LGG: Jonah - Love the Loveless Week 2/Day 2

Read: Jonah 2:3-4SOAP: Psalm 31:22

S: As for me, I said in my haste, "I am cut off from before your eyes." Nevertheless you heard the voice of my petitions when I cried to you."

 In the fourth watch of the night Yeshua came to them, walking on the sea. When the talmidim saw him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying, "It's a ghost!" and they cried out for fear.
But immediately Yeshua spoke to them, saying "Cheer up! I AM! Don't be afraid." Peter answered him and said, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the waters."
He said, "Come!" Peter stepped down from the boat, and walked on the waters to come to Yeshua.
But when he saw that the wind was strong, he was afraid, and beginning to sink, he cried out, saying, "Lord, save me!"
Immediately Yeshua stretched out his hand, took hold of him, and said to him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" 

-Gospel of Matthew, chapter 14

O&A: We are not alone in wondering if we've been forgotten when we go through hard times. We are also not alone in the fact that He WILL answer us when we call! HalleluYah! Jonah was in the depths, the heart of the sea; the boat Peter was on was in the middle of the sea, also. 

[Jonah: For you threw me into the depths, In the heart of the seas. The flood was all around me. All your waves and your billows passed over me.]

[Peter: But the boat was now in the middle of the sea, distressed by the waves, for the wind was contrary.]
Really amazing to me is that the Hebrew word for heart (as in the heart of the seas) is לֵבָב lêbâb, lay-bawb', which can be translated as the seat of will and purpose, or intellect and wisdom; the seat of the senses, affections, and emotions of the mind; the soul, life; the heart; the midst. So while Yonah was in the belly of the fish, in the heart of the sea, his own heart was being dealt with by Elohim. I personally notice that often when I've rebelled against Abba, He allows me to be consumed in order for me to recognize my rebellion so that I will make my choice - cry out to Him in my despair, or continue to turn away?? 

Consider this: doesn't His word say that He would rather us be hot or cold? That if we are lukewarm, He will spew us out. I know I'm ahead of the study throwing that out there, but He was giving Yonah the opportunity to show whether he would be hot or cold. Which of course makes me consider MY heart, and MY temperature. This study is not just about Yonah, but about how I must be changed for Abba's glory and perfection. It's so much easier to say, "Oh, Yonah, how could you do that? I would never..." 

But that wouldn't be true.

I spent most of my life running from God, all the while proclaiming to love Him and serve Him. I can't even begin to number the amount of times and situations I sought refuge FROM God, instead of finding refuge IN HIM. Even in my strongest times, and during minor trials, I have asked Him, "Are you sure? Won't this overtake me?" And still, just like Kefa/Peter and walking on the water, "But when he saw that the wind was strong, he was afraid, and beginning to sink, he cried out, saying, "Lord, save me!" Immediately Yeshua stretched out his hand, took hold of him, and said to him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?"

P: Avinu Malkeinu, our Father and our King, Your righteousness is astounding. Thank You for not having selective hearing, as I sometimes do. Thank You for hearing my cries immediately, even if it's not time for the answer to be revealed. I seek Your forgiveness for every matter that You've called me to that I have run from, for every word you've asked me to speak and I've said, "Huh? What's that, Abba? Are you sure?" Your love is so great, and I fail. Abba, change my heart during this study, so that I seek Your will and Your heart far greater than I seek my own, or even someone else's. I want to burn hotter and hotter for You, so that if I be consumed, it is by YOU! In Yeshua's name, I give You praise and thanks, Amein.

LGG: Jonah - Love the Loveless Week 1/Day 4

Read: Jonah 1:13-17SOAP: 1 John 1:9

S: If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us the sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

O&A: It is really interesting that the SOAP passage says "he is faithful and righteous to forgive us the sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness", and in Yonah, we see that they threw Yonah into the sea. What a visual of being cleansed! Abba didn't have mercy on just the people on the ship, but of course as we continue, we learn of His tender and loving mercies towards each of us. 

Didn't the men on the ship initially try to do exactly as Yonah did? They tried to run from Adonai's ruling, and it got worse for them! So not only am *I* Yonah, but so were they! 

I need to add in 1 John 1:10, also, "If we say that we haven't sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us." I, for one, do not want to make the Creator of the universe a liar! I have actually used this with my sons in regards to consequences of their actions. If I had told them, "If you choose to do (this), then (that) will be the consequence", and they still choose to do the thing, (and it is apparent that it was willful disobedience), then I would ask them if they remembered the consequence. If they asked me not to follow through on the consequence, I would tell them that if I did not follow through, then it would make me a liar because I would not have done what I said I would do. (Of course there are times of mercy, because Adonai DOES show us mercy, but it isn't every time because then what would we learn?)

