Fourth Sunday of Epiphany
January 28, 2024

Grace Can Be a Problem

Tom Are Jr.
Interim Pastor

Jonah 3:1–4:5

I don’t remember the particular trip, but I was on a flight and I was reading Jonah. I didn’t realize that I was laughing, evidently enough to get the attention of the woman who was seated next to me. She could see that I was reading the Bible, and she appeared to be a bit concerned that I was laughing at scripture. She probably thought I was irreverent. I assumed she was Baptist. But come on, this is a funny story. Jonah is called and runs the other way. To get his attention again, God sends a storm that terrifies sailors with whom Jonah is traveling. They toss him overboard, and a fish eats him. And then the fish, evidently finding disobedient prophets to be a bit like food poisoning, vomits Jonah on the beach, and Jonah is happy about that. You can’t read that with a straight face. 

It was then that the word of God came to Jonah a second time. And this time, with the fish still fresh in his mind, Jonah decides to do what God calls him to do. Jonah obeys, but just barely. 

Jonah preaches, “Forty days more and Nineveh shall be overthrown.” That’s it. Jeremiah needs fifty-two chapters. Ezekiel about the same. Isaiah requires sixty-six chapters. But Jonah just needs eight words. The truth is most folks ignored Jeremiah, Ezekial, Isaiah, Amos, Hosea, and all the rest. Most folks ignored the prophets. But not Jonah. He speaks eight words, and the whole town comes singing “Just as I Am.”

Not only the people, but the king repents. And then it gets ridiculous as even the animals join in the act of repentance, fasting and wearing sackcloth. Be grateful it was not your job to fit oxen with sackcloth. 

As prophets go, Jonah should be in the hall of fame. 

But as we said last Sunday, Jonah would have given an arm and a leg if God had called someone else to preach to Nineveh. I can’t help but wonder if God calls Jonah not simply because Nineveh needs to hear what he has to say, but because Jonah needs to be the one to say it. These enemies of Israel not only need to hear this word from the Lord, but Jonah needs to preach the word of the Lord to his enemies. The citizens of Nineveh may need to learn who this God is, but it is also Jonah who needs to remember who his God is. 

As Jonah feared, the Ninevites repent and God forgives. And when that happens, Jonah throws a temper tantrum. Like a two-year-old who is astonished to discover that he is not always going to get his way, Jonah throws a fit. Now, to be fair, with two-year-olds sometimes even a tantrum can be cute — if it is someone else’s two-year-old. But Jonah is a full-grown man. It’s not cute. Jonah berates God: “I knew you would do this. This is the very reason I went to Tarshish — because you are nothing but merciful and gracious, and I can’t stand it when your grace is poured out on the wrong people. Just kill me now.” 

You would think that grace would be a good thing. But for Jonah, grace is a problem. But why? 

If I understand the text, it is because Jonah knows that God’s love is expansive. All inclusive. We are all God’s children. 

Jonah knows this in his head, but his worldview is shaped by another value. There is a teaching in the world that some folks matter more than others, that Lord Grantham of Downton Abbey matters more than Bates. Our nation, like most nations, was built on that conviction. Jonah’s Israel was built on that conviction. Yes, all people belong to God, but some people matter more than others. 

Jonah is mad because the love of God challenges the view that he, as part of the chosen people, matters more than his enemy. Jonah believes that grace is a good thing, but he needs grace to have limits. I get that. 

When I was in Kansas City we invited Sonia Warshawski to speak one evening at our church. A documentary film about her had just been released entitled Big Sonia. It was her story that was big; Sonia herself was not. Big Sonia is so short that when she carries groceries in those shopping totes, the totes drag on the ground. How she sees over the steering wheel of her car is somewhat miraculous. For her to speak from our lectern, we had to build a box for her to stand on. She was a tiny woman with big courage. 

She spoke of how almost all of her family were murdered in the Holocaust. She watched her own mother marched to the gas chamber as they were separated in line. Sonia went to the right, her mother to the left. Sonia never saw her again. 

After enduring three different camps, she survived. She still has the serial numbers on her arm, and she still has scars on her heart. She found her way to Kansas City, and for most of her life she buried that painful past. She told no one about it. But in recent years, she changed her mind. She said she began to hear voices of hatred in contemporary America and that sounded frighteningly similar to the voices she heard as a little girl; she decided to tell her story. 

