Jonah 3:1

Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, "Arise, go to Nineveh, the great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you." So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three days' journey in breadth. Jonah began to go into the city, going a day's journey. And he called out, "Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!" And the people of Nineveh believed God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them. ... When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it.

Nineveh's repentance reveals a God of second chances who uses ordinary, obedient people to spare a city on the brink.

The Largest Revival in Scripture

Welcome to Cross Connection Church. Over the last two weeks we've walked through Jonah—Pastor Jason taught chapter 1, Pastor Mark taught chapter 2—and now we come to chapter 3, which I consider the largest revival recorded in the pages of Scripture. A wicked Assyrian city named Nineveh, with about 175,000 occupants, miraculously repents and avoids God's righteous judgment.

How does this happen? It happens when a loving, merciful God uses ordinary, obedient people. The story of Jonah is really the story of our merciful God. Unlike other gods worshipped throughout history, our God is known for giving second chances. Jonah 3 is the key chapter in the Bible revealing that He is a God of second chances, a God of all peoples, nations, tribes, and languages.

Giving second chances is not a natural part of humanity's fallen nature. Even for the prophet Jonah, it wasn't something he liked to do. Many of us would prefer a one-strike-and-you're-out policy: you mistreated me, I'm never giving you another chance. But God gives us this great image of Himself as a God of second chances.

Disobedience Has Divine Consequences

Here's a quick recap. In chapter 1, God speaks to Jonah. In chapter 2, Jonah speaks to God from the belly of the fish. In chapter 3, God speaks through Jonah to Nineveh. God told Jonah to go to Nineveh and say what God told him, and Jonah said no and fled. Chapter 2 shows the consequences of that flight.

This is my first point: our disobedience to God has divine consequences. In chapter 2, sin led Jonah down—quite literally—into the depths. For three days and three nights he cried out and repented, and God caused the fish to spit him onto dry land. I believe this fish really happened; Jesus believed it happened, and we'll come back to that.

The great fish was the vehicle God used for His divine mercy—essentially God's divine Uber. It carried Jonah from a place of disobedience back into line with God's will, where he needed to be. You may be in a place where you feel utterly stuck, isolated, unable to speak—where it honestly stinks to be. Jonah was alone in darkness for three and a half days with nothing to do but pray. Sometimes God uses such means to bring us from running to obedience. If God used a great fish for Jonah, consider what He might use in your life.

God Loves Cities

Why didn't Jonah want to go to Nineveh? They were incredibly violent, wicked people who did terrible things to the Hebrews. But it wasn't only the evil of the city; the word for evil can also be translated as the great distress of the city. Sin leads us down individually, like Jonah, but it also drags entire cities down corporately into darkness. And God cares both for the individual and for the fallen city.

We come to this passage having just lived through two years of pandemic, having broadly lost faith in the institutions meant to protect us. We've seen corruption in politicians and civilians alike—looting, rioting, people treating each other with disdain because of an R or a D behind their name. We're witnessing a justice crisis where criminals are let out of jail while people who pray outside abortion facilities are put in jail. You can murder someone and be out in years, or misgender someone and be fired. It is not a stretch to identify with Jonah the person and Nineveh the city.

I believe Nineveh was not only wicked but on the brink of collapse and chaos—a city greatly distressed, with famine in the land and a blood moon around the time Jonah was sent. Jonah knew that if this troubled city heard a word from God, they would probably listen. He could have shrugged: "They deserve it. They're terrible, violent, wicked people; let them burn." But that is not the attitude our God has toward cities. He loves not only His chosen people but the entire world, and so He sent His prophet. Jonah rebelled because he did not want to give this city any hope.

The Word Comes a Second Time

Jonah 3:1 mirrors Jonah 1:1. The book is almost poetic: in chapter 1 God says go, and Jonah says no; in chapter 3 God says a second time, "Arise, go to Nineveh." As a loving parent, you often have to repeat yourself. My mom was famous for saying things ten times, and we used to make fun of her—until I became the parent of a two-year-old.

I once told my daughter to put her Legos in the bin before bed, and the first thing she did was get up with a big smile and run to the opposite side of the house. That's disobedience—a little like Jonah, who ran the moment God spoke. Instead of three days and three nights, I gave her three minutes in her room. Within a minute she was bawling, knowing she'd done wrong. She came running, "I'm so sorry, Daddy," and I forgave her—and then gave her a second chance to clean up her Legos.

In a very real sense, God is like that as our Heavenly Father—the God of second chances. If you've ever felt like you messed up, failed to do what God wanted, and now He's done with you, I want to tell you He still loves you, He's still walking with you, and a second time He will come back and tell you the same thing. But there can be consequences. For Jonah it was three days in the fish; for my daughter it was three minutes crying on her bed.

A Sacred Word, Not Our Opinions

God tells Jonah the same command: go to Nineveh and call out what I tell you. This matters, because the prophets of God were responsible for one thing—to convey the word of God, nothing more and nothing less. They could not add to it or subtract from it. Deuteronomy 4:2 says:

You shall not add to the word that I commanded you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you.

