a short sermon

"In forty days Nineveh will be overthrown."

In the past couple of weeks, I've heard two different people comment on this, the entirety of Jonah's message to the people of Nineveh. Both pointed out that this was a pretty short message for a prophet of Jehovah, and certainly devoid of any "unless you repent" nonsense.

One said that this was because Nineveh was judged from the start, and their repentance brought only reprieve (of about a hundred years, till the time of Nahum). The other simply observed that it was a very short sermon to preach, but that God used it powerfully.

In general, I agree more with number two, simply because of the vast precedent set in the rest of scripture about grace and reprieve from earthly judgment. But I also think there's something more there. After all, this is the story of a reluctant prophet: reluctant to be sent in the beginning, reluctant to take part in God's grace at the end. And, I believe, reluctant in the middle as well.

Think about it. You do someone wrong and apologize, and the apology comes out like this: "Oh-my-goodness-I'm-so-sorry-I-can't-believe-this-happened-it-was-so-wrong-I-never-meant-to-hurt-you-please-forgive-me...." Now think about what it's like when you're not sorry at all. Say you're sorry. "Sorry."

This is exactly it, right? Jonah's delivering a message he simply doesn't want to deliver, to people he hates, and delivers the barest bones of it. And yet the people of Nineveh know somehow the pathway of repentance of mercy. In a short book with more miracles per word than most — the storm, the fish, the plant — maybe the most overlooked is the miracle that the Ninevites got the message. The whole message.