<TITLE>19. Par 66-68</TITLE>L-66 Now, you talk about Jonah being in a condition. He was in a bad shape. Lot of people talk about symptoms. They say, "Well, I was prayed for last night, but hmm, I still got the pain." That don't have nothing to do with it. "I was prayed for. My hand's still crippled." That don't have nothing to do with it. If you believe it, you don't look at that, you look at a promise. See? You're not looking at the hand. That's what we call symptoms, looking at symptoms.
Now, there's nobody in here could have symptoms like Jonah. Brother, he had the awfullest case of symptoms I ever seen. Looky here. Every... Now, he was--he was out on the ocean, his hands and feet tied behind him, and he was in the belly of the whale, probably several fathoms deep, laying in the vomit in the whale's belly on a stormy sea. Now, you talk about symptoms...
He looked this way, it was whale's belly. That way was whale's belly. Everywhere he looked was whale's belly. There's nobody in that bad a shape here. Look what--look at the symptoms he had. But you know what he said?
He said, "They're lying vanities. I won't believe any of it." He said, "Lord..." turned over on his back, the vomit all around him, seaweeds around his neck. He said, "Once more will I look to Your holy temple." Oh, not look at the whale's belly, or the circumstance, but, "look at Your holy temple."
Solomon, when Solomon dedicated that temple he prayed. He said, "Lord, if Thy people be in trouble at any time and look to this holy place, then hear from heaven." And Jonah acted upon Solomon's prayer. And God... I don't know what He done. He put a oxygen tent down there or something, and He kept him alive for three days and nights.

L-67 Now, we don't... We're not in that bad a shape. There's none of us as bad off as Jonah was. That's right, 'cause here's the Holy Spirit here. We're not in the belly of the whale, we--we're not in that condition. But if Jonah, under those circumstances, could look to a temple that a human being prayed when he dedicated it (and the man that prayed backslid later), and God heard his prayers, how much more under this circumstance can we look towards heaven where Jesus sets at the right hand of God, ever living to make intercessions on our confession? My, my. I won't look at my tummy ache. I won't look at my heart beats funny. I won't look at my crippled hand. But I'll look towards the promise, for He sets there ever living to make intercessions. Amen.

L-68 I want to show you something now, show where God knows what He's talking about. Now, the people of Nineveh... That was a big city about a half a million people, pretty near the size of St. Louis, Missouri. And they were heathens. They were in all kinds of sin. They worshipped animals, and idols, and everything, and they were--their occupation were fishermen. And so the whale was the god of the sea.
So all of them was out about eleven o'clock fishing, all the fishermen pulling their nets out there in the sea, and the first thing you know, up come the sea god, the whale. Run up to the bank, licked out his tongue, and the prophet come walking right out on the bank. Sure they repented. God knows what to do. God knows how to do things to people who wants to believe. See?
Jonah wasn't out of the will of God. See, the whale god spit the prophet right out on the bank. Sure they're going to believe his message. And there he come out.


<A HREF="P20">Next Page</A>