03/15/20 - When You Can't Get Any Lower - Jonah 2

Some of the most accomplished people on the planet will tell you about the failures that came before the successes. Although I prefer Popeye's, the Colonel makes some great chicken. You're probably familiar with his story. In retirement he started traveling by car to different restaurants and cooked his fried chicken on the spot for restaurant owners. If the owner liked it, they would enter into a handshake agreement to sell the tasty birds. Sounds easy right? Did you know he was turned down 1009 times before his chicken was accepted once! He was considered a failure, but his story was just beginning. By 1964 Harland Sanders had 600 franchises selling his trademark recipe.

Many of us have had some epic failures. Jonah can relate. He ran away from God. This always leads to a dark and desperate destination. He finds himself wrapped in seaweed under the raging waters of a storm. Previously he was down in the belly of a ship hiding, now he's down in the depths of the sea drowning. Jonah can't get any lower but God hasn't abandoned him. God interrupts our lives with storms in order to get our attention. Why? Because the human heart can't simply be told it is sinful, it has to be shown, and oftentimes this comes through brutal experience. It's not until we are under extreme distress that we call out to God. In the bottom of the pit we have nowhere to look but up. Sometimes God brings us out and sometimes we see him coming down to us, giving us the gift of his presence so that we might know peace in the midst of our storms.