Forsaking Idols, Finding Salvation
Have you ever been stuck with no way out? I’m not talking about a little inconvenience—I mean truly trapped, where no amount of effort, planning, or calling for help can fix it. I looked up some record stuck situations. The longest time stuck underground, if you remember the Chilean miners in 2010, is 69 days (33 men). The longest time someone was stuck in an elevator is 6 days. She was 76 years old and had just got groceries, so she was able to ration them. The longest time someone has been stuck at sea and survived is 484 days.
The thing about each of these situations is that each one would have remained stuck if someone didn’t come to their rescue. The only way they survived was because they were saved by somebody. Think about your life right now and the area or areas where you might be stuck. Maybe it’s in a repetitive sin pattern. Maybe it’s a feeling of hopelessness. Maybe it’s in grief. Maybe you can’t escape from fear and worry. Here’s the thing. You cannot get yourself unstuck.
That’s the situation Jonah was in. He wasn’t just in over his head—he was in the belly of a fish, buried in the depths of the sea, with no way out.
And that’s when he said the truth that is as true for you today as it was for him then: Salvation belongs to the Lord. Jonah couldn’t get himself out of that situation. He was completely powerless. His only hope was God showing up and doing what Jonah couldn’t do. And that’s the same for us. The question is, are you ready to turn to Him, even before you’ve exhausted all your own efforts?
Jonah 2:6b-9
God Brings Life from Death (6b)
In the second part of verse 6, we read these hope-filled words: “But you brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God.” Jonah had reached the lowest point a human could physically and spiritually go. He was entombed in the belly of the fish, sinking to the roots of the mountains, as he describes in the earlier part of verse 6. There was no way out. No human solution could save him from his situation. Jonah was as good as dead, and it was then that God stepped in and rescued him.
God specializes in bringing life from death and order out of chaos. This is not just something God does occasionally; it’s part of His very nature. Think about it: all throughout Scripture, we see God delivering people from situations that seem completely hopeless. From Israel’s exodus out of Egypt to Lazarus literally being raised from the dead, the God of the Bible is always in the business of rescuing.
Jonah’s situation is no different. He acknowledges that he was in “the pit,” a place often associated with death or total separation from God (Psalm 16:10). The word “pit” here represents both a physical and spiritual reality for Jonah. Physically, he was inside a fish at the bottom of the sea. It doesn’t get much deeper in a pit physically than that. Spiritually, Jonah had tried to run from God, and he found himself separated from the presence of God. He got what he longed for, but he found it’s not what he truly needed. But even in that separation, even in the belly of the fish, Jonah discovers that there is no place so far that God’s hand can’t reach.
We see this in the use of the word “yet.” Jonah says, “Yet [God] brought up my life.” That little word “yet” changes everything. It’s the hinge upon which Jonah’s story turns. Before this, everything is about Jonah’s descent—down, down, down. But God intervenes. God brings the inverse. Jonah went down, yet God brought him up. How often in your own life have you experienced a similar “yet God” moment? Just when it seems like all hope is lost, God steps in and does the impossible. He did it for Jonah, and He does it for us.
Don’t miss this, though: Jonah wasn’t just physically rescued; his heart was being resurrected. God wasn’t just interested in saving Jonah’s life; He was interested in Jonah’s soul. In the same way, God doesn’t just want to rescue us from our difficult circumstances; He wants to bring about transformation of our hearts. Sometimes He allows us to go through difficult times just for that. God brings life from death not only in a physical sense but also in a spiritual one.
Paul echoes this truth in Ephesians 2:4-5: “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.” God’s greatest act of bringing life from death is seen in the gospel. Just as Jonah was rescued from the belly of the fish, we have been rescued from the penalty of our sins through the death and resurrection of Jesus.
So, where are you today? Maybe you feel like you’re in the pit, that place where all hope seems lost. Let me remind you that no pit is so deep that God can’t pull you out. He did it for Jonah. He did it for you through Jesus. And He can do it in your life, even now. God brings life from death. It’s who He is. Remember that.
