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For all his foolishness, his disobedience and his disagreeable disposition, Jonah the son of Amittai, was genuinely a prophet of God. When it comes to the book of Jonah, all kinds of questions are raised. Many people, including not a few members of the clergy, don’t believe in the historicity of the narrative. They are skeptical whether there really was such a man, and scoff at the notion of his being gobbled up by a whale and surviving in its stomach for three days. But rather than attack the truthfulness of the Scriptures, such skeptics argue that it was never meant to be taken literally. They argue that Jonah is purely symbolic in nature; meant merely to teach us a moral lesson. For the record, I am not one of those. I believe the events narrated in Jonah really happened, AND I believe they are meant to teach us moral lessons.

As for the supposed impossibility of the story, if I didn’t believe in the existence of an all-powerful God, it would be a bit hard to swallow (pun intended). But I do! Besides, was it any harder for Adonai to create the conditions for Jonah’s survival inside a mammoth fish than it was for Him to create the conditions for Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-Nego’s survival inside a blazing hot furnace? Was it harder for Him than parting the Red Sea and bringing Israel out of Egypt in a day? The Lord God of Israel has both the ability and the authority to circumvent the physical laws He Himself set in motion. If you find yourself doubting it really happened, you may want to examine yourself to see if you really are in the Faith. Messiah Yeshua spoke of Jonah in literal and historical terms; He Himself regarded the story as genuine. Do you think He was wrong, or naïve?

With that qualification, let’s embark on our two-part study of Jonah this morning. I’m sure all of you are familiar with the story, but because there are so many delightful details, we will actually read through the book.

Chapter 1

Verses 1-2

The word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai saying, “Arise, go to Nineveh the great city and cry against it, for their wickedness has come up before Me.”

The name Yonah means ‘dove’. Considering what we know of his personality from this story, it seems like he was misnamed. But you must admit, Jonah is a better name for this book than ‘kvetch’. His father’s name, Amittai, is from the Hebrew word emet, and means ‘my truth’. In terms of genuine historicity, Jonah is also named in 2 Kings chapter 14. There we read, that Jeroboam II restored the borders of the northern kingdom of Israel (and I quote) according to the word of the Lord, the God of Israel, which He  spoke by His servant Jonah, the son of Amittai, the prophet, who was from Gat-Hepher (2 Kings 14:25). No one questions the historicity of Jeroboam II, or of the existence of the northern kingdom Israel, or of the town of Gat Hepher. But for some reason, skeptics still want to argue that Jonah was a fictitious character.

Nineveh was the capital city of the Assyrian Empire. It was right across from modern-day Mosul in Iraq. In fact, that area is known as the ‘Nineveh Province’. Jonah was written about 800 BC, roughly two generations before the Assyrian army invaded the northern kingdom of Israel and took our people away captive. I believe Jonah to have been written autobiographically. In other words, the prophet is not only telling the events, but admitting his own sins.

The Assyrians were renowned for their ferocity in battle, and equally so for their abject cruelty to their captives. When they were finally conquered in 609 BC by Babylon, I don’t think anybody shed tears for them. There are bas reliefs that have been excavated, depicting the barbarity of the Assyrians. You can understand, then, why Jonah was more than a little reluctant to go preach repentance to them. Let’s see what his response was.

Verse 3

But Jonah rose up to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. So he went down to Joppa, found a ship which was going to Tarshish, paid the fare and went down into it to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.

Gath Hepher, where Jonah lived, was in the lower Galilee region. Joppa (or Yafo, as it is called in Hebrew, meaning ‘beautiful’) is adjacent to Tel Aviv. So his journey on foot (or donkey) was about 60 miles, which probably took him 2 ½ to 3 days. That’s time enough to think about what you’re doing. But Jonah wasn’t thinking. He certainly wasn’t being rational, anyway. After all, how can you possibly flee from the presence of the Lord? His destination was Tarshish (NOT to be confused with Tarsus, where the Apostle Paul was from). Did you notice the repetition of Tarshish. It seems unnecessarily redundant, but it’s there to highlight the extreme effort Jonah was making, and just how distant Tarshish was. It was 180° opposite the direction God was calling him to go.

