Sermon: "Good News, Both Beautiful and Troubling" (Jonah part 6), February 14, 2021

“Jonah and the Gourd,” Martin Van Heemskerck, 1561.

Preacher: Rev. Ryan Slifka
Scripture: Jonah 4:5-11
This is the sixth and final sermon in our 6 week series on the Book of Jonah.

Well, here we are at the end of our six week sermon series on Jonah. And here we are at the end of the story, too. It’s been a wild ride with our man Jonah from the beginning. We’ve had divine communications, God-driven hurricanes, pagan sailors who convert. A three-day ride in a giant fish, and the miraculous conversion of a city full of the world’s most wicked people. It’s been both wild and weird. In my mind the Bible’s at its best when its at its weirdest. So I’m actually kinda sad that we’re at the end.

Regardless of the fact that we’re at the end, though, we’re still in for a treat. Cuz the weirdness keeps on comin’.

You’ll remember last week that when Jonah found out that God was going to spare the city of Nineveh, he freaked out. This was one of the world’s most bloodthirsty empires, these people deserved punishment, consequences for their sins. But God relented. And forgave them. This made Jonah furious. He figured God was letting them off easy. To which God asked him if his anger was good or right.

So in this week’s text Jonah stomps off without even answering the question. He heads out east, finds a good spot, maybe on a hill where he can get a panoramic view of the great city. He plunks himself down in a booth, waiting to see what’s gonna happen to this monstrous metropolis. God gave a 40 day limit for the Ninevites to turn themselves around. Sure they’re doing fine now, but Jonah figures that they’ll backslide before you know it. They’ll get back to their evil habits. Then WHAM divine judgment. So Jonah’s got the lawnchairs out, ready to catch the coming mayhem. He can’t wait.

And here’s where the weird comes in. Jonah’s got his feet up, waiting for the city to slip back into the evil abyss, popcorn in hand. And God creeps this plant up and over him and his booth. The booth—a sukkot—wouldn’t have had a roof on it and only provided partial protection. We don’t know what kind of plant it is, either. Our translation says a bush, others say a vine. The old King James is my favourite—it says it’s a gourd. If it’s not the most realistic it’s the funniest. A gourd for the Lord. This giant squash acting as this supernatural umbrella.

No matter what kind of vegetation it is, though, it blocks out the scorching sun. And this is the first time in the whole story that Jonah’s been happy. Cuz the gourd’s keeping Jonah nice and cozy while he awaits the city’s doom. What a nice thing for God to do. The Lord’s just too kind.

Just as Jonah’s got it made in the shade, though, God gets in there and messes things up. The day passes by, then night, and finally dawn. You can see the sun begin to rise, and God creeps this little worm up on the gourd that God crept up on Jonah. And this worm sucks all the life out of it. The gourd withers, dries up and dies off.

Then when the sun’s finally up God slaps him with an east wind. Could be a sandstorm, we don’t know. But it’s clear that Jonah’s suddenly defenseless, scorched in the desert heat. And this is the last straw. Jonah’s faint, he’s heatstruck. Last week Jonah wanted to die on account of the mercy God showed Nineveh. Now he wants to die because God’s withheld the mercy of the gourd for Jonah.

Does it get any weirder than this? Booth, gourd, worm, sandstorm. Weird as it gets. I love it.

Soon enough, though, we discover that all this weirdness has a purpose. It’s at this point where it’s clear that this whole thing with the gourd and the worm is actually parable. Parables in the Bible are these short stories with a surprising twist that are meant to shake us up with some new and different way of seeing God or God’s kingdom. You’ll remember that Jesus was the master of parables. They were one of his main tools for teaching. Usually he’d tell a little story and offer an interpretation.

This here’s a living parable, though. And Jonah’s both the star, and the student. And we know this story’s a parable because God offers the whole thing an interpretation.

Look Jonah, God says again. “Look—you’re so concerned about this bush. You pity this gourd. I mean, the pity’s all self-serving, but it’s pity nonetheless. There’s a wee bit of concern in there for something other than you.[1] You’re sad, you’re all worked up at the destiny of this little squash. Considering that little bit of pity you’ve got for this non-sentient vined shrubbery, shouldn’t I—the Creator of the Universe—be concerned for Nineveh, that great city of a hundred-thousand people who don’t know their right hand from their left? And also many animals.” You’re all messed up about a gourd which—by the way—you didn’t grow, one that popped up in a day and then died in a night. So, will you permit me a little pity for these people who I made? Ignorant, sinful, and violent as they may be? And don’t forget their little sheep and cows, too.

Through this parable, God’s trying to awaken in Jonah some compassion for these people. Because if he can muster just a speck of love for a little gourd he didn’t grow, imagine the kind of compassion the Creator of the universe has for these human beings. Human beings she did make, human beings she did grow from the womb. The point of this weird parable is to shake Jonah up, to soften his hard heart with a little holy pity, to spark the flame of divine compassion, by giving him just a glimpse of the unfathomable depths of divine grace. God’s one-way, unconditional, unilateral love for sinners. For all the human beings he’s made, no matter how terrible they’ve become. For all creatures, in fact. Don’t forget the many animals. The cows and sheep.