A similar warning closes Revelation 22: the very curses of the book will be added to anyone who adds or subtracts from it. The word of God is divine and sacred. Here at Cross Connection, this pulpit is sacred in the sense that you will not hear our pastors telling you what they think or pontificating about the world. You will hear the word of God and how it applies to your life, handled exegetically—looking at the historical context, what it meant for the original hearers, and how it affects us today. This is a place to come and hear from God, where followers of Jesus are refined, refilled, renewed, and sent out to proclaim the good news to the nations.

A Grassroots Repentance

Jonah arose in obedience and went to Nineveh, an exceedingly great city, a three days' journey in breadth. There were divine consequences to his sin beyond the three days in the fish—likely his skin and hair bleached by the stomach acids. Instead of traveling with a wallet and the comforts Mark mentioned, he now had to cross roughly 500 miles of Middle Eastern desert as a bleached man with no money, relying on the hospitality of strangers. We can imagine word spreading rapidly: a crazy, fish-smelling prophet of God is crossing the desert to bring Nineveh a message. That part is speculation—Pastor Garrett speaking, not God speaking—but the journey would have taken about a month.

Some scholars note a custom in which prophets spent three days in a city, the first two establishing who they were and the third proclaiming their message. We don't know if that applied here, and it isn't what we need to know. What we need to know is that as soon as Jonah proclaimed God's word, the people immediately believed and repented. Notice—it says they believed God, not Jonah. The message went viral on the very first day; it spread faster than Jonah could preach it.

God loves cities because cities are full of people made in His image, and because culture flows out of cities. Reach a city, and you impact a far greater number of people. Paul strategically targeted large cities on his missionary journeys, knowing those cities would carry the word to smaller ones. And Nineveh's repentance did not begin from the top down—it began from the bottom up, as a grassroots movement among the common people, and it went viral.

Genuine Repentance Has Divine Consequences

My second point: genuine repentance has divine consequences too. And genuine repentance is paired with physical change. When they believed God's word, they called a fast and put on sackcloth—itchy, scratchy, uncomfortable clothing. Why would anyone stop eating and wear that? Just as baptism is a symbolic picture of what God has done inside us, sackcloth and ash are a symbolic form of repentance. It says, "I am as uncomfortable with myself outwardly as I am with my sin inwardly. My sin disgusts me. I am ashamed, and I am sorry, God."

Then the word reached the king. This did not start with him—it reached him. He rose from his throne, removed his royal robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. Even the king repented publicly. He issued a decree that neither man nor beast should eat or drink, that all be covered with sackcloth and call out mightily to God, turning from evil and violence, "Who knows? God may turn and relent... so that we may not perish."

Imagine waking up to find our nation's flag at half-mast, schools closed, and a new national holiday: a day of repentance, "We're evil and we're sorry." Imagine our president on live TV saying, "I repent, and we all should. We royally screwed up—maybe, just maybe, God may relent." The king is essentially saying, "I hope God does not treat us as we treated the Hebrews and the violence we showed others." Even the animals fasted and wore sackcloth. This was serious, heartfelt repentance from deep within every soul—not a fad, not going with the flow.

They Did Not Even Know God Was Merciful

And notice the "who knows." The king of Nineveh had no idea who God was the way Jonah did. Jonah knew God was merciful, loving, compassionate, and patient. The Ninevites had no concept of God's character; they had no assurance He wouldn't simply smite them for being evil. Most gods they worshipped would have said, "You're gone in 40 days no matter what you do, so live it up." Yet the Ninevites repented anyway—genuinely—not knowing God was forgiving. That's the great story here: these wicked, hurting people who didn't know a merciful God still repented.

And it all happened because they believed God's word. What Jonah told them amounted to just five words in the original language. Five words of the Lord, and a city repented. They did not have an entire Bible like we do—they heard five words and responded, and it brought them to salvation.

Proclaim the Word; Leave the Results to God

That brings my third point: because we have the entire word of God, our job is to faithfully proclaim it and leave the results to the God of the word. When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil way, He relented of the disaster He had threatened.

Did God change His mind? I would say no. Some claim a problem here, but Jeremiah 18:7-8 says:

If at any time I declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, and if that nation... turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I intended to do to it.

God was perfectly in line with His word and character when He relented. Did Nineveh deserve judgment? Absolutely. But we have a merciful God who, when we repent, gives a second chance, a third, a hundredth. Why? Because 2 Peter 3:9 says God is not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. The "forty days" was itself God's mercy—they didn't even need it; they repented on the first day.

The Spirit of Jonah in Us

Sin always leads us down. As it brought Jonah down, it brought Samson down—one of the great servants of God, set apart under a Nazarite vow. God was patient with Samson's shenanigans for up to twenty years until He finally said, "Enough." Samson then experienced the divine consequences of his sin: bound, blinded, and ultimately dead because of it.

