NR 18-09-05
No one is too bad for the Love of God
In February, 1891, the "Star of the East", a whaling ship from Liverpool, England was hunting whales in the South Atlantic near the Falkland Islands.
A whale was sighted and two boats sent to kill it.
The first boat successfully harpooned the whale, but it swam away, dragging the boat with it.
Later, the harpooner in the accompanying boat also succeeded in harpooning the whale.
Both boats were towed about three miles by the whale, before it "sounded" or went below the surface. It then came back up to the surface and in its death throes, capsized one of the whaling boats.
All but two crew members were rescued by the other boat.
A few hours later, the now dead whale was lashed to the side of the ship and the crew began the task of cutting it up.
When they came to the stomach, they hoisted it onto the deck and were shocked to see something moving around inside.
They quickly cut the stomach open and found one of the missing sailors, 35 year old James Bartley, inside alive, but unconscious.
He was soon revived, but for two weeks was delirious. By the end of the third week he had recovered sufficiently to go about his duties again.
Sir Francis Fox wrote of Bartley :
His skin -where it was exposed to the action of the gastric juice - . . . face, neck and hands were bleached to a deadly whiteness and took on the appearance of parchment . . . (and) never recovered its natural appearance . . . (though otherwise) his health did not seem affected by his terrible experience. (http://www.grmi.org/renewal/Richard_Riss/evidences/8jonah.html)
Is this story a modern day story of Jonah – or as some people think - a seaman’s yarn? I leave you to judge.
Jonah was one of the Old Testament readings in the Lectioanry this week. As I thought and prayed about the passage, it seemed to me that the book of Jonah has a lot of similarities with the Parable of the Unforgiving Servant that I preached on last Sunday.
You may recall that the two key points from the Parable of the Unforgiving Servant were
1. that forgiveness goes to the heart of the Gospel – and
2. as we have been forgiven so much by God, so Jesus calls us – as his disciples to have a similar compassion - to that which God has to us - towards others.
For me the story of Jonah teaches us two important things
1. Firstly that no one is too bad for the grace of God and
2. Secondly God wants us to have the same compassion for others as he has had for us.
Background:
Some commentators think the book of Jonah is a parable or an allegory - but I think that there may be evidence for the story being historical.
Why –
1. Firstly, because we do find a reference to the Prophet Jonah the son of Amittai in one of the historical books of the OT, where it says:
“25 He (Jereboam the Second) was the one who restored the boundaries of Israel from Lebo Hamath to the Sea of the Arabah, in accordance with the word of the LORD, the God of Israel, spoken through his servant Jonah son of Amittai, the prophet from Gath Hepher. (2 Kings 15:25)
And if we are talking about the same Jonah, this might give us a clue to Jonah’s antipathy to the city of Ninevah – the capital city of Israel’s great enemy of that era – the Assyrians.
2. The second reason that I think the story may be historical rather than allegorical is because Jesus himself vouches for the authenticity of the story of Jonah – as we heard in our Gospel reading this morning.
3. The third and perhaps more tenuous reason is that Ninevah was a city where there was a lot of idol worship and recently an obelisk was found recording a king who changed from worshipping many gods to one God.
Is he possibly the same king of Ninevah who repented at Jonah’s preaching?
The Book of Jonah
Let’s review the story:
Scene 1: The book opens with God giving Jonah a calling: To go and preach against the evil in Ninevah.
Ninevah
Ninevah was called by the prophet Nahum “that bloody city” (Nahum 3:1). – and he wasn’t swearing!!
It wasn’t called “that bloody city” just because of the wars it started but also for its cruelty to its captives.
Story: For example, one of their kings (Ash- urna - sirpal) made a habit of cutting off the hands, feet, noses and the ears of his captives and also put out their eyes and raised mounds of human heads.
Ninevah was also the capital city of the Assyrian Empire – Israel’s great enemy of that time. It wasn’t the place to go – as a Jewish prophet - to preach a hard message.
But that wasn’t the reason Jonah fled to Tarshish.
