As we come to the final chapter of the book of Jonah, we look back and remember to what we, as God’s people, have been called: To reflect God’s compassionate character to the world around us and to do so obediently (chapter 1), consistently (chapter 2), and indiscriminately (chapter 3). And, no doubt, we want to do those things!

So, what stops us? Why do we still struggle from time-to-time like Jonah—with disobedience, with self-righteousness, and with biased love? Chapter 4 reveals what was at the root of the prophet’s battle, and what could be at the root of ours as well. In this concluding section of the book we find that what we, as God’s people have, is often not an understanding problem (a lack of information or clarity) but a submission problem (a lack of willingness to sacrifice).

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We come to the final chapter of the book of Jonah, a well-known and often-told biblical story that, we’ve been discovering, has more to say than perhaps some of us realized. 

The book is about more than an emotional prophet and a hungry whale. It’s about God’s compassionate character and how we, as God’s people, are to reflect that divine compassion to the world around us like the moon reflects the the sun, giving light to the darkest of nights. This assignment to be compassion reflectors is revealed primarily through the negative example of the title character—the prophet, Jonah—who fails to do what readers of the text like you and I are being called to do.

In the opening chapter we witnessed a prodigal prophet running from God. Jonah rebelled against God and found himself leaving, not God’s presence like he wanted, but God’s blessings. And, looking at Jonah’s mistake, we felt the simple but profound call upon our lives to Obey and enjoy! We are called to reflect God’s compassion obediently and then enjoy the blessings that certainly follow.

In chapter 2 we saw a pious prophet praying against God. As Jonah called to God from the fish belly he did so with impure motives and full of self-righteousness. And that reminds and motivates you and I to be a people that Pray with God! and not against him; that we are invited to reflect God’s compassion consistently; that is, consistent with God’s character.

In chapter 3 we found a pedestrian prophet speaking for God. Here God’s heart for the outsider was on display as he showed compassion to a repentant Nineveh. In contrast, Jonah showed callousness and vindictiveness. We, wanting to be more like God than Jonah, were called to Love across all lines! To not be selective with our efforts but to reflect God’s compassion indiscriminately. 

I suspect that very few Christians would find that list disagreeable. In fact, I think most would say we want to live a life that reflects God’s compassion obediently, consistently, and indiscriminately.We want to be people who obey and enjoy, who pray with God, and who love across all lines. These are undeniably good things!

The question then becomes, what stops us from doing them? They sound great, they sound divine, they sound powerful. So, why is it a struggle to carry them out with regularity? Why do I still sometimes disobey? Why does self-righteousness continue to creep into my prayers from time to time? Why is it a battle for me to love the outsiders in my life?

The closing chapter of the book provides us an answer. Turn to Jonah 4 if you haven’t already. What we’re going to find in this chapter is that our problem is not one of understanding but one of submission. That is, what stops us from doing what God has called us to do in this world—reflecting his compassion to those around us—has little to do with a lack of information and more to do with a lack of willingness to sacrifice. It’s not an understanding problem; it’s a submission problem.

While we’ve seen a prodigal prophet running from God, a pious prophet praying against God, and a pedestrian prophet speaking for God, as we come to the final scene of the book we find a pouting prophet angry with God. 

And it’s this closing interaction between God and prophet that reveals not only what has been Jonah’s problem throughout, but also what may be our problem today.

What stopped Jonah from doing what God called him to do? Well, first we see that it’s not an understanding problem. The reason for Jonah’s rebellion wasn’t a lack of information or clarity. That wasn’t his issue.

He prayed to the Lord and said, “Please Lord, was not this what I said while I was still in my own country? Therefore in order to forestall this I fled to Tarshish, for I knew that You are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, and one who relents concerning calamity.

After begrudgingly delivering God’s warning message to evil Nineveh, Jonah watched as God “relented concerning the calamity which He had declared He would bring upon them.” God showed mercy, a mercy that ticked off Jonah who now turns to God and says, “Listen up while I tell you why I’ve been so mad and why I’m still mad now.” 

And what’s the reason he gives? The reason he’s so angry with God is that he knows God. Like his statement to the sailors in chapter 1, this prayer in 4:2 is full of good theology. Jonah knows well the God he has run from, the God with whom he is unhappy, and the God to whom he now speaks. It’s because he knows God and God’s character, that he ran away in the first place, trying to delay what he knew God would probably do, that is, be who he is: “gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, and one who relents concerning calamity.”

