It Isn't Fair

Sermon on Jonah 3:10-4:11

Text: When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he relented and did not bring on them the destruction he had threatened.
But to Jonah this seemed very wrong, and he became angry. 2 He prayed to the LORD, “Isn’t this what I said, LORD, when I was still at home? That is what I tried to forestall by fleeing to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. 3 Now, LORD, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live.”
4 But the LORD replied, “Is it right for you to be angry?”
5 Jonah had gone out and sat down at a place east of the city. There he made himself a shelter, sat in its shade and waited to see what would happen to the city. 6 Then the LORD God provided a leafy plant and made it grow up over Jonah to give shade for his head to ease his discomfort, and Jonah was very happy about the plant. 7 But at dawn the next day God provided a worm, which chewed the plant so that it withered. 8 When the sun rose, God provided a scorching east wind, and the sun blazed on Jonah’s head so that he grew faint. He wanted to die, and said, “It would be better for me to die than to live.”
9 But God said to Jonah, “Is it right for you to be angry about the plant?”
“It is,” he said. “And I’m so angry I wish I were dead.”
10 But the LORD said, “You have been concerned about this plant, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight. 11 And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left — and also many animals?”

All people have an innate sense of wanting things to be fair. If you give pieces of dessert to two siblings, one will complain that their piece was smaller. If a referee makes a bad call, and your team loses because of it, you will say that wasn’t right. In our Gospel reading for this morning (Matthew 20:1-16), we have the situation where some men, who had worked all day, were upset that they were paid the same amount as those who had worked only an hour. I think that, if we were in their shoes, we would feel the same way. We want things to be fair. In our text, Jonah thought that God wasn’t being fair in his treatment of the inhabitants of Nineveh. As we study this account, we might have to confess that we feel the same way, at times.

The book of Jonah begins with an order that God gave to Jonah: “Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me.” (Jonah 1:2) We recall that, rather than obeying God, Jonah tried to run the opposite direction of Nineveh. As a storm arose, it was determined that Jonah was at fault, and the sailors threw him overboard. God provided a large fish to swallow Jonah. After being inside the fish for three days, the fish vomited him on the shore. The Lord repeated his order to Jonah: “Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you.” (Jonah 3:1) This time, Jonah obeyed and went to Nineveh. There he proclaimed the message: “Forty more days and Nineveh will be overthrown.” (Jonah 3:4) As a result of Jonah’s message, “The Ninevites believed God. A fast was proclaimed, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth. (Jonah 3:5) The people responded to the message that Jonah proclaimed. The Ninevites, from the king to the lowliest inhabitant of the city, repented and responded to God’s call to repentance. As a result, we read: “When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he relented and did not bring on them the destruction he had threatened.” (Jonah 3:10) Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the account of Jonah ended there!

However, we read, “To Jonah this seemed very wrong, and he became angry.” (Jonah 4:1) We find the reason for his anger in Jonah 4:2: “Isn’t this what I said, LORD, when I was still at home? That is what I tried to forestall by fleeing to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity.” Why would Jonah react this way? We get a clue when Jonah said, “I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity.” He was angry that God had spared the Ninevites. He accused God of being gracious, compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love. The reason that Jonah was angry is that the people of Nineveh were well known for their cruelty. Nineveh was the capital of Assyria, which was Isreal’s natural enemy. It had been prophesied a number of times that the Assyrians would take the people of Israel captive. These are the people, Lord, that you are sparing? Jonah was so upset by the entire situation that he said, “Now, LORD, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live.” (Jonah 4:3) The Lord asked Jonah, point blank, “Is it right for you to be angry?” (Johnah 4:4)

