JONAH: GROWING A
HEART FOR LOST PEOPLE
Have you seen the new movie “Hell is for Real”? No? You
probably won’t see anything like that in theaters. Heaven is more acceptable
subject in our culture.
We don’t
talk much about people going to hell these days. It is not politically correct
to speak of hell let alone suggesting anyone deserves to go there. There are a
couple of reasons for this according to Jonathan Merritt of the Religious News
Service:
Hell
doesn’t feel fair to the contemporary mind. Some compare the punishment of hell
to a 5000 dollar punishment for a 50 dollar crime. Unless your name is Hitler,
Pol Pot, or Pinochet, most people don’t feel they deserve to go to hell.
Hell
sounds harsh. The only people who talk about hell are hateful Christians. Think
of Westboro Baptist Church and you get a glimpse of popular opinion regarding
“hate” and “hellfire Christians.” Hell is bad news; we’re hooked on good news
and positive messages.
Hell scares
off spiritual seekers. So the church avoids talk of hell for the sake of
drawing people “in.” We’re trying to attract new followers, not repel skeptics.
What
then, is our motivation for sharing the good news of Jesus with those we call
“lost”? What are we trying to save them from if there is no hell? If there is a
hell, why are we so loathe to talk about it? Jesus plainly taught that
believers and unbelievers will be separated on the last day, the “cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for
the devil and his angels” (Matt. 25:41). Is this our motivation for
evangelism?
In the
story of Jonah, the Lord never mentions hell. He does say, “Should I not have
concern for the great city of Nineveh…who cannot tell their right hand from
their left?” The Lord’s main concern is their moral lostness. These people
can’t find God and thus don’t know him. Since God has compassion on lost
people, shouldn’t we have the same compassion?
1. God’s Grand Scheme of Grace for every race
We have read Jonah 3, and a quick review will reveal that
after the fish spit Jonah out on the shore, he went and obeyed the Lord and
went to Nineveh. Jonah preached an eight-word sermon of judgment on the people
(3:4). There was no hope offered, just a simple condemnation that in 40 days
they, their city, and all their animals would be destroyed.
Nineveh’s
response is the envy of every preacher – revival! They repented! First the
common people, then the king, and then a royal decree proclaiming a city-wide
fast. Most important, the king decreed that everyone give up their evil ways
and violence (3:8). Note that they did not need to be told what their sins
were, they simply knew.
This is
what touched God’s heart. Their confessions and their sackcloth were all very
well and good, but what the Lord noted most was their change of behavior, that
they were willing to turn from wickedness. We don’t know why the city was so
compelled to repent, but the result was amazing.
The key
verse is the Lord’s response, “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” (3:10). Did God change
his mind? Some of us may be appalled to think that God can be swayed.
Biblically and theologically we must remember that God does not change. Yet his
program of grace for every person and nation has been clearly taught in the OT.
Consider the prophecy of Jeremiah (read 18:5-8). Here, the Lord specifically
declares that a nation, including but not exclusive to Israel, that repents will
not be destroyed.
Like the
Ninevites, anyone who shows genuine repentance can be saved. This is not the
recitation of mere words, no trite “I’m sorry,” but a change of heart and mind
and resultant behavior. Turning to the Lord and acknowledging his right to be
God leads to abundant grace. And God wants to show this compassion to everyone.
2. Jonah’s small-minded plan for man
But that is exactly what infuriates Jonah. Jonah does not
believe that his Lord should show compassion on anyone but an Israelite. There
are those who are “in” and those who should and never will be “in.”
Jonah
should have been overjoyed that his preaching produced these amazing results
for God. Preachers dream of congregations falling down before the Lord because
their messages were so powerfully felt. Not Jonah. He gets angry. Why?
His
worst fears have been realized – God was consistent with his character – God
was gracious. See how with such ironic petulance he blames God for being God
(4:2-3). This, Jonah says, is why he fled for Tarshish, to keep God from making
a theological mistake (as if he could). Jonah practically quotes Exodus 34:6,
the orthodox doctrine of God’s character. Knowing all this, Jonah is still
embarrassed.
Jonah is
angry at God because he is surprised by grace. His idea of what God is supposed
to do and what God actually did were radically different. His imagination was
stunted by his prejudice and pride. He feels like a failure as a prophet
because he predicted the destruction of Nineveh, and it didn’t happen. His
competence as a prophet is in question.
Jonah is
angry at God. Anger can be a useful diagnostic tool. When we are angry, it
tells us something is wrong – an evil or incompetence or stupidity. Anger is
infused by a moral/spiritual intensity that carries conviction. What it fails
to do is tell us whether the wrong is outside or inside us. A spouse or a child
or a friend may do something that angers us. But if we track the anger, we
often find that it leads to a wrong inside of us – wrong information, poor
understanding, a small-minded heart. If we can admit that, we can move past
being angry with God and begin to understand his grace. Like Jonah, the wrong
may not be in our heads, but in our hearts. God’s grace and mercy are beyond
our comprehension.[i]
3. Jonah’s rant about the plant
Does anyone find it strange that when God relents and
shows compassion to Nineveh, Jonah goes outside of the city to watch God
destroy Nineveh? He builds a shelter, waits the 40 days we presume, and awaits
the fireworks. Jonah fully expects that the Ninevites will mess up and tick off
God. Then – then look out!