Tarshish was beyond Greece, beyond Italy, all the way to the Straits of Gibraltar – Spain – over 2,500 miles from Joppa! In the mindset of the ancients, Tarshish was the last known outpost of civilization before reaching the end of the Earth! Think of it as your last chance gas before you hit Death Valley. Jonah wasn’t playing around – he was seriously trying to run away from Adonai! He boards the ship in Yafo, but as we’ll see, that crew didn’t get very far.

Verses 4-6

The Lord hurled a great wind on the sea and there was a great storm on the sea so that the ship was about to break up. Then the sailors became afraid and every man cried to his god, and they threw the cargo which was in the ship into the sea to lighten it for them. But Jonah had gone below into the hold of the ship, lain down and fallen sound asleep. So the captain approached him and said, “How is it that you are sleeping? Get up, call on your god. Perhaps your god will be concerned about us so that we will not perish.”

We now have two incontrovertible facts before us:

1) It is impossible to flee from God. Wherever you’re going, He’s there.

2) The earth and everything in it is His. He commands the very elements.

God appointed this storm, a storm so violent that these otherwise seasoned sailors were certain they were going to die. So they began calling on their various false gods to rescue them; which was about as useful as hurling their valuable cargo overboard; it’s like trying to run away from God – an exercise in futility.

Meanwhile, Jonah had gone below deck and fallen asleep. They’re all about to die in this storm, and he’s shluffing away. And it was a deep sleep – the kind you have when you’re trying to avoid the unavoidable. You know, about 800 years later there would be another Jewish prophet who was fast asleep in a boat in the midst of a deadly storm. But Yonah and Yeshua were exhausted for completely opposite reasons. Yonah was trying to run away from God’s call. That will tend to tire a person out. Yeshua, on the other hand, was walking perfectly in His Father’s will, fulfilling that call, and His exhaustion was from giving and giving and giving of Himself.

The captain wakes up Jonah, incredulous that he should be sleeping at such a time. And if we freeze this moment, we see a disturbing contrast; on the one hand, those who have no knowledge of the true God, doing everything they can to survive, but to no avail, and with no help from their false gods. And on the other hand, we have a man who’s personally acquainted with the One true God of Israel who alone can save, but the man is asleep and oblivious.

Verses 7-9

Each man said to his mate, “Come, let us cast lots so we may learn on whose account this calamity has struck us.” So they cast lots and the lot fell on Jonah. Then they said to him, “Tell us, now! On whose account has this calamity struck us? What is your occupation? And where do you come from? What is your country? From what people are you? He said to them I am a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord God of heaven who made the sea and the dry land.”

These sailors may have been heathen, but they weren’t dense. They didn’t just assume this storm was a random phenomenon. They knew something spiritual was afoot. And they wanted answers, so they cast lots. And it fell to Jonah, which of course surprises no one, as Scriptures says, “The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from Adonai” (Prov. 16:33). And so the interrogation begins. “Who are you, what nation and people are you from, and what exactly is going on with you?” Well, Jonah ‘fesses up, and in so doing, affirms that the Source of the storm is Israel’s God, the One and Only God, who alone has jurisdiction over the earth and seas. It’s a really great monotheistic confession, but look at what it took to elicit that confession from the wayward prophet!

Verses 10-16

Then the men became extremely frightened and they said to him, “How could you do this?” For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them. So they said to him, “What should we do to you that the sea may become calm for us?” – for the sea was becoming increasingly stormy. He said to them, “Pick me up and throw me into the sea. Then the sea will become calm for you, for I know that on account of me this great storm has come upon you.” However, the men rowed desperately to return to land but they could not, for the sea was becoming even stormier against them. Then they called on the Lord and said, “We earnestly pray, O Lord, do not let us perish on account of this man’s life and do not put innocent blood on us; for You, O Lord, have done as You have pleased.” So they picked up Jonah, threw him into the sea, and the sea stopped its raging. Then the men feared the Lord greatly, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows.

