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Dr. Manny Arango
Hey, Bible nerds. This is Dr. Manny Arango, and I'm your host for the Bible department podcast powered by Arma. This podcast follows a Bible reading plan we created to help you read the entire Bible in a year. You can head to the show notes or thebibledepartment.com to download our reading plan and join the Journey family. Welcome to day 181. We are into the prophets. This is one of my favorite just genres of literature. I also think that it's a little overlooked. Now. Yesterday we dug into Joel today, and tomorrow we've got the Book of Jonah. And then when Jonah's done, we'll we'll get into Amos, which is going to be like the. More like traditional prophets. So there's anomalies with Joel, there's anomalies with Jonah, but as soon as we're done with Jonah, we'll get into Amos and Amos will start to feel more like, okay, this is what the prophetic books kind of function like. So like always, I'm gonna give you context clues, I'm gonna give you some nerdy nuggets, and we'll always leave off with a timeless truth. So welcome, welcome, welcome to the Book of Jonah. Let's dive in. If you've already done the reading, that's amazing. Good job. Congrats. Everything I say is gonna make perfect sense if you have not done the reading. Remember that this content is not designed to substitute your Bible reading, okay? This content is actually designed to supplement your Bible reading. So make sure that you read the chapters assigned for today. Jonah, chapter one and two. And with no further ado, let's dive into some context. All right, first piece of context that we need in order to understand the Book of Jonah as a whole. But definitely to understand chapter one and two is the first time Jonah's name is mentioned is actually not in the Book of Jonah. We've seen Jonah before. Okay, for all of you who have been tracking along with us for the whole year, we saw Jonah in 2 Kings 14:25. Okay? So that's our big context, is that we know Jonah. Jonah is not a new character. And remember, I'm gonna say this over and over and over again. The books of first and Second Kings act as a historical timeline that all the prophets fit in. Okay? So as we studied first and second Kings, we studied every single king. Kings of Israel in the north, Kings of Judah in the south. Well, Jonah prophesied during Jeroboam II reign. Okay? So Jonah is a prophet while Jeroboam King Jeroboam II is in power. For those of you who may have remembered this, Jeroboam ii, tons of economic growth, tons of political growth, but kings is going to say to us that he was a bad king, that he failed in his job to actually lead Israel. Which tells us right out of the gate, you could be killing it financially, you could be killing it with so many areas of your life. But if you're not doing a good job spiritually, then God ultimately gives you a failing grade because it doesn't matter what you're doing in life that you think is winning, God keeps a different scorecard. So Jeroboam II is king. Israel is flourishing in so many ways, but spiritually they're not. And God sends the prophet Jonah to prophesy. This is in 2 Kings 14:25. Now, this is fascinating. This is what Jonah says to Jeroboam. He's going to tell him that under your reign, Israel is going to have their land restored to their previous borders. Now, this is. We're gonna. We're gonna dive deep into our context clues. We're gonna get really, really deep because Jonah's prophecy is twofold. Okay? Number one, he goes to Jeroboam and he's like, hey, under your reign, Israel is gonna take back all the territory that God promised that would be the nation of Israel's. Now, when Jeroboam II is in power, you've gotta realize that the nation's borders have decreased over time. So whenever Israel is wicked and they follow idols, God allows foreign powers to come and. And take territory away from Israel. So the kings that had expanded the biblical map to the point of that was in accordance with the prophetic word that God had released to Abraham was David and Solomon. So under David and Solomon's reigns, man, Israel was the largest it had ever been. It had actually taken all the territory that God promised that would be Israel's. Now, here's the thing that's really, really, really fascinating that if you go all the way back to Genesis, this is Genesis chapter two. There's actually a description of where Eden is. Actually, we could go there together. And Genesis chapter two is actually going to tell you where Eden is located. Okay? Genesis chapter 2, verse 10. A river watering the garden flowed from Eden. From there, it separated