1. But Jonah was greatly displeased and became angry
The Hebrew word translated here as angry literally means “hot” and carries with it meanings of grief. This gives a real picture of Jonah returning to full on drama queen mode. Jonah does not want to see God forgiving the people of Nineveh, he wants to see bolts of lighting from the sky, he wants to see them destroyed from the face of the earth. He has told them God is going to wipe them out, and now he is going to have to tell them that God has forgiven them. Despite what has happened in Jonah’s own life, and how much God has forgiven him, he finds it hard to forgive other people, or to see them forgiven.
Has been forgiven by God made it easier for you to forgive others?
2. He prayed to the Lord, “O Lord, is this not what I said when I was still at home? That is why I was so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity.
3. Now, O Lord, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live.”
Jonah is saying here that he knew God would show mercy; that he knew that the people would repent, but instead of celebrating, instead of being pleased that this people have now turned to God, that he is so distressed by it that he wishes he was dead! The people of Nineveh have made Israelite lives a misery, and instead of being the instrument of their destruction, Jonah has effectively saved them from God’s anger by being the person to tell them that God is not happy and will judge them.
4. But the Lord replied, “Have you any right to be angry?”
The word “angry” here can also be translated as “grieved”. God has already forgiven Jonah for ignoring his original call to go to Nineveh, and as someone who has been forgiven by God; it seems that Jonah has little right to be angry when God shows mercy to someone else.
5. Jonah went out and sat down at a place east of the city. There he made himself a shelter, sat in its shade and waited to see what would happen to the city.
6. Then the Lord God provided a vine [kikaion] and made it grow up over Jonah to give shade for his head to ease his discomfort, and Jonah was very happy about the vine.
Although Jonah knows that God has relented, that he has forgiven the people of Nineveh he still sits a distance away from the town and watches in case God does bring destruction on it. Maybe Jonah hopes to see the place brought to ruin; we get the feeling in verse 5 of someone going to watch a public execution, and trying to arrive early so they can get a good seat. It is as though Jonah has not believed the news that there has been a reprieve, or maybe he believes that God will destroy Nineveh just because Jonah was not happy with God’s decision!
These two verses seem to contradict each other. Jonah built a shelter and then sat in its shade, so what use to him is additional shade from the “kikaion”. The only possible explanation is that Jonah’s best attempts to provide himself with shade had in some way failed, that as much as he had tried to provide for his comfort by building a shelter the sun was still hitting his head! The “kikaion”, translated by the NIV as a vine, is a gourd that grows rapidly to between eight and ten feet and fades quickly if injured.
7. But at dawn the next day God provided a worm, which chewed the vine so that it withered.
Certain types of small worm are able to do substantial damage to the root of gourds, resulting in them withering.
8. When the sun rose, God provided a scorching east wind, and the sun blazed on Jonah's head so that he grew faint. He wanted to die, and said, “It would be better for me to die than to live.” But God said to Jonah, “Do you have a right to be angry about the vine?” “I do,” he said. “I am angry enough to die.” 10. But the Lord said, “You have been concerned about this vine, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight.
This whole section gives us a vivid picture of losing perspective. Jonah is sitting where he is, in the heat of the sun, for one reason only; he is hoping to see some one else get destroyed. Jonah’s only reason for being there is that he wants to watch a people destroyed, and instead of worrying about the potential destruction of a huge number of people Jonah is worrying that he is too hot and his shade has gone. He could have dealt with the situation by walking away; instead of sitting in the desert watching this city in the hoping of seeing some one else get in trouble, he could have just left, but instead he sits there getting more and more depressed. Not only is the city not destroyed, but his shade is gone.
What things do you lose perspective about?
Living in the western world it can be very difficult to keep perspective and only worry about the things that really matter.
Do famines and disasters in other countries influence the way in which you view things that happen in your day-to-day life?
11. But Nineveh has more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left, and many cattle as well. Should I not be concerned about that great city?”
God tries to put things in perspective for Jonah by pointing out that if Nineveh was destroyed 120,000 people who don’t know their right hand from their left hand would die, and that livestock would die. It is possible that the reference to people who don’t know their left from their right is to people who have had no education, but it is more likely that this is a reference to children who are not old enough to know the difference between right and wrong. God is trying to wake up in Jonah the compassion He himself feels. If Jonah can not understand that he has chosen to forgive a repentant people, then maybe he can not be so bloodthirsty when he thinks about the children or animals that would die if God brought his judgment on the city. God uses the animals as a contrast between Jonahs concern for the plant, which Jonah is actually only concerned about because it gave some benefit to him.
