Today, I am reading and commenting on  Jonah 1-4 and Micah 1-2.

I had a couple of different thoughts about the Book of Jonah today.  As I started to try to put those thoughts into words a question occurred to me: why does God seem to hound certain people until they, like Jonah, stop running from His will and consent to fulfill it?  And I think Jonah illustrates at least part of the answer to that question.  Jonah ran from God’s will, but when the judgement God brought down upon him threatened to fall upon those around him, Jonah offered himself up as a sacrifice to turn God’s wrath aside from them.  And that seems to offer up the difference between Jonah and those whom God allows to run away from Him.  God sent destruction in the form of a storm upon the ship Jonah was on until He got Jonah’s attention.  Then, when the people around him, had done everything in their power to escape the storm, only then did they allow Jonah to “take the fall”.  Perhaps, if Jonah had continued to deny God, God would have allowed everyone on board to go on their way, even Jonah.  We do not know, but I have seen people who have turned from God suffer many things until a time comes when God seems to give up on them and allows them to live in peace.  On the other hand, I have seen people who have turned from God suffer one thing after another year after year, until finally they give up and acknowledge God.  One other point, Jonah denied God because he was afraid that the people of Nineveh would turn from their sin and God would forgive them: he wanted them to suffer.  However, Jonah was unwilling for the people on the ship with him to suffer for his sins.  That also plays a roll in why God went so far to bring Jonah back to Him.

I want to contrast the way the people of Nineveh responded to Jonah’s prophecy of destruction to the way the people of Israel responded to Micah’s prophecy (or, at least the way that their response is recorded in today’s passages).  When Jonah prophesied to the people of Nineveh that God would destroy the city in 40 days because of their wickedness, they repented of their evil and began to fast and pray.  On the other hand, Micah tells us that when he told the people of Israel that God was going to destroy Samaria and Jerusalem, they told him to shut up.  When a prophet of God speaks to us, let us respond like the people of Nineveh did here, not the way the people of Israel did.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.