Jonah 1

Paying The Fare

He paid the fare thereof. Jonah 1:3.

A ship bound for Tarshish in Spain was just weighing anchor in the harbour of Joppa when a little flustered man, very much out of breath, tumbled on board. “Here, my man,” said the captain, “what do you mean by boarding my boat like this? Don't you know it costs something to go for a pleasure trip? If you want to come along you must pay the fare.” “Certainly, certainly,” replied the little man, taking out his purse. “I will pay whatever is just and right. Only, please take me as far west as you can.” So Jonah paid the fare to Tarshish.

I want you to notice two things about this little incident. First, Jonah paid the fare and that was right. He was an honest man and paid his debts. But, second, Jonah paid the fare to go to Tarshish and that was wrong. Shall I tell you why? Because God had told him to go to Nineveh, which was in exactly the opposite direction, and Jonah did not want to go to Nineveh. He was really trying to run away from God.

So you see it is possible to do quite right things in a way that makes them quite wrong. For instance, some of you boys are keen on cricket or football, and you mean to stick in till you are captain of your eleven or of your team. Now, that is a good ambition. Cricket and football are splendid games. They will develop your muscles, they will make you quick and alert, they will help you to be manly and unselfish, and to “play the game.” But if you run off to cricket or football when you should be tussling with the pons asinorum or grinding Latin verbs, then you are making a right thing wrong.

I knew a boy once who could play a whistle to perfection. Everyone was charmed with his performances; but he used to sit on the top of his summerhouse tootling away when he should have been doing homework. He was paying the fare to go in the wrong direction.

One thing more I want you to remember. It is better to lose your fare than to run away from God. Jonah found that out. He never reached Tarshish. In the end of the day he went to Nineveh instead.

Let me tell you two stories which may help you to understand this.

Last century there lived in Stockholm a magnificent singer. Her name was Jenny Lind, and she was famous all the world over. Her voice was as pure and sweet as the voice of a nightingale, and she herself was as pure, and sweet, and true as her voice. Jenny was brought up on the stage. She acted first when she was only ten, and her acting came to be as famous as her singing. She always tried to lift up her profession, to make it noble and good. And yet before she was thirty she gave up acting altogether, and so cut short what her friends regarded as a splendid career. Many people were curious as to her reason for renouncing the stage. She herself once gave it in a few words.

A friend found her one evening sitting on the seashore, with a Bible on her knees, looking out into the glory of a sunset. And she asked the singer the sore- vexed question, “How was it that you ever came to abandon the stage at the very height of your success?” Quietly Madame Lind replied, “When every day it made me think less of this” she laid her hand on the Bible “and nothing at all of that ” she pointed out to the sunset “what else could I do?”

The other story is about a celebrated painter called Barry. When Barry was a young man living in Dublin he got mixed up with some very wild companions. One night when he was returning from an evening's riot, a great light broke on his conscience. He saw himself as he was, and he resolved to live a better life. He saw, too, that the only way to begin was to put temptation out of his way. He must rid himself of the means which gave him the chance of these excesses. So he threw all his money into the river. Thereafter he devoted himself to his profession and lived a noble, upright life.

And so, boys and girls, it is better, infinitely better, to give up anything that comes between us and God, even though it means a big sacrifice. We shall never regret it. It is better, far better, to lose the fare than to run away from God.