HELP!!!!! Help, thanks, wow
Carroll First
Most of us know this much about Jonah. He spent time in the
belly of a fish. But there is more to his story you might not know. Jonah is
not just an average person. He is a prophet of God. He is a preacher with a
special call to speak a particular message from God to the people… in his
opinion that meant Israelites. You know, God’s “chosen people.”
When God called Jonah to go to Nineveh. His response… “NO
WAY!” Now don’t be too hard on Jonah. You might have the same response when you
discover that Nineveh is in modern day Iraq.
Do you remember the Iraqi town by the name of Mosul? That’s what Nineveh
is called today. I’m afraid that if God called me to go to Mosul and preach the
Christian gospel, I just might find myself in the belly of a fish somewhere. And
if I found myself in the smelly belly of a fish, I’d certainly pray for help
like I have never prayed before.
That’s what Jonah did. The passage we just read is Jonah’s
prayer from the fish.
I did a lot of research into the Hebrew language used there
and there is a better translation. That translation is “HELP!” That is the best
translation ever …HELP!!
Then Jonah “remembers”
God and trusts in God’s ability. The Cliff’s notes version is, he was spit out
on the shore and went to do what God wanted him to do in the first place.
We have all been in the belly of the fish. It is dark, it
stinks, we are in ick up to our knees (or sometimes up to our chins), we can’t
believe we are there, we can’t figure out how we got here, let alone imagine
how we are going to get out. We feel alone and powerless and hopeless, and we
don’t know where to turn… here only one logical response; scream as loud as you
can… HELP!!!! SOMEONE HELP!!!! CAN ANYONE HAR ME????
The belly of the fish comes in a lot of different shapes.
I’ve rarely felt so helpless as I did during Amber’s heart surgery. HELP! I
have rarely felt so out of control as I did the day Richie was born and they
loaded him up in the neonatal ICU ambulance and whisked him off to Iowa City.
HELP! I have rarely felt so defeated as I did the day the church burned down.
HELP! I have rarely felt as alone as I did when I got laid off for the first
time. HELP! I’ve never been so scared as I was coming back into the church
after being a carpenter for 9 years.
HELP!
Those are the most gut
felt and honest of all prayers.
Anne Lamott who wrote a little book called HELP, THANKS, WOW
defines prayer as “reaching out to be heard, hoping to be found by a light and
warmth in the world, instead of darkness and cold.” Prayer is not at is essence
words. Praying help is the heart or the gut reaching out, grasping for,
yearning for, begging for something outside of the belly of the fish. For some
people that is fate, or nature, or human intervention. When you are that deep
in the belly of the fish. The only real answer is calling out to God. Prayer is
“reaching out to be heard, hoping to be found by God.”
The instinct to cry out for help is right in our genetic
code. What is the first thing a baby does when they need something…anything…
cry out. They don’t know what they need. They don’t know who can help. They
don’t have a plan. They don’t blame anyone. They just cry.
Somewhere along the way we stumble into thinking “I can do it
myself,” “I shouldn’t have to ask for help.” “I am an independent 2-year-old,
or teenager, or adult and I don’t need anyone’s help.” That works pretty
well…until it doesn’t. And then we spend the rest of our lives trying to learn
to ask for help again.
Why is it so hard to
pray help?
Perhaps pride is the number one reason. We will try anything
and everything we can think of until we run out of good ideas or even bad
ideas… before ewe admit we need help and turn to prayer.
The second reason is the opposite of pride. It is a feeling
of being unworthy. Thinking God has more important things to worry about than
me. Occasionally someone in the hospital says, “You didn’t have to come… you
are so busy… I want to tell them, ‘You’re in the HOSPITAL! This is exactly what
I’m supposed to be busy doing.’” I don’t, but there is something in us that
says we are not important enough to get help.
Third, I think praying for help might be hard for us is we
believe God somehow caused our suffering… Don’t believe it. Or we have the idea that God doesn’t care…
Don’t believe it. Or we have the notion
that God can’t do anything for us. Don’t believe it!
We have to jump over those hurdles and just cry out “Help me
God!” Sometimes, a gut-wrenching “God help me”... might be all we have. But what I want to tell you today is that’s
all we need.
Let me point out two
lessons from Jonah’s story. The first lesson is just do it. Don’t wait.
Take a look at Jonah in the belly of the fish on page 800 of
your pew Bible.… In verse 2 he says, “I called to the LORD out of my distress.
But how long did he wait? This was his
last resort. In verse 7 we read ““7 As my life was ebbing away, I remembered
the LORD.” It was after three days and with his last dying breath that Jonah
called out to God.
When I was at one of the lowest points in my life, when we
left the church and moved to Bettendorf without a plan, or jobs, or anything…
I’m sorry to say It took years…. And a thousand little tiny steps before I was
able to open up to God and cry “help.” It took folks from the church doing a
hundred kind things for us…it took our friends from the church inviting me to
do kind things for others with them… It took my going back to worship, not for
me, but to be a good example for Richie (and the crack began to open) …. It
took being rooked into chaperoning a mission trip (a little bigger crack) It
took hitting rock bottom and realizing that I had no options but to cry out to
God. And the light began to shine through e crack. Even then I didn’t have the
strength to reach out… I opened a crack and God’s grace began to shine through…
and it wasn’t long before God reached in and saved me again.
God will still be there if you wait, that’s not the issue…
but how bad does it have to get? Don’t
wait. Just do it.
Just do it… and then
just TRUST. It is hard to trust. But when we have run out of ideas, and
excuses, and blaming, and cursing what is left but to trust someone else. Trust
that God didn’t put you in this bad place. That is not the way God works. Trust
that God cares… and he does. Trust that God wants to help… and he does… trust
that God can help… and God can!
Notice the second half of the 2nd verse in Jonah’s prayer.
Jonah almost sounds surprised! “and he answered me. From deep in the realm of
the dead I called for help, and you listened to my cry.”
I believe every time we can trust God actually deepens our
relationship with God. When we pray, “OK, God. I’ve got nothing left. Did you
really mean it when you said you loved me no matter what? Well, here I am,
warts and all.” It’s at that moment, in that moment of helplessness and.
vulnerability, and trust that our healing begins.
What is your belly of the fish right now?
what is your belly of the fish? We all have one or two or
three, maybe it doesn’t look to bad right now or maybe it looks like the light
at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming freight train.
If everything is good right now think about a time when it
wasn’t or think about a friend who needs help right now.
Take you piece of yarn. Tie a knot in it. And pray for help.
Maybe your problem is bigger than one knot, feel free to tie another or two
more… Feel that knot and pray for help. Hold on to that knot like your life
depends on it and pray for help. You know they say when you get to the end of
your rope, tie a knot and hang on. That is kind of what we are doing. Tie a
knot or 6 and take it home to hold when you pray… pray for God’s help for you
or for others.
Remember there is “KNOT” one thing that can separate us from
God’s love. KNOT angels KNOT principalities, KNOT life, KNOT death. KNOT
anything in all creation can separate us from the love of god in Christ Jesus
our Lord. It’s OK to pray “help.” It’s a good and indispensable prayer. “Help!”
For now, and evermore. Amen.
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