Believe

“And the people of Nineveh believed God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them.” Jonah 3.5 ESV

It’s funny how we get our wires crossed so badly that we make everything that has nothing to do with us all about us.

Imagine a common glass bottle getting all uppity about carrying a rare and expensive vintage.

It is too easy for man to obsess over the label and gloat over his neighbors because of what he carries. He fails to realize it’s what’s inside that brings value. The bottle is common. The vintage makes it noble.

Jonah’s eight-word sermon, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” isn’t a paragon of eloquence even today, but its effect is undeniable. Even Jonah must have realized that God’s plan for Nineveh required neither the messenger nor the cryptic message, especially when it had such a profound effect.

Why does God persist in working through us when He could so easily go around us? It must mean that He has a plan not only for the hearers but also for the bearers.

Something transformative happens when the gospel is realized among us, and the point of God choosing a few to carry it to others is not so that the few can use our privilege as ammunition. If we do that, we haven’t ourselves received the message.

Like God was still able to work through Jonah, He can still work through recalcitrant vessels if He must, but His heart is that we would all be changed. Faith indeed comes by hearing, but we must not be hearers only. We must move into fullness and be doers. Further, the doing must find its source not in obligation but love. Jonah never laid hold of that, yet Nineveh still found repentance. Profound.