FAILING FORGIVENESS (41 OF 52)
Scripture: Jonah 3:10, Jonah 4:11
This content is part of a series.
Failing Forgiveness (41 of 52)
Series: Lectionary, Year A
Christopher B. Harbin
Jonah 3:10-4:11
Deep down, we don't really like the gospel. We want some kind of alternate message that makes us worthy of God's love, worthy of special attention, worthy of the better things in life, such that those ''other'' people actually deserve some lesser position of worth than ourselves. It seems it has been this way forever. Every people, every group, every clan, every family wants to believe they are more deserving than the next. How, then, do we deal with this gospel of Christ insisting that every bit of that is a lie, that God offers each of us grace, specifically because none of us is worthy?
Jonah knew the Ninevites were less than deserving. They were the scum of the earth. Nineveh was a major city of the Assyrians who had so recklessly endangered, mistreated, and killed people of all sorts of nations to exert its political and military dominance over the known world. They were idolatrous. They were wicked. They were ruthlessly violent toward other nations. They had killed, raped, maimed, and even ripped the unborn out of the wombs of pregnant women (war crimes perpetrated against Israel, even if Israel had do no differently against its own enemies). If any people on earth were unworthy of forgiveness, love, acceptance, and Yahweh's acceptance, it was these people. They threatened the stability of Israel and surrounding nations, and Jonah had nothing positive to say in regard to the people of this foreign threat.
Then Yahweh sent Jonah to preach to them. This was not what he wanted. He tried to run, but he found no way to get away from Yahweh's purposes and call on his life. Reluctantly, he made his way to and preached in Nineveh, announcing a coming time when Nineveh would either have a change of heart or be otherwise overturned. When the people all the way up to the rulers of the city repented for their evil actions, putting on sackcloth and covering themse ...
Series: Lectionary, Year A
Christopher B. Harbin
Jonah 3:10-4:11
Deep down, we don't really like the gospel. We want some kind of alternate message that makes us worthy of God's love, worthy of special attention, worthy of the better things in life, such that those ''other'' people actually deserve some lesser position of worth than ourselves. It seems it has been this way forever. Every people, every group, every clan, every family wants to believe they are more deserving than the next. How, then, do we deal with this gospel of Christ insisting that every bit of that is a lie, that God offers each of us grace, specifically because none of us is worthy?
Jonah knew the Ninevites were less than deserving. They were the scum of the earth. Nineveh was a major city of the Assyrians who had so recklessly endangered, mistreated, and killed people of all sorts of nations to exert its political and military dominance over the known world. They were idolatrous. They were wicked. They were ruthlessly violent toward other nations. They had killed, raped, maimed, and even ripped the unborn out of the wombs of pregnant women (war crimes perpetrated against Israel, even if Israel had do no differently against its own enemies). If any people on earth were unworthy of forgiveness, love, acceptance, and Yahweh's acceptance, it was these people. They threatened the stability of Israel and surrounding nations, and Jonah had nothing positive to say in regard to the people of this foreign threat.
Then Yahweh sent Jonah to preach to them. This was not what he wanted. He tried to run, but he found no way to get away from Yahweh's purposes and call on his life. Reluctantly, he made his way to and preached in Nineveh, announcing a coming time when Nineveh would either have a change of heart or be otherwise overturned. When the people all the way up to the rulers of the city repented for their evil actions, putting on sackcloth and covering themse ...
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