Year 6, Day 234: Jonah 3-4

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Bear Fruit

• Bear Fruit: We bear fruit after we grow.  Bearing fruit is ultimately the goal of abiding and the goal of being called into the Kingdom of God.  However, while bearing fruit is our calling, it is not the end.  We bear fruit so that we can then prune, abide, grow, and bear more fruit in another season.  Bearing fruit is not the end, but rather only a portion of the whole rhythm of life into which God has called us.

Jonah is a sad story, and it is a story with which I usually wrestle.  I wrestle with it because if I am honest, I see much of my humanity within Jonah.  When I look into this story, I see that I could so easily be Jonah if I am not careful.

To see what I mean, let’s look at what happens.  After being swallowed by the fish, Jonah heads to Nineveh.  He does it rather grudgingly because he doesn’t want the Ninevites to find salvation.  He wants them judged.  He wants them to receive what he believes they deserve.  He wants the errors of their ways to come back and haunt them.

Is that feeling really very far from any of us?  I know I feel that.  I’m sure that I feel that way every time a car sails past me on the highway, clearly breaking the speed limit.  I feel that way every time I hear about some corrupt politician clearly gaining popularity in spite of their lack of ethics and morality.  I feel that way every time I see someone using someone else unfairly.

To be honest, I’m not sure that such a feeling is inherently bad.  Where it turns bad is when I allow those feelings to cloud my understanding of bearing fruit.  Look again at Jonah.  He proclaims God’s message and the people actually believe!  They repent!  But Jonah isn’t happy about it.  He doesn’t want them to find salvation at all.  This is where it goes wrong.  It’s not wrong to want sin to meet conviction.  It’s wrong when we ever become unsatisfied with repentance.

We are called to bear fruit.  What greater fruit it there than people repenting and finding God?  We should always find joy in that fruit.  When we don’t find joy in grace and repentance, we are focused on bearing the wrong fruit.

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