Not only did Jonah not reflect God’s compassionate character, but he’s angry with God for having a consistently compassionate character.

Jonah’s problem was not an understanding problem. He knew God, he knew God’s character, he knew God’s assignment. He couldn’t claim ignorance.

And neither can we. There may be a season when a Christian, being new to the faith, is learning about God like drinking from a fire-hydrant. But as months and years pass, claims of ignorance become less legitimate. 

It’s like someone who gets arrested for stealing insisting they didn’t know theft was a crime. Either they’re lying and did know or they’re telling the truth and should’ve known. Either way, they’re guilty.

We serve a God who has revealed himself, his character, his will, his plan, and his purposes. Even those who ignore God’s self-revelation, Paul writes in Romans 1, “are without excuse” because creation itself screams with clarity God’s “eternal power and divine nature.”

God’s people are to reflect God’s compassion to the world. When we fail to do that, it’s not for lack of information. It’s not an understanding problem that Jonah had and that we have. What we find as we keep reading is that, actually, it’s a submission problem.

But it greatly displeased Jonah and he became angry.

Literally, the Hebrew reads “It was very evil to Jonah.” Jonah looked at Nineveh’s repentance and God’s mercy and says: “That’s wicked!” 

Just as God declares in the NT that all “have fallen short” of God’s standard, so here Jonah says God has fallen short of Jonah’s standard. 

The prophet sees God’s compassion on display and declares it unjust, “evil,” and, because of that, probably sees his own anger as righteous indignation. As a prophet, Jonah’s job was to speak God’s words but here he has the audacity to condemn God’s actions. He has put God on trial and declared him guilty.

“Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for death is better to me than life.”

Jonah would rather give up his life than live in a world where Ninivite lives are spared. But, just like on the ship, Jonah won’t do it himself and asks God to kill him. 

The Lord, rightly, questions this logic.

The Lord said, “Do you have good reason to be angry?” Then Jonah went out from the city and sat east of it. There he made a shelter for himself and sat under it in the shade until he could see what would happen in the city.

God’s question isn’t for God’s sake (he knows the answer) but for Jonah’s, that he might re-think his anger and submit his perceived moral high ground to God’s. But Jonah’s response is to camp outside the city, watch and hope the repentance won’t last or that God will come to his senses, see that Jonah is right, and destroy Nineveh after all.

You see, Jonah didn’t have an understanding problem, he had a submission problem. And that’s a problem we sometimes share, don’t we? When Christians struggle with leading the type of lives God’s calls us to live, it’s usually not because we don’t understand him or his will, it’s that we don’t like it. It clashes with what we desire, what we picture, with what’s easy, with what feels good, and with what the world says is right. It’s not an understanding problem, it’s a submission problem.

And we come by it honestly because the culture in which we live has a violent aversion to any authority beyond the self. Every truth claim—whether from government, teachers, parents, or experts in any field of study—every truth claim is put on trial by individual sensibilities, preferences, and experiences. It’s only true if I want it to be, if it doesn’t offend me, contradict me, inconvenience me. We’re encouraged to pursue and find and celebrate our truth, whatever that is. Parents, who are God-given authorities in the home, are told to listen to their children and let them guide their parenting. Political leaders know nothing, governmental documents are re-read in light of modern ideological movements, and God, if he exists at all, is made in our image and our likeness (not the other way around) and he exists only to affirm and encourage, never to correct or judge.

Any and every truth claim, no matter how patently obvious, can be—and we’re told should be—rejected, dismissed, mocked, and demonized if they run opposed to the new sherif in town: The self. If I don’t like any truth claim, I deny it, not because there’s evidence against it, but because there is no authority greater than me.

This is what the author of Judges was referring to when he lamented that “In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (21:25). There was no authority but the self. 

Likewise, back in Romans 1, Paul writes, speaking of sinful humanity: “For even though they knew God (not an understanding problem), they did not honor Him as God (it’s a submission problem) or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man (the self) ….”

In the time of the Judges, in the time of Paul, and in our time today, it’s the same thing. Humanity doesn’t have an understanding problem, we have a submission problem. God has revealed himself and instead of submitting as unto the perfect Authority and definer of reality that he is, humanity turns away, thinking ourselves really wise, but in actuality proving ourselves unspeakably foolish.

And because this is the water in which we swim (because this anti-authoritarianism is all around us), even as God’s people we must battle this submission problem. Jonah had to as well, didn’t he?

