Readings for the Day:
Sermon:
Original Manuscript:
Picture for a moment your greatest enemy. This could be someone you see all the time, or someone you haven't seen in years. It could be someone who just annoys you to no end, or someone who did something to cause you pain. It could be that this is someone who always seems to be lurking out there, waiting to destroy you.
Now picture that God has told you to tell you enemy that God is getting ready to destroy this person, to strike him or her down. And you don't want to do that. You barely want to be in the same room with this person. This person is your enemy for goodness sakes! If this isn't a reason for your enemy to have an excuse to strike you down, I don't know what is.
You rant and wail against God. You say "why me?" And "I don't want to do this." But you finally give in. You tell your enemy that her or his number is finally up. And somehow you survive. You're okay! All you have to do now is wait for God to have your enemy destroyed.
And then God does something true audacious. Your enemy realizes the error of his or her ways. Your enemy repents and begs for forgiveness. And you know what? God actually forgives them. How could He do that? How could he be so cruel to you?
Whether we want to admit it or not, the vast majority of us will subscribe to this kind of vengeful thinking once, twice, maybe more times at one point in our life or another. And if that is the case, Jonah is the story for you.
Jonah was mandated by God to go to the Ninevites and tell them God is about to destroy them. Now Nineveh was a great enemy to the Israelites, so it is understandable that Jonah would wish to avoid going there. Such a mandate would be seen as life threatening.
But though Jonah avoids this task, God finds a way to get Jonah to where he needs to be. Many will remember the story. Jonah gets swallowed by a whale and washes up on the shores of Nineveh.
Jonah then does what God has asked of him. He proclaims to the Ninevites that God is angry and will destroy them for their wicked ways.
And then something unpredictable happens here. The Ninevites are devastated that they have done wrong. They immediately repent. And God decides that He will no longer destroy Nineveh. For now they are saved.
Jonah is furious with this. How could God not want to destroy the Ninevites, especially after they have caused so much hardship to God's people? Why would God do this?
The answer is that God is a forgiving God. After all, He forgave us and instead of allowing us to be destroyed by our own sins. He came down and even died for us so that we might live. I think the whole point of Jonah's visit was that God believed the Ninevites would repent. I think the whole point was to bring Nineveh back into relationship with God. That's what God always wants, and it is what we always need.
In the Lord's Prayer, there is only one command given to us: that we forgive others as we have been forgiven.
It's unfortunately very easy for us to hold onto pain and hurt. It's very easy for us to wish harm on those who have done or wished us harm. It's very easy for us to not want to forgive.
But not forgiving creates a divide when there doesn't need to be one there. The Ninevites, once enemies of Jonah, were now worshippers of the same God. They were no longer enemies, but friends. That is, they were friends if Jonah would allow them to be.
We have more in common with each other than we often think. We don't need to let past sins, whether another's or our own, keep us apart. Forgiveness lets us move on from the division of the past so we can journey forward together.
Forgiveness is about unburdening ourselves too. It's about letting go of the hate inside us that will destroy us.
At the end of The Book of Jonah, Jonah is left waiting outside of Nineveh in the hope that God was just kidding and will actually make good on His original intent to destroy Nineveh. He forgoes all other responsibilities, pitches up a camp, and waits. But God is still caring after Jonah. He provides a tree to keep Jonah extra safe from the hot rays of the sun.
But eventually this plant dies, and Jonah is distraught. God points out to Jonah just how far gone he is, just how out of line Jonah has become in his values.
He asks Jonah that if he cares so much for this tree he did not make, how much more does God care for a city full of people that He created?
The Book of Jonah ends on this cliffhanger. We don't know what his reaction will be. I believe this was intentional. We have all been in Jonah's shoes at one time or another. And so it's left for us, just like Jonah, to choose. Will we allow our hatred and anger to shrivel us up, or will we forgive and allow those who were once our enemies be our friends?