Christchurch Parish News, December 2016
As we begin the second half of the story of Jonah, what does this turning point have to tell us about the character of God?
After spending three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish at the bottom of the sea, Jonah has been spewed up onto dry land. What happens next? Well, that’s an interesting question as the second half of the story of Jonah is far less well-known than the first half. Everybody knows the bit about Jonah getting swallowed by the great fish. But then what happens?
The second half of the story is only 20 verses or so. And as such, it would be easy for us to skip over the first verse of chapter 3, paying it scant attention. ‘The word of the LORD came to Jonah a second time…’ (Jonah 3.1). But that would be a pity as there is much in these first few words of chapter 3 which is worth taking a moment to think about.
Firstly, notice that it is the word of the LORD that comes to Jonah. The story is telling us that God is the agent, not Jonah. What do I mean by this? Well, it’s not that Jonah, having wiped himself clean, sits down on the beach and enters a period of sustained deep meditation and is thereby after many hours able to glimpse fleetingly what God’s will is for him to accomplish. No, for if that were the case, the agency would be on Jonah’s part. In that scenario, if he didn’t do whatever was required of him spiritually, then he would not be able to grasp the will of God. But that is precisely not how the story tells it. Instead the story goes that the word of the LORD came to Jonah. It is God who is proactive. It is God’s character to take the initiative.
This aspect of God’s character is wonderful news, for imagine if were it otherwise. If it were not true and God were not one so minded to take the initiative in our lives both individually and corporately, it would all be back down to us again, no matter what the difficult or painful situation we were dealing with happened to be. It would then be a question of our having to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps, always a tricky thing to do. In a world where God doesn’t take the initiative, then it’s not good news we hear but instead the insistent beat of ‘You’re just going to have to try harder … you are what you make of your life … at the end of the day, it’s all down to you …’ So part of a deepening faith is learning to trust and always be open to the underpinning reality that God’s character is that of the one who does take the initiative and who is very much active in our lives doing a new thing, even when it’s not so obvious that this is actually the case.
Secondly, notice that the word of the LORD comes to Jonah a second time. With God, the story is telling us, it’s not one strike and you’re out – not even for such a pain in the backside prophet as Jonah, who’s done his level best to thwart God’s good purposes for the people of Nineveh. And this isn’t simply to say that it is God’s character to forgive, however vitally important that is to always remember. No, here the focus is not on God forgiving Jonah for his refusal to cooperate; rather the focus is on God’s patient insistence that God’s will will be done on earth as it is in heaven. The lengths that Jonah has gone to, which have been comical at times, are in no way any impediment to God. For God’s agency and activity rest ultimately in his sovereignty. Again, this is profoundly good news. For if it were otherwise, then we would be living in a world where whilst we might in the short term have the comfort of being able to choose to live our lives unfettered by anything other than our own autonomous desires, ultimately, our comfort or solace would only be provisional and temporary. For wherein do we root the guarantee that all shall be well, ultimately well, if not in God? Of course, we all spend much of our lives trying to root such hope in anything other than God. But it never ends well when we do. So it’s good news to live in a world where the word of the LORD comes a second time, where God takes the initiative and does not relent in securing God’s good purposes.
Thirdly, in that ‘the word of the LORD came to Jonah’, we are reminded once again that a key aspect of God’s character is that God is self-communicative. We are not left in the dark. By God’s very character, out of love, God chooses to communicate with his creation. We take this for granted but imagine if it were otherwise. How could we begin to approach God and comprehend him or understand his character if it were based simply on our cognitive abilities to ascend to his? The notion is self-deceptively arrogant, such is the cosmic gulf. But in an act of deep, loving humility, as the story of Jonah tells us, God chooses to communicate with his creation. ‘The word of the LORD came to Jonah.’ We are not left in the dark.
Of course, it is not only in one of the short stories in the Old Testament that we hear this good news of God’s gracious character. Christmas Day is fast approaching and on that day we will hear the words from the prologue to the gospel according to St. John, ‘And the Word became flesh and lived among us.’ These few words announce God’s ultimate taking of the initiative, of God coming to be with us to do the new thing that changes everything in spite of all that has gone before, and in that act of living among us humbly – for what could be more humble than a vulnerable baby – thereby from the very beginning communicating to us God’s very own character in the person of his Son, our Saviour, Jesus Christ.
Jonah was not left in the dark. Neither have we been. All shall be well. For ‘the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it’ (John 1.5).