Quinguagesima
Dear friends in Christ. In our text today we meet one of the more famous OT prophets, Jonah. God had commanded him to go to the far off city of Nineveh to call the people to repentance. What made this so shocking to Jonah was that Nineveh was a city of non-Jews—Gentiles. Satan had so corrupted the thinking of many of the Israelites that they thought God only cared about the Jews; that salvation was only for them. And now Jonah is to go to preach to these people so that they might be saved? On top of that, Nineveh was the capital city of the Israelites’ enemies, the Assyrians; in fact, it was the Assyrians who would go in and conquer the northern kingdom and threaten Jerusalem.
So when God calls Jonah to preach to the people of Nineveh—calls him to this mission to the Gentiles—Jonah runs and takes a boat in the opposite direction. That’s when the Lord raises up a storm and the sailors throw Jonah overboard and the Lord raised up a large fish to swallow Jonah. Jonah, in the belly of the beast, prayed the Lord to rescue him and three days later the fish vomits up Jonah on dry ground. Jonah then goes to Nineveh to preach.
The story doesn’t end there, though. As a result of Jonah’s preaching, the people actually recognized their sin and repented. These non-Jews, these Gentiles, recognized and sorrowed over their sin—something the Israelites back in Jonah’s homeland refused to do and which caused God to punish them later by the Assyrians. This did not please Jonah. He would rather have seen Nineveh, these non-Jews, the enemy, destroyed. Then God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God relented from the disaster that He had said He would bring upon them, and He did not do it. But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he became angry.
Today we stand at the threshold of the season of Lent. For many Lent’s deep penitential reflection, its call to recognize and repent of sin, its attention to Jesus’ suffering and death is an unpleasant thing. The world around us, and even our old self within us, wants to have “fun”, “pleasure”; it seems that Christians are a kill-joy as we focus on sin and repentance; it seems that God is just mean for calling on us to repent—taking away happiness from us; the Christian’s life of repentance –especially Lent—seems, to many, to be “a downer.”
But, dear Christian, as we are about to enter the Lenten season, let us remember that yes, indeed, God does call us to recognize and sorrow over sin, but it is God in His mercy that calls us to repent. We see this with Jonah. Jonah’s message of repentance was rather blunt, summarized in a few words: Yet 40 days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown. But why did God call Jonah to preach this message to the people of Nineveh? –Because He wanted them to repent of their sin so that they would not be overthrown, destroyed; He wanted to bless them with earthly blessing—the continuation of their city and empire—and spiritual blessing—the forgiveness of sins and eternal life.
Now, extend that to us: why does God want us every day, but especially now in Lent, to examine our hearts and lives in the light of His holy law, to recognize our sin, to sorrow over our sin and turn to Him for forgiveness? The same reason He did the people of Nineveh—because He is merciful.
In fact, the very reason that we can observe Lent is because God is merciful. He didn’t give the people of Nineveh what they earned and deserved by their sin; and He doesn’t give us what we earn and deserve for our sin. Instead, in mercy, He sent them Jonah to call them to repent; to us He gives His word and faithful preachers of that word calling us to repent. The very fact that there is a Lent, that God calls us to repent, means that He is merciful; it means that what He says is true [Ez. 33.11]: I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. God’s mercy at work is Lent, His calling us to repent!
“To turn from his way,” to do a complete 180 is repentance. Our text: Then God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way. The people of Nineveh were truly sorry for their sin; they comforted themselves with the grace God promised them in the coming Savior from sin, Jesus Christ. In that faith that trusted in God to forgive them their sin they did the good works.
Of course, the same thing applies to us. We can observe Lent because God is merciful and so calls us to turn from our sins: to recognize them and be sorry that we have gone against His holy will and to trust in the forgiveness of those sins by the work of Jesus. In our joy of the certainty of that forgiveness, we, then, by the power of the Holy Spirit, strive to live a life more and more in accord with the will of God and more and more free of sin. That’s turning from our evil way. What a glorious motivation and example for us: as God spared the people of Nineveh when they turned to Him in repentance, so is He ready to show mercy to all who repent and turn to Him for forgiveness.
There is Lent because God is merciful. Lent’s foundation is the mercy of God. Lent and its repentance is a good thing: it throws us back to the mercy of God.
Our text: and God relented from the disaster that He had said He would bring upon them, and He did not do it. In mercy, God relented; that is, He had compassion and withheld His judgment. What does this mean? It means that God’s mercy dominates, not immutable justice. If God did not, or did not want to show mercy, He would not call us to repent; there would be no reason or point to Lent. But rejoice, dear Christian! There is Lent! God wants to be merciful to us; He wants His grace to dominate; He does not want to pour out His justice. We do well this upcoming season of Lent to hold God to His word and promise to forgive, to relent from pouring out His justice on us. He wants us to do that—that’s why the call to repent; that’s why Lent!
