A Whale of a Tale: Forgiveness and repentance

Homily Epiphany 3 Yr. B 2012

You might not think of the Bible as a place where you will find satire. But what else can we make of the story of Jonah, which was written about the sixth century before Christ, when the Hebrew people were in exile in Babylon.

While today’s first reading only includes a few verses from the Book of Jonah, it is the only time we encounter Jonah in our three year lectionary. Since Jonah was included in our canon of scripture for a purpose, it’s worth considering the story.

To start off with here is a brief outline of the story, which only takes four brief chapters. Jonah is called by God to go and preach to Nineveh, a wicked and disobedient city.

But unlike the other prophets of the Hebrews, Jonah flees. Instead of going to Nineveh he jumps on a ship to escape God. So God sends a great storm. Jonah blames himself for the storm when confronted by the sailors, and they throw him into the sea. Then the storm stops.

God provides a large fish—we usually assume it was a whale—to swallow Jonah and he lives in the belly of the fish for three says and nights. He prays to God, expressing his faith and thanksgiving, and is answered when the fish spews Jonah out on land.

Then God speaks to Jonah again, and tells him to get to Nineveh, and proclaim the message of repentance that God wants him to proclaim. Jonah, having survived the fish, finally does what God asks and surprise, the people repent in sackcloth and ashes, including the king. They turn from their evil ways, and God does not bring a calamity on them.

This is where the story takes a twist. Instead of being happy to do God’s work, and see the people of Nineveh repent and turn away from Evil, Jonah is mad. He asks God to take his life.

Jonah retreats out of the city and waits to see what happens, camped under a bush God gave him to protect him from the sun. But the next day God sends a worm to attack the bush, so it withers. And the sun beats down on Jonah, bringing him again thoughts of dying.

So the story ends with God asking Jonah why he should be angry about the bush, and why God should not be concerned about Nineveh, a great city of 120,000 people who had lost their way.

Now what are we to make of this rather unusual story.

Jonah can be seen as sort of an anti-prophet. The only prophetic thing he says to the people of Nineveh ids a warning from God: “Forty days more and Nineveh shall be overthrown.”

Jonah hardly covers himself with glory in the story. He first refuses God’s call, and jumps a ship. Then he sleeps through a storm until others wake him. Then he ends up throwing a tantrum when God forgives the repentant people of Nineveh.

So Jonah is hardly what think of as a prophet—fearful, bitter, angry, depressed. In the end Jonah just can’t let go. Instead of rejoicing when the Ninevites are spared God’s wrath, he is shocked, and dismayed. He is more interested in punishing sinners, than seeing people turn towards God and away from evil.

So what does this story of Jonah—the reluctant, and angry prophet—have to say to us, living in such a different time and place.

Perhaps the best way to approach this is what Jonah might have meant to the Hebrew people in the sixth century BC.

It was a time of great upheaval for the Hebrews. They’d been driven out of their homeland, and they feared they might never be able to return. They wanted to maintain their identity against other cultures and religious faiths in the Persian empire. Some Hebrews wanted to separate into their own communities to resist integration. They also struggled with their fate as exiles. Was it a punishment by God?

The story of Jonah sets up Nineveh as a symbol of evil and wrongdoing. And when Jonah finally passes on God’s message of impending judgment, Jonah is expecting the God of the Hebrews will show no mercy and punish these evildoers.

When instead they repent, from the king on down, it shatters Jonah’s preconceptions, about the people of Nineveh, about God, and about himself, so hetells God it is better for him not to live.

But what Jonah considers undeserved forgiveness on God’s part has been shown throughout history to that time in God’s merciful treatment of the Hebrew people, despite their disobedience.

One of the themes raised by Jonah therefore becomes God’s acceptance of all people, regardless of their backgrounds, provided they repent and believe.

Jesus provides a contrast to Jonah as a prophet. He willingly accepts God’s call, and is baptized, and preaches to all a message of repentance and fogiveness. He also spends three days, not in the belly of the whale, but in between his death by crucifixion, and his rising again to new life.

The part of the Jonah story which most relates to our lives in the 21st century is the reluctant prophet…God calls us to live out our faith—to proclaim the Gospel, share the good news.

Yet at a time when that Good News is needed more than ever, we are reluctant. Like Jonah we are easily discouraged, and angered. We would sometimes, like Jonah, like to jump on a ship and go to sleep to avoid God’s calling.

Instead God calls us during this season of Epiphany to awaken to the light of Christ, and to shine that light into a world which is sometimes far too dark.