into four headwaters. The name of the first is Pishon. Its winds, it winds through the entire land of the Havilah. Where there is gold, okay? The gold of that land is good. Aromatic resin and onyx are also there. The name of the Second river is Gihon. It winds through the entire land of Cush. Cush is Ethiopia. The name of the third is the Tigris. We know exactly where the Tigris is, and it runs along the east side of Asshur. And the fourth is the Euphrates. Okay, so you may have never heard this before, but that geographical location, if we take those four rivers, and obviously, in order for a river to create four more, you'd have to start at a mountain. So in ancient biblical cosmology, people would have imagined that Eden is up on a mountain. Also, I need you to get into the worldview of the biblical audience. In this worldview, gods lived in the mountains. I want you to think like Mount Olympus. Zeus and the rest of the pantheon of Greek gods all live in the mountains. This is how the ancient people thought. So if Eden is the place where heaven and earth meet, then it would make sense that Eden is this lush garden up at the top of a mountain. This is why God gives the law to Moses up at the top of a mountain. This is why Elijah challenges the prophets of BAAL up on top of a mountain. Mountains are seen as holy places. So you got a mountain and you've got ened up at the top. And one river creates four rivers. And if you actually look at the geography, it is the land of Israel. Okay, like, so. For real? For real. When God gives a promise to Joshua that you're going to take the land as far as the east, in west, north, south, when he gives the borders, he's actually saying, I want the land of Israel to be a new Eden for you and the people. Okay? So Genesis chapter two actually just gives us the borders we can see on a map. If you looked, okay, you look at Cush, the first river goes all the way down to Egypt. The second river goes all the way down to Ethiopia. And then the third river goes essentially up to the Assyrian empire, and then the fourth river goes up to the Babylonian empire. This is the land of Israel. Okay? So if you want to just know, okay, this is actually why Jewish people have such a connection to the land of Israel. Okay? Because they believe, yeah, this land is where the garden of Eden was. Family, the wait is over. My brand new book, Crushing Chaos is out now and available everywhere. Books are, are sold, literally. Today I walked into a Barnes and Noble and I signed a bunch of copies at a physical location. So you can grab this book at a physical Barnes and Noble or you can go to a Books a million or Amazon or anywhere books are sold and grab A copy. If you enjoy reading the Bible from an ancient perspective, if you understand that the beauty of Scripture is actually knowing it in context, then you'll love this book. And if there's any chaos in your personal life, I think that reading the Bible from an ancient perspective can actually help to crush the chaos in your life. I think this book is gonna be a New York Times bestseller. I really do. I think we wrote a good one. I think you should get a copy today. All right, back to the episode. Let's keep kind of moving. Cause I'm gonna build a picture for you. And then you'll get why this is really relevant to Jonah. So Jonah is going to prophesy to King Jeroboam, hey, under your reign, Israel is going to have its borders restored, okay? After Solomon, kings have been wicked. Territory's been lost. The Philistines have taken some territory. All kinds of the Edomites have taken territory. The Arameans have taken territory. But Jonah prophesies, you are gonna restore to Israel its proper boundaries, all the land that is supposed to be Israel's. It's gonna go back into Israelite ownership. But then it happens. That prophecy happens. It happens. But then the kings after Jeroboam are wicked. And so although Jonah prophesies something and it happens, it reverses. Because the people don't act by principle. What Jonah prophesied via promise. Now, here's the next interesting thing. We gotta kind of piece together some clues, the next thing that we need to do. Okay? So already in Jonah chapter one, we know that Jonah is Jonah. That's great. We got that. And now we got context on who is Jonah? What has he prophesied in the past? Who is he? Where does he fit into history? Here's the next piece of context. Okay? God tells Jonah, hey, go to Nineveh. Nineveh is the capital of the Assyrian Empire. You're gonna go to Nineveh and you're gonna preach to Nineveh. Cause I want the Ninevites to repent. The word of God says, arise. Go to Nineveh. The