The glorious thing is that God’s mercy is so great. The forgiveness He gives us is total and complete. Our text: So Jonah went out of the city and sat on the east side of the city. There he made himself a shelter and sat under it in the shade, till he might see what would become of the city. When Jonah completed his preaching, he watched to see what would happen—probably expecting the fire and brimstone of God’s justice and wrath to destroy the city. To be sure, he probably heard of the king’s decree to repent; he probably saw the outward signs of repentance. But would that be enough to make up for their sins? Their pains of repentance certainly were not equal to their offenses. But so great is God’s mercy that there is total, complete forgiveness for all their sin.
What a glorious foundation of Lent! We, from our end, could never “make up for” or pay the price for our sins. Our repentance is not such a good work that God “has” to forgive our sin; it is not that it is so valuable that it “earns” God’s forgiveness. Instead, God is merciful and because of that He can and does fully and freely forgive us our sins. Forgiveness is not “piece-meal” as if we do our part and God does His. Instead, recognizing and being sorry for our sins, we, in faith, come before God as beggars and ask Him to forgive us our sin; faith, like a poor beggar, clings to God’s promise to forgive us our sins in Christ. And, lo and behold, in mercy God forgives us our sin for Jesus’ sake. Our repentance is not a work that, like on a scale, balances our sins. The foundation of our repentance is God’s mercy, His promised forgiveness. Because God has promised us complete forgiveness of sin in Christ, He calls on us to repent because He wants His mercy to dominate, not His justice. Because of God’s mercy there’s Lent!
2. The other reason that we can observe Lent is because of God’s loving-kindness, His devoted love toward us. Again our text: You are a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and abundant in loving-kindness, One who relents from doing harm. God is merciful toward us because of His love for us.
Our text: And the LORD God prepared a plant and made it come up over Jonah, that it might be shade for his head to deliver him from his misery. So Jonah was very grateful for the plant. But as morning dawned the next day God prepared a worm, and it so damaged the plant that it withered. And it happened, when the sun arose, that God prepared a vehement east wind; and the sun beat on Jonah's head, so that he grew faint. Then he wished death for himself, and said, "It is better for me to die than to live." Then God said to Jonah, "Is it right for you to be angry about the plant?" And he said, "It is right for me to be angry, even to death!" But the LORD said, "You have had pity on the plant for which you have not labored, nor made it grow, which came up in a night and perished in a night. And should I not pity Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred and twenty thousand persons who cannot discern between their right hand and their left--and much livestock?"
Here God shows Jonah that the loss of a lowly vine so deeply affected him. The natural question, then, is: if you, Jonah, are so deeply affected by the death of a plant—one that you didn’t even plant, fertilize, or water— how do you think it affects, Me, God, when people whom I created die in their sins? Here is the love of God. Let us take it a step further: Jonah was deeply affected by that plant’s death because it benefited him; it gave him shade. Jonah was motivated by his own self-interest, not love. God, though, is motivated by His love of us, of all His creation. We can observe Lent not only because of the mercy of God but also because of His devoted love, his loving-kindness toward us.
What does Scripture say? Not only does God love the 120,000 people of Nineveh but, in fact: God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. God’s love and His mercy belong together and together they form the basis/ foundation of Lent.
In love for us sinners the Father sent His Son to be our Savior. In love for us sinners the Son became also one of us and was born of the virgin. He became one of us and in love for us sinners placed Himself under God’s holy law to obey it fully for us; to give that perfect obedience God’s justice demands of us but which we, because of our sin, cannot give. In love for us sinners, Jesus, the Son of God, also took upon Himself all of our sins and there on the cross suffered for our sins God’s wrath and punishment; He endured on the cross that absolute justice of God in our place. Because Jesus perfectly paid the price for our sin and His sacrifice was perfect and accepted by the Father, He rose from the dead Easter Sunday!
Because of Jesus and His work—His life, suffering and death—God can be and is merciful. There can be Lent! There can be that call to repent. Because God’s demand that His holy will be perfectly kept and that sin be punished—and Jesus did both for us—God can be and is merciful to us. His stern immutable justice has been fulfilled. Now, to us sinners God can be and is gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and abundant in loving-kindness, One who relents from doing harm.
Dear Christian, let us use the upcoming Lenten season rightly—as a time to make use of our Lord’s mercy and love for us. Because He is slow to anger and abundant in loving-kindness He calls us to repent. He works now on our hearts by His holy word and sacraments to bring us to faith and to keep us in that one true saving faith that looks to and trusts in Jesus and His saving work for us. We are still sinners and so we need Lent, time that our Lord gives us to recognize our sin, sorrow over that sin and trust in Jesus and receive His holiness and righteousness. We take great comfort from the Ninevites in our text as we, too, daily but especially in Lent, enjoy/ make use of the mercy of God and His loving kindness. For He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abundant in loving-kindness. INJ Amen.