Run to God
I read a fish story from the NBC Boston News that took my breath away for an instant and almost took Michael Packard’s breath away permanently!
Michael was diving in about 45 feet of water when “I just felt this truck hit me and everything just went dark,” he said…At first he thought he’d been eaten by a white shark — the feared sharks have become fixtures off the coast of Cape Cod in the summer — then he realized it didn’t have teeth: “I said, ‘I’m in the mouth of a whale!'”
Packard had been faced with an immediate struggle in the hard, shaking mouth of the whale, as his breathing regulator came out of his mouth, and he had to find it. Then, as the seconds ticked by, Packard thought, “This is how I’m going to die. In the mouth of a whale.” He didn’t know if he would be swallowed or suffocate, he said, and he thought about his 12 and 16 year-old sons, wife, mother and family. “I just was struggling but I knew this was this massive creature, there was no way I was going to bust myself out of there,” Packard recalled.
Then, suddenly, Packard saw light, felt the whale shaking its head and was thrown out of the water.” He reported, “I was just lying on the surface floating, and saw his tail, and he went back down, and I was like, ‘Oh my god, I got out of that, I survived,'” he said.
Michael Packard was swallowed by a whale, spent 30-40 seconds inside the whale, and then the whale spit him out back into the water! The ordeal left him with some minor injuries like a dislocated knee and some soft tissue damage, but he is already out of the hospital and doing fine. For Michael, being alive today is a miracle, but if this hadn’t happened in 2021 where the technology exists to prove that it really occurred, who knows if people would believe his story?
friend, this true story made me think about Jonah, the biblical prophet who ran away from God because He didn’t want to be obedient to the call to go “fish for people” in the town of Nineveh. In spite of Jonah’s disobedience and running, God sends a “great fish” to bring him back to His purpose and plan. My friend, the fish was not punishment, the fish actually saved Jonah’s life! If you want to read the whole story, check out the biblical book of Jonah! (Jonah 1-4 NIV)
My friend, are you running from God today? Don’t! Instead of running FROM God, run TO God! Instead of needing rescuing, be a rescuer! Run to His saving grace, and allow your miracle to be the sharing of how others can experience the same kind of salvation that both you and Jonah were shown by Jesus!
A good friend of mine once shared this wisdom with me, “The best answer to running from God is simply to stop.” When we stop running, God can use us to bring great revival to great cities. He can use you, friend, and never forget...
You are a miracle!
