3th Sunday after Epiphany

The narrative around Jonah, as we heard in today’s first reading does not need much introduction. In the story Jonah receives direction of God to go and preach in Nineveh but he goes into a different direction as we know from the story. But God does not easily takes no for an answer. It is the same in our lives, God will move us in the direction he wants us to go. It might not be so dramatic as in the case of Jonah, but he will get us where he wants us to be. Escaping God’s call is not easy at all. In the story Jonah ends up being swallowed by a  big fish… likely a whale.  He gets a divine inspired time out. Then Jonah repents and prays and the fish spits him out.  Now Jonah does what God wants from him: going to Nineveh and preach there. He hurdles his way through the city with basically the shortest homily ever. But it turns out it is the most effective message ever. The people of Nineveh repent and they turn away from their sinful ways. God has mercy on them and decides not to destroy the city after all.  

Not something that Jonah really wanted so God is about to teach him another lesson. In the last part of the story we see Jonah getting upset with God (yes, God can handle that). Jonah went out of the city and sat down east of the city, and made a booth for himself there and sat under it in the shade. God let’s a bush come up over Jonah, to give shade over his head. Jonah was very happy about the bush. Then a worm came and destroyed the bush. After that a sultry east wind made the sun beat down on his head. It made Jonah so upset that he wanted to die. God asked Jonah: ‘Is it right for you to be angry about the bush?’ Jonah told God that he was angry enough to die. But God answered Jonah: ‘You are concerned about the bush, for which you did not labor and which you did not grow; it came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should I not be concerned about Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who do not know their right hand from their left, and also many animals? Notice this last line in the dialogue. It shows us that God cares for all of his creation and wants to extend his mercy to all. 
 
Jonah was a Hebrew, one of God’s chosen people. He had shown himself faithful in his desire to follow God’s ways. But Jonah’s faithfulness has its limits, and Jonah discovers what those limits are. When God tell him to go to Nineveh he does not want to go and tell the people thereof God’s love and mercy. Jonah doesn’t want to go and for a good reason. Nineveh was the capital of the ruthless Assyrian empire, an empire that had terrorized the Israelites. The people of Nineveh were the Israelites’ sworn enemies. So no wonder Jonah resisted when God told him to go and preach about God’s love and mercy. For Jonah knew that God would be merciful in the end. Jonah is not so sure he wants to see Nineveh receiving God’s grace. We have that in our own lives ourselves. Showing mercy and forgiveness to the people that have hurt us is difficult. What happens to Jonah at the end, is a perfect example of someone fighting against the reality of God’s mercy and grace. Jonah is convinced that the Ninevites don’t deserve it. But he is convinced that he deserves the blessings God offers him. He is caught in this cycle of judgment, in which we are so often caught up in.

Just like is often the case with us, Jonah cannot extend to his enemies the same grace God has offered to him. It’s a pattern of judgment we all get caught up in at times. We judge ourselves worthy or unworthy, despite the evidence of Gods grace. We judge others too in one or the other way. We become trapped in a cycle of judgment. We seem to be unable to extend compassion, empathy and love. This is basically what Christ teaches us in the Gospel “Be merciful as your heavenly Father is merciful”. And we all know the story about the woman caught in “adultery”. They want to force Jesus into a discussion about the law. But he does not let it happen and refuses to condemn the woman. He only tells the bystanders: “let him among you who is without sin cast the first stone”. In all of his ministry, Jesus teached the same thing that God tried to teach Jonah. Namely that God is not obsessed with right and wrong,  guilt and punishment, success and reward. God is obsessed with loving us just as we are. Because He is a relational God….He is our heavenly Father and he loves us. Time and again, particularly with those on the margins, Jesus sets aside judgment and shows us what compassion looks like. The Jesuit Priest Father Boyle once said: "there is an idea that has taken root in the world. Namely that there are lives out there that matter less than other lives.” To move past this idea the solution is service. When we serve another, we move toward experiencing the kind of compassion. Service frees us for compassion because it puts us in relationship with those that we are likely to judge. 
 
When Jonah finally goes to Nineveh after his time in the belly of the whale, he simply walks a straight line through the city, preaches his seven-word sermon, and leaves. He does not stop to learn about who the people are like. He does not interact with them. The result is that he has no capacity to imagine their lives or empathize with the trials and challenges they have. He fails to go for service and relationship. And so Jonah remains trapped in ignorance and judgment. How can we ever truly know the other, if we cannot emphasize with the, often traumatic, experiences they had? In order to faithfully follow a relentlessly relational God, we need to find ways of compassion for people’s whose experience is not ours. We need to understand that God is the God of second chances. This is a lesson for both the Clergy and the laity. But especially for the leadership in the Church. It is disappointing to see how often the Church is judgemental and shows a lack of empathy and compassion. We are called to set aside judgment and focus on what we have in common: our identity as beloved children of God. 

We belong to God and God is love. Love is what God chooses over and over again. Even for Jonah, in his anger, even for the religious authorities with their judgmental attitude,  even for the Ninevites who persistently violated God’s ways. God chooses to love even us, even in our ignorance that prevents us from showing love and compassion to others. It is this love that is most fully revealed in the incarnation of Jesus Christ. Thomas Merton said ones” Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy. That is Gods business and not ours. All that is asked from us is to show love and compassion. God is calling us as well to go on our way to Nineveh. He wants us to go to that place and that people we cannot imagine are worthy of God’s love. God calls us to love others and not stop to ask whether they deserve it. We can run from that call, but God eventually will have the last word. When we heed to Gods call what wonderful things can happen in ourselves and in the world around us. Amen.