The story of Jonah ends abruptly; we are left without ever known what becomes of Jonah. Does he acknowledge that God is right to be merciful, does he return to Jerusalem and to the Temple to praise God, or does he spend the rest of his days sitting on the outskirts of a city which has turned to God, failing to ever do so himself? By leaving the story here, we are left sitting with Jonah with the question: Given the choice, would you rather see people who do evil destroyed or come to God? We know that God’s answer is that he would rather show mercy, and that he wants us to make his Name known throughout all the nations.
FINAL THOUGHTS
As with all the books of the Bible, Jonah contains multiple messages. There was a message to the people of Israel at the time of Jonah, in that the story of God’s mercy for the people of Ninevites and their rapid repentance was probably in part intended to shame the people of Israel, as they had after many prophets, continued to sin. There is a message about God hearing the cries of people who are suffering as a result of our actions and the action of others; that God does respond to these cries, and that, with repentance, God responds with forgiveness. We can also apply the message of Jonah to the time of Jesus, and can view it in this setting as an analogy for the relationship between Israel and Gentiles. Many messengers were sent to Israel but often they were ignored; when the message went to the Gentile world the repentance and change was quick and, as such, God responded to it. Within Judaism, the story of Jonah is read at Yom Kippur, a time when people repent of things they have done in the past year. Jonah is a reminder that God calls us to turn around our lives. We have a choice; we either change and turn back to God or face Judgment. Finally, we can consider that, if applying this story today, does the Church represent the people of Israel or the people of Nineveh? The Church has, like Israel, received teaching from God, knows the difference between right and wrong, and is in a relationship with God - does this result in us repenting quickly, or have we become used to our sin, and more slow to turn from evil than Gentiles when they are given the message of God?
Showing posts with label Bible study. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bible study. Show all posts
Saturday, 19 July 2008
Saturday, 12 July 2008
Jonah 3
1 Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: 2 “Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you.”
Where the NIV puts “proclaim to it the message” the Hebrew is more literally translated “proclaim the proclamation”. This is a God telling it as it is; after all this messing about he says to Jonah, "proclaim the proclamation". You can't really do very much else with it, it's use is when it's told, do with it what it was designed for.
How should this simple message influence the way we think about “telling the good news”?
What is the Good News?
3 Jonah obeyed the word of the Lord and went to Nineveh. Now Nineveh was a very important city—a visit required three days.
Jonah has become the perfect person to go to Nineveh, he is someone who has faced God’s anger, has repented, and has been shown mercy. What better person could there be to take a message to Nineveh that God was not going to put up with their behaviour anymore! Jonah is living testimony of the mercy of God.
4 On the first day, Jonah started into the city. He proclaimed: “Forty more days and Nineveh will be overturned.”
Nineveh is told it has forty days before God's judgment comes on them. This number is a significant one in terms of overcoming sin.
Where else do we come across the Number 40 in the Bible?
Gen. 7:12 Rains fell for 40 days and nights in the time of Noah
Exd. 16:35 The children of Israel ate manna in the wilderness for 40 years
Exd 24.18 Moses was on the mount with God for 40 days and 40 nights when the law was given.
1 Kin 19:8 Elijah fasted for 40 days and nights
Mark 1:13 Jesus fasted for 40 days and nights
5 The Ninevites believed God. They declared a fast, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth.
6 When the news reached the king of Nineveh, he rose from his throne, took off his royal robes, covered himself with sackcloth and sat down in the dust.
The Ninevites did not take much convincing that their actions were leading to trouble. All they needed in order to change was someone to come and tell them that they needed to do so.
Are you put off from working with people who seem particularly bad in there behaviour for fear of how they will react to the Gospel?
“Sat down in the dust” could be better translated sat down in ashes. The people of Nineveh fasted and put on sackcloth but the King went one stage further, he got up off his throne, took off his royal robes, symbols of his authority, and sat down in ashes. In doing so he recognised how far above him God is as a King. Nineveh’s kingship is nothing in comparison to God’s.
Sackcloth and Ashes are symbols of despair, of repentance, of mourning.
The King led his people by example, before he told anyone to do anything; he did it himself. He didn’t just tell his people to sort out their lives, and to repent, he repented himself.
Do you respect leaders more who lead by example? What modern or historical leaders follow this model?
7 Then he issued a proclamation in Nineveh:
“By the decree of the king and his nobles:
Do not let any man or beast, herd or flock, taste anything; do not let them eat or drink.