Jonah just couldn’t believe God would forgive people like the people of Nineveh, these jack-booted Nazi-like thugs who wiped out ten of the twelve tribes of his own people. But apparently God can.

He assumed that there should be a limit on divine patience, understanding and forgiveness. Apparently there isn’t.

And Jonah figured that in relenting from punishment God was in dereliction of his divine duty toward justice. God wasn’t fulfilling his divine job description as Creator. God wasn’t being God. But apparently this is exactly who God is.

In fact, you could even say, that this is the message of the whole book of Jonah to begin with![2] That God, the Creator of all things. The Source of all being, the heartbeat of existence doesn’t want anyone to perish, but come to repentance.[3] That God “desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”[4] And that in the same way God tried everything, from a Word, to a storm to a whale, to get Jonah back on track, God will bend over backwards, and will bend even the very rules of justice to save his most deranged and corrupted child… even to the point of death, “even death on a cross.”[5]

I mean, we sometimes say stuff like “the Old Testament God is mean and punishing.” But this passage, my friends, this Old Testament passage is as New Testament as it gets. Same God running all the way through. This God refuses to be God without us. With the God we’ve got… there’s no sinner left behind.

Which makes this the perfect place to end this sermon series. Because this is the radical heart of the Christian message. The most radical, and most beautiful. That you and I—and this wonderful, fragile world—we are the objects of an inexhaustible grace. A bottomless well of divine pity. From our first breath until our last, and beyond. No matter how fearful we may be. No matter far we wander, no matter how hard we fail, or how deep we sink—Jonah-like—into our own resentment. Even if we—like the Ninevites—don’t know our right hand from our left. Even if we do know which is which but fail to do it—the hound of heaven’s still on our trail, nipping at our heels, relentlessly running us down and back on to the path of goodness.

It means YOU ARE FORGIVEN. It means there’s always more mercy, there’s more hope, there’s always more life. And no matter how many times you throw this gift back in God’s face. It’s still yours for the taking.

Like I said. It’s beautiful. It’s not only good news. It’s the best possible news there is. And I pray that each of us—each of you—grab hold to it for dear life.

That’s more or less the end of it. There is one more tiny little thing, though. And it’s the thing Jonah had the most trouble with. We don’t know if he actually came around. The text remains open-ended with this question.

And it’s simply the fact that if this message of inconceivable grace is true for us, it means it’s also true for everyone else.

It means that every time we’re tempted to write anyone off—consign anyone to perdition—we’re confronted by the God who refuses to write us off. We’re met with the same merciful cross-examination of the Lord. “Should I not have pity for them? These people who do not know their left from their right?”

Think of the person, or the group of people who you find hardest to pity. For Jonah it was the evil Ninevites. But maybe it’s the person who hurt you. Maybe it’s the junkie on the street. Maybe it’s the conspiracy theorist, the racist relative, the bleeding-heart liberal who you’ve unfriended on Facebook. The terrorist. Or maybe it’s a particular politician who gets let off the hook yet again.

“Should I not have pity for them?” asks the Lord. “These people who do not know their left from their right?” “Father, forgive them,” Jesus says. “For they know not what they do.” The depth of God’s grace is not only a beautiful thing. It is deeply troubling. Because if the good news is for us, it’s for them, too.

 If we believe it, then we’re more than likely find that we can no longer hold on to any of our hate or our resentments about anybody. I mean, we can, but we know we’ll end up like Jonah.

If we believe it, it means we won’t be able to look into the face of the worst, even our own, without seeing what God sees. The face of Christ, the eyes of his children, the subjects of his love and the objects of his salvation looking back at us. We won’t be able to see anything less than a beloved brother, a sister. No matter their past, no matter their politics, no matter their deeds. Even them.

If we truly believe it, we won’t be able to do anything but turn in our hatred for love, our past for God’s future. For the joy and peace of eternal life. And that to do otherwise we’re destined—like Jonah—to wither and die in the scorching heat of judgment.

It’s weird, I know. But it’s also beautiful. And it’s as troubling and difficult as it is beautiful—I know that, too. But in its weird, difficult troubling beauty is the key to the life we long for.

Should the Lord not have pity for his creatures, even the ones who can’t tell the difference between right and left? The answer is not only that God should. But God does. And it’s for you, it’s for me. It’s for every creature that’s cast a shadow by the sun, or any of the stars of infinity.

And thank God for that.

AMEN.

[1] “Unlike Jonah’s merciless hatred toward Nineveh, this is an emotion the Lord can work with. Behind pity there is some degree of love, a certain tenderness [… though self-serving] it is a desire that someone other than Jonah should live.” Phillip Cary, Jonah: the Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible (Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2008), 156.

[2] “The truth of God’s patience with Nineveh and with himself (Jonah) for his own salvation is the ultimate message of this scripture.” Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics II.1, ed. Bromiley and Torrance (London: T&T Clark, 1957), 414.

[3] 2 Peter 3:9.

[4] 2 Timothy 2:4.

[5] Philippians 2:8.