Christ in All of Scripture – Jonah 2:9-10
will sacrifice to you;
what I have vowed I will pay.
Salvation belongs to the LORD!'
And the LORD spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah out upon the dry land."
“Salvation belongs to the Lord!” God’s dramatic intervention in the life of Jonah is full of hope—not only for those who seek God, but also for those who, like Jonah, have determined to shut him out. Many people believe God opens the door of salvation and then stands back, leaving it up to us to decide if we want to come in. But if God made salvation possible and then stepped back, refusing to interfere with our choice, then the entire life of believers would be about us—our believing, our serving, our following, and our choices to live a good life. In the case of Jonah, imprisoned in the whale’s belly, God was claiming someone who was quite incapable of performing any redeeming work to compensate for his sin. God was not relying on Jonah to save Jonah. The message remains the same for each of us today: if you have trusted God for salvation, he has done more than simply make salvation possible; he has actually saved you.
...if you have trusted God for salvation, he has done more than simply make salvation possible; he has actually saved you.
Consider what lies behind our faith. Even before the creation of the world, we were “on God’s horizon.” God set his love on us and formed his plans for us even before we were born (Ps. 139:16; Eph. 1:4–5). When Jesus came into the world, he came to save real people with real names and faces. If we are in Christ, we are among them. The sins he carried to the cross were our sins. The hell he endured was our hell. God did all this for us before we were born, but it didn’t end there. He brought salvation to us, opening our eyes to see our sin, and drawing our hearts to find hope in the Savior.
Each Christian has a unique story of how this took place. The times, the places, and the people involved vary, but behind each story, however simple, is the same amazing miracle of God’s grace (Eph. 2:8–9). Once you see that God has come after you and has laid hold of you, it will open up a new sense of worship and wonder, a new awareness of his love, and a new confidence in what God can do for others.
This series of posts pairs a brief passage of Scripture with associated study notes drawn from the Gospel Transformation Bible. For more information about the Gospel Transformation Bible, please visit GospelTransformationBible.org.