Bible tells us that Jonah arises and goes down to the docks and gets on a ship headed to Tarshish. So now this is just a quick logo search. What does the Bible have to say about Tarshish? Okay, so. So I have to have some context about Tarshish just to even know what is going on. So now I know Jonah, next thing I need to know is I need to know Tarshish. So there's 21 times in the Bible Where Tarshish is mentioned, we're just gonna talk about a couple of them. The very first place that Tarshish is mentioned is Genesis chapter 10, verse 4. And then 1 Kings chapter 10 is gonna talk about Tarshish. It's going to say that King Solomon's fleet brought gold, silver, ivory, apes and peacocks from Tarshish. So remember there was gold in Eden. Remember that there was a river that had gold in it. We just read that in Genesis chapter two. But Eden also had animals. So you can see in the middle of Solomon not obeying God, he's still trying to create his own Eden for himself. And this is the nature of human temptation, that even though God has kicked us out, out of Eden because of our sin, that does not stop us from trying to create a man made Eden for ourselves. And that's actually what Tarshish represents. It represents humans desires to create a man made Eden for themselves. So I'm gonna go to Tarshish and I'm gonna get gold, silver, ivory, apes, peacocks from Tarshish. 1st Kings 22:48 King Jehoshaphat built ships to go to Tarshish, and they were wrecked. 2 Chronicles 9:21 Solomon's ships went to Tarshish and brought back wealth. 2 Chronicles 20:36 Jehoshaphat allied with Ahaziah to build ships bound for Tarshish, but God disapproved of the alliance. 2 Chronicles 20, 37 the ships Jehoshaphat built for Tarshish were destroyed due to God's disapproval. Psalm 48, 7 God is said to break the ships of Tarshish with an east wind. Psalm 72, 10 Tarshish is mentioned as one of the distant places bringing tribute to the king. And Deuteronomy 17 tells us, what are kings not supposed to have gold? And what do the kings of Israel end up accumulating gold? And where do they get it? From Tarshish. And so what does God do all through the book of Isaiah? Isaiah chapter 2, 16 Isaiah prophesies against the ships of Tarshish. Isaiah 23:1, a prophecy against Tyre, mentioning ships from Tarshish, Tarshish, Tarshish, Tarshish. You say that like 15 times and you're like, Tarshish. I don't even know if I'm saying it right anymore. Okay, Isaiah 23:6, a call to flee from Tarshish because the destruction of tyre. Isaiah chapter 23, verse 10. A prophecy referring to the trade of Tarshish. Obviously trade and ships go together, so there's a clear Picture throughout the Bible that when the ships of Tarshish get mentioned, this is a emblem. This is a symbol. This is a logo of men trying to accumulate wealth and gold and get a new Eden for themselves. And this. And before we even get out of the first couple of verses, we already know Jonah is a prophet who's prophesying to Jeroboam that the land is gonna get restored and he's going to Tarshish, where Solomon got gold, to reward himself with a new Eden after he restored the boundaries of the land. All we need to know is context to know Jonah's in trouble. This is not good. Context alone lets us know something's fishy. No pun intended. Get it? It's Jonah. She's gonna get swallowed by fish. Something's fishy anyway. No pun intended. Something's fishy here. And I want you to train yourselves to get into a habit of going, all right, I'm reading the Bible, but I'm not just reading the Bible. If I see a city name, if I see something, I need to go. If I see a person or a city, let me throw that into a lexicon. Let me throw that into some kind of search engine to try to figure out who is this person and what is this place, what is Tarshish, and who is Jonah. Let's keep moving. I'm gonna give you a lot of nerdy nuggets. I'm just gonna kind of fire em at you. If you've done the reading, then all this would make a lot of sense. First off, Jonah rebels against God, goes in the opposite direction. Not only does it go in the opposite direction, he's trying to create Eden for himself, even though he's disobeying God. Okay? Whereas obedience and Eden go together, the moment Adam and Eve disobey God, they lose the Eden promise. But humans want to have their cake and eat it too. So they want to disobey God but still have Eden. And Tarshish represents man made Eden. When God made Eden has been taken away, man will always try to create Eden for himself. Jonah gets onto a ship. I want you to see this. There's this movement of down, down, down, down. So he goes down to the docks, then he goes down