The inclusion of the animals in the mourning process is as a result of the effect that sin has on everything, on all of creation. While the animals did not have a choice, that does not mean that they, and everything else were not tainted by the sin of the Ninevites (Rom 8:20, 22). In including even the animals in the mourning, the Ninevites show that the change they want to bring about is not just one on the surface or at the edges of their life, but is rather a complete transformation.
8 But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth. Let everyone call urgently on God. Let them give up their evil ways and their violence
The process described here for repentance is three stages:
· Show that you are sorry
· Cry out to God asking for forgiveness
· Give up the past behaviour
Carrying out stages 1-2 without changing our behaviour is meaningless. For our prayer asking for forgiveness to have meaning our behaviour must change.
9 Who knows? God may yet relent and with compassion turn from his fierce anger so that we will not perish.”
The Ninevites did not know God, they did not know that he has a merciful character, that he is a God that forgives, yet even without that knowledge, even with only the vaguest possibility that he might show mercy to them the people of Nineveh turned around their lives.
Do you think our knowledge of Gods mercy results in us taking it for granted that he will forgive us, and so take sin less seriously?
10 When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he had compassion and did not bring upon them the destruction he had threatened.
When God sent Jonah to the Ninevites he did so with a message saying "its all over, you are living lives that are so evil, that are hurting so many people that the only option I have is to destroy you." When the Ninevites changed their behaviour, the relationship God had with them also changed, the change of their behaviour in response to fear of God's judgement, opened the door for Gods mercy.
When a Christian stands before God, we do so with the judgement of God having already taken place. Jesus has already died for the sins we have committed. In becoming a Christian we, like the people of Nineveh, say sorry for the things we have done wrong, we cry out to God for forgiveness and with the help of the Holy Spirit set about changing the way we live our lives in the future. As Jesus has already died for things we have done wrong in our lives, we are assured of God’s forgiveness, unlike the Ninevites who had just the vaguest of hopes of God's forgiveness we have the certainty of it.
Where the NIV puts “proclaim to it the message” the Hebrew is more literally translated “proclaim the proclamation”. This is a God telling it as it is; after all this messing about he says to Jonah, "proclaim the proclamation". You can't really do very much else with it, it's use is when it's told, do with it what it was designed for.
How should this simple message influence the way we think about “telling the good news”?
What is the Good News?
3 Jonah obeyed the word of the Lord and went to Nineveh. Now Nineveh was a very important city—a visit required three days.
Jonah has become the perfect person to go to Nineveh, he is someone who has faced God’s anger, has repented, and has been shown mercy. What better person could there be to take a message to Nineveh that God was not going to put up with their behaviour anymore! Jonah is living testimony of the mercy of God.
4 On the first day, Jonah started into the city. He proclaimed: “Forty more days and Nineveh will be overturned.”
Nineveh is told it has forty days before God's judgment comes on them. This number is a significant one in terms of overcoming sin.
Where else do we come across the Number 40 in the Bible?
Gen. 7:12 Rains fell for 40 days and nights in the time of Noah
Exd. 16:35 The children of Israel ate manna in the wilderness for 40 years
Exd 24.18 Moses was on the mount with God for 40 days and 40 nights when the law was given.
1 Kin 19:8 Elijah fasted for 40 days and nights
Mark 1:13 Jesus fasted for 40 days and nights
5 The Ninevites believed God. They declared a fast, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth.
6 When the news reached the king of Nineveh, he rose from his throne, took off his royal robes, covered himself with sackcloth and sat down in the dust.
The Ninevites did not take much convincing that their actions were leading to trouble. All they needed in order to change was someone to come and tell them that they needed to do so.
Are you put off from working with people who seem particularly bad in there behaviour for fear of how they will react to the Gospel?
“Sat down in the dust” could be better translated sat down in ashes. The people of Nineveh fasted and put on sackcloth but the King went one stage further, he got up off his throne, took off his royal robes, symbols of his authority, and sat down in ashes. In doing so he recognised how far above him God is as a King. Nineveh’s kingship is nothing in comparison to God’s.
Sackcloth and Ashes are symbols of despair, of repentance, of mourning.
The King led his people by example, before he told anyone to do anything; he did it himself. He didn’t just tell his people to sort out their lives, and to repent, he repented himself.
Do you respect leaders more who lead by example? What modern or historical leaders follow this model?
7 Then he issued a proclamation in Nineveh:
“By the decree of the king and his nobles:
Do not let any man or beast, herd or flock, taste anything; do not let them eat or drink.
