Three Days in the Belly

The other day I was thinking about the Biblical figure of Jonah.

Many people know the story—Jonah and the whale. Of course, in the Bible, it is a big fish.

This is a point I made in Sunday school once, and it irritated my teacher. I said—quite rightly, I feel—that if the Bible is God’s word and God created the animals, then we can safely assume that God would know the difference between a whale (warm-blood mammal) and a big fish (cold-blooded). My teacher was not impressed, and frankly, neither was I. It was only a matter of time before I lost interest in Sunday school. A small point with big implications.

The story of Jonah, though, is that he was told by God to go to Nineveh and warn them that if they did not change their ways, then God was going to destroy them.

But, Jonah wasn’t particularly bright, it seems, as he decided to “flee from the presence of the LORD” and go to Tarshish. He boarded a ship at Joppa and off they sailed for Tarshish. This resulted in a storm that God brewed up to stop him.

The men on board the ship were afraid that they were all going to die, so they went and found Jonah who was sleeping below deck. They were angry that he could sleep during a storm. Finally, they all cast lots to see who was causing the raging tempest. Of course, the lot fell on Jonah.

He admitted that it was his fault for going to Tarshish instead of Nineveh, and he told them to toss him overboard. They refused. Jonah insisted. Off he was thrown.

To save him, God caused a big fish to swallow him and hold him in its stomach for three days and three nights. In the guts of the fish, Jonah prayed to God, and God spared him. Eventually, the fish “vomited out Jonah upon dry land.”

In Sunday school, often, this is where the story ends. Jonah disobeyed. God punished him but spared him from dying by providing a big fish to swallow him up and protect him from the depths of the sea.

Clearly, this was a fish large enough that he could breathe for three days and three nights. It makes you wonder what such an experience must be like. Very moist, I suppose.

But there is much more to the story.

When Jonah finally recovers from his big fish ordeal, he ventures off to Tarshish—like he was supposed to—and warns them that if they don’t change their ways, then God will destroy them in forty days.

Immediately, the people repent. They turn from their “evil ways,” wear sackcloth, and cry out to God.

Is Jonah happy? Does he share in this miracle? Is he elated to see people turning to his God at such a dire hour?

No, he’s pissed.

He goes and sits down and prays for God to take his life.

God allows a plant to grow up and shade Jonah from the sun. Then, God allows a worm to kill the plant. Then, he creates a hot, sunny day and scorching wind to beat down on Jonah’s uncovered head.

What does Jonah want? To die again.

God says, “Are you mad about the plant dying?”

Jonah replies, “I am greatly angry, even unto death.”

So, God says, “'Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for which thou hast not laboured, neither madest it grow, which came up in a night, and perished in a night; and should not I have pity on Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand, and also much cattle?”

This is where the book of Jonah ends, on God putting Jonah in his place.

Jonah reminds me of some Christian people these days. They sit around in insular lives—homeschooled children (or children in private Christian schools), church two to three times a week, completely shut down from people who do not agree with them. They look at people who are “sinners” living their untouched lives, and they can’t wait to “go home.” They say the world is “screwy” and “nothing is as it should be.”

And there they sit, like Jonah, in their living rooms each night, arms crossed, pronouncing judgment, complaining, essentially just waiting to die, only associating with other Christians, criticizing everything, angry that God has not “punished” the world yet.

I have received emails telling me I am an abomination and that I am distracted by smoke from the “pit of hell” because of the way I live my life. I am judged by people who lament the world and cannot wait to “die” and be in Heaven.

These people are like Jonah.

We never find out if Jonah learns how to be happy and not desire the suffering of other people—even those who have “sinned” and turned from God.

A few nights in the belly of a big fish didn’t change him. Having God speak directly to him didn’t change him.

It makes you wonder what people need to go through in order to learn compassion and to actually listen to what God is saying.