into the ship, and then he's gonna go down into the sea, and then he's gonna go down into a great fish. And so there's this descent of Jonah. It's just a nerdy nugget. This is a repeated word over and over and over. The author wants you to see this Visual that Jonah's not just running away, but that when we run away, our lives descend into chaos. And the author is actually using, like, kind of rare, kind of odd Hebrew words. Down isn't even the best word choice, but he's doing something artistic. He wants you to see that your life never ascends when you operate in disobedience, but your life always descends in the chaos. Next thing, he goes down into the ship, and Jonah's in a deep sleep. So where have we seen a deep sleep before? Two times in the Old Testament, there had been a deep sleep. First, Adam was in a deep sleep. Who put him in a deep sleep? God put him in a deep sleep. Why? So he could take out his rib and form Eve out of the rib. Second time, a character's in a deep sleep. There's a man by the name of Abram, and God is making a covenant with Abram. So God puts Abram in a deep sleep. Jonah is now in a deep sleep. But who has put Jonah in a deep sleep? He has put himself in a deep sleep. Because a deep sleep represents a supernatural peace that you receive from God where you are allowed to get a revelation of or a vision of what God is doing in your life. And when you walk in disobedience now, it's your power and it's your manipulation that has to put yourself into a deep sleep. So what we see is immediately these words, deep sleep are used for Jonah. But it's not God that's putting into a deep. Into a deep sleep. He has to put himself into a deep sleep. Next, the pagan sailors are gonna cast lots to figure out whose fault is it that there's this storm here? Okay? And I need you to remember, okay. How many times have lots been cast already in the Bible? Here we go. A couple times. Achan. They cast lots to figure out who was guilty of the sin at AI. There was a victory at Jericho, and they lost at AI. And they have to cast lots to figure out whose fault it is. And the lot falls on Achan. So casting lots is a supernatural way to figure out who the guilty party is. Next. There's lots cast for Saul in Saul's hiding. So now casting lots is already associated with guilt and with hiding. And so they cast lots to find Jonah. And what is Jonah doing? He is hiding in the bottom of the ship while guilty. So the fact that the Bible's using the imagery of lots being cast is already telling you that Jonah is connected to Achan and Jonah's connected to Saul. This is also going to not be good that in the New Testament that the disciples are gonna cast lots to figure out who the new replacement for Judas is gonna be. See, the Bible's already creating a connotation for casting lots for you, and it's not like a good connotation, okay? So by the time you get to the New Testament, you're supposed to go, they cast lots for Achan, they cast lots for Saul, they cast lots for Jonah. That was. None of those were good. And now I know that information. And, like, AI, I get smarter the more I engage with the Bible, okay? And so now I get to the New Testament and I'm gonna make some judgments about casting lots. Couple more nerdy nuggets for you. I want you to see the role reversal between the pagans who are acting righteously and Jonah who's acting like a pagan, okay? And so now Jonah gives his big plea, throw me overboard, okay? So that you guys can live. And the sailors actually don't wanna shed innocent blood because they're more righteous, Whereas a real prophet would have, like, preached or tried to convert them. He doesn't. Jonah would rather die, okay? This is not noble. This is not like some noble thing. Jonah would rather die. He would rather surrender his life to the grave than to do what God has called him to do or demanded him to do or requested that he would do or asked him to do something. And so now Jonah is actually going to surrender his life to the grave. You can look these up on your own, okay? Psalm 69, verse 1 and 2 and 69, 15, and Psalm 88, verse 3 to 7. In those two passages of scripture, Psalm 69 and Psalm 68, you'll realize that Sheol, which is the place of the dead, the waters and the deep are all used synonymously. So when Jonah surrenders himself to the deep, what he's then going to start saying in his poem is, I'm going down into Sheol. Now, here's another little nerdy nugget for you is, what does Jonah's name mean? Jonah's name means dove. What is a dove? In the Israelite system, a dove is the cheapest form of sacrifice that you could bring to the temple to atone for your