The inclusion of the animals in the mourning process is as a result of the effect that sin has on everything, on all of creation. While the animals did not have a choice, that does not mean that they, and everything else were not tainted by the sin of the Ninevites (Rom 8:20, 22). In including even the animals in the mourning, the Ninevites show that the change they want to bring about is not just one on the surface or at the edges of their life, but is rather a complete transformation.
8 But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth. Let everyone call urgently on God. Let them give up their evil ways and their violence
The process described here for repentance is three stages:
· Show that you are sorry
· Cry out to God asking for forgiveness
· Give up the past behaviour
Carrying out stages 1-2 without changing our behaviour is meaningless. For our prayer asking for forgiveness to have meaning our behaviour must change.
9 Who knows? God may yet relent and with compassion turn from his fierce anger so that we will not perish.”
The Ninevites did not know God, they did not know that he has a merciful character, that he is a God that forgives, yet even without that knowledge, even with only the vaguest possibility that he might show mercy to them the people of Nineveh turned around their lives.
Do you think our knowledge of Gods mercy results in us taking it for granted that he will forgive us, and so take sin less seriously?
10 When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he had compassion and did not bring upon them the destruction he had threatened.
When God sent Jonah to the Ninevites he did so with a message saying "its all over, you are living lives that are so evil, that are hurting so many people that the only option I have is to destroy you." When the Ninevites changed their behaviour, the relationship God had with them also changed, the change of their behaviour in response to fear of God's judgement, opened the door for Gods mercy.
When a Christian stands before God, we do so with the judgement of God having already taken place. Jesus has already died for the sins we have committed. In becoming a Christian we, like the people of Nineveh, say sorry for the things we have done wrong, we cry out to God for forgiveness and with the help of the Holy Spirit set about changing the way we live our lives in the future. As Jesus has already died for things we have done wrong in our lives, we are assured of God’s forgiveness, unlike the Ninevites who had just the vaguest of hopes of God's forgiveness we have the certainty of it.
Saturday, 28 June 2008
Jonah
Well I warned you, I gave you a chance to turn away..but you looked anyway. If you hate the idea of reading a bible study then run, run away now. But please do come back, I will only be posting studies on a Saturday. If you can bring yourself to stay, then please read on, and let me know your thoughts.
I relate to Jonah, he seems my kind of a man, with a father who was a sea fairer, who’s eyes seem to reflect the sea, and now lays in the deep the tail of Jonah seems as good as any place to begin.
JONAH RETOLD
We are told that the word of the Lord came to Jonah. We are never completely sure how it came to him, but for a moment we can imagine Jonah sitting down for his morning coffee, and a letter arriving, the postmark is Heaven, and the envelope shimmers in the morning light, the envelope is delivered by the Angelic Postal Service, who are making full use of their trumpets. Jonah opens the envelope and slowly reads the instructions; they are crystal clear, “Go to
Jonah’s response is swift, he packs his bags, and leaves the house, he goes to the port and takes the first boat he can in the opposite direction, he wants nothing to do with this. There is no way on this earth that he is going to the Ninevites, one of two things would happen if he went there; either they would kill him, or worse still they would repent and God would not wipe them out. Far better to leave them to it. Jonah thinks carefully about where to go, and settles on Tarshish, a place where the people haven’t even heard of God, clearly a safe place to go where God won’t find him. Jonah finds a boat, pays the fee and jumps on board.
Out at sea Jonah is feeling rather pleased with himself. Sure, he has turned his back on God but he has escaped a job which was never going to turn out well. God, however, had other plans, and hurled across the sea a huge wind as if skimming a stone across a lake. The sea exploded into the mother of all storms; the hardened sailors are chucking up, and are all crying for their mothers. They are praying to their gods, to each other’s gods, to every god anyone has ever heard of. Jonah knows exactly what needs to be done - he finds a corner curls up, pulls the covers over his head and goes to sleep. He could not have been clearer in his message to God if he had stuck his fingers in his ears and shouted “I’m not listening”.
The captain of the ship is organising; shouting out orders. The cargo is being thrown overboard to lighten the ship, and in amongst the storm and the chaos he notices that Jonah is curled up asleep. He is absolutely stunned, he shakes him, wakes him and says to him, “What on earth are you playing at? Don’t you see we are all going to die! Call on your god! Who knows he might be listening, he might save us!” The storm keeps getting worse, no one has ever seen weather this bad, and they know that this is more than a freak of nature; this is a god who is very, very unhappy. So the captain says, “Right, let’s find out who has upset the gods!” They ask the gods to reveal who it is who they are angry with and they each pick a straw, whoever picks the short straw will be the one that the gods are angry with.
