Jonah preaches the smallest message possible, “Yet forty
days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!”
What was the reaction? The people
believed God and had a public fast for forty days. Jonah had to have been stunned at the
reaction of the people. There are
reasons to believe that this actually happened.
The nation was losing its hegemony in the region, having recently lost
in battle and lost territory, there had recently been an earthquake and a solar
eclipse, both of which would have said to the people that something was going
on in the spiritual realm. Jonah decides
to take up a watch outside the city and the Lord provides shade against not
only the sun but also against the sirocco winds of the area but the plant is
not permanent and withers and dies, causing Jonah a bitterness in his soul
because God hasn’t treated him well. Who
is the only person in the picture who doesn’t repent? Jonah.
I believe Jonah wrote this story about himself ultimately because no one
else could have unless it is nothing more than a fairy tale. It is interesting that Jonah’s tomb was recently
desecrated but it is more interesting that it was in Iraq, in the city of
Mosul, which stands across the Tigris River from Nineveh and was a shrine at
which Muslims paid homage. Perhaps Jonah
finally understood what it meant to love others.
The tax collector went home justified. That is the point of repentance, to be
justified. We can’t justify ourselves,
it requires an act of God to do that. At
the end of confession in worship I pronounce the absolution but it is based on
God’s declaration that those who confess their sins with an attitude of
repentance, not only agreeing with God on what constitutes sin but also with
the desire to never do such things again, are forgiven. If we fail to confess our sins with such an
attitude, we are not forgiven and we aren’t justified by comparative
righteousness, being better than other sinful people. We are justified only by Him and only because
we have made our confession. Jonah was
certainly a better man than those who don’t know God like the Ninevites, but
they proved themselves willing to listen to God where Jonah’s heart was
hardened.
What sin clings closely to you? The writer calls for us to lay such things
aside in order that we might run the race without hindrance. We get so accustomed to such things in our
lives that we no longer have a sense that we are running with a weight attached
to us that slows us down, makes the race harder and less winnable. Perhaps the sin is obvious to you,
intemperance in something like food or alcohol, pornography, or other sexual
sin but perhaps the sin is such a part of you that you no longer even notice
it. Maybe you have a problem with gossip
or a negative and critical spirit or even that you are not thankful for what
you have because you don’t have what you want.
All these rob us of strength, vitality and joy in Him. Let this be the year you allow Him to show
you what needs to go and then confess, repent, and leave it behind.
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