The Bizarre & Backwards Faith of Jonah

Keeping faith in God is sometimes hard. By “faith” I don’t mean “saving faith.” If you have “saving faith” then your salvation is eternal and that “faith” will never be lost. I’m talking about a different kind of faith. The day-to-day faith that lets your heart rest easy because of your confidence in God’s ability to handle any situation in your life. THAT faith is sometimes hard to keep.

As Christians, we frequently face situations that test our faith. We face trials and we are tempted to doubt that God really knows what He is doing. I know as a Pastor, I sometimes wonder if God is using my words or not. A preacher can proclaim the gospel truth week after week; and yet watch people go out and seemingly ignore everything that was said in the sermon. It can be a struggle for any preacher, unless they constantly remind themselves that God is in control…and He is more than able to change and convict any heart. This is why the Old Testament prophet Jonah is so perplexing.

By all accounts, Jonah was a very gifted man. He was a prophet, who was inspired by God to proclaim the truth. He obviously had a high degree of spiritual knowledge that enabled him to preach. And he had a specific call from God to go to a specific group of people and proclaim repentance. But perhaps, the most amazing thing about Jonah was his faith. And ironically, he had a faith that was so backwards that it actually spurred him on to avoid God’s calling to preach to the people of Nineveh. Unlike most preachers who struggle with doubts about their effectiveness and God’s ability to save; Jonah was the exact opposite…..He KNEW God would save the Ninevites through his preaching…and he deeply resented it.

Of course, we know how the story goes with Jonah. He runs from God’s calling and ends up getting swallowed by a big fish on the high seas who promptly pukes him up on the shores of Nineveh. Concluding that he really has no choice in the matter, he preaches repentance to the Ninevites and they repent en mass. This would seem like any preacher’s dream. Thousands saved because God chose to use you to proclaim His word. Yet Jonah’s response is downright shocking! He’s angry at God for saving the scoundrels.

“But it greatly displeased Jonah and he became angry. He prayed to the LORD and said, ‘Please LORD, was not this what I said while I was still in my own country? Therefore in order to forestall this I fled to Tarshish, for I knew that You are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, and one who relents concerning calamity. Therefore now, O LORD, please take my life from me, for death is better to me than life.’ The LORD said, ‘Do you have good reason to be angry?’” (Jonah 4:1-4 NASB)

Fascinating, isn’t it? Jonah, literally, would rather die than see Nineveh saved. So what’s Jonah’s problem? God has blessed him with gifts out the wazoo….yet Jonah is lacking a vital component for the person of God, and the Apostle Paul can show us Jonah’s problem with crystal clarity. Take it away Paul…

“If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. (1 Corinthians 13:1-2 NASB)

Jonah had it all…except love. Which means Jonah really had nothing. As Paul teaches us, all the gifts in the world are nothing, if the love is not there. We should have a love for God that is Supreme over all things in our life. And that love should spill over into a love for our fellow Christians, and that love should spill over to the lost and perishing. Jonah lacked love.

In fact, God goes on to teach Jonah a very valuable and painful lesson. God causes a tree to grow that will shelter Jonah from the hot sun. Then God takes it away, and points out to Jonah that he’s more concerned over the tree (and his own comfort)than he is the perishing masses of Nineveh. “Then the LORD said, ‘You had compassion on the plant for which you did not work and which you did not cause to grow, which came up overnight and perished overnight . Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know the difference between their right and left hand, as well as many animals?’” (Jonah 4:10-11 NASB)

All Christians have gifts from God…and all Christians have a calling to share the gospel with the perishing. The question is whether or not you will use those gifts and fulfill that calling as God intends. If you hunker down and force yourself to be a witness you might become a very successful legalist. But if you walk daily with the Lord and cultivate a heart for Him, then your life will not be marked by legalism, it will be marked by love. And as Paul said, without love, “I am nothing.”

So use you God-given gifts to glorify Him, and to be a witness unto the lost. This is God’s will…..and this is love. The same kind of love that God has shown towards us.

“In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.” (1 John 4:9-10)

Comments

[brian]

shane, good article but im a little confused about the first paragraph. is saving faith really seperate from our day to day faith? isnt it so, that if we have saving faith we will trust in God's providence. i agree it is hard but is not the outcome of this faith salvation. 1 Peter 1:3-9. if we dont keep our faith we have no salvation, graciously God will not let that happen to his chosen people. if this is right then im confused about having two seperate faiths. could you explain this to me- brian

[Shane]

Salvific faith is certainly lived out day to day. But there can be an "ebb and flow" to our "faith" in terms of trusting God the way we should. While there is no "ebb and flow" to our salvific faith---you either have it or you don't. What I meant was that you can be a Christian with "faith in God" and yet still sinfully doubt God in a particular trial. Salvation is still there...but the severity of the trial jolts your faith somewhat. Maybe I didn't word the first paragraph very well.
Thanks for the comment.
--Shane