Jonah 3-4 Nineveh Repents

God sends Jonah back on the same mission He originally created. Because the people heard the words of God, Nineveh repents and is saved.

Jonah didn’t get out of anything by running away. God had a job for him to do and He was going to see that it got done. We still don’t know how far Jonah had to go to reach Nineveh, but this time, he didn’t back out. He also didn’t go ‘hog wild’ and make sure everyone knew. He goes to one place and preaches from there.

Another thing we don’t know is how long it took for the people to listen to Jonah and how long they fasted in repentance. I’m imagining it was a fairly short fast, or the animals would have revolted and all of them would have started dying. The king wouldn’t even let them taste water and it doesn’t take long to die without water. Let’s join the people in Nineveh today as they hear the word of the Lord. Holy Spirit, please guide this journey and show me what You would have me learn today.

♥ ♦ ♥

Jonah breaths deep of the first fresh air he has had in, who knows how long. He has lost all sense of time while in the belly of the fish. Finding out what day it is, and where he is, are high on his priority list. He looks around and tries to find some familiar landmarks or nearby towns.

This isn’t God’s first priority though. God has a mission for Jonah. “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you” (Jonah 3:2) God tells Jonah.

Jonah doesn’t even attempt to argue or voice a complaint. He gets up from where he sits. He knows he is on the seashore, but nothing more. “God, You are going to have to help me here. Show me which direction to go. Also, please provide me with food for my journey; however long it is.”

God is more than able to do both of these for Jonah. Jonah feels his heart being pulled in one direction, so he sets off. As he walks, he comes across an orchard. There are ripe juicy figs hanging off the trees. Jonah picks two hands full and continues walking. He slowly eats these along the way. He doesn’t know where his next meal will come from, so he wants these to stretch for a while.

Jonah begins to recognize his surroundings after a little while. He knows that Nineveh is about two days travel from his current location. As he walks, God continues to provide opportunities for Jonah to eat and drink along the way. He doesn’t have a change of clothes though. What he does have reeks of the ocean and the fish he was in.

On his second day of travel, God provides Jonah crosses a flowing stream. Here he is able to both refresh himself and get the smell out of his garments. “Thank You Lord for thinking about even the simple things for me. I was afraid that I would run the people away before they even heard what I had to say.”

Jonah reaches Nineveh early in the afternoon. The city is HUGE! He can’t even see the wall on the far side of it. The fact that the wall attached to the gate where Jonah entered was over 30 feet/10 meters tall, not being able to see the wall on the other side, was significant.

“How am I suppose to reach all these people” Jonah wonders. “I’m NOT going door to door!”

Jonah doesn’t have to. There is a central market place a day’s journey inside the city. It is a place that nearly everyone visits at some time or another. God draws Jonah in that direction. Jonah follows his heart’s pull as easily as he did when God gave him the direction to walk in the first place.

God also provides something for Jonah that he hadn’t thought about. As Jonah is walking towards the center of the city, a man approaches him.

“You are a prophet of God, are you not” asks the man.

“I am. He has sent me to declare His word to this city.”

The man bows low. “He has also given me a mission. You are to stay at my home while in the city. It is near the market place.”

Jonah smiles and looks towards heaven. He sends a silent “Thank You” to the Lord. He then looks at the man. “I would be honored to share your home, that the Lord has asked you to open.”

The two men walk together to the home of this servant of the Lord. While they walk, they get to know one another a little better.

“My name is Sirus. What might your name be?”

Jonah thinks it even more miraculous that the man doesn’t even know his name, yet is willing to open his home to him. “My name is Jonah. You have great faith, inviting a stranger into your home.”

“The Lord led me to You. He showed me the one I was to open my home to, and I simply do as He commands.”

“I can’t claim to always do as He commands immediately. And going against Him gets me in a LOT of trouble.”

“What do you mean?”

Jonah shares the story of his running from the Lord, the storm at sea, living inside the fish, and God calling him again. “This time, when He called, I didn’t hesitate for a moment!”

“That is an amazing story! How long were you in the fish?”

