Monday, October 01, 2007

God Loves the World!



Imagine a preacher preaching one message and seeing an entire city repent and believe in God. That is every preacher’s dream. But for Jonah it wasn’t a dream or a vision, it was reality. At the end of chapter three of Jonah, the entire city of Nineveh, from the king to the peasants, all repent. But how does Jonah respond to this? The Bible says in the opening verse of chapter four that he was greatly displeased and became angry at God. The literal translation is that Jonah was “hot at” God. He expresses his displeasure by basically saying to God, “I told you so!” Jonah knew the character of God. He knew that God was gracious, compassionate, slow to anger, abundant in loving-kindness and One who relents concerning calamity. This is why Jonah fled to Tarshish earlier in the book. He hated the Ninevites and did not want to see Nineveh spared. He knew that if he went and preached they might repent. He also knew that if they repented, God would forgive them. Jonah did not want these enemies of Israel who were so known for their brutal torture techniques to have this chance.

Jonah’s anger led to self-pity as he asks God to take his life. This is a cycle I see often. Man’s displeasure in God turns to anger toward God which turns to self-pity. God responds to Jonah’s anger by asking him if he has good reason to be angry? Jonah refuses to answer God. Instead he goes outside the city, builds a shelter and waits to see what would happen. It’s as if Jonah is trying to guilt God into changing His mind. But just as God earlier used a huge storm and a great fish to teach Jonah a lesson, he now uses a plant and a worm to teach an even more powerful lesson.

God causes a plant to grow rapidly and cover the hut Jonah is sitting under providing a relieving shade. The text implies that the plant grew overnight. Jonah was “extremely happy” over the personal comfort provided by this plant. But early the next day God appointed a worm that quickly destroyed the plant by the time the sun rose. God then appointed a scorching wind that, along with the heat of the sun, left Jonah feeling faint. The loss of his comfort combined with his self-pity resulted in his again begging to die.

God now returns to the same question he asked Jonah earlier, “Do you have reason to be angry over the plant?” Jonah replies that his anger was justified and that he had a right to desire death over these circumstances. God now details Jonah’s compassion for the vine. Jonah did not create the plant or cause it to grow. The plant was temporal, not eternal. Jonah did not have anything to do with the creation of the plant, yet he felt compassion for it and was angry that it was destroyed.

On the other hand, Nineveh was filled with 120,000 people whom God created. Each one of them was formed by God in their mother’s womb. Each one of them was greatly loved by God. If Jonah could have compassion on a stupid plant that he had nothing to do with, how much more should God have compassion on 120,000 people in Nineveh who spiritually did not know their right hand from their left? That’s the theme of the book of Jonah. It’s not about a fish. To understand Jonah you have to look past the whale. It’s about God’s love for the world. And if God loves lost people that much, so should we.

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