In the next verse we read, “Jonah had gone out and sat down at a place east of the city. There he made himself a shelter, sat in its shade and waited to see what would happen to the city.” (Jonah 4:5) Why did Jonah do this? In all likelihood, he was hoping that the Lord would change his mind and wipe out the Ninevites, and he wanted a front row seat to see it. The Lord, miraculously, made a leafy plant grow up and it gave Jonah some shade. It’s interesting to note that the only time that we read that Jonah was happy was because of this plant. The next day, God provided a worm, which chewed through the plant, causing it to wither. In addition, there was a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on Jonah’s head. He grew faint. He was so distraught that he wanted to die. God came to Jonah and asked, “Is it right for you to be angry about the plant?” (Jonah 4:9) After Jonah said that he had the right, the Lord chided Jonah, “You have been concerned about this plant, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight. And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left — and also many animals?” (Jonah 4:9-10) Jonah, you are more upset about a plant that you had nothing to with, than you are those many people who lived in Nineveh. When the Lord spoke of “More than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left,” it might mean that there were little children, who were not able to tell their right from their left hand. If this were the case, it would mean that there may have been 300,000 – 500,000 people in the city. It could also mean that the people of Nineveh were spiritually immature, which would mean that there were 120,000 residents. Either way, there were many people in Nineveh, and, instead of praising God that they had repented, Jonah was angry. It wasn’t fair that God would spare them. Sure, God’s grace and mercy were fine for Jonah. After all, he had experienced them, when God provided the fish to save his life. God’s grace and mercy should be shown to the people of Israel. They were God’s chosen people and the Savior would come through them. But these Ninevites? It didn’t seem right that they should be spared! What a sad commentary on Jonah’s attitude. Though the book of Jonah doesn’t say it, we pray that Jonah repented of his selfishness, his feeling that this wasn’t fair.

Do we ever exhibit that same sort of attitude? We read in 1 Timothy 2:3-4, “God our Savior . . . wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.” We are so thankful to read these words, because we are reminded that God wants to save us. We thank God that he has brought those who are near and dear to our hearts to faith and that they have been saved. We have our Mission Festivals, where we pray that more and more people are brough to faith. We are ever so thankful for all the missionaries, who go out in our name and share the good news of salvation through Jesus Christ. We pray that many people will be saved.
However, what about the atheist, who seems to use every breath that they have to speak about how foolish the gospel message is? What about those people in the world who persecute Christians? What about the ones that kill people for being Christians? How do we feel about someone who has committed atrocious crimes, those that make us sick to our stomachs? Let’s talk about the people who have grievously harmed us in one form or another. They did something to us or said something to us that wounded us deeply. Do they deserve to have God’s grace shown to them? Is it fair if they are saved?

The answer is “No. No, they don’t deserve to be forgiven. They don’t deserve to be saved. It isn’t fair.” Then, again, it isn’t fair that any of us are saved. Think back to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. They had been created holy. God gave one simple command to show their love to him. They were not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. God told they that, if they did, they would die. Adam and Eve ate from that tree. If God was being fair, they would have died, both physically and eternally, at that moment. However, God showed them grace. He promised to send a Savior. The same holds true for us. We read in Ezekiel 18:4, “The one who sins is the one who will die.” We know how many times we have sinned. It doesn’t matter how big or little we might imagine the sin to be. In God’s eyes, a sin is a sin. If he was fair, you and I would certainly die eternally for our sins. However, God chose to show us grace, his undeserved love. In his grace, he sent his son, Jesus, into the world to rescue us. Since he did not sin, he did not deserve to die. Yet, Jesus chose to die on the cross in our place. On his shoulders were placed every single sin that you, I, the entire world has ever or will ever commit. Rather than punishing us for our sins, in his grace, Jesus was punished in our place. In his grace, Jesus rose again from the dead to show us that all has been completed. Our sins have been forgiven and, instead of death, we have eternal life to look forward to. By his grace, faith has been created in our hearts, so that we might receive the benefits of all that Christ has done for us. We praise him for his grace.

Since we have been shown grace, and we realize how precious it is, we want others to experience the same grace. It doesn’t matter what or who that person was. We pray that they might experience God’s grace and be brought to faith, that they are saved. Jesus spoke of the angels rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents. May our voices join theirs as people are brought to experience the joy of God’s grace.

A beloved hymns is “Amazing Grace.” You might not know the story of the writing of that hymn. The author was John Newton. Newton went to sea at age 11 and later served in the Royal Navy, eventually leaving to work on slave ships. He actively participated in and captained vessels involved in the transatlantic slave trade, famously describing himself later as a profane and hardened sinner. On March 21, 1748, a severe storm struck the slave ship Greyhound off the coast of Ireland. As the ship filled with water and faced certain destruction, Newton prayed for mercy. He survived the ordeal, marking March 21 as a spiritual turning point. Years later, John Newton became a clergyman. In December of 1772, he wrote the lyrics of the hymn. The first verse of that hymn shows us where he was in life and what he, by the grace of God had become: “Amazing grace – how sweet the sound That saved a wretch like me! I once was lost but now am found, Was blind but now I see.” We join our voices in thanking God for his amazing grace, which might not seem fair to others, but is our dearest treasure. Amen.