Being the fourth shortest book in the Hebrew Testament, the Book of Jonah can be read in minutes. What we just heard is its only appearance in the Sunday lectionary. You would think that this little book would be as obscure as the other lesser known books of the Bible yet Jonah’s story captures our imagination.
God calls out to Jonah, “Go at once to Nineveh, that great city and proclaim judgment upon it; for their wickedness comes before me.” But Jonah chooses not to, fleeing in the opposite direction. He boards a ship, finds himself in a storm. The crew blames him for their plight and at his suggestion throws him overboard. The sea calms down. In the book’s most famous scene, Jonah spends three days in the belly of a big fish. In response to his prayer, he is spewed upon the shore. This time, as we just heard, he goes to Nineveh and relays God’s message to its residents. Much to his displeasure, (after all, they were pagans) the citizens of Nineveh change their ways and are spared.
The narrative is hardly believable and Jonah isn’t much of a hero but he delivered a timeless message. He awakened countless listeners to the fact that morality is the one quality God seeks in us humans. God doesn’t care about our status in life, or where we live, or the color of our skin, or what we have done in the past. What God desires is that we conduct ourselves in a moral way in the present moment.
Repentance is the one thread that runs through these readings. Even Paul is cautioning his readers of the need to repent, telling them that life is passing away. Now, you may think that I am out of season. After all, repentance is the message we hear throughout Lent, but repentance isn’t just a Lenten activity. As I said earlier, God desires that we live the moral life, not in some distant future, but today.
One could see Jonah’s ultimatum as a threat. “Do this or else, God will punish you!” That was a message we heard often while growing up, and it was a message we shared as parents with our children as well. We are still told to do certain things or face the consequences if we don’t. Ignore the speed limit around here, for example, and you are apt to get a speeding ticket that could put a hefty dent in your wallet. Simply put, the math is simple. If we act immorally, the pleasure is likely to be fleeting but the consequences could be long lasting. No wonder Jonah’s message is well known: change direction or else!
Jesus, on the other hand, isn’t marching on the scene as a prophet of gloom and doom. He is telling us, “Something great is happening! Change direction or lose out!” In other words, there is more to life than simply avoiding sin. With the good news of the gospel, Jesus is offering us the fullness of life, not just light years away in heaven, but even in this lifetime. The Kingdom of God, which we pray for often, can be realized when we strive to live our lives today according to his teachings.
We Christians can be the happiest people on earth if we accepted Jesus’ invitation like the apostles did. They put aside everything and gave Jesus their undivided attention to learn his message. This message impressed them so much that, unlike Jonah, they went forth with great enthusiasm to share God’s simple message with anyone who would listen. Sadly, a fair number of us aren’t so willing to really listen to what Jesus has to say about living the moral life and yet we wonder why the world we live in is such a mess.
Jesus’ call to repentance is not intended to be a guilt trip; it is an invitation to change our outlook on life and see life as God does, your path to heaven, a path that may be shorter than we expect it to be.
A first century rabbi would tell his followers, “Repent one day before your death.”“But how,” they would ask, “does anyone know when that would be? One might die any day; it could be tomorrow, next week, or next year.”“Then repent,” he would say again, “One day before your death.”
So, what should we do? For starters, keep in mind that repentance isn’t an emotion. It isn’t feeling sorry for one’s sins. It is a deciding that what God wants from you and what you want from God aren’t going to be achieved by doing the same old things or thinking the same old thoughts. Jesus is urging us to abandon our nets of self-centeredness, fear and despair and walk with him to become “fishers” of the life and love of God. A few weeks ago, I urged you to take on the New Year’s resolution of spending more time in prayer each day then you did last year. Have you been doing that? If so, you have exercised an act of repentance. Prayer, as I pointed out last week, is God’s prescription for dealing with sin in our lives, the root of whatever self-centeredness, fear and despair we are experiencing.
We Christians should be the happiest people on earth. We know why we are here, we know where we are going and we know how to get there. Along the way, there will be trials and tribulations to disrupt our journey. There are weaknesses in our human nature that often lead us astray, but then God knows we cannot make this trip alone. That is why Jesus is on the scene. It comes down to you and me, today, hearing his call and responding as though our lives depended on it.