Main idea: We often think that the moral of the Jonah story is, “You can run, but you can’t hide.” You’d better obey God or he will come after you. But that’s not quite right. Jonah was called to go on a mission trip. God wanted Jonah to proclaim God’s message to a group of people that he hated. Are there any groups that we “hate” (mistrust, don’t get along with) to whom God is calling us to reach out?
Jonah 3:1-5, 10
Jonah Goes to Nineveh
3 Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: 2 “Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you.”
3 Jonah obeyed the word of the Lord and went to Nineveh. Now Nineveh was a very large city; it took three days to go through it. 4 Jonah began by going a day’s journey into the city, proclaiming, “Forty more days and Nineveh will be overthrown.” 5 The Ninevites believed God. A fast was proclaimed, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth.
10 When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he relented and did not bring on them the destruction he had threatened.