You might say, "But I have a relationship with God; I'm religious, so I'm fine." Jonah had a relationship with God too, and he followed Him happily until it became inconvenient and uncomfortable. Go serve someone you don't like. Share your faith with someone you'd rather not. Care for lost, broken people who don't know their right from their left. Doesn't that sound like our society—and our church—today? The church has the spirit of Jonah: we want to serve God until it costs us comfort.

There are two attitudes we can carry: "I have to serve God" or "I get to serve God." Jonah had the "have to" mentality. Some Christians say, "I have to serve in hospitality, in kids' ministry, in youth," instead of, "I get to serve the living God who was merciful with me, who saved me out of the depths." Our salvation is pictured here—we are Jonah in the fish, raised to new life and spit up on the shore, given another chance.

Jesus Is the Perfect Jonah

That brings my fourth point: Jesus is the perfect Jonah. The Father sent Jesus, and Jesus stepped off His throne, took off His royal robe, and became a man to seek and save the lost. Interestingly, Jonah came from Gath-hepher, just a few miles north of Nazareth in Galilee—the only other prophet from that region. Jesus, of course, came from Nazareth in Galilee. And the only prophet Jesus compares Himself to is Jonah. Matthew 12:38-41 says:

Some of the scribes and Pharisees... said, "Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you." But he answered them, "An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here."

This is where I see that Jesus really believed Jonah was in a fish—it actually happened. The men of Nineveh repented at five words from a strange, fishy-smelling prophet, not even knowing God was forgiving. Then Jesus came—the Word of God in the flesh—and they would not listen. Something far greater than Jonah was indeed here.

Consider the parallels. Jonah preached repentance; so did Jesus. Jonah brought revival to a boat and a city; Jesus brings revival to the whole world. Jonah traveled from Israel to Nineveh; Jesus traveled from heaven to earth. Jonah went unwillingly; Jesus went willingly. Jonah came out of a fish alive; Jesus came out of the grave alive. Jonah preached five words of God; Jesus came as the Word of God. Jonah saw a king step off his throne and repent; Jesus was the great King who stepped off His throne that we might repent. Jonah gave Nineveh forty days; Jesus has given us thousands of years.

The Power of the Word

Jesus is how we experience the mercy of God in its fullness, how we receive forgiveness, how we are reconciled to God. And it is Jesus who sends us out on mission to our community, friends, relatives, and neighbors. We don't go alone—He sends a divine Helper, the Spirit of Christ, to dwell in us and go with us. We have not five words but the entire Bible in our hands, and I'm excited to see what God will do with that this year.

Is there really any hope for the United States? We Christians often pray for revival, but we don't want to do the work, because the spirit of Jonah is too strong in us. What would widespread repentance look like here? Not sackcloth and ashes, but abortion facilities closing because there's no need, adoption agencies downsizing because all the kids are adopted, porn sites shutting down for lack of traffic, and platforms like TikTok wiped out—because there's no need for evil when the hearts of men are changed by the word and Spirit of God.

When the word of God comes, it comes with power. That's why I only need to be its messenger and let the God of the word do the rest. Acts 1:8 says, "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses." The Greek word for power is dunamis, from which we get dynamite. The word of God has explosive power; when I'm faithful to proclaim even five words, that's enough. You don't need to know the entire Bible perfectly to share the gospel—be faithful in what you do know.

How Many Days Do You Have Left?

We've explored God's mercy in Jonah's life and in Nineveh. Now I ask you: do you know how many days you have left? If I told you that you have forty days, then you're gone, what would your response be? We do not know our final day or hour, but death is 100% certain for every one of us. Do you know how long until the consequences of your sin catch up, until God says, "Enough"?

There is coming a day when you will be judged for your sins. Repent and believe the good news—that Jesus lived the perfect life we could not live, came off His throne, died the death we deserved in our place, and rose again after three days so that you and I could have new life in Him. My question is not merely, "Are you saved?"—to which you might answer, "Yes, I prayed a prayer." My question is, does Jesus live in you? Unlike any other god ever worshipped, the Lord Jesus wants to dwell in you, transforming you from the inside out, changing your character to match your calling.

It is not the church's job to evangelize Escondido—it's your job and mine. The church is where believers are built up, strengthened, encouraged, and re-sent. As Jesus transforms us by the power of the Spirit who dwells in us, removing sin and making us more like Himself—the perfect Jonah—we may yet see a great revival and repentance in our generation.

Closing Prayer

I thank You, Lord, that You are merciful. I thank You that You were merciful with Jonah and gave him a second chance, merciful with Nineveh and gave them a second chance, and merciful with us. By sending Your Son, Jesus Christ, You gave the world a second chance. Father, may Your word come in power in our lives, dealing with any sin that remains. May those listening today, whatever sin is in their life, repent and turn to Your word and believe it. May we see a great repentance and revival in this generation. Forgive us our sins; count them not against us. Make whatever sin remains as disgusting and uncomfortable to us as sackcloth was on the Ninevites. Bless them and keep them; cause Your face to shine upon them and be gracious to them. May we be faithful to carry out the great commission Jesus has sent us on—to go and tell the world the good news that Christ saves. May we not have the spirit of Jonah and run from Your command. We ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen.