It’s remarkable that Jonah is in the Bible at all, given how negatively this prophet is portrayed.  But God is honest with us, even when it’s deeply unflattering toward his people (just think how Jesus’ disciples are pictured!).  In 4:1-3, Jonah lashes out against God, angry over mercy shown to sinful Gentiles when a stunning revival sweeps through Nineveh.  It’s like Jonah is trying to tell God how to be God and act like God!  Such audacity!  

How did Jonah stray so far from God’s heart?   Apparently by clinging to a half-truth.   A profoundly important “half” of biblical reality is that God chose Israel to be his people and to receive his favor.  Jonah was committed to this fact—and rightly so.  

But the other “half” of the story is God’s ultimate aim in entering into a covenant with Abraham and Sarah and their descendants:   they were blessed to be a blessing (Genesis 12:1-3).  For Israel to receive God’s special favor was never intended as an end in itself, but a means to a greater end, namely, that “in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (12:3). 

God’s heart for the nations is a redemptive drumbeat pulsing through the Old Testament, from the Law to the Psalms to the Prophets.  Consider God’s word to Pharaoh in Exodus 9:16, “For this purpose I have raised you up, to show you my power, so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth.”   And Psalm 67:3, “Let the peoples praise you, O God; let all the peoples praise you!”  And Isaiah 49:6, “I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”  Plus so many more texts!  This is the “half” that Jonah missed.

The Book of Jonah ends with a question:  will he repent and share God’s heart of compassion for lost sinners from the ends of the earth, or will he stand firm in the sad space of his ethnocentric pride?  We’re not told.  And maybe that’s so we’d ask the question of ourselves:  do we share God’s heart for the world?