By J. Vernon McGee
Now I want to write Luke 11:30 over this section:
For as Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites, so also the Son of Man will be to this generation.
Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites. When this man arrived in the city of Nineveh, he not only had a message, he was a message. He was a sign to the Ninevites. And that is something to keep in mind as we get into this third chapter of the Book of Jonah.
We read here in the first verse, "Now the word of the LORD came to Jonah the second time...." I know some folk who consider this verse their favorite verse in the Bible. You may wonder why this could be the favorite verse of anyone. Suppose our government had commissioned a man, for instance a general, to carry a message, and he disobeyed as Jonah did. What would be done with him? They would dismiss him, wouldn't they? Would they trust him with orders a second time? I don't think so. I asked a friend of mine who was one of the vice presidents of the Bank of America in San Francisco, "Harry, if you had a cashier in one of these thousand and one branches you have, and he absconded with all the funds and then returned after spending the money down in Mexico, would you take him back and give him another chance?" He said, "Absolutely not! He had his chance. We would never give that man another chance--never again trust him with any money." I do not know, but I have a notion that would be the policy of every corporation in this country. And I'm sure many churches would never give a man a second chance. Aren't you glad, beloved, that God will give you a second chance? "The word of the LORD came to Jonah the second time." It's wonderful, isn't it! God gave him a second chance.
A schoolteacher spoke to me when I was teaching the Book of Jonah at Mt. Hermon. Teachers always have had the faculty of asking me questions I couldn't answer! On this particular morning she came with this question: "Dr. McGee, suppose Jonah had bought a ticket again for Tarshish and started out, what then?" Well, I had never thought of that, so I said to the lady, "The only thing I can think of is that there would be another fish out there waiting for him--or maybe the same one. I'm confident that this man is going to Nineveh. 'The word of the LORD came to Jonah the second time,' and since he is God's man, I don't think it will be necessary for it to come to him the third time."
In a parallel situation, I have never read of the prodigal son asking his dad to stake him the second time or the third time to go out into the far country. He had one fling and that was it, because he was a son of the father. And Jonah, this backsliding prophet, is now on the way to Nineveh, I can assure you of that. And he is going there to give God's message. "The word of the LORD came to Jonah the second time."
I like to think of our God as the God of the second chance. He gives us a second chance. And, by the way, He gives us more than two. I'm working somewhere up in the hundreds. I do not know exactly where, but I'm working way up there. God has been so gracious to me! He gives us many chances, and He has always done that. For instance, you may remember Jacob in the Book of Genesis. God had made wonderful promises to that man, yet he failed God again and again. But God would not let him go. And one night at the Brook Jabbok, God crippled his leg to get him. God would not give him up. He is the God of the second chance.
And then David, the sweet psalmist of Israel, committed an awful sin. And I do not know why, but over the years I've noticed the soapbox orators, whom I've heard as I have walked through the park, are usually preaching on David. They feel like God made a terrible blunder choosing David and letting him have a second chance. Without question the double sin he committed was awful. The Bible doesn't tone it down. But aren't you glad God gave him a second chance? If He had not, we wouldn't have Psalm 23; we wouldn't have Psalm 32; we wouldn't have Psalm 51; and we wouldn't have almost a hundred other psalms, for David wrote most of these psalms following that experience. And you don't read about David continuing to live in disobedience to God. David slipped, and God gave him a second chance. He is the God of the second chance.
And then Simon Peter, you remember, stumbled and fell. And our Lord had even warned him,
"... Simon, Simon! Indeed, Satan has asked for you, that he may sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail...." (Luke 22:31, 32)
God says, "I'll not give you up." And this man Simon Peter was given the privilege of preaching the first sermon on the Day of Pentecost when 3,000 men came to Christ. And God gave him a wonderful lifelong ministry. God did not give him up.
