Jonah and me, we both agree....sort of

So before all of you grammar people start freaking out, yes I do know that the verbage should be "Jonah and I, we both agree," or perhaps "Jonah and I agree." But let's be honest, my way is catchier, and it rhymes!! :)

Anyway, so today in our staff meeting David gave a devo about the story of Jonah. He talked about how Jonah had such a bad attitude with what God was asking him to do. This is what I remember from the devo...of course these are my words, not David's! Jonah got frustrated when the people repented. He got even more frustrated when God had compassion on them. He became indignant and decided to pout out in the desert. Then when God was kind enough to give him some shade, he started to perk up. But God sent a worm to eat the the perty plant, and it withered and died, which merely caused Jonah to throw a hissy fit about how God took away his blankie. "It's hot, God! It's sunny, God! I just wanna die, God!" Waa, waa, waa.

God asks Jonah something very important that struck me today. "Do you have a right to be angry about the vine?"

Wow. I mean, seriously. Do you hear the importance of this question? As David was giving his devo, all I could think about was that sometimes things happen around us that have nothing really to do with us. I wish I could explain this better, but suffice it to say that sometimes God sends us to spread His Word and share His Message, and our job is not to sit around and cast judgment on the people hearing the message, or even to be there to reap the harvest of that message. Sometimes our job is just to share and trust that the God of the universe and Creator of all things knows what He is doing.

"Do you have a right to be angry about the vine?"

There were more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who don't know their left hand from their right hand in the city of Nineveh. There were people who needed to hear God's message that had never heard it before. Had Jonah not gone to Nineveh, those people would have died without having ever heard of the Creator God. This just gets to me. How often have I said, "No," to God because I don't want to do something. It may not have even been an audible, "NO," maybe it was just my own non-action.

"Do you have a right to be angry about the vine?"