Sermon on Jonah 3:1-5,10, for the 3rd Sunday after Epiphany, "God Relented"
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. One of the most fascinating stories in the Old Testament is the prophet Jonah. Jonah happens to be the only prophet Jesus directly compares Himself to, and He says the Sign of all signs that will prove who Jesus is, would be the Sign of His three day burial and resurrection. Jesus says this was foreshadowed by the 3 days and nights Jonah was in the belly of the whale. Jonah lived about 800 years or so before Jesus, during the time when Assyria was the mega power in the Middle East, and had a reputation for its terrifying armies and the total destruction they brought on conquered lands. Nineveh, the capital city, was the heartland of the wicked empire that spread violence across the Middle East, even to Israel. It’s not too hard to figure out why Jonah didn’t want to obey God’s command to go there and cry out against their evil. The prophet Jonah can teach us a lot about ourselves. Instead of obeying God, Jo...