Love-The Story of Jonah

Sorry for not posting about weeks six and seven, but the end of camp was a busy and crazy time so having time to write was difficult. Over the next couple weeks or so I will be wrapping up this blog about my summer and sharing what and how different elements of camp impacted my life beyond the summer. The first way I am going to do this is by going through our bible study and sharing how God used the bible studies I taught every day all summer to re-shape and mold me.

I waited on the bible study packet with great anticipation in the months leading up to camp. I was anxious to see what the Lord was going to do through this bible study, so I was obviously on the edge of my seat waiting to see what scripture I would be teaching. So, the day camp and I opened the packed. The first scripture passage I came to was Day 1 where the theme was Love and the scripture was the entire book of Jonah. What a bummer--a story I've heard a million times and a story my students have heard a million times, right?

I will admit that because I knew the STORY well, I just skimmed over the commentary and scripture but during my skimming some things I had never thought about popped off the page at me. First, why WAS jonah so against going to Ninevah? Yeah its a bad place, yeah they hung captured heads after a victory in war, but was that the WHOLE reason? The answer, I discovered, was no. The commentary pointed out that the Hebrew people were extremely nationalistic; they believed that they were set apart and the reason Jonah didn't want to go was because he didn't want anyone else to be shown God's mercy like his people had and he knew as he says in Jonah 4:2-3 its the REASON he fled. The point of this in bible study was to make the students search out who in their communities, in their lives, in the world, that they have prejudice against, who is their Ninevah? who is MY Ninevah?

The fun question that I liked to ask my students each week was,
"So guys, what do you think the consequences of Jonah's disovedience to the Lord were?"
Their answer was the same each week: "being swallowed by a whale".
I asked, "was it?"
someone usually stuttered, "I......don't know"
From really reading I discovered that despite the conclusion I suspect most of us have that being swallowed was a consequence, it was in fact Jonah's saving grace. If God hadn't sent that whale, Jonah would have be engulfed and swallowed up by the waves.

The final big thing that I took away from this study was Chapter 4 of the book. In Chapter 4, Jonah throws a serious temper tantrum and to be honest I can't remember ever truly reading over chapter 4 before camp. The end of Jonah's story is a lot different than what I always learned as a kid, it does not end "and they all lived happily after." In fact, it ends without us knowing what happens at all. After Jonah throws a temper tantrum, God causes a vine to grow up and give shade for a brief time before causing a worm to eat it up. I knew that part of the story but what I didn't remember was HOW God used this to prove a point. Jonah gets mad about the plant being gone so God asks if he really has a reason to be angry. When Jonah says yes, God slams him by saying if you think you have reason to be angry about this plant you didn't create, this plant you only had for a brief moment in time, then why shouldn't I have compassion on Ninevah, a city I created of 120,000 people? And then the story ends. We don't know what Jonah says, how he responds, but we are left with God's lesson to him.

A quote from the monologue my great friend and roommate for the summer John Sickles performed every tuesday night sums up what i pulled from this lesson all summer long it says "God loves everyone, not just our friends". When are we gonna wake up and realize God loves that homeless man standing on the street corner, that prostitute, the people in China, our worst enemy, just AS MUCH as he loves us?