It was because he had no compassion towards his enemy Ninevah. He realised that God would forgive them if they repented. Look at what Jonah says at the beginning of Chapter 4
4. 2 He prayed to the LORD, "O LORD, is this not what I said when I was still at home? That is why I was so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity
Instead of going up to Ninevah he went down to Joppa to catch a ship to Tarshish in Spain.
Joppa
Interestingly, Jonah starts from a small seaport near to Jerusalem called Joppa – which is known today as Jaffa.
Interestingly it was the same Joppa where St. Peter was staying - about 900 years later - when the Lord called him to take the Gospel to the first Gentiles - the house of Cornelius. (Acts 10, 5-48).
Like Peter, Jonah was called to preach the Gospel of repentence to the Gentiles.
Like Peter, Jonah had to overcome the same prejudices - that grace was only for the Jews and not for the heathen Gentiles.
Jonah, unlike Peter was disobedient in Joppa and took off in exactly the opposite direction - to the other end of the world.
Scene 2. While out to sea, the ship that Jonah was on, ran into a storm and it looked as if the ship would go down.
So the sailiors drew lots to find out who is the cause and the lot falls on Jonah.
What was the lot:
“Basically there were “stones or inscribed tablets were put in a vessel, and having been shaken, were drawn out or cast out” (Davis, Dictionary of the Bible p 481)
The throwing of the lot was usually preceeded by prayer to God for his direction.
Once the lot had fallen on Jonah, he realised that God’s hand was in the matter. And so he told them that their only chance of survival was to throw him over board.
Scene 3 As Jonah hits the water, God sends a
Great Fish (not necessarily a whale) to save Jonah and he is in the inside of that fish for three days.
I wonder what Jonah thought while he was in the Great Fish. You might get a clue by reading Jonah 2 when you get home.
Scene 4: After three days, the fish vomitted Jonah up and he then decided to obey God and go to Ninevah.
Here we can see clearly Jonah as an OT prefiguring of Christ. In the same way that Jonah was three days in the belly of the large fish - so Christ was in the tomb three days before his Resurrection.
As an aside: I wonder what Jonah must have looked like after being three days inside the fish. I expect that the internal acids in the fish had eaten away at Jonah’s skin and he probably looked a mess. No wonder the Ninivites took notice of his story
But God has already preceded Jonah and as a result of Jonah’s preaching - Ninevah repented and God spared them
Scene 5: This is where the story – for me - gets interesting
Far from being pleased that Ninevah has been spared, Jonah sulked. Why - because the great enemy of Israel had been spared.
But it is deeper than that – Jonah did not have the compassionate heart of God.
After all, God had spared him from the inside of the Great Fish and had given him the prophet – who should have know better -a second chance
So why shouldn’t God give Ninevah a second chance?
Conclusion
1. Compassion
God wants us to have a compassion for those who are lost. We must remember – no one is beyond the pale.
2. Obedience
God calls us to be obedient – not comfortable
And often our calling as Christian disciples will mean that God will challenge us to change. And I mean change in all its guises
1. Change how we think,
2. Change where we are,
3. Change how we act.
Jonah was called from his comfort zone as a revered prophet in Israel to preach to repentence to his enemies - Ninevah.
Jonah had to PUT HIMSELF OUT to fulfill his calling.
It cost him – and perhaps it will costs us too if we are going to fulfill the commission that Jesus has for us.
It seems to me that when I read the Scriptures that when great things of God happened – they happened when Christians were obedient – not comfortable!
Let me leave you with this thought for prayer
Stroy: Today, Ninevah is a city of about 100,000 in Iraq - of which about 90% of the present day population are Assyrian Christians and which has three members in the new National Assembly.
One of these members recently said:
“ We don’t want to come under Muslim Law because we are Christians”
God knew what he was doing by calling Jonah 2,800 years ago – but I DON’T get the impression that Jonah DID – but he was obedient – if rather grudgingly!
Could it be that even today God has honoured Jonah’s preaching by calling the inhabitants of that city Ninevah to be a beacon of Christian Faith in the heart of a Muslim country, Iraq.
