In Spite of our Best Efforts...
Text: Jonah (Chs. 1-2 read in worship)
I have a confession to make. I decided to preach Jonah after hearing the choir’s anthem. Today’s the Sunday School picnic, and really a time to celebrate and have a bit of fun. The choir captured it beautifully, and the last thing we needed was a long dull treatise on the doctrine of the Trinity. So instead of using the usual Trinity Sunday readings, I changed one of them… to Jonah… There are some benefits of being part of a “free church” tradition, we can change things if we need to!
The story of Jonah is the best-known short book in the entire Bible. While it’s not the shortest, one can easily miss it flipping through the pages of Hebrew Scripture. It is only four chapters long for a total of 48 verses, and 1,343 words. By that count it’s certainly shorter than most sermons! I’ll have to remember that… You can find it between page # and page # in your pew Bibles, but as you may have noticed this morning it can pass by pretty quickly.
Yet the story of Jonah and the whale is so well known, particularly in children’s stories, that almost everybody is familiar with it in some capacity. It has inspired authors and movie makers, from serious works like Moby Dick, moral tales like Pinocchio, and more lighthearted fare that we used to watch on Saturday morning cartoons. The trouble is, along the way, we have become so familiar with the elements of the story, that somewhere along the way we missed the point. I have actually seen some well-thought out and not-so-well thought out speculation on exactly the species of whale or fish. Yet the point isn’t dwelling on the details, like some overly dour essay. Like the idea of the big fish, it’s supposed to be a fun story… almost fanciful where the details don’t matter… because along the way this story teaches us something very powerful about God.
We focus so much on Jonah being swallowed up in by the big fish that we forget what Jonah was doing out there in the first place.
As the story goes, Jonah, son of Ammatai… was a reluctant prophet that struggled with his own sense of calling. His name literally means “Dove, Son of Truth.” The story begins in a very similar way to the stories of other prophets… “the word of the Lord came to Jonah.” The story says that God wants him to go to the city of Nineveh and preach against it. So promptly Jonah packs up all of his things, goes down to the coastal city of Joppa and hops on a boat heading towards Tarshish.
This is where we need to pause for a short geography lesson. It would seem that if Jonah is going to a far-away city like Nineveh, it would be a logical thing to go down to the coast and catch a boat. Right? Well… not exactly. At the time, map-makers didn’t have the wonderful backup that satellite imaging technology allows us hyper-accurate pictures of what the world looks like. Even so, just about everybody knew that one did not take a boat to go to Nineveh… After all, it was landlocked on the Tigris River, its ruins are now part of the city of Mosul in Iraq…. perhaps you’ve heard of it? There goes Jonah, setting course for a place called Tarshish…which as best as we can guess was in a far off land we call Spain today… In fact, in terms of directions, Nineveh was “this way”, and Jonah is going “that way.” Jonah was literally heading to the ends of the earth… to put as much real estate between him and Nineveh as possible.
Not exactly a good example of a prophet, is it?
But the story of Jonah isn’t really about Jonah, but about how God never gives up, and how gracious, patient and forgiving God can be. When God calls Jonah to go to Nineveh and preach against them, Jonah himself flees… because he’s not particularly enamored with Nineveh’s reputation, and he would prefer that those people got what they deserved. His thinking is, “why warn them? The world would be a better place without Nineveh on the map…” Jonah wants to see Nineveh blown to pieces. So when God calls him to go to that eastern city, he heads in the absolute opposite direction.
As the story goes, as Jonah travels westward on the ocean, God throws a massive storm onto the sea. Jonah doesn’t seem particularly concerned as he’s gone down into the hold to have a bit of nap. Besides, this seems to be working in Jonah’s favour, after all, if the ship breaks up in the storm, it’ll sink, Jonah will drown, and Nineveh will get blown to pieces. Where’s the problem?
The problem is the other occupants of the ship. They’re not exactly enthused about drowning, and so each of them calls on their own god… ‘cept for Jonah. The captain of the ship comes down into the hold and pleads with the wayward prophet to actually do something. Then they get the bright idea of casting lots to see whose fault this storm happens to be… and all signs point to Jonah. The sailors response was “wow, you really must have done something to tick off your God like that. What do we do now?”
“Easy” Jonah replies… “Throw me overboard. Since I’m the problem, throw me over the side.”
While the sailors are initially reluctant, they eventually relent and pitch Jonah over the side.
As far as Jonah is concerned, this is a win-win situation. The sailors will be saved, Jonah himself will drown, and Nineveh will get blown to pieces. Again, where’s the problem?
This is where the big fish comes in. Just as Jonah thinks he’s going to get his way, along comes this big fish that swallows him up. Keep in mind, Hebrew culture was definitely land-locked. These were not mariners, and they had only one word for things that wriggled in the deep…
Note: The remainder of the story here is improvised. Specific point is that even when Jonah does go to Nineveh, he gets upset that God relents.
It seems that in spite of his best efforts to get away, God doesn’t give up on Jonah that easily. In spite of his best efforts, Nineveh is going to hear what God wants to say… and… in the end, in spite of his best efforts, Nineveh turns from its wicked ways and God is merciful.
In spite of our best efforts, God works in and through us for the good of all. No one is beyond redemption…
Amen.
