If you recall, last Sunday we started looking at Jonah’s ministry after his time spent in the stomach of the great fish; three days he spent in that fish’s stomach. He reflected back on all that had taken place, all that he had experienced, and ultimately offered up a beautiful prayer of repentance and thanksgiving before being put back on dry land. He even seemed to have a somewhat different outlook on life after those events, at least momentarily. Now, while we did read Jonah’s message and did touch a little bit on the seemingly immediate repentance offered up by the people of Nineveh, we didn’t really dive into much detail about what happened there in Nineveh. What we looked at last time was primarily about the astonishing news that God would even choose to still use Jonah to accomplish His will despite Jonah’s obvious rebellion from God and his lack of desire to see the people of Nineveh repent; although that news shouldn’t really surprise us all that much. After all, many times it’s the very thing that we don’t want to have happen that God so clearly tells us must happen. Many times it’s the person that you don’t want to talk to or the place that you just don’t want to go that God is specifically drawing you towards. A friend of mine used to refer to that as God’s sense of humor; although few people rarely get the joke and laugh at it when it’s them. Now, what I want to do today as we look at this extended text from last Sunday is to look at the actual message of Jonah (which won’t take long) and then examine exactly what happened both externally and internally with the people of Nineveh after hearing this word from God. Finally, we will see what all of this means for us in our modern context.
When I try and picture the scene of Jonah’s call for repentance there in Nineveh, I often think of my children apologizing to one another. Y’all know the type of apology I’m talking about don’t you? I’m talking about the one where they really don’t know that they did anything wrong, or if they do then they really don’t care and aren’t that sorry about it. However, they know that their mother or their father won’t let the day continue on until they apologize for whatever it is that they have done. It’s the kind of apology where you have to have them say it over again, this time actually looking at the person that they are supposed to be apologizing to. It’s a begrudging apology. Jonah makes his way through this great city, getting right in the middle of it. The fact that we’re told that it’s three days in length and that he walks one is meant to point out that he had gone to the center of the city to deliver God’s message. He wasn’t standing on the outskirts, but right in the middle of things. There’s no security, there’s no safety. It’s not as if Jonah can escape if the people don’t take kindly to his message. So, he stands up in the middle of this great city who we read was doing some evil things and he proclaims this message that God has been so adamant about him delivering and he says, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” That’s it. That’s all he says.
Now, you may be surprised that his message was only eight words long. Well, actually it was only five words long in the original Hebrew; so even shorter than you thought. So, the same prophet that prayed the entirety of chapter 2, that wonderful psalm of repentance and thanksgiving and God’s glory, and he could only muster up five words as a means of calling Nineveh to repentance. Now, there are some out there who believe that his actual message was longer and that the words recorded are merely just the theme of what he said, but there really is not evidence for such a belief, just speculation built upon the reaction of the Ninevites. However, I would remind you that it’s not about Jonah’s oratory skills, but the one that he’s speaking about that gives his message its power.