These ‘heathen’ demonstrate greater moral uprightness than the prophet from Israel! He tells them that their only hope for survival is to cast him into the sea, admitting that the whole disaster is his fault. But they do everything they possibly can to avoid having to do that. What a contrast! Jonah runs away from God, recklessly imperiling the lives of others. Meanwhile, they make every effort to save his life.

And have you noticed how everything seems to go down, down, down? Jonah went down to Joppa. Then he went down into the ship. Once on the ship, he went down below deck, and now with the ship about to be destroyed in the storm, he’s about to go down into the sea. My friends, when you run away from the Lord, it goes down, down, down.

But these sailors find themselves fighting the will of God, and the storm is becoming deadlier by the minute. With no other recourse, they pray fervently to Adonai, confessing His supreme authority, and beseeching Him not to hold them guilty for what they must now do; and their words are remarkable! “You, O Lord, have done as You have pleased.” They are acknowledging Him as the Supreme God, and if anything, this is only a short step away from monotheism.

The sequence of events takes place quickly. Having prayed, they picked up Jonah, threw him over the side, and no sooner does he hit the water than the storm ceases – again, remarkably like the immediacy with which the winds on the Sea of Galilee abated and the waves disappeared the very moment Yeshua spoke to them.

When these Gentile sailors see the swift calm that comes over the Mediterranean, they immediately recognize that Jonah’s God is God. And right then and there they offer a sacrifice to Him, and it says they made vows. The implication is that these foreigners renounced the false gods of their respective nations and vowed to follow the Lord God of Heaven only. They are in good company. Such was the decision of Naaman and such was the decision of Ruth, and of countless people from all the nations! Next week, God willing, we will consider the bigger picture at length, because the entire story of Jonah is a foreshadowing of God’s plans for Israel and the nations. But for this morning, let’s continue reading.

Verse 17

And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the stomach of the fish three days and three nights.

Okay, this is where all the hullaballoo arises. Skeptics argue that there are no seaborne creatures capable of swallowing a man whole (there are), and that even if there were, it would be impossible to survive three days and nights without sufficient oxygen and awash in digestive juices.

First, the Hebrew word here is “great fish” not “whale”. Actually, there isn’t a separate biblical Hebrew word for “whale” or “whale-shark”, so pretty much any seaborne creature is possible, including a whale. But I am prepared to concede that there probably isn’t a naturalistic explanation for Jonah’s survival. I see no need to come up with such an explanation in order to satisfy skeptics, or to have intellectual credibility. As I said at the outset, it isn’t difficult for our God to create the conditions for Jonah’s survival inside a mammoth fish, and to have that fish in place and ready, any more than it was for Him to create the conditions for Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-Nego to survive inside a blazing hot furnace; or to part the Red Sea and bring our people out of Egypt. For all we know, God created that particular fish for just this occasion. Either we believe there is an all-powerful God with the authority to circumvent physical laws by way of miracles or we don’t. I do.  And so Jonah is rescued. But he is also changed by the experience.

Chapter 2

Verses 1-9

Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the stomach of the fish, and he said, “I called out of my distress to the Lord, and He answered me. I cried for help from the depth of Sheol; You heard my voice. For You had cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the current engulfed me. All Your breakers and billows passed over me. So I said, ‘I have been expelled from Your sight. Nevertheless I will look again toward Your holy Temple.’ Water encompassed me to the point of death. The great deep engulfed me; weeds were wrapped around my head. I descended to the roots of the mountains. The earth with its bars was around me forever, but You have brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God. While I was fainting away, I remembered the Lord, and my prayer came to You, into Your holy Temple. Those who regard vain idols forsake their faithfulness, but I will sacrifice to You with the voice of thanksgiving. That which I have vowed I will pay. Salvation is from the Lord.”

