Day 215- Today we are reading chapters 3-4 of Jonah/Yona.

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  Dawn Marie McAlister
  August 3, 2019 at 9:53 am  /

  I think Yona has just become one of my favorite books of the Bible. This book club has been such an awesome experience for me because I’ve sort of set aside a few of my typical habits when “reading” the Bible. I don’t usually just read it for what it says but because of the fast pace of the reading, I’ve had to do exactly that and that’s actually allowed me to see the words in a fresh way.

  So why does that suddenly make Yona one of my favorite books of the Bible? Because I just got to experience Yehovah’s “amazing grace” with the Ninevites in a way I’ve never done before. In the past I always had to play games with a certain theological understanding I had which dampened the force of what Yehovah did here. Today I experienced that force fully and I’m just a little giddy about it.

  Yona marches into town and announces the end of their existence because of their evil ways. The Ninevites waste no time in expressing their shame and admitting their guilt, which moves Yehovah to suspend His judgment of destruction. They didn’t have to convert, they didn’t have accept a new theology, they didn’t even have to stop worshiping their own gods. All they had to do was admit their evil ways and show their sorrow over those ways.

  The book ends with a poignant question: “And should not I care about Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not yet know their right hand from their left, and many beasts as well?!”

  Yehovah only sees what’s in the human heart because He cares a great deal about people no matter where they come from, no matter their age, no matter their religion. And He even cares about animals because they are His creation, too. I don’t have to jump through any of my old theological hoops to understand why Yehovah relented, He loved them and that’s all I need to understand.