Disclosure: I received this book to review. The opinions shared here are 100% mine.

My kids love bedtime stories.  Actually, they like any-time-of-the-day stories.  My husband is the creative one, coming up with all kinds of fun fiction that would make J. K. Rowling give up her firstborn for just a snippet of the plot.  On the other hand, my stories are very blah.  In fact, one night I informed my son I was going to tell him the shortest bedtime story ever.  It goes like this.  “Once upon a time, there was a boy. The End.”  It only took a few seconds for him to get it.  He laughed so hard that I started laughing and neither of us could stop.  It’s been an inside joke ever since.  But the issue remains…what’s the bedtime story tonight?

I’ll let you in on my little secret.

I tell my kids Bible stories at bedtime.  They have no idea that their bedtime stories are really biblical.  At least until they hear the story in Sunday School.

The story of Jonah and the whale makes an absolutely fabulous tale.  You’ve got this guy who knows that it’s futile to run away from God.  Even the sea knows that he’s not supposed to be there and it tries to toss him out.  When he finally gets to Nineveh, he doesn’t beat around the bush.  He spits it out — Nineveh will fall!  Luckily the Ninevites heed his warning and take him seriously.  All crisis is averted due to God’s mercy.   You could really drag this story out for days.  It’s got a lot of meat to its bones, don’t you think?  There’s the scaredy-cat prophet who decided to make an attempt to escape God’s watchful eye.  Then you’ve got the whole whale incident.  And what of the giant gourd that offered Jonah shade?  The message of forgiveness and redemption is just the icing on the cake.

If you find yourself having a difficult time making heads or tails of such a story, try reading a commentary on it. The book Prophet on the Run by Baruch Maoz is an easy to read, thin paperback that turns this story into something miraculous.  Maoz takes the verses apart bit by bit, comparing them to other scriptures that support the meaning behind the words.  He also explains the poetic Hebrew words, differentiating between the repentance of the Ninevites and the repentance of God in his decision to forgive.  Each “part” of the Jonah story is separated into short chapters that take only a few minutes to read. The discussion questions at the end are good food for thought.  Maoz even offers a prayer to help guide the devotional aspect of the commentary.  The book is a bit dry but completely bare bones, making it easy to finish a chapter in just a few minutes. I found this book to be very helpful in making the Jonah story easy to understand.  It allows me an opportunity to pay some attention to God’s Word.  Reading it in the morning gives me a chance to come up with a good twist in time for the night’s story!

Is there a Bible story that you think would make a good bedtime story?