There is a phrase here in chapter two that has excited biblical apologists. Jonah declares ‘I descended to the roots of the mountains’. Why is this significant? Because as recently as the 19th century, it was assumed by geologists that the entire ocean floor was flat and comprised purely of sand, and that it was deepest in the middle. But in the past century and a half, oceanographers have discovered both incredibly deep trenches and entire ranges of underwater mountains. And here is a 2,800 year old declaration that only recently we were able to confirm. Jonah wasn’t a scientist, and the Bible doesn’t claim to be a science textbook. But this tells me that the events narrated in the Word of God are factually and historically reliable.

But that isn’t the point of chapter two. The point is that this heartfelt prayer of repentance and faith in Adonai is evidence that Jonah is a changed man! His life had flashed before his eyes, but God rescued him. And he pours out praise to the Lord, and redoubles his determination to be faithful once again.

Verse 10

Then the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah up onto the dry land.

I’m sure it wasn’t a pretty sight. And if that fish could have talked, it would have said, “Whew! Thank You, Lord! That man tasted nasty, and he gave me a stomach ache!”

Here’s a question for you: What dry land? Where exactly was Jonah vomited up? How far had the ship traveled before the storm? At least far enough, apparently, that it required three days and three nights for the great fish to get Jonah to his point of disembarkation. Bear in mind that Nineveh is hundreds of miles from the Mediterranean. One thing is for sure: the fish didn’t vomit him up anywhere near Nineveh! If he was deposited back in Joppa, or even if the fish took him way north to Tyre or Sidon, he still had hundreds of miles to travel. Again, time enough to think about things.

Chapter 3

Verses 1-2

Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, “Arise, go to Nineveh the great city and proclaim to it the proclamation which I am going to tell you.”

This is beautiful. After all, doesn’t everybody need a second chance? Jonah is a man figuratively raised from the dead; and now he is given a second opportunity to do what God told him to do. God’s ways don’t change, God’s message doesn’t change and God’s purposes don’t change. Nineveh still needed to hear, and Jonah still needed to go and tell them. So he’s forgiven, and he’s restored, and now he still needs to go do what God told him to do. We can be forgiven, but we still need to do what God tells us to do.

Nineveh is called a ‘great city’ Not great as in “It’s a wonderful place,” or “You should buy up real estate there.” No, it was a great city because of its comparatively impressive size and population for that time. There were more people in ancient Nineveh than in Ann Arbor, MI today!

Verses 3-4

So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, a three days’ walk. Then Jonah began to go through the city one day’s walk; and he cried out and said, “Yet forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown.”

Jonah is a man with a changed heart and an obedient will. You see it at work in the relationship between God’s command and Jonah’s quick compliance.

Presumably Jonah went to the center of the city, and that’s where he cries out. But what troubles me is that this message seems to lack a warning to repent. Nothing about ‘If y’all don’t repent…” just an announcement that forty days later the city would be destroyed. Perhaps we are not given the full text of what was said. But I wonder whether there was more to the message than that, and maybe Jonah didn’t want to give it.

Forty days is an important biblical number. Moses was up on Mt. Sinai for forty days, and Israel’s loyalty was tested. The spies went into the Land of Canaan for forty days.Israel was in the wilderness for forty years. Yeshua went into the wilderness and fasted forty days. It’s a number of testing. And this is a test for Nineveh. So let’s see what happened.

Verse 5-9

Then the people of Nineveh believed in God; and they called a fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest to the least of them. When the word reached the king of Nineveh, he arose from his throne, laid aside his robe from him, covered himself with sackcloth and sat on the ashes. He issued a proclamation and it said, “In Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles: Do not let man, beast, herd or flock taste a thing. Do not let them eat or drink water. But both man and beast must be covered with sackcloth; and let men call on God earnestly that each may turn from his wicked way and from the violence which is in his hands. Who knows, God may turn and relent and withdraw His burning anger so that we will not perish.”