sins. So when the sailors throw Jonah overboard, he's actually fulfilling the name that God's given him. He's acting as a sacrifice, even though his motives are wrong. And he is becoming the sacrifice so the storm can die down and the sailors can live. Because he is a dove. Last thing, he gets swallowed by A great fish. Now, in the New Testament, Jesus is going to make it very clear that this is actually a sea monster. Like the same sea monsters from Genesis chapter one. This is a tannin. Here's the very, very fascinating thing. This is just a nerdy nugget that blows my mind that in Jonah 1:17 and in Jonah 2:1, it's a male fish, which is dag d a g in Hebrew. In Jonah 2:2, it's a female fish. And so I need you to think about this. It's a female fish with a prophet in its belly. The image that the author wants you to see is that the fish is pregnant with Jonah. Okay? So the intentionally moves from a male fish to a female fish. So the fish goes from dog, which is male fish in Hebrew, to daga, which is a female fish in Hebrew. And this is not a mistake. It's not a mistake that the fish would be male for two verses back to back, and then female. The Bible wants you to see a picture of Jesus that what you thought was a tomb will always turn into a womb. And so Jonah goes down into death. He actually experiences a rebirth. And the whale doesn't just vomit him out, but the whale or the tannin, or the sea dragon or the sea monster or the great fish, whatever you have in your imagination, actually becomes the vehicle for new life and our timeless truth. We acts have two today is that when we follow Jesus, that means following him into death. That for the believer, death doesn't mean what it means for everybody else. For the believer, a tomb is always a womb. It's a new beginning. The death of one thing means the new life of something else. And so Jonah experiences rebirth. And that is the Christian hope that we would experience not just a rebirth, but series of rebirths. My next time of truth, this helps me a lot, is that God is in control but never controlling. I want you to see that God controls the whale or the great fish or the tannin. He controls the storm. He controls everything but Jonah. So he controls everything, but he is not controlling. Okay, so he's not going to pick Jonah up and put him in Nineveh. He never infringes on our free will, but he is completely sovereign and totally in control. And there's a lot of people that in order to preach the sovereignty of God, they have to impinge upon human free will. But I actually think that the Bible is giving us a picture of God who is completely sovereign, completely in control, but never having to control you with the cosmic remote control. He allows you to have free will. And we're gonna see this dance of free will and sovereignty all throughout the Bible with people like Pharaoh, who is hardening his heart, but God is also hardening his heart. We're gonna see this dance of free will and sovereignty all throughout the Bible. And you've probably experienced it in your own life where God is sovereign, but that doesn't mean that you're a puppet, and that doesn't mean that you get to blame him. And even though you are doing things that fall in line with things that he's predicted or prophesied, he's prophesied that someone would betray Jesus. That didn't mean Judas has to do it. So prophecy doesn't doom us. A prophecy actually comes with lots of options. I know that may not be the way that you've learned prophecy or heard prophecy, but Rebekah gets a prophetic word from God about her two boys, but that doesn't mean that she gets to manipulate her husband into blessing the boy that he doesn't wanna bless. And so prophecy does not give us license to act in ways that are not godly. And so even with prophecy, there's still options to hold life with an open hand. That's my timeless truth for the day. All right, if you're on a streak, don't break it. We're gonna finish the Book of Joda tomorrow. If you're not on a streak, what's stopping you? Let's get a streak going. A daily diet of God's word will completely change your life if you are on a streak. I'm so proud of you. I love you and I'll see you right here tomorrow for day 182. Let's keep going through the Book of Jonah together. Love you guys. Peace. Thanks so much for joining us on the Bible Department podcast. You can find us online and learn more about the show at the Bible Department and on Instagram. Hebibledepartment. If you enjoyed this episode and want to dive deeper into the Bible, you can get free access to our library of courses@thebibledepartment.com we'll see you back here tomorrow.