Jonah 3

WEEK    25                                              Jonah 3

THURSDAY  Reflections

Jonah went this time when God told him to. He gave the message but just barely and left. He didn't preach to the whole city, try to instruct them on repenting, or tell them how to get right with God. He just said that they were going to be destroyed (turned over) in 40 days.

 

The Spirit of God had to move on these pagan people because, without instruction, they repented in sackcloth and ashes (ways to show grief and remorse). They were not going to take any chances and even clothed their animals with sackcloth and ashes. These people believed, and since the proclamation was for forty days, I assume they wore these types of clothes the whole time. If you have ever held sackcloth and felt how uncomfortable it is, you can understand that these people were serious. 

Jon 3:1-10
(1)  And the word of the LORD came unto Jonah the second time, saying,
(2)  Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.
(3)  So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the LORD. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days' journey.
(4)  And Jonah began to enter into the city a day's journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
(5)  So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.
(6)  For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes.
(7)  And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water:
(8)  But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands.
(9)  Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger, that we perish not?
(10)  And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.

Photo by Ahna Ziegler on Unsplash