He Learned From His Mistakes

 

"Get Up, Go to Nineveh"

Jehovah told Jonah: "Get up, go to Nineveah the great city, and proclaim against her that their badness has come up before me." (Jonah 1:2)  It is not hard to see why this assignment might have appeared daunting.  Nineveh lay some 500 miles (800 km) to the east, and overland journey that would likely take about a month on foot.  However, the hardships of such a trek might have seemed the easy part of the job.  At Nineveh, Jonah was to deliver Jehovah's judgment message to the Assyrians, who were notoriously violent, even savage. If Jonah had seen little response among God's own people, what could he hope to see among those pagans? How would a lone servant of Jehovah fare in Nineveh, which would come to be called "the city of bloodshed"? - NAHUM 3:1, 7.

Such thoughts may well have occurred to Jonah. We do not know. What we do know is that he ran. Jehovah had directed him to go east; Jonah headed west, and as far west as he could go.  He went down to the coast, to a port city named Joppa, where he found ship  headed to Tarshish.  Some scholars say that  Tarshish was in Spain. If so, Jonah was heading some 2,200 miles (3,500 km) away from Nineveh.  Such a voyage to the far end of the Great Sea might have taken as long as  a year.  Jonah was that determined to get away from the assignment Jehovah had given him! - Read Jonah 1:3.

Does this mean that we can dismiss Jonah as a coward? We should not be too quick to judge him. As we shall see, he was capable of remarkable personal courage.  Like of us, though, Jonah was an imperfect human struggling with a great many faults.  (Psalms 51:5) Who of us has never grappled with fear.

It may occasionally seem that God asks us to do what strikes us as difficult, even impossible.  We may even find it daunting to preach the good news  of God's Kingdom, as Christians are required to do.  (Matthew 24:14)  It is all too easy for us to forget the profound truth that Jesus uttered:  "All things are possible with God."  (Mark 10:27)  If at times we lose sight of that truth, perhaps we can understand Jonah's difficulty.  What, though, were the consequences of Jonah's flight?

Next time: He Learned From His Mistakes - Jehovah Disciplines His Wayward Prophet

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