It doesn’t come as a shock to anyone when Jonah picks the short straw. He is the only one who hasn’t even called on his god for help; so the sailors ask him who he, what god it is that he has upset, and how. Jonah replies to them the he is a Hebrew and that his God is the God of everything, the creator of the Heavens, of earth and Sea, He is the God above all gods - and then he tells them that he is running from this God! The sailors are stunned. If they were scared before, now they are petrified, they ask him what his God will require to stop the storm and spare them.
Jonah could have answered “Get on your knees with me and pray”, he could have answered “I will cry out to God and ask Him to forgive me”, but instead Jonah said “He wants me, not you. Throw me in the sea, get me of the boat and God will leave you alone.” Instead of asking for forgiveness Jonah just wishes he was dead. The sailors do all they can to save the ship, to save the lives of those who are on board, but when it’s clear that there is no choice they cry out to the God of Jonah, they cry out to him and say, “We have tried everything, but you say this is who has made you angry, that this is what you want? We will throw him to the sea but we do this only because its what you have shown us you want, please don’t hold his death against us” and with that, they hurl him into the deep.
Almost as soon as Jonah has vanished under the waves the storm melts away, the sea becomes calm, the clouds clear, letting light stream onto the sailors’ faces. If the sailors were not convinced beforethat Jonah’s God was the one who sent the storm, they were now; they fell to their knees and prayed, they thanked God for saving them and vowed to follow Him for the rest of their lives, they pledged sacrifices to him and abandoned the carved gods that failed to save them.
Meanwhile in the ocean deep, God sent a fish of gigantic proportions who opened his mouth wide and swallowed Jonah whole, saving him from death but providing accommodation that did not suit his tastes. For three days and for three nights Jonah stayed in the dark belly of the fish as the fish made his way across the ocean towards land.
So begins the tale of Jonah….
Thursday, 26 June 2008
Studying?
It seems that some of the people reading this blog are Christians; as I have mentioned I begin studying in September for ordination. As a vicar I will be required to both preach and prepare Bible Studies, and so I thought I would try some out on you, my hapless readers, if that’s okay?
Now being an interactive type I don’t want to post very long rambling Bible Studies that are of no interest to anyone but me; the plan is that we get interactive, that you tell me why what I am saying is wrong, that you take on the role of my guide. Maybe we could have a look at some of the questions together and have some discussion. It’s written that a friend sharpens a friend like iron sharpens iron. That’s the plan. So how do you want to do this? Do you want to do this at all? Its okay – I can take a "no" – I can handle it – I can – I won't cry – honest.
Studies I have recently tried writing are: Jonah, The Samaritan and the Theologian (aka the Good Samaritan), a character study of Joseph (father of Jesus), and The Circumcision of Jesus. Maybe we could take one of those, I could post part of it once a week, and we could go through it together. I'd love some new thoughts on them. If you have any friends who might have an opinion too, please invite them to pull up a chair - the more, the merrier.
So then folks – which one do you fancy? Do you like the idea at all? If you hate the idea of me posting this stuff do let me know. (I am more than happy to stick with just rambling on about my life). If you would be prepared to have a look at some studies with me, then please let me know that too.
The Broken Man
Now being an interactive type I don’t want to post very long rambling Bible Studies that are of no interest to anyone but me; the plan is that we get interactive, that you tell me why what I am saying is wrong, that you take on the role of my guide. Maybe we could have a look at some of the questions together and have some discussion. It’s written that a friend sharpens a friend like iron sharpens iron. That’s the plan. So how do you want to do this? Do you want to do this at all? Its okay – I can take a "no" – I can handle it – I can – I won't cry – honest.
Studies I have recently tried writing are: Jonah, The Samaritan and the Theologian (aka the Good Samaritan), a character study of Joseph (father of Jesus), and The Circumcision of Jesus. Maybe we could take one of those, I could post part of it once a week, and we could go through it together. I'd love some new thoughts on them. If you have any friends who might have an opinion too, please invite them to pull up a chair - the more, the merrier.
So then folks – which one do you fancy? Do you like the idea at all? If you hate the idea of me posting this stuff do let me know. (I am more than happy to stick with just rambling on about my life). If you would be prepared to have a look at some studies with me, then please let me know that too.
The Broken Man
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
