Daily Devotional | The Sailors Fear

“We did everything we could.” That’s the last thing you want to hear from a doctor because it means that they weren’t able to save the person’s life, despite how hard they tried. I’ve heard the phrase most often from television doctors, but it’s catastrophic when you hear it in real life.

In Jonah 1:13–16 the sailors on the ship found themselves in a situation where they had done “their best to row back to land” (v. 13). But nothing they did was getting them to safety. Instead, “the sea grew even wilder than before” (v. 13). Readers might expect the sailors to care little for Jonah’s life. After all, he was responsible for their deadly dangerous situation, and they were pagan sailors. Their concern for Jonah provides a stark contrast with his lack of concern for their lives when he boarded the ship. Put another way, these pagan sailors showed more love toward Jonah than the prophet Jonah showed toward them, even though Jonah is the one who claimed to “worship the LORD, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land” (v. 9).

Desperate for the lives, the sailors did what Jonah recommended and “threw him overboard” (v. 15), but not before they cried out to Jonah’s God, pled for mercy, and recognized His sovereignty: “You, LORD, have done as you pleased” (v. 14). Miraculously, “the raging sea grew calm” (v. 15). Having heard the truth about God from the reluctant prophet and having witnessed His power over the sea, “the men greatly feared the Lord” (v. 16). Here we see another contrast: Jonah confessed to fearing God in verse 9 (“worship” in the NIV translates the Hebrew word “fear”), but the sailors’ actions show that they truly fear the Lord.