Remembrance of God is Not Passive; It Moves Us to Seek Him (7)
In verse 7, we see a shift in Jonah’s heart: “When my life was fainting away, I remembered the Lord, and my prayer came to you, into your holy temple.” Jonah had been running from God, actively trying to escape His presence. But here, in the belly of the fish, he comes to a moment of desperation and he “remembered the Lord.” Do you ever walk into a room and forget what you went in there for? It’s so easy for us to forget! We so often forget the Lord as well.
Jonah wasn’t just thinking back nostalgically about God. The word he uses for “remembered” is the Hebrew word zakar, which means far more than just recalling something to mind. It’s a word that always implies action.
In the Old Testament, zakar often signals a call to action, especially when it comes to a person’s relationship with God. For example, in Exodus 20:8, the Israelites are commanded, “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.” That remembrance isn’t just about mental acknowledgment—it required obedience and the setting aside of the day for worship and rest. Similarly, in Numbers 15:40, the people are told to remember God’s commands and do them. Zakar isn’t passive; it compels movement, obedience, and turning toward God. Jonah’s remembrance of God in the fish reflects this same idea. His remembering wasn’t a fleeting thought…“Oh yeah…God!...” It was a turning of his heart back to God.
True remembrance of God moves us to seek Him. Jonah had been running from God’s presence, but in his moment of despair, his remembrance leads him to cry out to God. His prayer rises up to the holy temple, to God’s very presence. And even though Jonah was far from the temple physically, his heart is now directed toward God’s presence.
So, what does this mean for us? There are times when we feel distant from God—whether because of our sin, like Jonah, or because of the storms we face in life. But in those moments, we need to remember the Lord. And that remembrance should lead us to action. It should move us to seek God in prayer and His Word, to turn our hearts toward Him, and dig deeper in our faith.
Remembrance of God is not passive; it moves us to seek Him, and when we seek Him, we find that He’s been waiting for us all along. But so often we have to learn the hard way. We have to reach rock bottom or chase the things of the world before we realize the world cannot and will not satisfy.
Every Created Thing is Powerless to Save and Satisfy (8)
In verse 8, we see a deep theological truth emerge from Jonah’s prayer. He says, “Those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love.” Jonah is praying this from the belly of the fish, a moment of total isolation, and he’s reflecting on this reality—idols are powerless to save. Jonah uses this moment of prayer to teach us a lesson he’s just learned the hard way: placing your trust in anything other than God leads to a tragic forfeiture of God’s grace.
Let’s start by unpacking what Jonah means when he talks about “vain idols.” The Hebrew phrase here is something like “worthless vanities,” which gives you a picture of how empty and futile idols really are. Idols are all talk and no substance. They promise what they can’t deliver. Now, Jonah’s talking about more than just physical idols—he’s addressing anything we put in the place of God. These could be literal idols, like the pagan gods the sailors prayed to earlier in the narrative, but they could just as easily be the modern-day idols we build our lives around: money, career, relationships, even our own ambitions and desires. Remember, we’ve talked about it before: the number one idol the church faces is comfort.[1] Jonah is saying that when we look to these things for security, identity, or satisfaction, we’re chasing after something that is ultimately empty. They are vain and worthless.
Now, Jonah’s not just making a general theological statement here. This comes from his own personal journey. Why would Jonah say this while in the belly of the fish? Think about where he is. Jonah ran from God, trying to escape His presence. He had his own plans, his own vision of how his life should go. Jonah was essentially clinging to the idol of self-determination, believing that he could outmaneuver God. And where did it get him? He ended up in the darkest, deepest place imaginable, swallowed by a fish in the depths of the sea. From that pit of despair, Jonah finally realizes that his idols—his plans, his control—are powerless to save him. And so he prays this truth: those who cling to idols, those who “pay regard to vain idols,” are forsaking something so much greater—the steadfast love of God.
Now we need to talk about that phrase “steadfast love.” Jonah uses the Hebrew word hesed,[2] which is one of the richest words in the entire Bible. Hesed is God’s covenant love—His loyal, never-giving-up, never-failing, always-and-forever love. It’s the kind of love that holds on to you even when you’re running in the opposite direction. It’s the love that pursued Jonah when he was fleeing to Tarshish and the love that rescues him now from the depths of the sea. It’s often translated as “kindness” or “lovingkindness.”
