Day #167: Jonah 3:1-5

This week's blog is written by Pauline Lo Alker

Background

In the belly of the great fish for three days and three nights, Jonah prayed. His prayer was not so much a request to be saved from the fish, but a thanksgiving for being saved by the fish. However, one glaring request was missing in Jonah's prayer: He did not pray for God to save the pagan sailors! In spite of his eloquent expressions of gratitude and praise, Jonah's heart was still hard. Nevertheless, God had compassion for him and commanded the great fish to "vomit" Jonah out onto dry land.

Now what?

Second Time; Second Chances

If Jonah had thought that after his 'punishment' at sea and his imprisonment in the belly of the fish, surely he was now "free" to return home, well, he was sorely mistaken. No sir, Jonah!

No sooner after cleaning himself up a bit from the slime and grime of the fish, "Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, 'Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you."" (3:1-2 ESV)

God was determined to get His warning message of repentance to the Ninevites, and Jonah was the one He had chosen to deliver it. "Now get up and go do exactly what I had called you to do in the first place." God again gave Jonah the same command the second time.

Some of us have often referred to our merciful Lord as "God of Second Chances" because of His steadfast grace of forgiveness and restoration. And indeed many of us have been the blessed recipients of many second chances. But we need to ask ourselves this question: After we repent and turn back from our disobedience of God the second time, is our compliance truly from the heart, or out of a begrudged fear of God?

"The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart." (1 Samuel 16:7 NIV)

Jonah Delivered

This time around, Jonah knew he must obey. Out of genuine obedience or not, Jonah headed for Nineveh.

Nineveh was a big city of Assyria located on the east bank of the Tigris River, approximately 220 miles north of today's Baghdad. The Assyrians were hostile towards the Israelites, and vice versa, although there was no war between them at the time. "Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three day's journey in breadth." (3:3) With over 120,000 inhabitants, most Ninevites, if not all, were Gentiles who worshipped pagan gods and idols.

Imagine being Jonah, called by God to tread into the heart of the enemy's territory to preach a somewhat hostile message that was bound to be ill-received! But Jonah did as he was told. It took him three days to walk through Nineveh and the outlying villages to preach God's message. (Notice the number three here again. For more comments about this number, please review yesterday's blog.)

Surprised?

Amazingly, everywhere Jonah went, "the people of Nineveh believed God." Not only did they readily acknowledge God, "They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them." (3:5) What miracle! The Ninevites immediately repented and became believers of the True God. They even put on sackcloth and fasted to openly express their mourning of their former wickedness and evil ways.

How we wish we could have taken a peak at Jonah's heart as he witnessed the Ninevites' seemingly impossible mass conversion! Was he surprised? Did he feel rather smug at the prowess of his own preaching? Was his heart filled with amazement and joy over God's compassion for the Ninevites?

I don't know about you, but my answers are "yes" to the first two questions and "no" the third. After all, if Jonah had sufficient faith in God's sovereignty and power, he would not have questioned, feared and resented God's unusual command to the point of disobedience.

Here is another important reminder for us: God does not issue random commands without specific divine purpose; and He never sends anyone out "to the world" without equipping him/her with His awesome power!

So What? (What will I do with what I have read today?)

Like Jonah, at times we may appear to be doing exactly what God has called us to do, but God knows the true conditions of our hearts. We may not have run away from God physically, but spiritually we might as well have gone completely AWOL.

Granted, our Lord is immanently patient with us because He knows that as mere humans, often our "spirit is willing but the body is weak." (Mark 14:38 NIV) Still, we need to be careful not to press God's grace too far. Let us remember what God said, "My Spirit will not contend with human beings forever." (Genesis 6:3 NIV)

How, then, shall we deal with our defiant hearts? I often pray a verse from the Bible:

"Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts." (Psalm 139:23 NIV)

Was God done with Jonah now that the Nivevites had listened to God's message and turned away from their evil ways? Not even close. Come back tomorrow. You won't want to miss the fireworks ........