Morning Coffee With Renae

Jonah 4:4-5 “But the Lord replied, ‘Have you any right to be angry?’ Jonah went out and sat down at a place east of the city. There he made himself a shelter, sat in its shade and waited to see what would happen to the city.“
Jonah must have been pretty mad, alright. [...]

Jonah 4:3 “Now, O Lord, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live.”
Have you ever had a really bad day? How about a bad week, or month, or even year? Perhaps your whole life seems to be going down the tubes. Well, that’s the kind of frustration and [...]

Jonah 3:10 “When God saw what they had done and how they had put a stop to their evil ways, he changed his mind and did not carry out the destruction he had threatened.” NLT
“It’s a woman’s prerogative to change her mind.” That old adage has been my defense for many an indecisive moment in [...]

Well, Jonah was only in the belly of the whale for three days and nights. But apparently, I’m not as compassionate as our Almighty God, and I have left the poor fellow hanging in cyberspace for nearly six months. When I get to glory, I’ll have to seek him out and beg his forgiveness.
All that [...]

about the morning when death was conquered by our Lord.
I mean, God, I know how things were on that Friday when He died. Or at least I’ve heard.

The sun hid its face. All was black, right in the middle of the day.
The earth shook.
Creation mourned, that day that Your own Son became sin, for [...]

Jonah 3:4 – 5 “On the first day, Jonah started into the city. He proclaimed: ‘Forty more days and Nineveh will be overturned.’ The Ninevites believed God. They declared a fast, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Jonah must have thought on the [...]

Jonah 3:1 – 2 “Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: ‘Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you.’”
Have you ever messed up big-time, and wished you could have a do-over?
I have. Plenty of times. Sometimes, in the little things like a [...]

Jonah 2:10 “And the LORD commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.”
My son likes this part of the story because it’s gross. And he’s seven. And seven-year-old boys like anything gross.

But I like this part of the story because of that first little phrase: And the Lord commanded the fish.
And the fish [...]

Jonah 2:9 “But I, with a song of thanksgiving,
will sacrifice to you.
What I have vowed I will make good.
Salvation comes from the LORD.”
How far does God have to go to get your attention? I wish I could say I responded to His every whisper, but that would be a gross untruth. Sometimes, He has to [...]

Jonah 2:8 “Those who cling to worthless idols
forfeit the grace that could be theirs.”
Wow. This is an interesting twist that Jonah’s prayer makes. It’s kind of random, considering he’s in the belly of a smelly, slimy fish, crying out for his very life. Why does he suddenly think of other people who worship idols?
Maybe he [...]