This will be our last week in Jonah.
We are diving into the very last exchange we see between Jonah and God in this Book.
“Jonah went out of the city and sat to the east of the city and made a booth for himself there. He sat under it in the shade, till he should see what would become of the city. Now the Lord God appointed a plant and made it come up over Jonah, that it might be a shade over his head, to save him from his discomfort. So Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the plant. But when dawn came up the next day, God appointed a worm that attacked the plant, so that it withered. When the sun rose, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on the head of Jonah so that he was faint. And he asked that he might die and said, “It is better for me to die than to live.” But God said to Jonah, “Do you do well to be angry for the plant?” And he said, “Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die.” And the Lord said, “You pity the plant, for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?” Jonah 4:5-11 (ESV)
This passage is hard for me to read without reflexively rolling my eyes at Jonah’s dramatic responses to God.
But the more I read it, the more I realize how incredibly sad it is.
Jonah did not love the people of Nineveh, nor did he care about their wellbeing. In fact, he wished destruction on them and was disappointed that God showed them mercy and love.
And in the heat of the day, Jonah’s heart still longed for his own comfort over loving the people God sent him to. So much so that he genuinely grieved over a plant while still wishing doom on an entire city full of people.
And then I started thinking. God’s called me to love the people in the place I am in.
Just as He’s called all of us to love those around us.
But, do my prayers consistently reflect a love for other people more than, or at least as much as, my love and desire for my own comfort?
As I started feeling guilty that my recent prayers have been more about me, my family, and how my life is going, God reminded me of what He tells us in His Word:
1 John 4 says,
“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.”
1 John 4:7-8 (ESV)
“No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.” 1 John 4:12 (ESV)
“Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.” 1 John 4:15-16 (ESV)
Not only is God the Creator of love, but He is love. So unless we go to Him, we do not know what love is and we cannot give love to others.
I cannot read these verses and assume that perfect love will just well up inside of me for all the people God has for me to show love to.
Look at Jonah.
He had the perfect opportunity to bring the love of God to that city. He brought the message of warning from God, which in turn still turned their hearts to Him, yet had no love for these people.
I would like to think that I can muster love for all people on my own, but apart from God my love is finite, self-seeking, and often blind to those around me who are outside of my constant bubble.
My two year old, JJ, is in a phase where he’s trying to understand loving others in his own toddler way. We are constantly having conversations that go something like this:
“I don’t like Ace.” (Ace is his brother.)
“Why do you say you don’t like Ace? Did he do something naughty?”
“No, I don’t like Ace. I like Daddy.”
“Oh, JJ you can like more than one person sweety. Just because you like one friend, doesn’t mean you don’t like another friend.”
“Mommy, I just like Daddy.”
It’s a constant battle. But, it’s gotten me thinking about how on our own our love for others tends to be selective while eventually cutting others out.
Our capacity for loving others on our own is finite.
We need God to abide in us, and us in Him, in order to love others.
Not just to love those that are hard for us to love (as we will speak into more directly next week). But truly for us to love anyone around us.
In John 15, Jesus is describing to His followers the contrast of how their lives look if they abide in Him compared to if they do not. He says,
“I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.” John 15:5 (ESV)
And later says, “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” John 15:12 (ESV)
This kind of love is impossible for us to sustain on our own. We need Him to abide in us as we abide in Him so that we can love the way that He has asked of us.
We are all called to love the people where we are.
But, if we are closed off to them, we won’t care about them. We’ll continue our lives without any love for the ones God’s placed us close to in order to show them love. To show them who He is.
We end up living our lives just as cold toward people as Jonah did.
This week, let’s spend time asking God to cultivate a love within us for the people around us.
How many people do you come across in a matter of a few days that you don’t give a second thought about? This isn’t a guilt trip to make us try harder to muster love for everyone.
It’s to open our eyes that we can’t conjure up love for everyone on our own. We have to be intentional about asking God to do the impossible inside of us and abide in us so that His love can be perfected in us as His Word says.
What if instead of only praying for the people we care about, we prayed so that we would care more about all the people around us?
Let’s pray this week that God would pop our bubbles and open our eyes to who’s around us.
Week Five’s Challenge: Pray for the people you come into contact with this week. At the grocery store, appointments, workplace coworkers and customers, the person who delivered your mail, your neighbor you saw out your window. Everyone. Make a note of the people you come into contact with, and then intentionally pray for them, that God would give you a love for them from Himself.
Father, show us what you can do within our hearts towards other people. Open our eyes to see the people around us how You see them and give us Your love for them that can only be explained by abiding in You, and You in us.
From one of His children to another,
Christi