God can cast the Jonah of your outward senses into the sea." Molinos

Jonah was a prophet of God. To be a prophet of God one has to hear from God. To hear from God one has to have an intimate relationship with God. To know His voice. To listen. To do.

But, as the story goes, Jonah didn't like the people God loved enough to warn, woo, and show mercy. They were enemies and evil in Jonah's eye. His outward eye. His outward justice. His outward ideals. He wanted the judgement of God to fall on them.

Jonah refused. Jonah walked the other way. Jonah was cast into the sea.

As I pursue a leaner life, stripped down of unnecessary outward distractions, I must face my outward Jonah senses. My sense of justice. My sense of who is worthy to be called God's children. My sense of what external practices are acceptable, and unacceptable, to God. Basically, my judgemental attitude.

Jesus talks sternly about judging. He says the measure I use to judge others will be used to judge me. Do I whip out Leviticus and accuse others of sin? And then eat ham?

Paul writes to Timothy, "I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgivings, be made on behalf of all men, for kings and all who are in authority...God our Savior, desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth."

God desires All to come to the Him. Even the politician I disagree with. Even the person who's lifestyle I judge as unacceptable. Even the vilest prisoner in the deepest cell. All.

Have I wished judgement to fall on them? Have I refused to pray? Have I walked the other way?

I desire to come to the end of my outward sense of judgement, my outward sense of justice, my outward sense of who deserves love.

My opinions are bony, grinding against the abundance of God's grace. I desire to be more like Him.

Come, God and cast the Jonah of my outward senses into the sea.

I feel bone dry

bone tired

bony

no flesh to buffer

the sharpness of

my need

my opinion

I desire freedom

from my self

outside of you

like a sinking ship

throwing ballast

overboard

my need to be heard

understood

accepted

my opinion

and sense of justice

has sunk

like Jonah