She spoke to us of how loving one another is the only way forward, that hatred must be set aside. After she spoke, someone in the congregation asked her, “After all you have lost, how did you forgive them?” Sonia said, “I haven’t forgiven them. I don’t think I will ever forgive them.” And then she said, “God will have to do that.”

I cast no judgment on her feeling. She is stronger than I, and I have no reason to believe I would be half as gracious and loving as Sonia had I experienced even a portion of what she suffered. 

But I think she knew something that Jonah feared was true: there is no limit to God’s grace. Jonah knew that, and he hated it.

It’s interesting how when we are the recipients of grace, it seems almost reasonable. When we are the recipients of God’s love, it seems almost understandable. 

But to extend that grace to everyone?

Until this moment, Jonah could tell himself that he was different. He could tell himself that he was better than them. He could tell himself that his nation’s wars were unfortunate but necessary; his enemies’ wars were terrorism. Jonah’s failings were regretful, but his intentions were good; his enemies, on the other hand, were heartless and cruel. Until this moment Jonah could convince himself that he was more important to God than they were. But now God has treated them just like God treated Jonah. They are the same, and Jonah cannot stand it. 

Jonah has lived like relationship to God is an Olympic sport, and compared to them he has medaled and they have been disqualified. But it’s obvious that in God’s eyes that distinction is not really there. Jonah is troubled not because grace has come to those he deemed unworthy but because he realizes that no one is worthy of God’s grace. The evil Ninevites are not completely evil, and more shattering, Jonah is not as righteous as he would like to believe. He’s not more important, but he is arrogant. Not in the sense that he is boastful, but in the sense that he can’t help but believe that he matters more than they do. That kind of arrogance is a spiritual problem.

This is the challenge of this faith that we share. It challenges a basic assumption most humans carry, and that is, at the end of the day, I am more important than some others. This is a story that teaches if we can’t love our enemies, we should remember that God will. 

But it’s not just about enemies. It’s more basic than that. It’s the way of the world to identify those who matter and those who do not.

When my son graduated from college he moved to New York and lived in Brooklyn. Having not yet visited him there, I was asking about the specifics of where he was living. He said, “Dad, there is this really cool neighborhood in Brooklyn, and I live right next to that cool neighborhood.” I said, “Ah yes, the story of the Ares’ life. We can always see cool from where we are, but we are never there.” 

I went to a high school of more than 2000 students, and I was, for the most part invisible, at least three neighborhoods away from cool. But my junior year I tried out for the musical, West Side Story. I was cast as the leader of the Jets. What was his name? Biff, Rif, poof … I can’t remember. I had lines. I had to dance. I had to sing … “Get cool, boy.” 

When opening night came to conclusion and we stepped up to take our bows, the audience rose to their feet. When it was my time to take a bow, the applause thundered — I’m sure my memory here is completely objective — the walls were shaking. 

The next day, I walked through the halls of Lakeside High School just a little bit slower. I had just a little swagger in my step. And the little people — the ninth graders — would come up: “Was that you?” “You were so great, man.” I’d say ... well.

For about three days I convinced myself I was great. I walked among the ordinary folks of modest talent and, like Fred Craddock would say, had to hold on to the shrubbery just to keep from ascending. 

The temptation to think I am better than someone, that I am better than you, it is a powerful seduction. Even now, all these years after high school, I must keep a watchful eye on that inner adolescent, who hungers to matter more than others. 

It’s been a problem for a long time. The Greek philosopher Plato provided justification for such thinking. It was the order of creation, he remarked. People are ranked, like the medals given at the Olympics. There were the bronze medalists in life. They exist to serve the more important folks. They were slaves, immigrants, servants. There are silver-souled people as well. They are warriors and such. They provide great service to the city. And, of course, there are gold-souled people. They are the ones who think great thoughts and shape cultural life. How convenient for Plato, the philosopher, that the most important people in the world are philosophers. 

The world has been ranking people for a long time. Jonah may not have been an obedient prophet, but he was a good theologian, and he knew that God doesn’t rank us. With God there are no unimportant people. 

There are lots of people for whom the world has given them very little reason to believe that they are loved by God. They move through this world that ranks them as unimportant. They move through this world hated or just invisible. That’s why it’s the church’s job to tell them. They need to know that they are loved by God, that there are no unimportant people with God. It might save their life. 

And maybe just as importantly it will be important for us as the church to be reminded that the love of God includes all. God does not rank us. There are no unimportant people with God. Remembering that just might save our lives too. 

Sermon © Fourth Presbyterian Church