Isn’t
that the way the suspicious nature of the self-righteous works? Someone comes
to Christ who was a “lost cause” and we fully expect them to revert back to their
addictions and bad habits. Or not. Frankly, our problem may be that once
they’re “in” we’re satisfied with their being “in” so long as they don’t rock
the boat.
God
doesn’t leave Jonah alone. He wants the prophet to understand grace. Jonah’s
shelter is sparse, so God causes a leafy plant to grow up over Jonah and shade
him. For the first time in this book, Jonah is happy – exceedingly. Next day
God sends a worm (a weevil) to kill the plant. Jonah is angry again.
You
would think that Jonah would identify more with the worm than the plant. Jonah,
like the worm, found greater fulfillment in the destruction of God’s creation
than in bringing pleasure or relief. Jonah is more like the worm than like God.
Consider the contrasts:
-
Jonah had compassion on the plant; God had
compassion on people.
-
Jonah had compassion on the plant in which he
had no investment; God had compassion on people whom he created, whom he wanted
to bless.
-
Jonah was upset with the destruction of a plant;
God was concerned with the eternal damnation of people.
-
Jonah had compassion on himself; God had
compassion for others. Jonah did not really care about the plant, but for what
the plant did for him. The plant made him happy. If the plant did not make him
happy, he wouldn’t have cared if it died. God cared for people, even people who
had sinned and greatly offended him.[ii]
The Lord showed Jonah how tiny the prophet’s heart was
and how immense his own was in comparison. One would hope that like the Grinch,
Jonah’s heart grew a little.
4. God’s Passion for Compassion
God’s grace can be as offensive as hell. Why would I need
forgiveness if I believe that I am not that bad? Why would I need grace unless
God saw something in me that wasn’t right? Grace presumes that there is a
deep-seated need in me born out of sinful existence and offensive behavior to
God. So grace is offensive.
The Lord
tells Jonah, “And 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?” (4:11). What is wrong with the Ninevites? They have
their shoes on the wrong feet? The right-left word picture describes their
inability to tell right from wrong. Didn’t Jesus say, “Forgive them Father for
they don’t know what they do?” Sounds like our world today. Isaiah said, “Woe to those who call evil good and good
evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for
sweet and sweet for bitter” (5:20).
But God
does not want to leave people in such ignorance, even though they deserve it.
That’s the whole point of grace. Grace is unmerited favor, a blessing
undeserved. Jonah didn’t like grace because it was not something a person could
earn. Recipients of grace are exactly that – unworthy of grace. Jonah did not
want to see himself as unworthy, and it’s possible many of us don’t think we
need grace (and so don’t show it to others). God is not like us in this matter,
as God put it, “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show
compassion on whom I will show compassion” (Ex 33:19).
The Lord
does not simply shower grace on the unworthy and then leave them to their
ignorance. The goal of God’s grace is holiness (as opposed to happiness); the
ultimate goal is fellowship with God. By his grace he declares us acceptable to
come into his courts and know how holy he is, so that we can be holy too.
God’s
passion for compassion didn’t fit Jonah’s program. Jonah was unwilling to admit
that, even though he was a Jew, he did not deserve God’s blessings. If our
program doesn’t fit God’s, we gotta change the channel.
There is a world of lost people all around us. Do we have
God’s compassion for the lost? Do we believe they are lost in their moral and
spiritual direction?
Tony
Campolo once drew his audience to attention about their priorities when he made
a rather shocking statement. As part of his message he angrily said, “Yesterday
30,000 children around the world starved to death and you don’t give a “blank
about it.” And the pastors that were there admitted that they were thinking,
“Oh Tony, you shouldn’t have said that. You’re only going to get us mad at
you.” And many of the pastors admitted that they were indeed angry at his
cursing. But then just as all of them moved up to the edge of their seats in
sort of a defensive posture Campolo said, “The sad thing is you pastors are
more upset that I said ‘blank’ than you are about 30,000 children who starved
to death yesterday.” Silence descended over the room and they said that almost
in unison all of the pastor’s slunk back into their seats thinking, He’s right!
O God, how did our priorities get so mixed up? When did we become so calloused
to human need?
My
concern is that followers of Christ have lost their concern for the lost. And I
stand among those Jonahs who are more concerned about the plant than about the
120,000 lost souls. So how do we change that?
By
growing a heart for lost people; by understanding the heart of God who longs to
show compassion on all people, including you and I; by realizing that we need
grace and are as undeserving as anyone of the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ
who died for our sins. But here we stand – covered in grace.
This is
the heart of God: “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” (John 3:16).
AMEN
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