Rev. Peter J. Haugen
St. Paul Evangelical Lutheran Church
Jonah is in many ways the prophet we love to despise. He’s not one of the great prophets like Elijah or Isaiah, whom we admire because of their miraculous deeds or because of their well-known writings. But neither is he one of the prophets like Zephaniah or Haggai about whom we know nothing except maybe that they, too, wrote one of the books of the Old Testament…even if we never bother to read their books. Jonah is famous among us. Or at least Jonah is infamous.
We know at least some of Jonah’s history. He was the prophet who began his Ministry behaving nothing like a prophet, but rather like a bigot who hated others or like a spoiled child who threw a tantrum when he was told to do something he did not want to do. We know of this prophet, who took a ship from Joppa as he attempted to flee from the presence of God, who was swallowed by a great fish, who only reluctantly obeyed God’s command to preach to the Ninevites. We know Jonah. And we despise him, at least in part, don’t we?
We know Jonah as the reluctant prophet. But Jonah is a type of Christ. That is, Jonah points us ahead to the Christ who was to come. He directs our attention to our Lord Jesus Christ.
Indeed, in some ways, Jonah more clearly foreshadows the Christ than do many of the other prophets. When Jonah fled and God sent a storm to pursue him, when that storm would not be quieted, when the sailors were certain to perish, Jonah offered himself and was thrown into the sea as the sacrifice to save the ship, to save the sailors. So also did our Lord Jesus Christ offer Himself as the sacrifice to save the world, to save us. Jonah endured the judgment of God before being restored as a prophet. So also did our Lord Jesus Christ endure the judgment of God on the cross before being vindicated. And Jonah preached the Word of God purely to the Ninevites. So also did our Lord Jesus Christ speak forth the clear Word of God for the salvation of us poor sinners.
Perhaps most significantly, Jonah spent three days in the belly of the fish before being resurrected to new life. Just so did our Lord Jesus Christ spend three days in the belly of the earth before being resurrected for our life. This was the sign identified by our Lord Jesus when the scribes and Pharisees came to Him demanding such a sign: “An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign shall be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet” (St. Matthew 12:39). Our Lord Jesus has died our death in order that all who believe on Him might live His life. May God grant us so to do. Amen.
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