“I honestly don’t know. It was the second day of the week when I was swallowed whole. I have been walking for almost three days now. So, what day is it now?”

“Tomorrow will be the first day of the week.”

The two men stop to calculate and look at one another in astonishment as they both come up with the answer at the same time.

“THREE DAYS” they both say with great wonder n their voices.

“Who would have believed it” Sirus says.

“I certainly wouldn’t if it hadn’t happened to me” replies Jonah.

That night is spent in good company and the first bed Jonah has had since leaving home. When morning breaks, Jonah makes his way the rest of the way to the market place. He finds a large grouping of stone statues. Three stairs lead up to the platform where they rest. Jonah climbs the steps. “I’m ready Lord. Tell me what I am to say to these people. I know it is a proclamation of judgment. But I am grateful for the one soul You prepared for me in advance. Protect him from whatever is to come.”

The Lord puts the words into Jonah’s mouth and he begins proclaiming them loudly from his place above the people. “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” (Jonah 3:4).

The people in the market turn at the sound of Jonah’s voice. “What does he mean?” “Who is this man?” “Overthrown how, and why?”

These are just a few of the questions running through the people’s minds and expressed on their lips. Jonah has to go farther in the proclamation.

“The Lord, the God of heaven who made ALL things, has seen the state of this city and its sin. Repent and turn from your sins for He is about to bring judgment upon your heads.”

“What shall we do?” the people ask one another.

Some of the people ignore Jonah’s words, but most let them settle deep in their hearts. They begin pondering their own behavior and searching out sin in their lives. Once identified, they work to change their ways. They also put off their daily clothes and put on sackcloth and began to fast. One at a time the inhabitants of Nineveh turn towards the Lord in repentance.

Jonah stands on this platform day after day, proclaiming the word of the Lord. He makes certain to keep accurate count of the days left for Nineveh’s repentance. Day after day, more people come to hear him and listen to his warning. By the end of a month, there is not a person in Nineveh who hasn’t heard Jonah’s words. Today, those words land on the king’s ears and heart.

The king’s heart is torn by the Lord’s message. It is ten days until the deadline the Lord has fixed. The king issues a decree to all the people. His messengers are sent throughout the city to proclaim his words. “EVERY man, woman, and child must here this message. It may be that the Lord is counting to ensure that ALL the people turn to Him.”

The messengers go out, crying in the streets, visiting all the businesses, into the markets, even go into the bath houses. After proclaiming the king’s words to all those in the city, they go to the fields and farms surrounding Nineveh; those that are under the king’s protection. Their cry is heard EVERYWHERE!

“By the decree of the king and his nobles: Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything. Let them not feed or drink water, but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and let them call out mightily to God. Let everyone turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands. Who knows? God may turn and relent and turn from his fierce anger, so that we may not perish” (Jonah 3:7-9).

It takes two days for the whole city and its surrounding lands to hear the king’s proclamation. Every person who hears it takes immediate action. Every animal inside and outside the walls is fitted with sackcloth. The markets close, for there is no one who will eat anything until the king decrees it. The people return to, or stay in their homes. They sit in ashes wearing sackcloth.

God sees the hearts of the people; from the king down to the lowliest servant. ALL are humbled. ALL have turned from their sins. ALL are repentant. “I will relent of the judgment I had planned, because they have humbled themselves before Me.” He knows Jonah’s heart too. “He is going to need another lesson soon” the Father says to the Spirit.

Jonah finds his audience gone after a few days. He is not blind to what is going on. The people are repenting. He heard the king’s decree. He is very angry with this result. In his anger he calls out to God.

“O Lord, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster. ³ Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live” (Jonah 4:2-3).

God is not pleased with Jonah’s attitude. “Do you do well to be angry?” (Jonah 4:4)

By the time Jonah makes it to the gate, there are but five days left before God’s judgment rains down on the people. He doesn’t want to be in the city, just in case God is still angry. But neither does he want to be far away when the time comes. He wants to see if God still judges the people. He goes a little way to the east of the city. He finds branches and leaves and constructs a shelter for himself. Here he will wait to see what the Lord does on the appointed day.

