You're Going the Wrong Way.

I have a friend named Chris. I have known him since I met him in college at Cal Lutheran. And not too dissimilarly from me Chris felt the call to go into ministry. The only difference was that I was headed toward that call by getting my undergraduate degree and then looking at which seminary to go to afterward, and Chris was looking into ways to do other things with his life before he went into ministry and to really figure out if ministry is what God was calling him to do.

After college Chris got jobs working at churches and for church organizations and at one point Chris even worked for a Lutheran college, but in a way still refused to take that step that God was calling him to go into ministry. I don’t know exactly what he was thinking when he was doing this but it always struck me as funny personally that he was willing to work for all of these church organizations and feel so connected to the church but just didn’t take that step into serving as a pastor in the church.

Jonah did the same thing. Maybe not the exact same thing becuase Jonah was already a prophet for God, but when God calls him to do something he decides he’s not going to do it. In fact, he decides not only is he not going to do it but he is going to go to a place called Tarshish which as you can see on the map up on the screen is on the very far left side. For some reason I couldn’t get the image to show both Ninevah and Tarshish clearly, but I felt that was fitting because Jonah quite literally wants to go into the exact opposite direction that God is calling him to go. Tarshish was located in Southern Spain near Gibbraltor, so it’s not like Jonah was just going to another part of Israel to hide or maybe even down to Egypt.

Jonah was so insistent that he was not going to bring the word of the Lord to the Ninevites that he was prepared to go halfway across the world to avoid what God was calling him to do. As if somehow traveling to what we now know of as Spain would escape God’s presence or God’s jurisdiction or something. I”m honestly not sure.

I don’t even think Jonah really knows becuase when he is confronted by the sailors about the storm on the boat he admits that he is a Hebrew and the Lord is his God. But then he goes on to say that it is the God who made the sea and dry land whom he serves. I’m sorry but this is actually quite funny. Jonah is running away to probably the furthest place that he could think of that was the opposite direction he was supposed to go and yet he admits to the sailors on the boat that the very sea he is on and the land he is running way to is all created by the same God he believes in and serves. Why Jonah? Why?

After serving at the Lutheran college my friend Chris re-listened to the call that he felt God was calling him to do and he entered seminary and is now a pastor in the church. He loves what he does and the church that he is currently serving. While he felt he was doing great things throughout his life, he now feels like he is truly living out his vocation, where his passion meets what God is calling him to do with his life.

Jonah, after being in the belly of this fish, which doesn’t sound pleasant at all by the way, relents and goes to Nineveh to declare punishment unless there is repentance. He lives out his vocation as a prophet and listens to what God is calling him to do to speak to the people of Nineveh.

And the people repent and Jonah gets pissed. Jonah is ticked becuase God relents, and maybe Jonah wanted to see the people punished for their sins. This is another funny part of the story, becuase Jonah is acting so selfishly. Jonah wants punishment and he was justice for the wickedness of the people. I don’t think it’s that hard to venture a guess that Jonah was hoping for the destruction of the whole city and yet God doesn’t and Jonah pouts because of it. He pouts becuase he knows that God is gracious and merciful and slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

Then God teaches Jonah another lesson by growing a bush that provides shade and then destroys it. Jonah again gets pissed and is so upset this time that he would rather die than live becuase of all this unfairness that is happening around him. God then shares the meaning of the lesson by comparing a silly bush to a town of 120.000 lives. Should not these people have another chance at life and to know God then to be tossed away like this bush that you had for one day?

What lessons for us! The first being this idea that we can somehow escape God’s presence when we don’t want it or when we know we’re supposed to be doing something with our lives and we try to avoid it for as long as we can. And maybe you can avoid it your whole life. Maybe you won’t be swallowed up by a giant fish, but listening to something God has called you to do and following through with it even if it isn’t what you want to do will be more fulfilling in your life than tiptoeing around the issue for the rest of your life. A calling from God could mean ministry or it could mean using your gifts in the world in other ways that glorify God.

The other main lesson I get from Jonah is that it’s not about us and what we want. Which is similar to the one above becuase the whole reason Jonah avoided God’s call was becuase he wanted to happen what he wanted to have happen. Maybe if he didn’t proclaim God’s repentance then God would have no choice but to destroy Nineveh. But guess what? It’s not about what I want or you want but it’s about what God wants. That’s not to say that they are always mutually at odds with one another, but Jonah wanted punishment and knew God was going to be forgiving. It’s not about Jonah but about the 120,000 lives in Nineveh and their chance to have know the God of Israel.

Sometimes we place our thoughts, our opinions, our projection of what we want God to do instead of listening to what God actually wants, whether for our own life or for others. Sometimes we want what’s best for us what satisfies us instead of following what we have learned about God from the Bible and the world. Sometimes we’re just like Jonah and we want to moan, complain, get pissed and want to die because God was gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love when we didn’t want God to be in that situation or to those people.

In those moments and others as well it is a good reminder for all of us that God is that exact same way with us. When we get grumpy that God loves those people. When we aren’t gracious or kind to others. When we insist on our own way. For all of our own failings God loves and cares for us, just as God cares and loves for all people and wants all people to have that same relationship with us that we have with God. God is the God of all creation, of all people, of all cultures and races. Shouldn’t God care for all of them and want them to have the same blessings we have? For one I am grateful for a God who loves me in spite of my selfish failings and who wants others to be a part of the same family of God that I have been blessed to be a part of for so many years. Thanks be to God for God being like God and not like me. Amen.