My sister is one of the most long suffering, patient people I have ever met. I incline to irascibility and while I always regret and often have to apologise for shortness of temper, I find it hard to be as good as she appears to be. I do not suppose I am alone in not standing scrutiny beside a sibling.
The book of Jonah started as he ran away from God’s mission for him and then, as the chronicle neared its conclusion, his motive became clear. Jonah just could not cope with God’s nature, his goodness. [Jonah 4:2] ‘I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity’.
Jonah will have grown up to dislike the Assyrians. There was background history and inherent culture deep within him that clouded his judgement. For him, for God to encourage the Assyrians to repent of their sin and then to forgive them in response to their repentance was anathema.
Jonah’s frustration, anger or mere bemusement at God’s boundless love seems unbelievable with hindsight; but that is to we who are not steeped in the prejudices of the world Jonah inhabited. In our own era, some people of my parents’ generation still find it difficult to forgive things from the second world war. Different generations have their own hang-ups.
How is it, I wonder, that we can hold a bitter memory and keep it alive for years, sometimes for generations; of all the virtues we possess, that seems one of our least endearing flaws. It is easy to say, ‘I would not be like that; I could never nurse a grudge’; but are we sure that we never get waspy over the remarkable way that God’s unquestioning love seems to buoy up someone who we think should not get away with this, that or the other. Is that so different?
The same God who called Jonah to go to preach to the people of Nineveh calls us to turn from all our sin; he calls us to worry about repenting of our own wrongs and not to be the judge of other people’s nature. He certainly does not call us to question his mercy.
A Prayer
Gracious God, you are compassionate to all who repent and turn from their sin; grant us grace to turn from our own and to avoid daring to judge your compassion and mercy to other people. Save us from that thickness of skin that seems impervious to your unending love and instead, teach us to be at peace with all people by trusting in your judgement of us all, and the rightness of it.
May we know your forgiveness and grace and be glad when others are restored to goodness, for Jesus sake.
Amen.