9 But God said to Jonah, ‘Is it right for you to be angry about the bush?’ And he said, ‘Yes, angry enough to die.’ 10Then the Lord said, ‘You are concerned about the bush, for which you did not labour and which you did not grow; it came into being in a night and perished in a night. 11And 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?’ Jonah 4.9-11
We have now heard two vignettes from the story of Jonah. The first one recounts how, after spending three days and three nights in the belly of a fish, The Lord tells Jonah to go to Nineveh to tell them to repent, and he finally does so, and the people do repent. You see, that is what the Lord told him to do the first time, but Jonah ran away, getting on a ship bound for Tarshish. Then spending three nights and three days inside a fish after he was thrown overboard by a superstitious and suspicious crew of sailors.
After he is spewed onto dry land, he goes and does what the Lord told him to do, preach repentance to Nineveh. But, Jonah then is mad at the Lord for sparing Nineveh and has a heated exchange with God. Jonah throws a temper tantrum, going out into the desert to die. God, being a good God, does what God needs to do to prove a point. God causes a bush to grow over the petulant Jonah to comfort him. And Jonah is indeed comforted. But God, doing what God needs to do to prove a point, sends a worm to eat the bush and cause the sun to burn on Jonah, to the point that Jonah wants to really die.
Then they have the exchange I read. God telling Jonah a truth about the way God works and the way humans work. Basically, and more often than not, we humans care about the wrong things, or constantly dwell on the things we think we should care about. Usually these things are small in detail, like grounding a child when they spill their yogurt. Or, when we denounce as horrific the slowness of the express lane at a grocery store. Or, when we get wound up at the clergy because the hymn boards do not match the leaflet. What keeps the world spinning on its axis? Yogurt? Express lanes? Hymn Boards? Why don’t we care more about what God has made, in a bigger picture, like a whole city of people who need to hear the word of God and turn and be thankful. Why do we run from this proclamation?
The story of Jonah has so many levels to it. From hearing and running away, to praying and being heard. From Temper tantrums in front of God, to the gentleness of a God who cares for prophet and city alike. From a powerful God, who can control the weather and the fish and the bush and the worm, to a penitent people, not of Hebrew decent, but a foreign blood, a people who hear and receive the grace of God through a reluctant prophet. Jonah is a small book with a large punch. It speaks to us about power, and goodness, and our intimate relationship with our God. It is a story about a God willing to show us where to go and what to do. It is a story about a God willing to care for us and teach us. It is a story about a God willing, through trial and error, to be with us and show us what we need do to speak to the world about the goodness of our God. It is no wonder Jonah holds our fascination so many centuries after it was first written down. Jonah means “Dove” by the way.
It is my belief that the people of God are always in a state of limbo. We are called into a place where we say, like the boy Samuel, Speak Lord, for your servant is listening. We wait for the Lord to speak. And when the Lord does speak, we are, more often than not, called to go out and tell others about this faith we share, usually with the invitation to, “come and see.” What is on display for people to see is the power of God. That power of God is seen in the setting of the universe in its order. This order is seen in the way everything seems to have its own course, its own stability. The sun and the moon, the earth and her waters, you and me, we all seem to live in a natural association of things. There is a power there, a power that we as creatures do not posses. I can plant a seed in the ground, I can water it, I can tend to it, but that seed doesn’t really need me. Plants have been able to grow and be nurtured long before I came along. I can plant and garden, but I cannot create the seed, or the idea of the seed, or even tell you where it came from. I can get at it a little through the description of evolution and time, I can tell you the story, but there is more to the story, and that is the power of God, which extends well beyond you and me.
I was struck by the two kinds of power on display last week. One was our country’s power. A power built on ideas and a common commitment to a constitution. We saw the power of a people who could build a nation like ours, with all of its wealth and glory. We continue to be an oddity to the rest of the world, a young powerful nation, yet an experiment that is some two hundred years old. We are a successful place, where the power is shared and transferred by a people willing to be governed through democracy. The way we use power would suggest that we have it figured out. We used our minds to make a culture where people have the opportunity to live out lives of peace and abundance. We are not perfect, but we strive to be better with each generation. We see power used through ourselves and in our ability to use our brains and our bodies to make ourselves better. “We can do it,” we say. “Yes we can” is a current motto. And yes we can, and yes we have, and yes we will. But I cannot help but remember I am mortal. And that is the other power that I saw on display last week.
I have a memory of watching my children come into the world. It is a memory like none other. They each seemingly came from “no where.” All of a sudden they were here, and it was as if time before them did not exist. The same holds true for my wife. She appeared one night at a dinner party and I cannot imagine a time when she was not in my life. I know there was once a time when she was not near me, but it is a cloudy time, and one that seems unreal. The same is true for me closest friends. In my memory, I cannot imagine a time when Jeff Held was not in my life, or Chris, or Todd, or Jim. These friendships sprung up and were nurtured in what I know to be true as a short amount of time, but these friendships feel as if they will last for eternity.
Friday I sat with a friend while she die, surrounded by her friends and her family. She was a good woman, who did good things and loved and laughed and screwed up and figured it out and tried again. She led a good life. And in her death, she was given the gift of hearing her sisters each tell her how much they loved her, and how it was okay to die. And as her breathing slowed and as her body stopped, I saw a power greater than this country of ours, greater than any of our inventions, greater than our selves, I saw the power of God in love. Love for a child, a sister, a friend. Love that I did not create, but was already here when I arrived. Friday I realized we did not create love, I discovered that love exists without us. That love created us.
We can make gigantic cities, teaming with people, all in order, and all in their place. Each generation can make societies that are grand and ornate and show off all that we can do with our minds. We can make vehicles that go fast. Express lanes for quicker service, yogurt for our enjoyment, hymn boards for our convenience, and this is all pretty amazing stuff when you think about it. But the power of love, an invisible power that sustains and enlivens us, even in our death, that power, even as our bodies fail us, the power of love trumps all inaugurations, all marble towers, all ships and sea monsters, all bushes and all worms. And that power, witnessed in the power of a God to save a foreign city from sin, and in this place where we proclaim to save all of humanity from sin, that power is found in the quiet moments after you were born, after you fell in love, after you leaned on a friend, after your diagnosis and in your weakest most frail moment. In those places, that power holds you, surrounds you, envelopes you and envelopes me. This power, the power of love, holds us. And the one requirement that I can find, the one thing that you are to do with your time on this earth, the one thing to know God, the meaning of life, is love. God asks Jonah to find the people of Nineveh. Jesus asks Andrew and Simon to follow him and be fishers of people. Find people, find them and love them. If you do that, you will have the power of the universe in the palm of your hand. And think of what you can do with all of that power. We are called into the power to change lives and make them better. The power of God. Amen
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