Jonah

To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable, because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you. C. S. Lewis

When I study the Bible I like to study one book at a time. I almost always do the following before I dive into a book.

1. Pray.
2. Watch Bible project 
3. Read the entire book (if you have time do it in one sitting).
4. Read ESV Study Bible’s Introduction
5. Observation – Genre, who, what, where, when, why, how, repeated words (count them), structure (pay attention to transition words like therefore) (I do my observations using Logos App. A free version could be found here
6. Application – How can I apply it in my daily life.

Genre – Narrative

Theme – Salvation belongs to the LORD. The Lord is a God of boundless compassion not just for “us” (Jonah and the Israelites) but also for “them” (the pagan sailors and Ninevites).

Who – Main Characters
Jonah, sailors, king & the Ninevites – All of the characters ironically do the exact opposite of what you think they would do. The prophet rebels; the sailors repent; the powerful king humbles.

Jonah – Jonah is a rebellious prophet of the Northern Kingdom of Israel who is angry with God for loving his enemies.
Early life – He prophesies that the border of Israel will be restored and it did get fulfilled. He would have been very popular for prophesying prosperity. Who wouldn’t like their borders to be expanded and restored?

The sailors ask a series of questions to Jonah: What is your occupation? And where do you come from? What is your country? And of what people are you?” The answer is found in II Kings 14:25 & Jonah 1:9.
“He restored the border of Israel from Lebo-hamath as far as the Sea of the Arabah, according to the word of the Lord, the God of Israel, which he spoke by his servant Jonah the son of Amittai, the prophet, who was from Gath-hepher.” II Kings 14:25
“I am a Hebrew, and I fear the LORD, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.” (Jonah 1:9)

When (Time) – 2 Kings 14:23–28
Jonah prophesied during the politically prosperous time of Jeroboam II (782–753 B.C.) who reigned over Israel’s northern kingdom. Although Jeroboam did what was evil in the sight of the Lord (2 Kings 14:24), he expanded the kingdom of Israel even further than his father (King Jehoash), matching the boundaries to the days of David and Solomon. This was, “According to the word of the Lord, the God of Israel, which he spoke by his servant Jonah the son of Amittai, the prophet, who was from Gath-hepher” (2 Kings 14:25). He prophesied in an era when Assyria was not an immediate threat to Israel and when Israel enjoyed peace and prosperity because of the compassion of God. Thus Jonah witnessed firsthand the restorative compassion of God extended to his wayward people.

Where – The City of Nineveh
Nineveh was situated at the junction of the Tigris and Khoser rivers (modern-day Mosul, Iraq). Nimrod was the founder of the city (Gen. 10:11). It was once a thriving city and it contained luxuries like public squares, parks, botanical gardens, and even a zoo. The area of the city was approximately 1,850 acres. The book of Jonah reflects the flourishing nature of Nineveh at this time (3:1–5). Nineveh eventually fell to the Medes and Babylonians in 612 B.C. The invading armies dammed the rivers that supplied water to the city, causing a flood that broke through one of the perimeter walls, giving the foreign army access to the city.

Biblical Context
Hosea, Jonah, Isaiah & Amos all lived and prophesied during this time.  Amos ends with, if you repent you will be restored. Hosea talks about the blessing and destruction.  Isaiah’s message was very similar (judgement for those who don’t repent).

Prophet Amos confronted King Jeroboam and through him God specifically reversed Jonah’s prophesy (2 Kings 14:25) that King Jeroboam will lose all those territories because he was so horrible (Amos 6:13-14).

Hosea & Amos were prophetical saying God will use the Assyrian empire to punish Israel. Jonah is well aware that if he goes to preach to Nineveh and if they respond to the message with repentance and if Israel doesn’t repent then his own people will be destroyed.

