Day 31 - Jonah

Day 31 - Jonah (

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I find Jonah to be one of the most interesting characters in the Bible.  When God told him to go to Ninevah (modern-day Mosul in Iraq) to preach repentance so God might spare the city from destruction like he did with Sodom and Gomorrah.  Instead of going east to Ninevah, Jonah jumped on a ship headed exactly in the opposite direction to Tarshish in modern-day Spain.

We all know the story of how the sailors had to throw Jonah overboard because they had no other choice and how God commanded a giant fish to swallow Jonah for 3 days.  What most do not know is what happened after Jonah was delivered from the belly of the fish after he prayed to God.  Jonah reluctantly obeyed God and went to Ninevah to preach judgment to that great city.  The people of Ninevah were convicted and repented as one and God relented of His wrath and withheld His judgment.

Surprisingly, Jonah became angry to the point of wantng to die because God did not destroy Ninevah (an enemy of Israel).  God questions Jonah and asked him "Is it right for you to be angry?"  After that, Jonah waited hoping that Ninevah would still be destroyed (I guess kind of like when most of the Allied soldiers waited and hoped for Hitler’s hideout to be bombed).  God saw Jonah’s misery under the heat of the sun and provided a plant to grow to become shade for Jonah.  Jonah was very thankful for the plant but then God decides to make the plant wither.  Again, Jonah became very mad.  Here is what happened as recorded in the last verses of the book of Jonah:

"Is it right for you to be angry about the plant?" And he said, "It is right for me to be angry, even to death!"  But the Lord said, "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?"

You and I are just like Jonah - one moment we disobey God, then the next moment we repent and ask forgiveness, and then we turn around and become angry when things don’t go the way we want it to.  What we need is to have the same perspective as God and place value on the things that God values.  And there is nothing that God value more than the people He created in His image.