Context: What did the storm and the fish teach Jonah? (Jonah 2:8-10)
- Obedience. He learnt that disobeying God could lead to painful consequences
- Vanities: Strong’s 1892 from a primitive root (1891)t; to be vain in act, word, or expectation; specifically to lead astray:–be (become, make) vain.
- Vain: worthless
- Lying: Strong’s (7723) figuratively idolatry
- Jonah 2:8 Those who cling to vain gods abandon their Merciful One.
- –Ukrainian Bible (Public Domain) translated to English with Google translate
After the fish experience, what would you expect Jonah to do? What did he do? (v3:1-3)
- That Jonah would follow God’s original call
- Go to Nineveh and preach God’s message
- However, doesn’t look like Jonah followed through
- What is the vow then in Jonah 8:9?
- Perhaps something else that didn’t involve Nineveh
- What is the vow then in Jonah 8:9?
- God’s word came to Jonah a second time
- That is when he obeyed God as he learnt that lesson
- But did he understand the love of God?
- That is when he obeyed God as he learnt that lesson
Why was Jonah exceedingly displeased and angry? (Jonah 3:4, 3:9, 4:1-3)
- The message to Nineveh was that it will be overthrown in 40 days
- Doesn’t look like the message had any hope – that God would relent
- However, the king hoped that God might relent
- if they repent, fast and cry out to God
- God did relent!
- However, the king hoped that God might relent
- Doesn’t look like the message had any hope – that God would relent
- Jonah was exceedingly displeased and angry because of Who God is – to Nineveh too
- Gracious
- Merciful
- Slow to anger
- Abundant in loving kindness
- Relents from doing harm
How is God’s view of Nineveh different compared to Jonah’s view (Jonah 2:8-10, 4:11)
- God’s view
- 120000 clueless people – and much livestock
- Jonah’s view
- People of Nineveh are idol worshipers who abandoned the true Merciful God
- They are not like Jonah who
- Will sacrifice to the true God with thanksgiving
- And will keep all his vows
- Will sacrifice to the true God with thanksgiving
- Similar to the Pharisee’s thoughts about the tax collector?
- Thinking he is better than the people around him
- Fasts and tithes
- Thinking he is better than the people around him
- They are not like Jonah who
- People of Nineveh are idol worshipers who abandoned the true Merciful God
Conclusion / Application
- Do I believe God loves everyone and will save anyone who believes in Him?
- We see God’s long suffering loving kindness and mercy towards Jonah and Nineveh
- And us! The Assurance that nothing will separate us from His love!
Main Passage Jonah 4:1-11 – World English Bible (WEB)
4 But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry. 2 He prayed to Yahweh, and said, “Please, Yahweh, wasn’t this what I said when I was still in my own country? Therefore I hurried to flee to Tarshish, for I knew that you are a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, and you relent of doing harm. 3 Therefore now, Yahweh, take, I beg you, my life from me; for it is better for me to die than to live.”
4 Yahweh said, “Is it right for you to be angry?”
5 Then Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city, and there made himself a booth, and sat under it in the shade, until he might see what would become of the city. 6 Yahweh God prepared a vine, and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shade over his head, to deliver him from his discomfort. So Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the vine. 7 But God prepared a worm at dawn the next day, and it chewed on the vine, so that it withered. 8 When the sun arose, God prepared a sultry east wind; and the sun beat on Jonah’s head, so that he fainted, and requested for himself that he might die, and said, “It is better for me to die than to live.”
9 God said to Jonah, “Is it right for you to be angry about the vine?”
He said, “I am right to be angry, even to death.”
10 Yahweh said, “You have been concerned for the vine, for which you have not labored, neither made it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night. 11 Shouldn’t I be concerned for Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred twenty thousand persons who can’t discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much livestock?”
Notes / Cross References
Jonah 2:8-10 8 Those who regard lying vanities forsake their own mercy.
9 But I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving.
I will pay that which I have vowed.
Salvation belongs to Yahweh.”
10 Then Yahweh spoke to the fish, and it vomited out Jonah on the dry land.
Jonah 3:1-3 Yahweh’s word came to Jonah the second time, saying, 2 “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach to it the message that I give you.” 3 So Jonah arose, and went to Nineveh, according to Yahweh’s word. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three days’ journey across. 4 Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey, and he cried out, and said, “In forty days, Nineveh will be overthrown!”
Jonah 3:9-10 9 Who knows whether God will not turn and relent, and turn away from his fierce anger, so that we might not perish?” 10 God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way. God relented of the disaster which he said he would do to them, and he didn’t do it.
Psalm 31:6 I have hated them that regard lying vanities: but I trust in the Lord.
Deuteronomy 32:21 They have moved me to jealousy with that which is not God; they have provoked me to anger with their vanities: and I will move them to jealousy with those which are not a people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.
Luke 18:10-14 10 “Two men went up into the temple to pray; one was a Pharisee, and the other was a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee stood and prayed to himself like this: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of men, extortionists, unrighteous, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I get.’ 13 But the tax collector, standing far away, wouldn’t even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’
Luke 18:14 14 I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted.”
Romans 8:38-39 38 For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from God’s love which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
John 3:16-18 16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. 17 For God didn’t send his Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through him. 18 He who believes in him is not judged. He who doesn’t believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the one and only Son of God.