Let me be clear about something: Jonah’s survival in the big fish isn’t the great miracle of this story. The Ninevites’ faith and repentance is the great miracle of the book! After all, the oceans don’t argue with God. Fish don’t argue with God. We humans are the ones who give Him grief.

To a man, the entire city enters into this fast. Even the king identifies with the people in repentance (the Hebrew verb is shuv). There are three groups of people in Jonah, if you think about it: the one who ought to believe, but resists God’s will; those who believe upon witnessing miracles; and those who believe, seeing nothing, merely hearing the word. And it reminds me of Yeshua’s statement, “Blessed are those who have not seen, and yet believe”.

By the way, the expression ‘The King of Nineveh’ as opposed to ‘The King of Assyria’ isn’t unusual. It isn’t unusual for a capital city to stand for the country (see for example, 1 Kings 21: ‘King Ahab of Samaria’).

The king’s decree shows an awareness of the merciful nature of God. Somehow they knew something about the God of Israel being merciful. It seems that a general awareness of (Israeli) monotheism existed there.

Verse 10

When God saw their deeds, that they turned from their wicked way, then God relented concerning the calamity which He had declared He would bring upon them. And He did not do it.

The verb used for God relenting isn’t shuv (God didn’t need to repent), but rather, nacham (a niphal form, meaning God was ‘moved to pity’). We are meant to see God’s grace here – even in the warning from Jonah. When He announces judgment it is so that we might turn from our sin and be healed.

Here’s the irony: Nineveh repents, and experiences grace, whereas Israel, despite a more intimate relationship with Adonai, rebels, and experiences judgment. But Israel will also, in time, experience God’s grace – after the time of discipline. Never write Israel off. God has wonderful future plans for her. These actions reveal both the just and merciful nature of the Lord.

Now, this ‘city-wide revival’ should have been cause for rejoicing. But it didn’t quite go down that way, as we’ll see in chapter four.

Chapter 4

Verse 1

But it greatly displeased Jonah and he became angry.

The grammatical construction here is actually a double emphatic use of the word ra’ah – ‘evil’). In other words, Jonah considered it exceedingly evil that the Ninevites repented. This is, perhaps, evidence that his preaching was with wrong spirit. He performed the right actions, but his heart wasn’t right with God. No matter; despite the prophet’s impure motives, God worked in the Ninevites’ hearts.

There are many people who claim to represent Jesus, and they’ll preach impressively, and maybe even perform miracles; but whose motives are evil. No matter; God will still accomplish salvation and healing in people’s lives. But these false messengers will be judged, and they will not be able to take credit for the good that was done.

Jonah is a repentant man, not a perfect man. Yes, he threw a temper tantrum. But before you point the finger at Jonah, you need to carefully search your own heart. However hateful, however vicious our enemies may be, those of us who love the Lord should desire their repentance, and not their demise.

Verses 2-3

He prayed to the Lord and said, “Please Lord, was not this what I said while I was still in my own country? Therefore in order to forestall this I fled to Tarshish, for I knew that You are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, and One who relents concerning calamity. Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for death is better to me than life.” 

What is he saying? “I knew You were going to forgive them! That’s why I ran the other way. I just knew You’d forgive them, because that’s how You are; and I didn’t want them to be forgiven. So just kill me!” So now we know why Jonah fled this assignment. And the prophet quotes the Torah (in paraphrase, Exodus 34:6-7). Maybe he was humiliated. Maybe he was hoping they would be destroyed in forty days, and when they weren’t, it was egg on his face.

Regardless, what he should be rejoicing about he resents. And you know, this is the same behavior as the older brother of the prodigal son! “I can’t believe that after all he put my father through, after all the horrible things he did, he just waltzes back in, and expects to be forgiven. And they’re throwing a party for him? Well, that’s one party I’m not going to!” It’s the same prideful attitude.