Some translations say that idol worshipers forsake God’s steadfast love, mercies, or the grace that could be theirs. This interpretation suggests that when we cling to idols, we are essentially choosing to abandon the grace God offers us. It’s like we’re holding on so tightly to the things we think will save us that we miss out on the only thing that truly can—God’s hesed—his kindness and mercy. Idols fail us, and when we cling to them, we forfeit the faithful, covenant love of God that can freely be ours.
Do you know how to catch a monkey? All you have to do is cut a little hole in a gourd and put some nuts and fruit inside it. The monkey will grab a hold of the food and its fist will cause his hand to be stuck. It will thrash and thrash but it won’t become unstuck. You can then just causally walk over, and you’ve caught a monkey. Now, what is the one thing the monkey must do in order to be free? All it has to do is let go. All it has to do is let go, and it’s given freedom. But by grabbing hold to what it thinks it needs, or at least what it so strongly desires, it is forsaking the freedom that it could have. When we grab hold of idols, we do the same thing. You can’t cling to idols and cling to God at the same time. When you cling to idols, you forsake the steadfast love of the Lord.
Why did Jonah say this in his prayer? Because Jonah had firsthand experience of what it was like to run after worthless things, to grab hold of worthless vanities. He had placed his hope in his own plans, his own desires, and it led him to the pit. Jonah realized that while he was clinging to his idol of pride and self-will, he had been missing out on the grace and mercy that God was offering him all along. From the belly of the fish, Jonah finally sees that his only hope lies in God’s hesed—not in his plans, not in his control, but in the steadfast love of the Lord.
What idols are you clinging to? It might not be a golden statue, but maybe it’s success, the approval of others, your own control over your life. Whatever it is, if it’s not God, it’s powerless to save and it cannot satisfy. Jonah’s prayer is a warning to us—when we place our hope in anything other than God, we forsake the very lovingkindness that could be ours. The only thing that can save and satisfy is God alone.
Salvation Belongs to God Alone, and That Should Lead Us to Worship God Alone (9)
In verse 9, we hear Jonah proclaim a simple yet powerful statement: “Salvation belongs to the Lord!” That’s it. That’s the gospel in five words. Jonah, who had run as far as he could from God, now declares that salvation is completely and totally in God’s hands. There’s nothing Jonah could do to save himself. He had no bargaining chips left. He wasn’t negotiating with God from a position of strength. Jonah was stuck in the belly of a fish, at the bottom of the sea, with no hope of saving himself. And in that moment, Jonah realized: Salvation is God’s job. It’s what He does. And He alone does it. Jonah can’t save himself.
This is a humbling truth for us because it means that we don’t contribute to our salvation. It’s as Johnathan Edwards said, “You contribute nothing to your salvation except the sin that made it necessary.” We don’t earn salvation. We don’t deserve salvation. Salvation is a gift, a rescue mission launched by God from the very beginning. Ephesians 2:8-9 says, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”
Jonah’s realization that salvation belongs to God naturally leads him to worship. He vows to make sacrifices and keep his promises to God because when you’ve been saved by grace, worship is the only appropriate response. Our Salvation should stir our hearts to adoration. It should move us to give God the praise and devotion that only He deserves.
When you understand that salvation is from the Lord, it leads you to worship the Lord alone. No idols. No distractions. Just wholehearted devotion to the One who saved you.
No matter how far you’ve run, how deep you’ve sunk, or how lost you feel, God is the God of rescue. Salvation belongs to Him, and His hand is never too far to save. So today, whatever you’re holding onto—your idols, your pride, your fears—let them go. Turn to the One who brings life from death, who moves mountains to rescue you, and who offers you a love that never fails. Don’t wait for another moment. Run to Him. Worship Him. And experience the freedom that only He can give. Salvation belongs to the Lord.
[1] https://research.lifeway.com/2022/08/09/pastors-identify-modern-day-idols-comfort-tops-list