Can you see why I say that this call made by Jonah reminds me of my kids (and even some adults I’ve seen) offering up what I wouldn’t even consider being a half-hearted apology? I mean, what would you do if someone came and spoke such a message to us? We would hear it, think about it for a second, and then move on with our lives. Now, I will give you the fact that at the very least prophets were still active at this point in time in the life of the Church. We don’t have any prophets walking the streets today, so we’re probably more apprehensive or skeptical when hearing something like this. However, don’t you just imagine most of the people of Nineveh were just looking at each other and saying, “Well, that was strange!” I mean, think about all of the other prophecies of the Old Testament and all of the other messages and calls delivered by prophets and apostles in both the Old and New Testaments. There isn’t one that comes anywhere close to the brevity of this word spoken here by Jonah. Some of them are chapters and chapters long (whole books even), yet very few come anywhere close to the apparently immediate impact that the words of Jonah seemed to have had upon Nineveh. I mean, it isn’t as if Jonah had any follow-up comments. He simply spoke this message and walked away, but what followed was something that no one could really put into words. Again, there are those who will look at Jonah and think that his time spent in the stomach of the fish gave him this new confidence and drive in ministry. They act as if Jonah was anxious and eager to go and proclaim God’s message after being given a second chance. Frankly, I don’t think that there is any way that we could take such a view of Jonah given the brevity of his message here and given what we will see in the last chapter about his reaction to Nineveh being spared. Jonah doesn’t really seem to deliver to these people anything more than the bare minimum of what God has revealed to him. “Ok God, you want me to tell them of their smiting in forty days, well then that’s what I’ll tell them, and no more.” Again, it’s not about the message that you deliver, but about God’s power being delivered in that message. If the effectiveness of Jonah’s call for repentance hung on Jonah’s words then no one would have repented, but the power isn’t in the message or messenger but the one whom the message is about. If the Ninevites repenting was based on Jonah’s articulation of this call then it wouldn’t be genuine. Genuine repentance, true repentance, only comes about from God granting to us a knowledge of Him, which results in saving faith, which ultimately leads to repentance.
As soon as we are given the words of Jonah, we’re told that “the people of Nineveh believed in God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them.” We’re told that the king of Nineveh got up, took off his robe, and put on sackcloth. He also called for everyone else in the city to do the same. He called for a fast from both food and drink (even water) for all the people of Nineveh, and even the livestock. Now, obviously a goat or a mule can’t repent and wouldn’t understand what was going on, but this language serves to emphasize the lengths to which this repentance extends. It points out the sincerity of their hearts and the severity with which they were treating this prophetic word from Jonah. They all called out to God. The fact that our text says “the people of Nineveh believed in God” tells us that prior to this they didn’t believe. So they’ve gone from non-believing to believing in a matter of five words. That’s astonishing. I don’t know if you’ve ever had a conversation with a non-Christian before, but it can be a frustrating thing. It can be a very beautiful thing as well, but there are times when it is maddening. You can present every text and every piece of evidence that you can think of to them to show that God is real and He’s active and that He’s exactly who Scripture says that He is, and yet they won’t have any of it. You can present all types of examples to them of God’s gracious hand working in the lives of His children, and they will brush it off as merely the way that the world works. Yet, here in Nineveh, Jonah gives this somewhat pathetic excuse of a call for repentance and the whole city repents. Again, it’s not because of Jonah’s words but because of God’s power. Jonah gives them what God has revealed to him in a manner that almost seems devoid of any emotion or urgency, and they all turned away from their evil ways and the wickedness that they were doing that had placed them in this position in the first place. That is, they turned away from their wickedness for a while. We know that it doesn’t last forever. They thought that if they got really good really quick then God might relent from the destruction that He had spoken of through Jonah. After all, they did have forty days to make an impression on God according to the words of Jonah.
Now, we know from the final verse in our text that that is exactly what happened. “When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it.” The prophetic warning of verse 4 was enough to scare them so badly that they changed their ways enough for God to withhold His punishment. And that brings up an interesting question, does God change his mind? You see, for God to change His mind, it would imply that God didn’t have the best solution from the beginning or that He didn’t know that something was going to turn out a particular way. It’s like when we read that “God remembered his covenant with Abraham.” Are we implying that God, the all-knowing Creator of the universe, ever forgot that He had a covenant with mankind? Of course not! Are we implying here that God somehow didn’t know what the citizens of Nineveh would do or that He realized that He was making a mistake in overthrowing them? Of course not! There’s never one second here (or anywhere else for that matter) where the sovereignty of God, i.e. God’s having all things under His rule and control, and that nothing happens without His direction or permission, is ever in question. After all, it’s not as if God would have Jonah deliver this message to them if He was just going to destroy Nineveh regardless.