When we try to do things our way, we are not giving glory to our Father, our Adon/Lord; we are trying to give glory to ourselves. Yonah was choosing disobedience, the men on the ship were choosing disobedience, and how many times have I chosen disobedience? And what does it take for us to cry out to the One True God, and repent and do what's right? Will we continue to fight as the storm grows more tempestuously around us, and keep thinking, "I've got this. I can do this." Or will we fall in submission to Adonai, and truly understand that He does not do things to please US..? Yes, He does things that we feel pleased by, but He doesn't do it for our sake, but His.

P: Abba, my Father, You are worthy to be praised, and I praise You for Your sake, not my own! I am so thankful for Your mercies, for Your love, and for Your salvation. Abba, I don't want to be like Yonah, but I realize sometimes I do run away from what You've called me to run toward. I pray for Your discernment to know what to do, where to go, which direction to travel, etc., because my feet don't always know where to go. I pray for Your discernment in my friendships, in my homeschooling, and really in every interaction I have so that I will not stray from Your calling. In Yeshua's name, Amein.

LGG: Jonah - Love the Loveless Week 1/Day 3

Read: Jonah 1:7-12SOAP: 1 John 2:4-6

S: One who says, "I know him," and doesn't keep his mitzvot, is a liar, and the truth isn't in him. But whoever keeps his word, God's love has most assuredly been perfected in him. This is how we know that we are in him: he who says he remains in him ought himself also to walk                                   just like he walked.

O&A: I once lived a life of a "believer". I believed, yet I didn't keep the mitzvot/the commandments. I was a liar, and the truth was not in me. I had to learn (the hard way, of course) that being religious is not the same as being a Yeshua follower. Verse 3 says, "This is how we know that we know him: if we keep his mitzvot." Mitzvot being commandment, meaning a prescribed rule in accordance with which a thing is done; of the precepts of Jewish tradition: universally, of the commandments of God. It amazed me that I was supposed to DO something, LIVE it out, not just SAY I was something. Yonah SAID he was a Hebrew and that he feared the LORD, but he wasn't LIVING like that. He was a liar, and the truth was not in him. The same goes for me. 


Even the men who were on the ship knew Yonah's actions had put them in grave danger. "Then were the men exceedingly afraid, and said to him, "What is this that you have done?" For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the LORD, because he had told them." This is the moment I can still see: I AM YONAH. Does my walk always line up with my talk? Or am I just blustering? Am I Beth, or am I God's? If I am running from God's decree, I am serving myself. If I put my desires aside and do as I am commanded, I am honoring Elohim, King of the Universe. How many times must I defy Him and be swallowed by the fish, and die to myself? (As many times as it takes to submit fully to Adonai.) (And to skip ahead here, sorry, but I don't want to forget this: When Elohim vomits Yonah out onto the shore, remember what Adonai says He will do if we are lukewarm... He will spew us out if we are neither hot nor cold.)

P: Mighty Elohim, King of the Universe, Your word says we are to keep Your mitzvot, that we are to take up our execution stake/cross DAILY and follow Yeshua. We are to constantly deny our selves so that we are free to serve You, our one Master. I thank You for the breath in my lungs this morning that I am proclaiming Your glory, honor, and power with! I thank You and praise You that no matter how faithFUL or how faithLESS I am, YOU ARE STILL IN CONTROL! YOU ARE STILL ON THE THRONE! However, I desire to serve You better, no, I desire to serve You with my BEST. (Good, better, best, never let it rest, til your good gets better, and your better gets BEST!) You are worthy of all that I have to offer, and even more. Thank You, Abba, thank You! In Yeshua's name, Amein

LGG: Jonah - Love the Loveless Week 1/Day 2

Read: Jonah 1:4-6SOAP: Psalm 135:5-6

S: For I know that the LORD is great, That our Lord is above all gods. Whatever the LORD pleased, that he has done, In heaven and in eretz, in the seas and in all deeps;

O&A: Tying the Proverb in with Yonah, "So the shipmaster came to him, and said to him, "What do you mean, sleeper? Arise, call on your gods! Maybe the gods will notice us, so that we won't perish." When a person doesn't know Adonai as Elohim/God, they cannot truly understand how great/gadol and magnificent He is! The people on that ship to Tarshish were trying to call out to multiple gods - they were going for QUANTITY, not QUALITY. 

