The theme for this week’s readings seems to be following God’s call. Jeremiah preaching what no one wanted to hear in the Old Testament reading and the first disciples being called in the New showcase that idea. Another example
comes to mind that is listed in other lectionaries as well: Jonah 3:1-10
And the word of Yahweh came to Jonah a second time, saying, 2 “Get up! Go to Nineveh, the great city, and proclaim to it the message that I am telling you.” 3 So Jonah got up and went to Nineveh according to the word of Yahweh. Now Nineveh was an extraordinarily great city—a journey of three days across. 4 And Jonah began to go into the city a journey of one day, and he cried out and said, “Forty more days and Nineveh will be demolished!” 5 And the people of Nineveh believed in God, and they proclaimed a fast and put on sackcloth—from the greatest of them to the least important. 6And the news reached the king of Nineveh, and he rose from his throne and removed his royal robe, put on sackcloth, and sat in the ashes. 7 And he had a proclamation made, and said, “In Nineveh, by a decree of the king and his nobles: “No human being or animal, no herd or flock, shall taste anything! They must not eat, and they must not drink water! 8 And the human beings and the animals must be covered with sackcloth! And they must call forcefully to God, and each must turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands. 9 Who knows? God may relent and change his mind and turn from his blazing anger so that we will not perish.”
10 And God saw their deeds—that they turned from their evil ways—and God changed his mind about the evil that he had said he would bring upon them, and he did not do it. — Jonah 3:1–10 (LEB)
When Jonah followed God’s call, he was able to be part of God’s plan and experience God’s love and mercy in action. And he hated it. The next (and final) chapter show Jonah’s displeasure with God’s actions toward a group of people
Jonah hated. He wanted them destroyed, not restored.
Are there any people we feel are beyond redemption? Any people we want God to destroy instead of change? Anyone we would be horrified, or at least disturbed, to think about seeing in Heaven? The answer for probably all of us is “yes.” Murderers, rapists, child molesters, and the like, are typical examples of people we want removed from society
permanently, both here and in the afterlife. But God continues to reach out, even to those we think aren’t worth saving.
Read the final chapter of Jonah to see how God brings him around to kingdom thinking. While you’re at it, read the preceding two chapters to see why Chapter 3 begins with the word of Yahweh coming to Jonah a second time. Jonah
(unlike Nineveh’s king) refused to follow God’s call the first time, and it didn’t work out very well for him. He tried traveling across the Mediterranean Sea beyond Yahweh’s reach (gods were considered local entities in the Ancient Near East), but that disastrous results.
How about us? Do we follow God’s call in our lives the first time? Or do we ignore it until it becomes the only choice that we seem to have left? Are we Jonah I or Jonah II?
God has a purpose for you and is calling you to do something that is specifically designed for you and the spiritual gifts he has provided to you. Some of you are already involved in various ministries (e. g., writing prayers each
week, creating quilts for the injured and infirm), and others are still discerning God’s call.
The fancy theological term for whatever thing God is calling you to do is “ministry.” A function of disciples is to train the saints for ministry:
And he himself gave some as apostles and some as prophets and some as evangelists nd some as pastors and teachers 12 for the equipping of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for building up the body of Christ…— Ephesians 4:11–12.
Saints, or “holy ones,” are those people called by Jesus to follow him as his disciples. In other words, you are all saints. And you all have ministries. That means God is calling you. Answer his call.
Your Brother in Christ,
Fr. Austin