Harry Foster
"Salvation is of the Lord" Jonah 2:9
THE true Christian has no problems about the story of Jonah. The Lord Jesus settled those once and for all. It is a noteworthy fact that our Lord, without any systematic teaching on the inspiration of the Bible, made it plain that some of the most disputed passages of the Old Testament are wholly reliable. These include the Creation (Matthew 19:4), the Flood (Matthew 24:37), the prophet Daniel (Matthew 24:15) and this story of Jonah when He authenticated not only the prophet's successful mission to Nineveh, but also his strange experience inside the huge fish (Matthew 12:40-41).
We therefore do not question the facts, but we may well ask why this book is given a place among the prophets since -- unlike the rest -- he has no words of correction or exhortation for us. Clearly it is the story itself which is meant to convey God's message to us, and perhaps that message is best summed up in Jonah's own words, spoken from the depths: "Salvation is of the Lord". His deliverance was so wonderful that Christ chose it as an illustration of His own death and resurrection, and it was so undeserved that the worst of us, in the most hopeless circumstances, can take heart of grace from its message.
I suggest four obvious truths which emerge from this little book:
1. However unlovely a man may be, God still loves him.
One of the simplest items of evidence that this book is inspired is found in the fact that it is not allowed to end with chapter three. What a dramatic climax that would have made! What a success story for God's servant! The first three chapters tell of the prophet's deliverance, his recovered ministry and the mass turning to God of those who heard him preach. If this had been written by human skill, it would have ended on that high note. But it does not do so. We go straight on into chapter four and find the whole chapter devoted to the anticlimax of Jonah's sulky petulance. 'Is this a man of God?', we ask. 'Can a preacher so mightily used by the Spirit of God be such a mean complainer, such an unchristlike character?' The answer is here for us all to see. He can. And since the Bible acts as a mirror, we may have to confess that we see something of the corruption in our own natural hearts as we read this sad disclosure of unexpected depths of meanness and ingratitude in the prophet.
We know that he resisted God's original call to go to Nineveh, but we also know why he did so. A man may perhaps be forgiven for unbelief in such a situation, so if Jonah had argued that the Ninevites were so corrupt that they would not pay any attention to his call to repentance, [35/36] we might have felt some sympathy with him, even though this proved not to be the case. Not that he could be justified in such an assumption, for we are told to despair of no man; but at least his disobedience might be a little more excusable.
Or if he feared for his own life, we would not feel so critical of him, since most of us shrink from activities which expose us to mortal danger. If Jonah had run away from God's will because he was afraid of being martyred, who of us could blame him for that? The reason, however, was quite different from this. He later freely admitted that his reluctance to obey was not due to either of these emotions but simply and solely to the fact that he did not want God to spare the city: "Was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I hasted to flee into Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and full of compassion" (4:2). Grace for me, but condemnation for them!
Quite possibly, as a true patriot, Jonah might have been apprehensive that this heathen power would overthrow the kingdom of Israel. It may be that he presented to God arguments -- and very good arguments -- as to why it would be risky to spare Nineveh and much safer to destroy it. We usually have pious arguments when we try to reason ourselves out of obedience to God's demands on us. The blunt truth was, however, that Jonah was a man of mean and selfish character, a most unlovable type.
We may perhaps attribute better things to him when we read of his advice to the frightened sailors, for this seems unselfish enough, and we are ready to forgive his original reluctance when we find him accepting the second chance of obeying God, setting out on his mission and faithfully delivering his message to the city ripe for judgment. His subsequent outburst, though, confirms our worst fears as to the baseness of his character; he is "exceedingly displeased" (4:1), not because his mission had failed, but because it had succeeded beyond any human expectation. Four times over we are told that he was angry, angry with God, when he saw a mass repentance and a sensational demonstration of the very words he had earlier uttered about himself: "Salvation is of the Lord". How nasty can a man be! Even a believing man!
Jonah forgot the grace that had delivered him and even told God to His face that it would have been better to have left him in the fish: "Therefore now, O Lord, take I beseech thee, my life from me ..." (v.3). We are aghast that any man, above all a most successful preacher, should talk to God like that. We find ourselves in sudden agreement with the last part of his outburst: "it is better for me to die than to live!" Amen, Jonah! We quite agree. You really are not fit to be allowed to cumber God's earth!
Yet God loved him. Our heading reminds us that even the most unlovely man of the covenant is loved by our faithful Jehovah. We are therefore not surprised that God did not lose patience with him but took the trouble to remonstrate with this sulky servant of His, trying to teach him a lesson of Godlike compassion. What condescending grace was this! The great God of creation, Maker and Sustainer of the universe, took the trouble to order the sun and an east wind and to prepare a shady bush and a destructive worm, in a patient effort to teach Jonah a spiritual lesson. In that lesson He gave the complaining prophet an indication of His own compassion towards His needy and ignorant creatures. How much Jonah profited from that lesson we are not told. So far as we know his last words on the subject were: "I do well to be angry, even unto death" (v.9). What an unattractive character! Yes, but he was loved. That is miracle of divine grace. Salvation is indeed of the Lord.