Also, John Mark is an example in the Scriptures of one who failed. He was on the first missionary journey with Paul and his uncle Barnabas, whose name means "son of consolation." But when John Mark looked out on that frightful wilderness of Asia Minor, he showed a yellow streak down his back, and he headed home to mama. So when they were ready for the second journey, Barnabas said, "Let's take John Mark with us again and give him another chance." In effect, Paul's response was, "Absolutely not! Do you think I would take a man who had so failed on the first missionary journey? I won't give him another chance." But Uncle Barnabas took him anyway. The team of Paul and Barnabas split over John Mark because Paul wouldn't have him. But Paul was proven wrong. And there came the day when Paul acknowledged it--in fact, in his swan song he wrote, "...Get Mark and bring him with you, for he is useful to me for ministry" (2 Timothy 4:11). Isn't that a wonderful thing--John Mark made good! God didn't give him up after his first failure. God gave him another chance.
After giving these messages on Jonah on a radio program in downtown Los Angeles many years ago, I received a letter from a doctor in Beverly Hills. He wrote: "Thank God for Jonah 3:1. That now is my favorite verse, and I'll tell you why." Then he told me his experience. He had been an officer in a church in Chicago, and some problem had arisen. Charges had been brought against him. He said he was not guilty at all, but everyone turned against him. He found no sympathy, no understanding from anyone in the church. So he walked out. He even moved his practice to Southern California and became a success out here, but he would never darken the door of a church. He said, "Never again!"
However he did listen to our radio program. And, friend, may I say to you, that has been the wonder of radio. We never know who is listening. We find that there are countless numbers of people who have never darkened the door of anyone's church, but they will listen to the radio. And that doctor was listening the night we came to this third chapter of Jonah. He said, "If God would give those men a second chance, He will give me a second chance." And this man came back to the Lord. So as a preacher I wrote a very professional letter and urged him to become active in some church, and he wrote back: "I've already done that!" May I say to you, the word of the Lord came to this doctor in our contemporary society the second time; and there are any number of people to whom the word of the Lord has come the second time, giving them a second chance. Only God will do that. And God will give you and me a second chance.
Putting It On the Line
So let's follow this man Jonah as God gives him a second chance and sends him into the city of Nineveh. We're told, "So the LORD spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land" (Jonah 2:10). At last he is out on the dry land, and we believe God has raised him from the dead.
Now the word of the LORD came to Jonah the second time, saying, "Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach to it the message that I tell you." (Jonah 3:1, 2)
And this man now will give one of the most startling messages that city ever heard.
So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the LORD. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, a three-day journey in extent. (Jonah 3:3)
Now if you were to go back to the nineteenth century, you would find writers of the school of higher criticism ridiculing this story, not just on account of the fish, but on account of the statements attributed to the Lord that Nineveh was a great city; and Jonah says it was an exceedingly great city! An ancient city of that size just wasn't possible at all, according to the critics, because anyone knows that the ancient cities--certainly one as prominent as Nineveh--would have had walls around them. Even Babylon in all of its glory was not a great city in size. It was compressed together, with very narrow streets, so that in time of a siege people could get inside of it. Babylon was walled in, and that had to be true of Nineveh, the critics reasoned; and in their view, by no means could it be said that it was an exceedingly great city.
Well, that was before Sir Austen Layard, the French archaeologist, and others with him were in Mosul. They could see across the Tigris River a very large tell or mound two and one-half miles long in the shape of a trapezium. These men began to make inquiry of the natives there and came to the conclusion it must be ancient Nineveh. When they began to excavate, they found that it was, indeed, the ancient city of Nineveh. But even with that discovery, the size didn't meet the measurements necessary for what Jonah was saying. So these men probed further and found there was a tremendous valley there, a valley that was filled not with just one city but quite a few of them; and three of them were prominent cities. You see, Nineveh was located at a juncture of the Tigris River and the upper Zab. It was the city farthest to the north. About twenty miles south of Nineveh, at another juncture of the upper Zab and the Tigris River, was the city of Calah. Then on the upper Zab and about ten miles east of Nineveh was the city of Khorsabad. Now there were other cities also in this area. It was low, rich land--in the South we would call it bottom land--which was easily farmed. And so this was a very rich and apparently irrigated area. It was the center of a tremendous population.
There's a very interesting passage in the Bible, way back in Genesis 10:11-12, which speaks of this particular area:
From that land he [Nimrod] went to Assyria and built Nineveh, Rehoboth Ir, Calah, and Resen between Nineveh and Calah (that is the principal city).
