Jonah 1:10-16

This is a beautiful part of the history. The modest enquiries of the mariners; the honesty of Jonah; the reluctances in the minds of the ship's-company to cast Jonah into the sea; their cry unto the Lord; and the offering they made when they had done it, to be freed from the guilt of his blood; all these form most interesting points for improvement. But it is high time to pass over the history to what is infinitely more interesting, and to inquire for that which no doubt was the one great point to which Jonah's ministry was directed, and for what the Holy Ghost hath caused it to be written; namely, to consider him, as the Lord Jesus points him out, an eminent type of himself. Here the subject riseth to a sublimity and importance which demands our closest attention in every part of it. When we behold the storm thus pursuing the mariners, we behold in it the wrath of divine justice represented as pursuing our whole nature unto universal destruction. In the person of Jonah embarked with the ship's company, we behold the representation of Christ in our nature; who though he had no sin of his own, neither was guile found in his mouth; yet was he made sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. 2 Corinthians 5:21. In the throwing Jonah into the sea as the only means to abate the storm, we behold the total helplessness of anything short of Christ saving our whole nature from the wrath of God. In Jonah's being thus given for a ransom, and the storm as instantly ceasing, we behold how Christ hath borne the sins of many, and by his voluntary offer of himself, thus once offered, he hath satisfied divine justice, made reconciliation for iniquity, and brought in an everlasting righteousness. It is true indeed, Jonah himself was the sole offender in this storm; and the Lord Jesus Christ altogether holy. Yet, as Christ became the surety of his people, he stood forth with all the guilt of his people before Jehovah, and both bore our sins, and carried our sorrows; and in this state was strikingly represented by Jonah when cast into the sea. Wonderful working God is our God, whose ways are not our ways, nor His thoughts our thoughts! Isaiah 58:8.