You see, this brings in another notion that we so often misinterpret. We like to think of God as a micromanager of life here on earth. We like to think that God is watching over us and controlling things almost like a puppet master controls a puppet show. That’s not how God works. Now, don’t get me wrong, He could if He wanted to. I just don’t think, and more importantly, Scripture doesn’t declare or indicate, that He works that way. However, don’t make the mistake of thinking of God as a watchmaker either. Don’t think that He just created everything, set things into motion, and simply sat back and watched history unfold. God is active in the world, but He works on a more macro level. God works by the unfolding of His will, but many times the details of how that plan comes about are unscripted. It’s not as if we are robots clothed in flesh that have no control over our lives whatsoever. In fact, it is because of God’s grace working in us that we have what little control we do have. If it weren’t but for the grace of God, then we would be robots, but only carrying out the evil desires of our hearts. It is only because of God that we are not complete and total slaves to sin. God’s grace is what gives us the freedom to choose what we will do. However, when God decrees or orders something, then it comes to pass simply because God has deemed it so. I spoke last Sunday about my call to ministry. It didn’t matter whether I listened the first, second, or third time that God spoke to me; what mattered was that I listened. God placed a calling upon my life that I was to enter into gospel ministry and that is exactly what happened. The details are inconsequential to the unfolding of the plan of God other than the fact that they happened according to God’s decree.
The truth of the matter as it pertains to Nineveh here in our text is that God didn’t destroy this city because, in fact, it wasn’t the same city that Jonah pronounced judgment against. This city of repentance and fasting and good works wasn’t the same place where all of the evil works were coming out of at the start of this account. This was an entirely different place altogether. God was still going to destroy the evil city of Nineveh. The prophet Nahum writes of the time when this promised judgment finally does come upon Nineveh after they turn back to their wicked ways. What the author of our text speaks of with God’s relenting (or perhaps repenting in some texts), is more of a temporary withholding than anything else. Now, if you are getting hung up on the words relenting or repenting on the part of God, don’t! These words are used here because there simply aren’t words in the realm of human understanding that can adequately and correctly define God’s decision to withhold judgment from being leveled upon the Ninevites.
So, how are we to take this text and apply it in our modern context? As I said already, we don’t have prophets like Jonah walking around the streets today. The Word of God isn’t given to us by some divine orator, but by the Word itself, revealed to us in Scripture. The closest thing that we have to anything like prophets are preachers, and I can personally attest to you that there is no divine revelation hidden in this particular pastor, nor in any other I’ve met. Now don’t get me wrong, does God choose to reveal things to His people through pastors, absolutely. As I pray each Sunday, hopefully, this is God’s message and not mine. However, God speaks through the layperson as well as the pastor. The Holy Spirit inspires all people and carries out good works through them no matter what their knowledge, ordination status, or really even their faith. I’ve seen people of low Bible knowledge who aren’t even what I would consider fully Christian yet speak some amazing things about God. Now, usually, this work leads them to a more complete faith. The heart of all of this is something that I’ve referenced numerous times today and in previous weeks. The power of God’s Word isn’t in our words, but in whom the Word is about. When we looked at the armor of God in Ephesians 6 a few months ago, we noted that God’s Word, Scripture, was the only primarily offensive weapon. It’s referred to as the sword of the Spirit.
In our efforts to evangelize and tell people about God, we don’t need to rely upon new gimmicks and innovative presentations. We need to rely upon God’s Word. We need to rely upon the message that God has already revealed to us in His Son. If we faithfully present God’s Word, God will take care of the rest. Do you realize how freeing it is to know that someone’s conversion or their faith isn’t based upon what you say or how you say it but upon God’s working in their heart and creating in them a saving faith? Now, will we have the type of impact that Jonah had on Nineveh? Probably not, but think about the joy that we would have if even one person comes to a saving faith. Don’t let your feelings, your lack of knowledge, your opinions, or anything else ever prevent you from sharing the gospel because God works through our broken words to call broken people to a perfect relationship with Him.
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