How it ties to the New Testament
Substitute – Jonah is hurled into the raging sea and the sea calms. The sailors witnessed that day that a substitute paid the price for their life. Later we see Christ who is perfect in all ways died on the cross and paid the price to redeem the wayward world. The judgement for my/our sins is paid by Christ on the cross.
Three days – Jonah’s rescue from death provides an analogy for the resurrection of Christ (Matt. 12:39–40).
Salvation – Jews & Gentiles – The repentance of the Ninevites anticipates the wide-scale repentance of Gentiles in the Messianic era (Matt. 28:18–20; Luke 24:47).

Outline
Two Main Sections
Jonah 1: 1 – Word of the Lord comes to Jonah
Jonah 3: 1 – Word of the Lord comes to Jonah

Structure
Jonah’s commissioning and flight (1:1–3)
Jonah and the pagan sailors (1:4–16) (Non Israelites)
           Jonah’s grateful prayer (1:17–2:10) (When God was merciful to him)
Jonah’s recommissioning and compliance (3:1–3a)
           Jonah and the pagan Ninevites (3:3b–10) (Non Israelites)
                      Jonah’s angry prayer (4:1–4) (When God was merciful to the Ninevites)
Jonah’s lesson about compassion (4:5–11)

Repeated words – Great (7 times)

Repeated words/themes in the book of Jonah – Fleeing from the presence of the LORD – 3 times
Problem of disobedience Disobedience takes you away from the presence of God. Jonah 1:3,9 says Jonah moved away/flee from the presence of the Lord. When Adam and Eve sinned the first thing they did is they hid themselves from the presence of the LORD. Genesis 3:8. And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.

But Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish. So he paid the fare and went down into it, to go with them to Tarshish, away from the presence of the Lord. Jonah 1:3

Then the men were exceedingly afraid and said to him, “What is this that you have done!” For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them. Jonah 1:10

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Application – My Takeaways from the book of Jonah

God wants to use the ordinary ‘you’ for His tasks even though He can achieve it by making the stones speak.
God is more concerned about what we become than our own comforts. The Bible says if you refuse to speak the very stones will speak (Luke 19:40). When the almighty God comes to us seeking our attention not once but multiple times and achieves the greatest results in-spite of our reluctance, I couldn’t help but be encouraged by it. Simultaneously, I also feel a bit discomforted because I know that the Lord would ask of me things that I don’t love to do. The very unlovable people in our lives God brings them again and again into our lives so that we may change and be shaped through the process.
Question – What are you resisting lately? What is bothering you lately? Who do you find hardest to love? Are you running from God or to God?

God can and will use you even when you reluctantly obey his word
Jonah’s mere five word sermon (“Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” Jonah 3:4–5) brought the greatest revival yet he couldn’t celebrate it. There are several flaws in his sermon: it doesn’t talk about repentance, it doesn’t address the problem of sin and finally it doesn’t talk about God. He preached it with reluctance yet we see the repentance of the king and the people (120,000) in it.
Question – Are you ready to do your part?

God’s sovereignty over creation – God appoints : tempestuous sea (1:4); fish (1:17); plant (4:6); worm(4:7); east wind (4:8)
The God of the universe is trying to get our attention in so many ways. The problem is we don’t realize it. God appointed a fish to protect Jonah. He appointed a plant to get him to realize why he was compassionate.
Question – Do you stop and see God in your everyday life? Or do you take the little things that fit so perfectly in your life for granted?

God gives hard assignments
Jonah was utterly incapable of handling a God sized assignment on his own. He couldn’t understand the full picture of what God really could achieve by forgiving the Ninevites. He first ran away from the task, then he died figuratively (Jonah 2:1-3) and later wished to die literally (Jonah 4:8-9). So often we brush off people who are struggling with their God given assignments by just saying, “Oh God won’t give people more than they can handle.”  The truth is God certainly gives people more than they can handle so they will learn to trust that only God can do it and not them. Let’s be sympathetic to people who are struggling with their God given assignments. Let’s not forget to point them to Jesus. 
Question – Are you okay with God loving your enemies? Is God calling you to a place which you would find hard to go? Do you really want to hear his voice?