Getting back to the actual text of Jonah we find that the book closes with God trying to solidify this lesson in the mind of his prophet through the use of an object lesson. 

So the Lord God appointed a plant and it grew up over Jonah to be a shade over his head to deliver him from his discomfort. And Jonah was extremely happy about the plant. 

But God appointed a worm when dawn came the next day and it attacked the plant and it withered.

When the sun came up God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on Jonah’s head so that he became faint and begged with all his soul to die, saying, “Death is better to me than life.”

Then God said to Jonah, “Do you have good reason to be angry about the plant?” And he said, “I have good reason to be angry, even to death.”

Then the Lord said, “You had compassion on the plant for which you did not work and which you did not cause to grow, which came up overnight and perished overnight. 

Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know the difference between their right and left hand, as well as many animals?”

God exposed the root of the issue. Jonah cares more about his own comfort and agenda than about anything else in this world, including his relationship with the God he knows so well.

In verse 9, God gives Jonah one last chance to see his own foolishness: “Are you serious about this plant, Jonah?” To which Jonah responds: “As serious as a heart attack.” 

Then God drops the hammer: “Let me get this straight: You love this plant so much—which you had nothing to do with and which comes and goes—and I, God Almighty, am not allowed, in your estimation, to have compassion on the people of Nineveh, whom I made and love? They have eternal souls!”

You see, Jonah knew God. That wasn’t his problem. His problem was he wasn’t submitting to God. Instead, he wanted God to submit to him; to do things his way, think the way he thought, care about the things he cared about, and, especially in this case, hate the things he hated. The prophet had it backwards. Jonah didn’t have an understanding problem, he had a submission problem.

The book of Jonah reminds us that God is a compassionate God who desires his people to reflect that compassion to the world. We are to do that obediently, consistently, indiscriminately, and now, in chapter 4, submissively—to default to God’s authority. We are to submit to him, his will, his character, his demands, his description of reality, his word, his rebuke, his correction, his church. We, as God’s people, are to reflect God’s compassion submissively. He’s God, we’re not. 

So, in the book of Jonah we’ve been called to obey and enjoy, to pray with God, and to love across all lines. As we come to the end of our study we’re met with a final invitation: We’re to Love ’til it hurts! Love ’til it hurts! We’re to love God and others to the point where we are having to sacrifice our own preferences and sensibilities on the altar of obedience to God. Love to the point where we empty ourselves of any entitlement or claim on our own lives. 

This may mean submitting to authorities God has put in place, relinquishing our precious autonomy. It may mean standing for a biblical truth around people who reject that reality and the authority of Scripture. It may mean obedience to God even when we don’t like it, feel like we don’t agree with it, or want to explain and justify away our rebellion. This is loving ’til it hurts! 

Jesus clearly said “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it” (Matt 16:24–25). That verse hurts! Self-denial hurts. Cross-carrying hurts. Life-abandonment hurts. But, according to Christ, and as we’ve seen negatively in Jonah, it’s the way to true life. So, we love ’til it hurts, submitting all we are, all we think, all we plan to the One who has authority anyway.

This week, I suggest that you re-read the last two verses of the book of Jonah every day and let its open-endedness haunt you and guide your prayers. 

Then the Lord said, “You had compassion on the plant for which you did not work and which you did not cause to grow, which came up overnight and perished overnight. Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know the difference between their right and left hand, as well as many animals?”

We’re left hanging for a reason, because God’s question is not only directed to Jonah, but at you and I as well. Do we care for that which God cares for, submitting our emotions, dreams, preferences, sensibilities, and everything else to him, or do we, like his prophet, expect God to bend to ours? Do we put him on trial. Are there commands of God that, if I’m honest, make me blush? Things he’s said that I don’t agree with? Do we look at that which he commands and does and call it “evil”? Let these two Spirit-inspired verses search your heart this week and reveal anything Jonah-like that needs to be dealt with, confessed to God, and covered with his forgiveness.

The book of Jonah is an invitation to the abundant life God wants us to live, a life of blessing, usefulness, significance, worth, power, love, grace, excitement, peace, reconciliation, and joy. 

It’s an invitation to an intimate relationship with the Creator and Sustainer of all things.

It’s an invitation to impact the world in which we live in the only sustainable and significant way that there is—by reflecting God’s character, by God’s power, with God’s message, and for God’s glory.