Jonah sits in the shade of his shelter day after day as the countdown draws closer. On his third day of watching, God begins a new lesson for the angry Jonah.

Jonah wakes up this morning with the same anger in his heart. He sits up in his shelter and looks out over the city. As the day goes on, Jonah notices a plant growing right before his eyes! It has broad leaves that are spreading out above him and covering him in shade from the hot sun. Jonah settles down beneath the plant and enjoys the comfort it offers. His shelter gets quite warm in the afternoon sun. This plant even provides him with a couple gourds to eat while he waits.

Jonah keeps watch all that day. “Two more days” he says to himself. In his heart he knows that God has forgiven them, but he won’t allow himself to believe it.

The next morning, Jonah stretches and rises from the ground. The gourd plant that he sat under yesterday looks withered. “What happened” he asks as he examines the plant. He shakes his head but goes to sit under what is left of the plant anyway.

As the sun moves across the sky, the Lord removes EVERY cloud between it and Jonah. It beats down on him relentlessly. The gourd plant lies dead on the ground. It has no shade to offer. Jonah moves to his shelter for what little relief he can find.

God sends a scorching east wind to blow over Jonah. It blows all the leaves and branches apart that Jonah used to make his shelter. Now he has nothing to block the sun’s rays. Jonah refuses to move. Soon, the sun is making him dizzy and nauseous. He is sweating profusely and extremely thirsty. He feels too weak to even rise and look for water. In anger, he calls out to the Lord again.

“It is better for me to die than to live” (Jonah 4:8).

God answers Jonah right away, but not how Jonah expected Him to answer.

“Do you do well to be angry for the plant?” (Jonah 4:9a).

Jonah turns his face towards heaven and cries out his right to be angry. “Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die” (Jonah 4:9b).

God’s voice is full of accusation as He answers Jonah. “You pity the plant, for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?” (Jonah 4:10-11).

Jonah drops his face into his hands. “I did it again” he tells himself. He turns his face back towards heaven. “I’m sorry Lord. I have no right to my anger. You do as You see fit. I will watch and judge no more.”

The scorching east wind dies down and a cloud moves over the sun. Jonah slowly rises to his feet and goes in search of the stream he bathed in just before reaching Nineveh. He falls and stumbles several times before reaching it, but God does NOT let him die. Jonah revives himself in this stream.

God has other missions for Jonah and, hopefully, he will carry what he has learned from this one for MANY years to come.

(to be continued)

We don’t actually get to see how ‘angry Jonah’ handles this last lesson. I’m assuming that he gets the message. I wonder though if he was always a ‘selfish’ man. He didn’t care about the people of Nineveh. Did he think they needed punished? Did he think that, God relenting made him look foolish? He apparently wanted to see God ‘smite’ them. He wouldn’t have stayed in the area watching if he didn’t. And God STILL used him!!!

Our attitude while serving the Lord doesn’t dimmish His power or His work. But it robs us of a blessing. When I was a teen, one summer I decided to show my family how much work I did. It was hot that summer and the whole family took their mattresses out onto the deck and slept. I would get up in the morning and go in the house and clean the kitchen. I made certain that I made noise while doing it. Cabinet doors were shut with more force than necessary. Pots and pans rattled against one another. I even walked a little harder on the floors. NOT enough to make it obvious that I was trying to wake the rest of the family up. But I carried anger inside me because NO ONE got up to help. My family reaped the benefits, but I lost out on them. If my service would have been done in love, everyone would have benefited. I also noticed that the ‘sleepers’ woke up AFTER the noise ended. I was getting a lesson too.

Father God, forgive me for my attitude. Sometimes even now, I want others to ‘notice’ how hard I ‘work’. I don’t want to tell them outright, but have them see all I do and be ‘impressed’. Forgive me for that Father. Help me serve with a right attitude. One that is full of love and takes joy in seeing to it that the needs of others are met.

In a few days, it will be an especially busy day of serving. Help me show gratitude for those who help as well as serve from a heart of love myself. PLEASE keep the rain back until our day is concluded. And, Thank You Father for the ability to host my family this way each year.