Our Elohim, praise be to Him, is absolutely sovereign. We see that whatever pleases Him, he has done. I'm thinking about my position as a wife; I do things to please myself from time to time, sure, but my objective as wife to MY husband is to please him, as well. Adonai doesn't have to bend to us, however, the word for pleased is חָפֵץ (chaphets, pronounced as khä·fāts') can also be described as 'bend down' (properly, to incline to; by implication (literally but rarely) to bend; figuratively, to be pleased with, desire:—× any at all, (have, take) delight, desire, favour, like, move, be (well) pleased, have pleasure, will, would.) 

The gods of the unbelievers can do nothing, as evidenced by all the people crying out to their own gods, yet still demanding that Yonah call out to HIS (also brings to mind Eliyah/Elijah and the prophets of ba'al, and how wonderfully our Abba appeared!); but our God can do any thing and does do everything.

One last thing, if I may. I was considering how it's almost like Abba has one of those child locators for each of us. I recently requested my family to download an app called Family360. With our eldest off at college, my husband having a delivery job, and my younger son sometimes liking to take walks alone, I like to know that if needed, I could see where they are, like in case of an emergency or something. Am I playing God by being able to see where they go? Heaven forbid! I'm keeping a watchful eye, just as He does with us, His chosen treasure.

P: Avinu Malkeinu, our Father and our King, Your majesty astounds and surrounds me.You truly are great, and above all gods. You are above the gods of our own making, and it's amazing to me that You, who answers to no one, would do anything to please anyone other than You. Abba, I proclaim You, just as Yonah was asked to do. He is not alone in trying to run from what You've asked, and he is not alone in storms coming because of his disobedience. Thank You, merciful Abba, for being greater than any and every god, every idol, every machination of our mind. May we be pleasing to You in all our ways. In Yeshua's name, Amein.

LGG: Jonah - Love the Loveless Week 1/Day 1

Read:Jonah 1:1-3SOAP: Psalm 139:7-10

S: Where could I go from your Spirit? Or where could I flee from your presence? If I ascend up into heaven, you are there. If I make my bed in She'ol, behold, you are there! If I take the wings of the dawn, And settle in the uttermost parts of the sea; Even there your hand will lead me, And your right hand will hold me.

O&A: God's Ruach ha Kodesh/Holy Spirit is EVERYWHERE. It is in the shamayim/heavens, and in She'ol/the grave or pit... As I read 'the wings of the dawn', I see a wonderful vision of a sunrise over the ocean, over a lake, over a countryside, and the view stretches from side to side, covering the entire expanse that my eyes can take in. This passage is telling us we can ascend to the highest of highs, the lowest of lows, as far to left or right, and even in the middle of nowhere, we are never hidden from Adonai. One way of looking at it, too, is where it says, "If I make my bed in She'ol" which is often translated as the grave, then one could even understand that even in death, when 'we are removed out of the sight of all living, yet not out of the sight of the living God; from his eye we cannot hide ourselves in the grave.' (Matthew Henry's commentary; exactly what I wanted to say but he says it in a much better manner). 

I see in this passage opposites and contradictions; heaven and hell, up and down, left and right, east and west north and south - the extremities of the earth; morning and its opposite, night, too. For if we see the the wings of the dawn, what does dawn follow? The night sky. So even in the darkness, as well as the light, He is there, just as in the beginning when He said "Let there be light" and there was, and then He separated light from the dark... I cannot say it enough... HE is there.

We can flee from people we know, from the places we've lived our whole lives, and escape to a place where we are virtually unknown and STILL He sees us. Still He knows us. Still He is with us. So on that note, let me say this: If Adonai is with me everywhere I go, should I maybe take heed on where I go, knowing that He comes with me? If He is always with me, should I consider my words, my thoughts, my deeds at all times? May He be praised! And may He be praised in me doing so, to bring Him glory.

P: Avinu malkeinu, our Father and our King, I bless You and thank You for Your faithfulness. I remain in wonder that You would call one such as me to be Your own, and I am thankful that You called me to You, and I can rest in You. You know I was like, have been like, and sometimes still AM like Yonah, trying to run from Your calling, and just like Yonah, You are with me wherever I go. Abba, I once again ask Your forgiveness and turn back to You. You know better than I do. You are such a merciful God, showing kindness to us, even as You see where we go, what we do, how we treat others, how we treat YOU. Have mercy upon us as we continue to follow Your path, and remain with us, Abba, as we study Your word, and we study Your character, and as we study Your Son, Yeshua, so that we can live better lives... lives according to Your master plan. In Yeshua's name, Amein.