Oh, Jonah!

A couple folks have asked for permission to use or quote these lectionary reflections in their own sermons. The answer is always YES. I'm hoping that these posts can be a resource for preachers, so if there's an idea that sparks your own reflection, gank it! If you use a direct quote, then attribute it to me, of course, but ideas are yours for the using.

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Sometime around 1989, our church’s district put on a regional production of the children’s musical “Oh, Jonah!” It was, apparently, a popular musical during that time because several people from across the country have told me that they too, still have all the songs memorized.

I remember giggling with my friends at play practice, drinking Kool-Aid in the Central CoB fellowship hall, and understanding that Ninevah - that place Jonah has to go, against his will, was a straight up Den of Iniquity. There were feather boas and lots of slinking around seductively.

The beginning of the musical, which I will now be singing for the rest of the week, goes like this:

It's a whale of a tale,

It's a tale of a whale,

A story of the deep blue sea,

About a fish and a man named Jonah

And responsibility.

The way Jonah’s story got told in that musical was consistent with how I've heard it told most other places: Jonah, a stubborn and disobedient dude, tries everything he can think of to get out of doing what God asks him to do. God, the story goes, gets so frustrated with the knucklehead that he has a WHALE swallow him whole, swim across the sea and spit Jonah up on the shore.

The message of this story, as it usually gets told, IS about responsibility: we'd do well to just obey God in the first place and not be snotty little babies about it, lest we too get swallowed by some massive sea creature and inelegantly spit out in the spot we’ve been commanded to go.

But that is not actually what this story is about. Jonah’s problem has nothing to do with being responsible or obedient and everything to do with God’s extravagant mercy. Yes, that's the Old Testament god, the God of vengeance that people like to either quote or ignore depending on their outlook, being TOO MERCIFUL for human liking.

God didn't ask Jonah to go just anywhere and preach repentance; she sent him to the Israelites’ most bitter enemy, the notoriously violent and murderous Assyrians. The Assyrians are known, historically, as a cruel empire, kidnapping and torturing the people of the lands they conquered and occupied.

Jonah would have *known* victims of the Assyrian regime. He would have lost and grieved friends and family tortured and killed by these enemies. He would have been raised with the understanding that Assyrians were not to be trifled with, not to be befriended and certainly not to be supported or helped.

God asking Johan to go preach repentance to the Assyrians in Ninevah would be like God asking a Ukrainian to go preach repentance to Putin, a Gazan to go preach repentance to Netanyahu or the United States. Imagine the person or institution you hate the most, that has done the most harm not just to you but to your entire community, for generations on end. It's like God commanding you to get your butt over to their headquarters and offer them amnesty for their crimes, an invitation to your next potluck.

Jonah didn't jump the next ship to Tarshish because he was lazy or irresponsible; he could not imagine being a part of God's plan to restore and forgive these bitter, sworn enemies.

Because Jonah KNEW that's what God was up to: mercy. Restoration. Forgiveness and reconciliation. He says as much right there in the text, after he finally does get forcibly delivered to Ninevah, reluctantly preaches a five word sermon and, in an unbelievable plot twist, the Ninevites repent immediately and enthusiastically.

“That is what I tried to forestall by fleeing to Tarshish,” he tells God. “I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. Now, Lord, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live.”

Jonah cannot bear God’s compassion. He would rather die than go on living with the knowledge that God loves even his worst enemy and that he himself participated in their restoration and forgiveness.

The book of Jonah isn't about "responsibility.” It's much bigger and harder than that. It's a brilliant story about how hard it is for us humans to understand and accept - much less practice - enemy love. Sometimes it takes being swallowed by a sea creature and barfed up on our enemy’s doorstep for us to learn the lesson that the God who made us and claims us is, in fact, gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love. And God is not just compassionate toward us, not only gracious toward our allies and friends, but abounding in love for everyone. Even our bitter enemies.

I guess that truth is a little more complicated to squeeze into a children’s musical, though.