Title: Manifesting the Promises of God/ Topic: Faith and Prayer

Today’s Reading: Jonah 1; Jonah 2; Jonah 3; Jonah 4; 2 Timothy 2

Scripture: Jonah 2
1 From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the LORD his God. 2 He said: "In my distress I called to the LORD, and he answered me. From the depths of the grave [a] I called for help, and you listened to my cry.
3 You hurled me into the deep, into the very heart of the seas, and the currents swirled about me; all your waves and breakers swept over me.
4 I said, 'I have been banished from your sight; yet I will look again toward your holy temple.'
5 The engulfing waters threatened me, the deep surrounded me; seaweed was wrapped around my head.
6 To the roots of the mountains I sank down; the earth beneath barred me in forever. But you brought my life up from the pit, O LORD my God.
7 "When my life was ebbing away, I remembered you, LORD, and my prayer rose to you, to your holy temple.
8 "Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs.
9 But I, with a song of thanksgiving, will sacrifice to you. What I have vowed I will make good. Salvation comes from the LORD."
10 And the LORD commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.

Observation: It's very interesting that the prayer of Jonah is all in the past tense, even though he was still inside the fish. He declares that God has delivered him (vs. 6,7) and affirms God's salvation with thanksgiving. It was after he prayed this way that God commanded the fish to vomit Jonah out of its mouth. This is an example of someone praying in faith as described in Hebrews 11:1 “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”

Application: We are generally not taught to pray this way. It's considered presumptuous to pray as if what we are asking for has already been done. Could it be that this prophet Jonah had an understanding of prayer and faith that we need to grab hold of? I think so. And I think all we need to do to keep from being presumptuous in this practice is to make sure that our requests are within the will of God. The will of God, according to the scriptures, includes healing, salvation, deliverance, provision, everything we need for life and godliness. That's a lot. I need to pray like Jonah did much more than I do.

Prayer: Teach me Lord, to pray in faith. May I call those things that are not (but should be) as though they already are. May my faith, spoken and declared by my mouth, bring the manifestation of your promises into existence in my life and the lives of others.
This I pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.