I have a confession to make. I decided to preach Jonah after hearing the choir’s anthem. Today’s the Sunday School picnic, and really a time to celebrate and have a bit of fun. The choir captured it beautifully, and the last thing we needed was a long dull treatise on the doctrine of the Trinity. So instead of using the usual Trinity Sunday readings, I changed one of them… to Jonah… There are some benefits of being part of a “free church” tradition, we can change things if we need to!
The story of Jonah is the best-known short book in the entire Bible. While it’s not the shortest, one can easily miss it flipping through the pages of Hebrew Scripture. It is only four chapters long for a total of 48 verses, and 1,343 words. By that count it’s certainly shorter than most sermons! I’ll have to remember that… You can find it between page # and page # in your pew Bibles, but as you may have noticed this morning it can pass by pretty quickly.
Yet the story of Jonah and the whale is so well known, particularly in children’s stories, that almost everybody is familiar with it in some capacity. It has inspired authors and movie makers, from serious works like Moby Dick, moral tales like Pinocchio, and more lighthearted fare that we used to watch on Saturday morning cartoons. The trouble is, along the way, we have become so familiar with the elements of the story, that somewhere along the way we missed the point. I have actually seen some well-thought out and not-so-well thought out speculation on exactly the species of whale or fish. Yet the point isn’t dwelling on the details, like some overly dour essay. Like the idea of the big fish, it’s supposed to be a fun story… almost fanciful where the details don’t matter… because along the way this story teaches us something very powerful about God.
We focus so much on Jonah being swallowed up in by the big fish that we forget what Jonah was doing out there in the first place.
As the story goes, Jonah, son of Ammatai… was a reluctant prophet that struggled with his own sense of calling. His name literally means “Dove, Son of Truth.” The story begins in a very similar way to the stories of other prophets… “the word of the Lord came to Jonah.” The story says that God wants him to go to the city of Nineveh and preach against it. So promptly Jonah packs up all of his things, goes down to the coastal city of Joppa and hops on a boat heading towards Tarshish.
This is where we need to pause for a short geography lesson. It would seem that if Jonah is going to a far-away city like Nineveh, it would be a logical thing to go down to the coast and catch a boat. Right? Well… not exactly. At the time, map-makers didn’t have the wonderful backup that satellite imaging technology allows us hyper-accurate pictures of what the world looks like. Even so, just about everybody knew that one did not take a boat to go to Nineveh… After all, it was landlocked on the Tigris River, its ruins are now part of the city of Mosul in Iraq…. perhaps you’ve heard of it? There goes Jonah, setting course for a place called Tarshish…which as best as we can guess was in a far off land we call Spain today… In fact, in terms of directions, Nineveh was “this way”, and Jonah is going “that way.” Jonah was literally heading to the ends of the earth… to put as much real estate between him and Nineveh as possible.
Not exactly a good example of a prophet, is it?
But the story of Jonah isn’t really about Jonah, but about how God never gives up, and how gracious, patient and forgiving God can be. When God calls Jonah to go to Nineveh and preach against them, Jonah himself flees… because he’s not particularly enamored with Nineveh’s reputation, and he would prefer that those people got what they deserved. His thinking is, “why warn them? The world would be a better place without Nineveh on the map…” Jonah wants to see Nineveh blown to pieces. So when God calls him to go to that eastern city, he heads in the absolute opposite direction.
As the story goes, as Jonah travels westward on the ocean, God throws a massive storm onto the sea. Jonah doesn’t seem particularly concerned as he’s gone down into the hold to have a bit of nap. Besides, this seems to be working in Jonah’s favour, after all, if the ship breaks up in the storm, it’ll sink, Jonah will drown, and Nineveh will get blown to pieces. Where’s the problem?
The problem is the other occupants of the ship. They’re not exactly enthused about drowning, and so each of them calls on their own god… ‘cept for Jonah. The captain of the ship comes down into the hold and pleads with the wayward prophet to actually do something. Then they get the bright idea of casting lots to see whose fault this storm happens to be… and all signs point to Jonah. The sailors response was “wow, you really must have done something to tick off your God like that. What do we do now?”
“Easy” Jonah replies… “Throw me overboard. Since I’m the problem, throw me over the side.”
While the sailors are initially reluctant, they eventually relent and pitch Jonah over the side.
As far as Jonah is concerned, this is a win-win situation. The sailors will be saved, Jonah himself will drown, and Nineveh will get blown to pieces. Again, where’s the problem?
This is where the big fish comes in. Just as Jonah thinks he’s going to get his way, along comes this big fish that swallows him up. Keep in mind, Hebrew culture was definitely land-locked. These were not mariners, and they had only one word for things that wriggled in the deep…
Note: The remainder of the story here is improvised. Specific point is that even when Jonah does go to Nineveh, he gets upset that God relents.
It seems that in spite of his best efforts to get away, God doesn’t give up on Jonah that easily. In spite of his best efforts, Nineveh is going to hear what God wants to say… and… in the end, in spite of his best efforts, Nineveh turns from its wicked ways and God is merciful.
In spite of our best efforts, God works in and through us for the good of all. No one is beyond redemption…
Amen.
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