THESE words occur in one of the most remarkable prayers recorded in the Old Testament—the prayer of Jonah in the fish’s belly (Jonah ii. 9). It was the cry of one that was in more senses than one in deep waters to Jehovah. It was its affliction that wrung from him the cry that reached Jehovah’s ears and to which He gave a speedy answer. Jonah has disobeyed his God and his trouble came upon him for his disobedience. The prayer, as left on record by the Holy Spirit, reveals the desperate plight of the prophet. He went down to the mountains, the earth with her bars was about him for ever. Hope was almost gone but in his extremity he would look again toward His holy temple where Jehovah promised to meet His people over the mercy-seat. When his soul fainted within him he remembered Jehovah, the God of salvation and his cry came in unto God into His holy Temple. The words in the primary sense as used by Jonah describe his personal experience and the acknowledgment that “salvation is of the Lord,” as used in the prayer, has reference to Jonah’s extraordinary deliverance out of the depths from which he cried to his God but it is not straining the words beyond what they can bear if we consider the words as the experience of many a sinner who was taken out of greater depths than those to which Jonah sank and whose deliverance was a greater salvation than that of Jonah’s. Let us briefly notice, (1) Jonah’s desperate condition; (2) His cry of distress; (3) His wonderful deliverance, and (4) His acknowledgment that it was from the Lord.
We are told that he went down to the bottom of the waters—these were not shallow waters out of which by some effort of his own he might save himself. Into these depths there was no outstretched human arm that could reach, no human could see his desperate plight and no human ear to hear his cry. What was he to do? Well, he did the very thing he ought to have done. He cried to Jehovah, the God of salvation—the God whose arm could reach him, whose eye could see him and whose ear could hear his cry. Of old, those who found themselves in great trouble were counselled to call upon God in the day of trouble and the assurance was given them that He would answer them and they on their part would glorify God. It is not only that Jonah was in great depths but he felt himself as in a prison house with no prospect as far as human hope was concerned from which he could not get out—the earth with her bars was about him.
His state was hopeless as far as human deliverance was concerned—but not so far as divine power was concerned—for out of these depths and out of that prison house Jonah was to be taken by a Hand that is strong in might and which has to its credit the deliverance of a multitude which no man can number. Is it, therefore, any wonder that Jonah was forced to acknowledge that his deliverance or salvation was of the Lord.
In the greater salvation which is so often referred to in Scripture, there is surely more reason, if we may put it this way, that every saved sinner may assuredly say that salvation is of the Lord. In the planning of this salvation He had no counsellor, in its carrying-out there was none of the people with Him. In its application, human power had no part or lot—it was the work of the divine Spirit and where is the saved sinner who ever looked into the depths from which he was taken and looked at the prison house in which he was held will ever take credit to himself that his salvation is due to his own special efforts or the efforts of his fellow-men. Surely he will ungrudgingly place the crown of this salvation on Christ’s head, who is worthy to wear it. None of the ransomed throng when they sing the song that has no ending will ever mar the melody of that song by a jarring note. All the glory will be given to the Lamb that redeemed them and washed them in His own blood. How great were the depths from which the ransomed were delivered, none but the One who saved them can tell. We get a faint impression of what it must have been from the language of the sweet Psalmist of Israel, who was a prophet, when he says in such solemn words: “Deliver me out of the mire, and let me not sink; let me be delivered from them that hate me and out of the deep waters. Let not the water-flood overflow me neither let the deep swallow me up and let not the pit shut her mouth upon me” (Psalm lxxix. 14-15).
When this song of the ransomed will be sung by thousand times ten thousands and thousands of thousands, what a noble song it will be. May it be the happy lot of the writer and his readers to be numbered among those who can truthfully say: “Salvation is of the Lord,” for they shall stand among the ransomed and sing the song they sing!