remember YHWH

When Jonah receive a Word from the Lord, he didn't heed it. He didn't embrace it. He ran from it. His journey that should have led him to Nineveh instead led him deep inside the belly of a whale. All alone. Imprisoned in the darkness and cast out of the Lord's sight.

While the waters were compassed about him, Jonah prayed. He had the Word hidden in his heart and he drew strength from this. From his deep pit of despair and distress. Jonah remembered YHWH.

Jonah knew that God was a God of mercy. In the isolation of his incarceration inside the whale, Jonah became submissive and repentant. And he knew that the prayer was heard by Jehovah in His Holy temple.

"When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the LORD; and

my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple"

(Jonah 2:7)

Jonah desired the same mercy that he was trying to keep from the people of Nineveh. He desired God to bestow on him something that he wasn't willing to bestow on others.

God had compassion on Jonah. Compassion that we should strive to have on others. God reached down and lifted Jonah out of his place of despondency and grace him generously.

When we find ourselves in the midst of discouragement and deep in a pit of sin, we must remember YHWH. We need to call on His name in prayer. Recognize our sin and spend time in confession. Repent and turn away from those sins. And then we need to strive to walk in Him and submit to His authority.

Remember the Lord. Cry out to Him. God hears the cry of His people.