My Day of Desperation
A story based on the book of Jonah
--
Desperation has a way of quickening the spirit of a man. The fleeting last moments of your life bring alot of focus and clarity.
I can personally attest to that. My day of desperation came recently and unexpectedly. It was very chaotic. Everybody was panicking. That day we all thought we were going to die.
When we left Joppa the weather seemed fair. The route to Tarshish was one we had taken many times. I worked on the boat, usually doing the inspections and making sure everything was in working order.
I gave the boat a thorough inspection before we shipped off and everything checked out just fine.
The only thing that I found strange before we left was one of the passengers. His name was Jonah. He looked nervous and he had a heaviness about him.
He couldn’t get down into the bottom of the boat fast enough. It was like he was trying to find the darkest corner possible. I could tell he was running. At the time, I didn’t know why or from whom. It wouldn’t be long until I found out.
The storm
I don’t remember exactly how far from Joppa we traveled before the storm came, but we were far enough out to be at the mercy of the sea.
It came suddenly and behaved strangely, not like any storm I had ever been through. The clouds were different. They had a peculiar and glorious kind of darkness. The waves began to overpower the ship. We were going to be thrown into the sea.
We all worshipped different gods and we put them all to the test that day, crying out for salvation.
All of us, that is, except Jonah. I suppose he was testing his god too, just in a very different way. We were all running around in frantic madness, praying prayers, and trying to throw off unnecessary weight to keep the boat from sinking. Jonah was asleep in the bottom of the boat.
