“The God of Us and Them”
Jonah 3:1-5, 10
(inspired by a sermon by Chris Mathis)
Our lesson for this morning starts in Chapter 1 with God saying to Jonah: “Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it because its wickedness has come up before me.”
But Jonah was a prophet from the Northern Kingdom of Israel—and he was a patriot, an Israelite nationalist, and a man of the king.
And Nineveh was the capital of Assyria, the king’s enemies.
Historians frequently say that the Assyrian Empire was one of the most ruthless the world has ever seen.
Another Old Testament Prophet, Nahum described Nineveh as “the city of blood, full of lies, full of plunder, never without victims.”
It was to this ruthless and violent city that God sent Jonah.
But at first, Jonah refused to go.
Instead, he got on a ship and sailed as far as he could go in the opposite direction.
And it wasn’t fear that kept Jonah from obeying God.
It was hatred for the Assyrians.
And as he admits in Chapter 4, he was worried that if he went and preached to Nineveh, God would forgive them and save them.
Jonah viewed the world through a lens of politics and religion, and he divided the world into “us” and “them.”
And many of us, I think, have a natural, sinful tendency to automatically assume that “our” group is better than “others” who seem different from us.
We tend to associate with people who look like us, people who dress like us, people who talk like us, people who think like us, people who pray like us, and people who vote like us.
Everyone else—the “thems” are suspect.
Psychologists call this phenomenon “othering.”
Othering means that we think only our group is acceptable and all others are a threat.
Othering means we divide the world into us and them.
Who are your “others”?
Who are my “others”?
Perhaps you dislike people from the “other party,” however you define that.
Or maybe you distrust people with lots of tattoos and body piercings.
Some folks just can’t stand people from another generation.
Many professionals with college degrees look down on blue-collar workers, and many folks who sweat for a living look at educated professionals as “educated idiots.”
Lots of people have a dislike for anyone who doesn’t look like them.
In our fallen, sinful world, othering is a way of life.
We tend to highlight differences and turn them into causes for suspicion and distrust.
We’re very good at “othering.”
Othering was Jonah’s way of life.
So, what happened to him after he ran?
As most of us know, you really can’t run away from God.
We are told that “the Lord sent a great wind on the sea, and such a violent storm arose that the ship threatened to break up.”
The sailors threw Jonah overboard to save themselves from sinking.
And as Jonah sank down into the depths of the ocean we are told that “the Lord provided a huge fish to swallow Jonah.
I used to think the fish or whale was part of Jonah’s punishment, but it wasn’t.
The fish saved Jonah from drowning.
And that’s because God loved even the self-righteous, hateful, spiteful Jonah.
After the fish spit Jonah back out on dry land, he decided to obey God and head for Nineveh, smelling of fish, no doubt.
He must have been quite the picture when he showed up with his short and fiery sermon: “Forty more days and Nineveh will be overthrown.”
Have you ever heard a preacher get finished with a message that quickly?
His sermon was a mere five words long in Hebrew.
And how did the people of Nineveh respond?
We are told that they “believed God.”
They called for a fast and put on sackcloth.
The king himself put on sackcloth and poured ashes on his head, declaring that every person in the city must “give up their evil ways and violence.”
Isn’t that amazing?
The king of the nastiest nation in the history of the ancient world told his people to repent.
And that is because God’s Word changes hearts.
We are told in Chapter 3:10 that “When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he relented and did not bring on them the destruction he had threatened.”
And they all lived happily ever-after.
The end!
Am I right?
No.
The story isn’t over—not yet.
What happened next is that Jonah pouted.
The Lord’s prophet had a hissy fit and threw a temper tantrum.
He didn’t want Nineveh to repent and be spared.
What he had worried would happen—did happen.
“I knew that you are a righteous and compassionate God,” Jonah whines, “slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity.”
And now comes the climatic moment in the story, the critical question that leaves the story open-ended.
Like a parent smiling through sad tears, God asks Jonah “Should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left—and also many animals?”
In other words, “Shouldn’t I have mercy on Nineveh, a city so lost and broken by sin that they don’t even realize how lost they are?”
It reminds me of what we are told about Jesus in Matthew Chapter 9.
It says that Jesus went through all the towns and villages… “when he saw the crowds he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.”
That is our God.
The God of love and grace and compassion.
“Shouldn’t I have concern for more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left?”
Jonah never answers God’s question or at least we are never told how or if he responds.
Instead, God leaves the question open to you and to me.
“Should God have compassion on people, no matter what we might think of them?”
And should this, perhaps, affect how we think of “them”…whoever “them” might be?
Unlike us, God doesn’t divide the world into “us” and “them.”
Jonah found out that the God of “us” also loves “them.”
Who in your life do you need to love rather than thinking of them as an “other”?
God doesn’t play favorites.
In Ephesians 4:6 we are told that He is “God and Father of all.”
In Acts 10:34 Peter says that God “God does not show favoritism.”
He doesn’t like Jews better than Gentiles or men more than women.
He doesn’t love Americans more than the Chinese or Iranians.
And He doesn’t love Christians more than Muslims.
He doesn’t like Republicans more than Democrats or vice versa.
He doesn’t value my life or salvation any more than yours.
He loves and has compassion for everyone—the whole world!
That’s what we are told in John 3:16, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
And in 1 Timothy 2:4, it says that God “wants all people to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth.”
Through Jesus Christ, God came down and became one of us—a real, living, breathing, flesh and blood human being—so that He could show us what it means to love and to die on the Cross to save us from our sins.
God made everyone, God loves everyone and God wants to save everyone, even you and me.
As Jesus hung from the Cross, dying in agony He looked out over a strange mixture of family, friends and enemies, and then He prayed: “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”
That sounds, again, a lot like God’s comment about the Ninevites: they “cannot tell their right hand from their left.”
God is a God of grace and mercy, He loves us long before we love Him.
He calls to us.
He goes searching for us like a shepherd searches for a lost sheep and like a woman searches for a lost coin.
He waits for us like a heartbroken father Who never gives up on us.
And when we turn to Him, as Jesus says, “there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”
That is our God.
He is the One Who created us.
He is the One Who loves us and died for us.
Have you repented of your sins and turned to Him?
If not, He is waiting.
He’s been searching for you for your entire life.
Won’t you turn to Him now?
Will you pray with me?:
Dear God,
I thank You that You love all people the same and that You came and died for everyone...even for me.
I am a sinner.
I repent of my sin.
I want to follow You.
I turn to You now.
Change my heart and set me free.
I thank You for Your love, mercy, compassion, and forgiveness.
I give my life to You.
In Jesus’ name and for His sake I pray.
Amen.
