Who Knows?
1Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: 2 “Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you.” 3 Jonah obeyed the word of the Lord and went to Nineveh. Now Nineveh was a very large city; it took three days to go through it. 4 Jonah began by going a day’s journey into the city, proclaiming, “Forty more days and Nineveh will be overthrown.” 5 The Ninevites believed God. A fast was proclaimed, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth. (Jonah 3:1-5)
When Jonah finally went to Nineveh, things went exactly as he had feared. His enemy, an enemy of Israel, turned from their sin, prayed for God's mercy, and received God's mercy. Fear of this very outcome had caused Jonah to initially disobey God, and go as far away from Nineveh as he could rather than risk the people of Assyria (of which Nineveh was the capitol) experiencing God's grace rather than God's judgement. They had created turmoil for the people of Israel, causing them pain and heartache. If God was going to show them mercy, Jonah wanted no part of it! Yet, after an inscrutable three days and three nights in the belly of a sea creature, Jonah surrendered to God in prayer, then he went to Nineveh with a simple message that he still hoped they would ignore: in forty days Nineveh would be overthrown.
But the Ninevites did not ignore the message. Unlike Jonah, they did not need to be warned a second time. Instead, they immediately went into a time of fasting, showing grief over their sin, in hopes that God would relent and change God's mind. The king, himself, said in verse 9, "Who knows? God may yet relent and with compassion turn from his fierce anger so that we will not perish.” Indeed, God did just that.
In our pride we often assume that our enemies are God's enemies, but God wants salvation for all. Yes, God grieves when we grieve and hurts when we hurt. But God desires justice most from changed hearts that change minds, such that changed lives feel the pain of their previous choices and make better ones going forward. We can trust God with the hard things and the difficult people in our lives. God wants all to be right with God even more than we want "them" to be right with us. We are called to be as patient with others as God is with us, to give the grace we want to receive, and to trust that God's justice is enough. Who knows? We might even
learn to love "them".
Trust in the LORD with all your heart, And lean not on your own understanding; In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He shall direct your paths. (Proverbs 3:5-6)
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