Jonah goes and preaches to the people of Nineveh and he does a great job. He delivers God's message to the best of his ability. He understands what it means and communicates it effectively to all the people.
Unfortunately he appropriates the job and the message as his own! It is a familiar scenario. When one gets so involved in a task, even though it is not of one's own responsibility, one is likely to treat the task and everything involved in it personally. So naturally when God changes his mind and does not bring about the destruction he has promised, Jonah is upset. Perhaps if I were in his place, I too would have felt the same.
Take the unlikely scenario of God carrying out what he initially planned to do to Nineveh. Destroy it. Then naturally Jonah would go about saying, "See, I told them so!" He would have happily taken the credit. That's how we humans normally work: quick to take credit for success but reluctant to acknowledge failure.
What Jonah suffers from is a typical sickness of religious and priests. Taking God's work as one's own, leaving nothing to God! The former part of the process is good, not the latter. We need to realise that God is incharge. It is primarily his work that we are upto.
Unfortunately he appropriates the job and the message as his own! It is a familiar scenario. When one gets so involved in a task, even though it is not of one's own responsibility, one is likely to treat the task and everything involved in it personally. So naturally when God changes his mind and does not bring about the destruction he has promised, Jonah is upset. Perhaps if I were in his place, I too would have felt the same.
Take the unlikely scenario of God carrying out what he initially planned to do to Nineveh. Destroy it. Then naturally Jonah would go about saying, "See, I told them so!" He would have happily taken the credit. That's how we humans normally work: quick to take credit for success but reluctant to acknowledge failure.
What Jonah suffers from is a typical sickness of religious and priests. Taking God's work as one's own, leaving nothing to God! The former part of the process is good, not the latter. We need to realise that God is incharge. It is primarily his work that we are upto.
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