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This week we come to the end of our journey through the book of Jonah. If you have found it useful please consider contacting the author; let me know what you thought was good and not so good - and we can look forward together to next week's exciting new topic! This week we see Jonah's final actions immediately after discovering how God's mercy and grace would be poured out upon Nineveh.

'Jonah went out of the city and sat to the east of the city and made a booth for himself there. He sat under it in the shade, till he should see what would become of the city. Now the Lord God appointed a plant and made it come up over Jonah, that it might be a shade over his head, to save him from his discomfort. So Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the plant. But when dawn came up the next day, God appointed a worm that attacked the plant, so that it withered. When the sun rose, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on the head of Jonah so that he was faint. And he asked that he might die and said, “It is better for me to die than to live.” But God said to Jonah, “Do you do well to be angry for the plant?” And he said, “Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die.” And the Lord said, “You pity the plant, for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?”'

Jonah's short sightedness

As soon as I read that Jonah made a booth I was reminded of another famous Christian mentioned in the Bible who made a booth. In Mark 9 we read of the transfiguration, perhaps one of the most incredible happenings in the ministry of Jesus. In bright, shining glory Elijah and Moses appear with Jesus on a hill, and Peter, James and John are there to witness it. Peter's immediate response? 'Let's build three tents, so Elijah and Moses can stay for a while!' It was foolish because Elijah and Moses were not going to stay; their temporary presence was enough.

Jonah's situation is similar. He creates a booth in which to sit so that he can watch Nineveh receive its punishment, despite the fact that he knew it would not happen! This is absolute foolishness, and reminds me of my own tendency to ignore what God has said to make way for my own comfort and priorities. Perhaps you can share in my confession and relate to Jonah here. It is too often that we hear the voice of God clearly pushing us in one direction but wish not to leave our comfort zone. On occasions like these we should look at Jesus' example. He was in the ultimate comfort zone, heaven, yet he willingly and joyfully stepped into human history to suffer. Why? Because God had told him to. Let us be inspired to lift our eyes from ourselves and see the bigger picture, and our place in it.

'God appointed...'

In this passage we see this phrase so often, and it is clear that this passage is here to speak about God's sovereignty; nothing less. I love that John Piper said 'God is really big, really strong, really powerful, really knowledgeable, really wise, really great, really weighty, and he is going to be big in this service, and we're going to make a big deal out of God here.' When we have a view of God that is biblical like this we cannot fail to see that God is in control of everything; He determines the whole of history, and if anything happens it happens either because God ordains it or because He actively lets it happen. The world is suffering from the credit crunch, and God is still in control. He was in control before, He is in control now and He will be in control when this is all ancient history. God's power and sovereignty is mind-boggling and we would do well to acknowledge that, and act accordingly.

Irony

A good place to finish this study would be to look at the irony with which it finishes. We have seen this humour throughout the book of Jonah, and here to finish we experience God's sense of humour. I cannot wait to be in heaven, where God will tell jokes so funny that we will literally laugh for thousands of years, how wonderful will that be? Here we see that Jonah refused to have compassion on the people of Nineveh, yet would have compassion on a plant if he thought it would do him some good. In fact, he is so angry at the death of the plant that he wishes to die himself! Apart from this being a caricature of the gospel it serves as a highlight of Jonah's folly. God finishes this book in His Library with Him taking the Mickey out of Jonah; in 'justifying' His decision to show mercy to the city of Nineveh He points out that 'much cattle' exist in the city, to show to Jonah his own folly. He has compassion over a plant, yet will not extend that compassion even to cattle, or many people in desperate need of a Saviour. Let us enjoy laughing at Jonah, but let us also not become like him.

"Chip Shots from the Ruff of Life" from Tom Kelley

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