Fish Story (Part III)- Take Two

Note- This is the third installment in a four part series on the book of Jonah that we walked through as a Student Ministry last month. This little book, tucked away in an obscure corner of the Old Testament, has encouraged, challenged, and disturbed me thoroughly over the past several weeks, and I felt compelled by the Father to share some of these simple but powerful truths with a broader audience (i.e. you!).  I pray God uses it to shake you up as you seek to follow Him.

If you're anything like me, you can readily identify with a guy like Jonah.  Like most of us, he is a mixed bag of emotions, attitudes, and actions, fluctuating with alarming regularly between humble, heartfelt obedience to God and outright rebellion against His decrees.  Jonah 1 brings us "bad Jonah," desperately on the run from a God that He just can't escape.  Jonah 2, on the other hand, brings us "good Jonah," crying out to God in worship as he sits helplessly in the belly of a "great fish."  


The close of these second chapter provides us with one of the most graphic pieces of good news you'll read anywhere- "And the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land."  And thus begins "take two," both for Jonah and for the wicked inhabitants of the city to which God had called him.  If Jonah 3:1 reads strikingly like Jonah 1:2, it's because it is.  Despite Jonah's attempt to trash God's mission to Nineveh, the plan hasn't change...not a bit.  What happens next, however, is drastically different.


I have to be honest with you here.  Jonah 3 is at once the most boring and beautiful chapter in this little book.  The happenings are rather straightforward...

• Jonah obeys God's command.  He goes to Nineveh, calls its people to turn from their wickedness to God's righteousness.
• The Ninevites listen to Jonah's message.  They repent of their wickedness and cry out to God for mercy.
• God relents from sending His wrath and instead offers compassion.

No escape attempts...no storms at sea...no "great fish" this time.  Just obedience, repentance, and restoration.  On the surface, it seems rather anticlimactic, especially in light of the earlier intrigue. 

But if you'll take a second, closer look, you'll find that the sequence of events described here is anything but routine.  Quite the opposite!  It's groundbreaking, earth shattering, I-can't-believe-what-I'm-reading good news for any and all of us who have found ourselves to be anything less than deserving of the love, mercy, and grace of a holy God.

At the most basic level, this is a story about second chances...radical second chances.  Jonah- he of "God, you crazy" fame- gets one.  Perhaps even more astoundingly, the Ninevites- a people of near-legendary evil- get one too.  In both cases, they take it full on.  And just in case there is any lingering doubt about the trustworthiness of God, He delivers on His promises to both, using Jonah mightily and sparing Nineveh in the process.

No matter who you are, where you've been, or what you've done, God is a God of radical second chances.  Honestly, though they aren't unlimited (at some point, judgment will come), He very often offers more than just two.  It's vital to recognize that this says far more about God than it does about you and me.  God isn't sitting in heaven trying to figure us out; rather, He's revealing Himself to us in different ways so that we might, by His grace, finally figure Him out (insofar as that is possible for us :)).  He is pursuing us in love not because He just can't seem to catch us, but instead because His character compels Him to do so.

The compassion of God so often shows up in places and among people that we never thought possible.  It did for Jonah...it did for the Ninevites...it did for me...and it can for you too.  Don't ever believe the lie that you've done too much, gone too far, or somehow let God down; you were never holding Him up anyway.  He loves you as you are, because of who He is.  Will you allow Him to initiate a "take two" moment in your life?