Arise, You Sleeper!

“What do you mean, you sleeper? Arise, call out to your God!” - Jonah 1:6

This scripture comes at the beginning of the story of the prophet Jonah. Most of you reading this are probably somewhat familiar with the story, or at least the VeggieTales version. This is a story full of irony, one of the most prominent being Jonah’s behavior as a prophet of God starkly contrasted against groups of nonbelievers.

At this point in the story, Jonah is running away from God’s call and has fallen asleep on a boat headed for “anywhere but Nineveh” (specifically Tarshish, but that’s beside the point). When the storm came and the threat of death by drowning or shipwreck became very real, all of the sailors began calling out to the gods they believed in, but our buddy Jonah was still sound asleep.

The pagan sailors cried out to their gods before the prophet of the One True God cried out.

It took the captain of the ship shaking Jonah awake and echoing God’s original call to Jonah, “Arise, call out to your God!” (v. 6)

What was God’s command to Jonah at the beginning of the story, you ask?

“Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it, for their evil has come up before me.” - Jonah 1:2

God will use any means necessary to get his message across. If we don’t listen to His voice, He’ll use someone else’s voice or His creation to get our attention.

I think you see where this is going…right?

Even still, Jonah did not cry out to God. Instead, they cast lots to try to find some divine answer. Then the sailors called out to God. But Jonah just told them, “Pick me up and hurl me into the sea…” so they did, and God used a giant fish to get Jonah back on track.

There’s so much more we can learn from Jonah if we really dug into the rest of the story, but that’s for another day.

For now, we’re going to focus on this command to “Arise, and call out”. When the captain came to wake up Jonah, he said, “What do you mean, you sleeper?” Other translations say, “How can you sleep at a time like this?”

The sailors were desperate to save their lives. They had already abandoned all of their cargo, which was probably their livelihood. They saw that death was imminent and were willing to do anything to avoid it.

And yet, Jonah was asleep. Somehow, despite his rebellion and the raging storm, he slept, oblivious to the chaos going on around him.

Then even when the pagan sailors begged him to cry out to his God (whom they immediately feared and respected, by the way), he still did not call on God, but offered his own solution.

It’s easy for me to look at the story of Jonah and think, “he’s crazy to think he can run from God and then repeatedly refuse to call out to him when he’s obviously desperate!” until I remember that I’m just as guilty as Jonah.

How many times have I ignored God’s word spoken to me?

How many days have I slept when I was called to get up and pray?

How often have I waited for God to go to extreme measures before I will listen?

I can’t help but take a moment to ponder my honest answers to those questions and feel the weight of my rebellion against my God. If you’re in the same boat as me (pun absolutely intended), please hear this: these questions are not meant to fill you with shame, and hurling yourself into the raging storm around you is not the only solution.

Let’s learn from Jonah.

Rather, the weightiness of our rebellion and God’s call is meant to lead us to repentance. To wake us up, so we can open our eyes to the truth that only God can calm the storm we’ve brought on ourselves, and call on Him.

In all of this, I can’t help but think of Jesus calming the storm. You can find the story in Matthew 8:23-27, Mark 4:35-41, or Luke 8:22-25. All three versions are very short if you want to take a second to read it.

Go ahead, I’ll wait…

Done? Great! What did you notice about it?

Hopefully, the same things that struck me: here’s another story of a raging storm on a boat and a Man of God sleeping below deck. Although it’s not really the same scenario as the story of Jonah at all.

In this case, Jesus was the one sleeping below deck while the storm rages on, and he was with the disciples on his way to teach and minister to people. The disciples had the same fear for their lives that the sailors did, but they called on Jesus.

“And they went and woke him saying, ‘Master, Master, we are perishing!’ And he awoke and rebuked the wind and the raging waves, and they ceased, and there was a calm.” - Luke 8:24

“And they woke him and said to him, ‘Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?’ And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm.” - Mark 4:38-39

“And they went and woke him, saying, ‘Save us, Lord; we are perishing.’ And he said to them, ‘Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?’ Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm.” - Matthew 8:25-26

Notice what the disciples said to Jesus. Pick whatever version you like. In all three, they did not sugarcoat their feelings or try to offer a solution to the problem. They did not

take the time to make their request sound eloquent. They were desperate, and they came to Jesus with their raw emotions and fears.

God doesn’t ask us to call on Him with suggestions like Jonah, but to call on Him in faith. Like the disciples, He just wants us to come to Him in the middle of the chaos so He can make it still.

Jonah slept in the midst of rebellion and refusal to call on God. Jesus slept in the midst of obedience and faith in God’s sovereign power over creation.

So brothers and sisters, let’s recognize how often we look like Jonah, repent, and seek to look more like Jesus.

“Arise, call out to your God!”