The Reluctant Messenger

   In our Sunday school class we have been looking at the lives of various women of the Bible.  My personal studies took me to the book of Jonah and I discovered that no women are mentioned at all in that little book.

   It is easy to judge poor Jonah and declare that maybe he could have used a good woman who would have told him it’s not a good idea to run from the Almighty.  In fairness, however,  I really wouldn’t want my life to be put under a microscope to examine all the character flaws like Jonah’s life was and then put on display for untold generations.

  We can actually learn quite a bit from Jonah’s life and God’s interaction with Him, as we look at 10 things that God did.

  First He 1. came.  God came to Jonah with an assignment to deliver a message to the inhabitants of the city of Nineveh.  God said “I want you to cry out against it because their wickedness has come up before Me.”  

  God sees wickedness.  God cares about the victims of wicked people.

  Nineveh had a reputation for cruelty, terror, violence and torcher.  Does this remind you of anything?  It does me.  It makes me think of ISIS.  It makes me think of drug lords who are cruel and vicious. From these current situations we can get a feel for what God was asking of Jonah.  It would be like asking Jonah to go tell the ISIS soldiers that God has a message for them.

   Well Jonah wasn’t too keen on the idea and he quickly got himself out of Dodge.  He wanted no part of taking any message to the reprobates of Nineveh.  They were the enemy.  I’m not so sure I can blame him.  If God called me to go cry out against ISIS I might run the other way too.  I might forget that I could trust God. 

   Jonah’s plan was to flee “from the presence of the Lord”.  Seriously, is that even possible?  No.  Do we sometimes try to flee from God’s presence?  Do we shun the things He asks of us?  Like obedience, faithfulness, looking out for others?  We may not get on a boat and head for another country, but do we mentally head in a different direction?  Do we fill our minds and time with so many other things that we block out the whispers of the Holy Spirit?  It can happen but it’s not a good thing.

  Next we read that 2. The Lord sent a great wind.  This was no gentle breeze, and it was not happenstance.  This was a great wind by the hand of God.

   The men traveling on that ship with Jonah were in a very strange situation.  This man of God who came aboard was saying “this storm that threatens us is my fault.  You must throw me overboard.”  They believed that Jonah was indeed connected to the one true God so what a dilemma they faced.  What would happen to them if they killed this man of God?  Well, they did throw him overboard but they immediately took some vows and offered a sacrifice to Jonah’s God.   The Almighty knew that no sacrifice was necessary because Jonah wasn’t going to die.  This was all part of God’s plan.

  The third thing God did was 3. He prepared a great fish.  This specially provided fish swallowed Jonah and from within this fish Jonah prayed.  This prayer is recorded in chapter two of the book of Jonah.  As part of this prayer, verse 4 says, “I have been cast out of your sight.”  I can almost hear God saying…. “Ummmm wasn’t that what you wanted Jonah to flee from me?”  Actually that is human thinking I believe God had much deeper thoughts going on right then.

  The next thing God did was 4. He spoke to the fish.  At God’s command the fish vomited Jonah onto dry land.  Poor Jonah, was now a seaweed covered, vomit dripping, fish expelled human hairball. 

   Then God  5. came again.   Jonah was given a second chance to be obedient.  Aren’t you glad that God gives second chances?  It demonstrates God's deep love in several ways.  He loved Jonah and He loved the people of Nineveh, and He loved the victims of their cruelty and torture.

   Jonah obediently took God’s message to the people of Nineveh this time.  Nineveh was a large city.  It would take three days to walk across the whole city.  On the first day he began telling them God’s message, which was: “In forty days Nineveh shall be overthrown.”

   He must have been pretty persuasive, (Or God did some work ahead of time) because the people believed what Jonah was saying, including the king.  This message began a great revival. The king ordered a city wide fast.

   Can you imagine how it would be if all the ISIS soldiers started bowing down before Jesus Christ, God’s Son and the world’s Savior.  How it would be if they were to put down their weapons and started lifting up Christ.  Imagine how it would be if today the Boko Haram soldiers were to release the abducted young women and allowed them to go back home to their families with the soldiers begging for their forgiveness and God’s.  Jonah’s frightening words brought just such a revival.

   6.  God saw their works.  God saw the need because of the cruel Ninevites, and God saw when they repented.

   7.  God relented from the plan He had for them.  God prefers repentance to discipline.  Not so Jonah.  We get a closer look at Jonah in chapter 4.  Jonah threw what southern folks know as a hissy fit.  He wanted God to destroy them.  He couldn’t wait to see that happen.  Have we ever wanted God to reign down judgement on someone?  If we are honest we probably have to answer yes.  But we all want God’s mercy shown to us.  We don’t want Him to rain down His judgement on us.

   In the midst of his hissy fit Jonah made himself a little pity palace to mope in.  He was hoping that he could sit and watch and maybe God would change his mind and destroy Nineveh.

  8. God provided a vine. It grew up quickly in one day and provided shade over Jonah’s pity palace and brought him comfort.  Jonah was pleased.

  9. God provided a worm.  The worm chewed on the vine and the vine withered.  Jonah was not pleased.  Then God 10. Provided a vehement east wind. Now Jonah was really not pleased and he whined that he just wanted to die.

   God was teaching Jonah (and us) a hard lesson about God’s priorities and ours.  The book of Jonah ends with God asking Jonah a couple of questions.   He asks “Is it right for you to be angry about a vine that you had nothing to do with.  You didn’t create or plant or tend it.”   You pity a plant.  Should I not pity Nineveh where you will find 120,000 persons who cannot discern between their right and their left? (Referring to children) 

   Jonah was throwing a fit over his lost shade from a vine but had no concern for the loss of 120,000 innocent children.  It is a rhetorical question.  It needs no answer.

   Maybe we should be praying that God would send some messengers into our world today.  

   One of the ladies in the Sunday school class pointed out how even with all of his flaws God still used Jonah.  We are all people with flaws and bad attitudes and self-centeredness, but when we are obedient to God amazing things can happen.  Blessings.