Compassion for a Godless World
The Old Testament book of Jonah, though written in a distant time and place, offers an important message for believers living in America today. It highlights God’s heartfelt compassion for the people of an unbelieving, hostile world. It also highlights – with sharp contrast – how his own people easily fail to share his compassion, responding to the world with deep-seated hatred and resentment instead.
Perplexing Contrast on the Sea
The book opens with the LORD sending Jonah to the city of Nineveh (1:1), the capital city for the Assyrian empire, a cruel and powerful regime that did not worship the LORD. In fact, the LORD had instructed Jonah to denounce the wickedness and depravity of this city, but Jonah declined, boarding a ship that would take him in the opposite direction (1:2-3). However “running from the call of God” is not the purpose of this true and captivating story.
During this journey, the ship encountered a massive storm and nearly broke into pieces (1:4). Fearing for their lives, the captain and sailors on board called out to their gods for deliverance. In fact, it is stunning to observe that everyone did this but Jonah (1:5-6). Though he claimed to fear the LORD, he showed no interest in rescuing these panic-stricken men from the storm (Jonah 1:6-9). Eventually, however, after further appeals, he instructed them to throw him overboard (Jonah 1:12). To their credit, these unbelieving men balked at this cold-hearted idea and attempted to row back to shore instead, intending to spare his life despite his disobedience to the LORD (Jonah 1:13-14). As soon as they threw him overboard and the storm had ended, they responded to the LORD with the kind of reverence which Jonah claimed to possess but failed to practice (Jonah 1:15-16). In summary, then, this opening scene shows us that the nonbelievers on this ship showed more compassion to Jonah than Jonah had shown to them.
Not only did the sailors show compassion to Jonah, but the LORD showed compassion to him as well. Just as he had thrown a great storm into the sea (Jonah 1:4), he also prepared a great fish in the sea to swallow Jonah and to preserve him alive for the space of three days and three nights (Jonah 1:17). Only after all that length of time and depth of distress did Jonah pray to God at last (Jonah 2:1). Remarkably, God answered him (Jonah 2:2). In response to his prayer, God instructed the fish to vomit Jonah back onto dry land (Jonah 2:7). (It is interesting to observe that both the fish in this scene and the worm / caterpillar in the closing scene obey God immediately and perfectly, and both are merely animals, while Jonah – who is a human being – does not.)
Can you sense the subtle emphasis on contrast here? In his dialogue with the sailors, Jonah had described the LORD as the God “who made the sea and the dry land,” which are two contrasting climates in the world (Jonah 1:9). When the fish spit Jonah out onto dry land, he bridged both biospheres at once. The opening scene of this book takes place in the sea, while the extended closing scene would take place in the dry land of Nineveh. You can also sense in the closing words of Jonah’s prayer a twinge of arrogance as he compared himself to “those who regard worthless idols” (Jonah 2:8-9). This appears to be a backhanded reference to the sailors on board the ship. Ironically, those men had turned from their idols to fear the LORD. Jonah didn’t know this because they did this after departure.
Perplexing Contrast on Dry Land
In mercy and compassion, the LORD gave his assignment to Jonah for Nineveh a second time (Jonah 3:1-2), and Jonah grudgingly obliged, preaching a very short message indeed, a message devoid of compassion (Jonah 3:3-4). Remarkably, the residents of Nineveh repented thoroughly of their sins, from the king and beyond (Jonah 3:5-9). Just as God had shown compassion to the sailors, and just has he had shown compassion to Jonah, he responded with compassion to the Ninevites as well: he reversed the disaster and “did not do it” (Jonah 3:10).
When God showed mercy to Nineveh, the problem in Jonah’s heart became most clear. The resentment which he displayed for the Ninevites at the opening of this book, the callousness that he displayed to the sailors on the boat, the prejudice which he hinted at in his prayer, and the curtness that he expressed in his message to the city reappear in this moment through a fit of seething rage (Jonah 4:1). In fact, he finally revealed why he refused to go to Nineveh in the first place. It wasn’t because he was afraid of what the Ninevites might do to him, that he was shy, or that he had other pressing plans on his agenda. He didn’t want to go because he had a hunch that God might show compassion to the people of that city (Jonah 4:2-3). Therefore, just as he encouraged the sailors to throw him into the sea, he asked the Lord to take away his life in that moment. He could not bear to see God demonstrate compassion to the wicked city of Nineveh (Jonah 4:3)!