So we know now that Nineveh was a tremendous area by all standards. Even by today's standard it would be considered very large. Obviously, the man who wrote the Book of Jonah was an eyewitness. He had been there!
Frankly, I think it would correspond to the Los Angeles basin in many ways. They had natural fortifications with the Tigris River on the west, and on the south and to the east the Zab River; plus, there was a wall. As a result, this entire area could be protected from an enemy and was protected for many centuries. It was actually a flood of the Tigris River which took out a portion of the wall that finally permitted an enemy to come in and destroy this city. Nineveh was an exceedingly great city.
Now we are told here that Jonah entered the city:
And Jonah began to enter the city on the first day's walk. Then he cried out and said, "Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!" (Jonah 3:4)
This man comes into the city with this very startling message, a message that would shock the people. His only problem was, how would he get a crowd? He was not known in the city of Nineveh. The king didn't know him; none of the great people in Nineveh knew him, nor was there a committee to arrange for a campaign. So how did Jonah get a crowd? If you were a preacher you would worry about this. It would be of great concern to you, especially in these days of apostasy. How would a prophet of God, going into the pagan city of Nineveh, get a crowd?
Well, let me call you back now to this man Jonah who had spent three days inside a fish with the gastric juices working upon the epidermis of this backsliding prophet. I can tell you that he was a mess when he came out of that fish!
I have given one account of a man being swallowed by a fish near the Falkland Islands. But, let me briefly give you another. Dr. Harry Rimmer, President of the Research Science Bureau in Los Angeles, writes of another case. "In Literary Digest we noticed an account of an English sailor who was swallowed by a gigantic Rhinoden in the English Channel. Briefly, the account stated that in an attempt to harpoon one of these monstrous sharks the man fell overboard, before he could be picked up again, the shark turned and engulfed him. Forty-eight hours after the accident occurred, the fish was sighted and slain. When the shark was opened by the sailors, they were amazed to find the man unconscious but alive! He was rushed to the hospital where he was found to be suffering from shock, and a few hours later was discharged as being physically fit."
Dr. Rimmer was in London, England, two years after that, and this man was being advertised as the Jonah of the twentieth century. When Dr. Rimmer went to see him, he noticed that he was very strange, in fact, startling looking! He didn't have a hair on his body, and his head looked like a billiard ball. His skin was covered with patches of a very peculiar yellowish brown color. Dr. Rimmer said you would notice him anywhere he'd go, and that was two years after he had been inside the fish.
Now Jonah spent three days inside a fish. (We don't think he was alive, but that's beside the point right at this moment.) Inside that fish the gastric juices had been working on him for three days and three nights, and now this man has come into the city. I want to tell you, he was a sight to see! And our Lord makes it very clear. He says, "As Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites ..." (Luke 11:30). I think when this man came to a street corner and stopped to wait for a street light, the people gathered around him and said, "Brother, where have you been?" And it didn't take him long to gather a crowd. He probably said to them, "I'm a man who has come back from the dead to bring you a message from God."
"You don't mean it!"
"I certainly do, and I'll tell you my experience." And he'd give them his experience, then say, "I'm back here to tell you that in forty days this city is to be destroyed." May I say to you, the entire population of that city began to listen to this strange-looking man.
Now let's get this down to where we can get hold of it. These things are real, you know. I think of that area where Nineveh was located as very much like Southern California where we are spreading out in every direction. Maybe that's true in your city. Suppose a man began in the city center and walked from corner to corner all the way to the outskirts. Don't you think that by the time he had gotten halfway the word would have spread until everybody was coming to hear what he had to say? Obviously this man Jonah was a sensation in the city of Nineveh! And our Lord says he was a sign to these Ninevites.
When God Relents
Jonah began to enter the city--a day's journey. He cried out with a startling message, "Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!" But even more startling than the message, more sensational than the fish or anything else in the story, is the reaction of the people.
So the people of Nineveh believed God... (Jonah 3:5)
And I want to say to you, friend, had I been the head of a mission board sending out missionaries in that day and somebody said to me, "Why don't you send one of your missionaries into Nineveh?" I would have said, "Let's forget that place. That's a godless city. They are the most brutal people in the world. There's no use sending a missionary there. It wouldn't do a bit of good!" I don't know but what you might say the same thing. You would look at the brutality and sin in that city and say it's hopeless. God didn't think so. God wanted a message brought to this city. And all it says here is that the people of Nineveh believed God.
