Jonah 3 

Jonah Preaches to Nineveh

Jonah Goes (1-4)

Jonah’s disobedience did not change Yahweh’s mind. He called Jonah a second time. Chapter three mirrors chapter one, but instead of preaching to Gentile sailors, Jonah preached to the Gentiles of Nineveh. 

The prophetic word came to Jonah again, and we are reminded of God’s gracious love. The first words of God’s second calling were for Jonah to “arise” and then “go.” Some think Jonah returned to his home in Gath-hepher, and there Yahweh gave him his second chance at obedience. I think it is more likely that Jonah stayed at the port city of Joppa for some days or weeks and waited for God to speak, while God waited for the sailors to return. When they returned, they would have disembarked as followers of Yahweh. Possibly then is when Jonah met up with those sailors; he would have had to have learned of their conversion somewhere. There and then, he showed them what Yahweh had done, and then he was called to go to Nineveh and told what to say (1-2).

Jonah arose and went to the city and found it to be so large that it took three days for him to deliver his message to each section of the city (3). 

His message from day one was simple: “In 40 days, Nineveh will be destroyed.” The 40 days represented a season of mercy and time to allow God to change their hearts—something Jonah hoped would not genuinely happen (4). 

Nineveh Repents (5-9)

The citizens of Nineveh believed, meaning they considered God just in His decision, and they also believed He could be depended upon to keep His word. Jonah did not record any other of his words, their questions, nor his answers to their questions. He glossed over the entire event by stating that they were convinced God was just in what He said and could be trusted to do it. 

One must speculate a bit. Did all or some of the sailors come with Jonah? Did their confirming testimony of Jonah’s having been puked out of a fish provide a powerful witness to God’s love and grace for the city?

Whatever made Jonah’s preaching so powerful, it had miraculous effects. The conversion of the city was so complete, and the city so humbled that the king himself called for fasting in sackcloth (5-6).

The king was gripped by Jonah’s message himself and made legislation for all men and beasts not to eat or drink. All were to be covered with humility, right down to their clothing. They were to convene for prayer meetings and call out to Yahweh with great passion. They were, above all, ordered to discontinue their habit of violently and brutally harming others and were to cease all human insensitivity immediately. The overcrowded city was to lavish itself with kindness (7-8).

The king had no idea if God’s sovereign hand would be stayed by their change of heart and behavior, but on the chance of mercy, he ordered a city-wide change of heart and conduct (9).

God Relented (10) 

When God saw the change of heart and action, He “relented,” meaning He began to grieve for the city and began to comfort and console them in their mourning. God’s kindness caused Him to give the city a reprieve from the impending disaster had the city not humbled itself (10). 

Jonah 4 

Jonah Gets Angry

It was easier for the Ninevites to change their hearts than for Jonah to change his. 

Jonah’s Anger (1-3)

Jonah was “displeased,” meaning he found the actions of Nineveh and maybe even Yahweh to be morally objectionable or wrong. Jonah became angry. This one act of Yahweh had ruined Jonah before the Israelites. No matter how humble the Ninevites made themselves, they had been so wicked that Jonah thought Yahweh should have destroyed them anyway (1).

Jonah started praying, telling Yahweh this was why he had been a shirker in the first place in fleeing bound for Tarshish. He knew Yahweh to be gracious, merciful, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love. He knew Yahweh was capable of being exactly in character with the benediction of the priest and what Moses had declared from Sinai (Numbers 6:24-26; Exodus 34:6).

So overcome was Jonah with God’s decision and the impactful shame to his reputation that Jonah thought death was a better circumstance. Jonah’s loss of position, privilege, and celebrity would leave Jonah disgraced and wishing no more existence in that life (2-3).

Jonah Confronted (4) 

Yahweh then confronted Jonah: was it right for Jonah to be angry with God for saving a city when God had been so gracious in saving him? The question in Hebrew is only three words—no rebuke, just a probing question (4).

Jonah Sets Up Camp (5-6)

Jonah was hoping the Ninevites’ repentance was not genuine, so he went to a safe spot just to the east of the city, and there he waited to see if the 40-day prophecy of destruction might still happen. He made a makeshift shelter of some intertwined branches. Yahweh, then, in another one of His gracious miracles, made a fast-growing leafy plant grow. The plant was likely a castor oil plant, and it grew and provided shade for Jonah from the sun. The quickly-growing plant eased the discomfort of the heat and Jonah’s pain of a repentant city he wanted destroyed. Jonah was thankful, yet he pouted (5-6).

God Rescues Jonah (7-11)

Jonah needed rescuing in the boat when fleeing from Yahweh, so Yahweh sent a storm. Now Jonah needed rescuing again as he sat and pouted in suicidal discouragement. Yahweh sent a worm this time, and by morning, the worm had eaten the stem of the plant so that it thoroughly withered away. 

God then sent a scorching east wind to blow on Jonah to make his life more miserable. The intensity of the heat of the sun rose in temperature and beat down on Jonah. Jonah grew so faint that he moved from assuming he was better off dead to desiring death, figuring death better than his lot in life (7-8).

God then asked Jonah another question, asking if it was right for him to be angry because the plant had died. First, he was angry because Nineveh was not destroyed; then he became angry because a plant growing close to Nineveh was destroyed. 

Jonah told Yahweh that he had lost his patience with Him, His ways, and His purposes. He was again done with the whole prophet-of-God relationship. He had first made a run from Yahweh to Tarshish. At that point, he wanted to make a run from God in death (9).

Yahweh did not give up on Jonah, just like He had not given up on Nineveh. Yahweh carefully showed Jonah the inconsistency of his logic. He felt sorry for a plant that was destroyed. He had not caused it to grow, nor was he responsible for its death. Yet Jonah felt compassion for a plant that had no soul, no value as a living human being (10).

Nineveh, on the other hand, had a population of 120,000 people, all living in moral darkness. The city was further filled with all sorts of animals. Jonah felt sorry and had compassion for a plant, angry that it had been destroyed, and yet could not grasp God’s compassion for human souls and living animals. Jonah could have compassion on a plant but could not grasp God’s compassion on a city (11).

Jonah ended the book with no conclusion, just God’s question for every reader to answer: “Should not the souls of any persons, even evil persons, be of value to God and to you?”