Verse 4

The Lord said, “Do you have good reason to be angry?”

God deals graciously with Jonah. He doesn’t beat him up about his attitude, but simply asks a question in a fatherly way. And the answer is implied, but no answer is forthcoming from Jonah.

Verse 5

Then Jonah went out from the city and sat east of it. There he made a shelter for himself and sat under it in the shade until he could see what would happen in the city. 

If I didn’t know better, I’d think Jonah was hoping for a cosmic fireworks show in Nineveh, and set up a comfortable front row seat from which to watch it. And he definitely would have needed a shelter! Did you know that it was 105° in Mosul this morning? But this is so sad; instead of rejoicing with and for the repentant Ninevites, he is aloof. He’ll have nothing to do with them. You have to wonder how the Ninevites viewed his conduct, and in the long run, also wonder if things might have gone differently between Israeland Assyria if he had behaved differently. I say that because just two generations later (roughly 80 years) the Assyrians invaded Israel.

Verse 6

So the Lord God appointed a plant and it grew up over Jonah to be a shade over his head to deliver him from his discomfort. And Jonah was extremely happy about the plant.

A little shade in a desert land means a lot! You know, considering his lousy attitude, Jonah is receiving undeserved kindness here. Again, we see Adonai acting as a patient Father with his ill-tempered son. Jonah is happy, but he’s happy for all the wrong reasons. I mean, really… a plant? 120,000 people have repented, and he couldn’t care less about that… but he likes the plant.

Verses 7-8

But God appointed a worm when dawn came the next day and it attacked the plant and it withered. When the sun came up God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on Jonah’s head so that he became faint and begged with all his soul to die, saying, “Death is better to me than life.”

Just as He appointed the plant, God in His sovereign wisdom appoints a worm to kill the plant. Adonai seems to be appointing a lot of things in this story: He appointed the wind and the storm; He appointed the big fish, and now He’s appointed a plant and then a worm. But God is not being cruel here… He is trying to teach Jonah something very important. Unfortunately, Jonah is not very teachable at the moment. The prophet repeats his lament, “Just kill me!” Be careful what you ask God for.

Verses 9-11

Then God said to Jonah, “Do you have good reason to be angry about the plant?” And he said, “I have good reason to be angry, even to death.” Then the Lord said, “You had compassion on the plant for which you did not work and which you did not cause to grow, which came up overnight and perished overnight. Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know the difference between their right and left hand, as well as many animals?”

Adonai repeats His original question, and Jonah answers with extreme bitterness, his cynical view of things dictated entirely by his immediate circumstances. But what is God’s lesson to Jonah? “I need you need to see with My eyes. I need you to value what I value.”

The Lord God of Israel is also the God of all the earth, and He cares about all people. We need to have the same heartfelt priorities He has. And you know, it’s easy to point the finger at Jonah, but we are more like him than we would care to admit. The world is perishing, as though in a storm, and people don’t know what to do to survive, spiritually speaking. And we, the people of God, seem to be asleep and oblivious… or worse, indifferent.

Yeshua said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy, but I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in Heaven.” (Matthew 5:43-45). So let me ask us all a question:

Could you rejoice in Muslim terrorists turning to Yeshua? Even if their terrorism had touched your own family? Could we forgive? Could we rejoice in their conversion? What are the limits of your and my forgiveness? It is one thing to see the problem in Jonah. It is altogether another thing to honestly see and acknowledge the sin and bitterness in ourselves.  May God, through His Holy Spirit, grant each of us the grace to forgive and to rejoice when we see those who have been our mortal enemies turning to Him in faith. May we be willing to embrace them as our very brothers and sisters.

Next week, God willing, we will revisit Jonah, but we’re going to take a different approach. We will see the entire story as a foreshadowing of God’s larger purposes for Israeland the nations of the world, and what are our respective roles in that great plan of worldwide redemption.