Now think this over very carefully. Did you know that all God has ever asked any person to do is to believe Him? That's all. It's amazing today how easy it is to believe people. While we were away recently, we heard a rumor that our organist at the church had broken her arm on Thursday night. I told everybody she had broken her arm, because that's what I had been told. I just believed them. Then on Sunday morning, much to my chagrin, there she sat, playing the organ as usual. You may think I'm gullible anyway, and maybe I am; but I believed what I heard. Isn't it interesting that we readily believe what people say and yet find it difficult to believe what God says? "If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater...." (1 John 5:9). But these godless, brutal people of Nineveh believed God!
My friend, all that God ever asked any of us to believe is that He gave His Son to die on the cross for us; and if we will receive Him, God says, "I'll save you." All God asks a sinner to do is just to believe Him! And we're told that the people of Nineveh believed God. Someone says, "They were terrible people!" They sure were, and Jonah believed that for a long time, too, as we'll see in chapter 4 when we get to it.
So the people of Nineveh believed God, proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest to the least of them. Then word came to the king of Nineveh...
And this is amazing!
... and he arose from his throne and laid aside his robe, covered himself with sackcloth and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published throughout Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, "Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything; do not let them eat, or drink water."
All the way from the king on the throne to the peasant in the hovel, this entire city turned to God!
"But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily to God; yes, let every one turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands." (Jonah 3:5-8)
And this city was noted for its violence! Nineveh was hated throughout the world, probably more hated than any other nation in its day; but everyone turned from his violence and from his brutality. These people turned to God, and when they did, they turned from their evil ways.
Friend, there is nothing else like this on record anywhere. There has never been a great turning to God to equal this.
Why Nineveh?
Why did God choose this wicked city? The very interesting thing is that the examples given to us in the Scriptures are always extreme. Whom did God choose to save in the city of Jericho? He picked Rahab the harlot. I heard a man speaking on the radio the other day who sure cleaned up Rahab's character. He said she was merely an innkeeper running a motel. May I say to you, that's not what the Bible says. But God saved her, if you please. Why? Because she believed God.
And God saved the entire city of Nineveh--a brutal, pagan, heathen city--to let the Gentile world know He will save anybody who will turn to Him and believe Him. And, of course, that still holds good today.
Now the king's word went throughout Nineveh; and the entire city went into sackcloth and ashes, crying out to God for mercy because they believed God. And what did happen?
"Who can tell if God will turn and relent, and turn away from His fierce anger, so that we may not perish?" 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. (Jonah 3:9, 10)
God said He would destroy Nineveh, but He did not destroy Nineveh. The only prophecy of Jonah that we have recorded is, "Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!" But it wasn't overthrown. God did not destroy Nineveh. So, did Jonah give a wrong prophecy? No, it happened to be a right prophecy. Had God changed His mind? Was God wishy-washy?
Someone asked that of Dr. G. Campbell Morgan years ago in England: "Dr. Morgan, is God as changeable as a weather vane?" His reply was, "You used the wrong illustration. A weather vane is not changeable. It never changes. It operates according to a law that says it doesn't make any difference which way the wind will blow, the weather vane always points in the direction the wind is going. It is the wind that does the changing."
Who really changed? God or Nineveh? The weather vane turned to Nineveh because God will always save when people turn to Him. He has never changed. He will never change. And if they don't turn to Him, He will do what He promised--He will judge.
If you want the sequel to the story of Jonah, read the little prophecy of Nahum written a hundred years later. It is the judgment of Nineveh. By then the city had again turned from God, and this time they did not repent of it. The revival was gone. Judgment came, and Nineveh was left in ruins. Even the ruins were lost to civilization until the city was excavated in the nineteenth century. May I say to you, God never changes.
It does not matter which way the wind is blowing in your life, God never changes. He will save any sinner who will come to Him in faith. The writer to the Hebrews assures us that,
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. (Hebrews 13:8)