Following this angry outburst and cold-hearted request, the LORD questioned whether Jonah had responded the right way to his compassionate nature (Jonah 4:4). In fact, it seems that this question serves as the underlying question of this book, though Jonah stubbornly declined to give an answer. Instead, he departed from the city to see whether God might still send judgment on the city after all, somehow hoping that this might be the case in the end (Jonah 4:5). In yet another act of compassion, the LORD prepared something else for Jonah to deliver him. In the opening scene of the book, God had prepared a large fish to deliver Jonah from drowning in the sea. But in this final scene, he provided another stark contrast by preparing a small, leafy gourd plant to deliver Jonah from the dry, arid heat of the desert, a plant for which Jonah was grateful (Jonah 4:6).
On the following day, God prepared something else. Instead of a massive fish, he prepared a tiny worm or caterpillar to destroy the gourd plant (Jonah 4:7). Can you see the contrast? Later in the same day, he sent another strong wind, similar to the wind he had thrown into the sea in the opening scene (Jonah 4:8). Then once again, as you might guess, Jonah hoped that he might die (Jonah 4:8). Once again, the LORD asked Jonah whether he was justified in being angry about the withered gourd plant, to which Jonah said he was (Jonah 4:9). Following this brief and disappointing exchange, the LORD provides the “punch line” for the entire book (Jonah 4:10-11).
“You have had pity on the plant for which you have not labored, nor made it grow, which came up in a night and perished in a night. And should I not pity Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred and twenty thousand persons who cannot discern between their right hand and their left—and much livestock?”
The problem with Jonah was a problem with compassion. He showed compassion towards a gourd plant – a lifeless, soulless plant into which he had invested nothing and which lasted no more than one day. Meanwhile, he showed hatred and prejudice towards the Ninevites (and the idol-worshipping sailors) whom God had made as living, eternal persons. In fact, the LORD reminded Jonah about something which he may not have considered. While Jonah fixated on the wickedness, cruelty, and oppression of the Ninevite adults, he had overlooked the great number of young children in the city who were not yet old enough to tell the difference between their right hands and their left, what’s more to deserve the hatred that Jonah expressed. Beyond this, the LORD even reminded Jonah that there were many animals in the city (which themselves had never sinned of course). Though these creatures did not carry the image of God by means of an eternal human spirit, they at least had souls, something that the gourd plant certainly did not have. By making this point, the LORD not only provides another striking contrast, but he injects an element of appropriate sarcasm as well. By doing so, he highlights the problem of Jonah’s resentment of divine compassion.
Our Jonah Tendencies Today
Believers living in America today encounter (in a relentless way) the wickedness, ignorance, and hostility of an unbelieving and idolatrous world. This intense clash of worldviews and our growing experience of marginalization easily fuels seething thoughts of prejudice and feelings of resentment in our hearts. We hope for God to intervene with sudden justice, yet we fail to love the world as God loves them.
Like Jonah, we also fail to understand the compassion which God has shown towards us when we least deserved it, and the compassion which he continues to show towards us despite our cold-hearted, self-absorbed tendencies.
Like Jonah, once again, we easily care more for the material, lifeless objects and temporary comforts that God provides than we do for the perishing people around us whom God has made and towards whom God feels compassion, as he did for the sailors in the ship.
Let us not wish to die and escape this wicked world. Let us take the faithful message of judgement and redemption on our lips and share it with our world. Let us love material comforts less and eternal souls far more. This is the timeless message of Jonah.
Thomas Overmiller serves as pastor for Faith Baptist Church in Corona, NY and blogs at Shepherd Thoughts. This article first appeared at Shepherd Thoughts, used here with permission.