{"id":25471,"date":"2025-07-08T07:37:14","date_gmt":"2025-07-08T11:37:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=25471"},"modified":"2025-07-08T08:03:53","modified_gmt":"2025-07-08T12:03:53","slug":"25471","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=25471","title":{"rendered":"Jonah\u2019s Anger and Our Own"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Selah - How Deep The Father&#039;s Love For Us [with lyrics]\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/SKDujmtyAVk?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Author Debie Thomas considers how Jonah\u2019s story challenges our notions of God\u2019s mercy:&nbsp;<\/em>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Following his preposterous marine adventure, Jonah grudgingly obeys God\u2019s instructions and warns the people of Nineveh that their wickedness is about to be punished. But then the impossible happens.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Ninevites listen to Jonah\u2019s warning, take it seriously, and repent. And God, seeing their penitence, changes God\u2019s mind and shows them mercy. In other words, Jonah preaches a sermon, and his congregation responds to it!&#8230; You\u2019d think that Jonah would be thrilled. But no. He\u2019s furious, and he tells God so.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>After hearing Jonah\u2019s complaints, God asks, \u201cWhat right do you have to get angry?\u201d (Jonah 4:9). Thomas continues:<\/em>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To Jonah, then, God\u2019s question is a ridiculous one.&nbsp;<em>Of course&nbsp;<\/em>he has a right to be angry. Isn\u2019t it right to be angry that God\u2019s mercy extends to killers? Isn\u2019t it right to be angry when people who break the rules don\u2019t get the comeuppance they deserve? Isn\u2019t it right to be angry about a grace so reckless and wasteful that it challenges our most cherished assumptions about justice?&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>God doesn\u2019t scold Jonah for his anger. Instead, God engages it with compassion. God even goads it in a playful attempt to broaden Jonah\u2019s horizons. <strong>God wants the grumpy preacher to see the Ninevites as God sees them<\/strong>. For while the Assyrians are everything Jonah believes them to be\u2014violent, depraved, and wicked\u2014they are also more\u2026. <strong>They\u2019re human beings made in God\u2019s image, but they\u2019re lost and broken. What they&nbsp;<em>deserve&nbsp;<\/em>is neither here nor there. What they&nbsp;<em>need&nbsp;<\/em>is compassion\u2026.&nbsp;<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>God challenges Jonah to consider the hard truth that even his worst enemies are God\u2019s beloved children\u2026. Should God not care for God\u2019s own? Is it right for Jonah to be angry? <strong>The story wisely ends with these questions unanswered. We\u2019re left with Jonah still sulking<\/strong>\u2026.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>All too often, we are also left to wrestle with the scandalous goodness of God, a goodness that calls us to become instruments of grace even to those who offend us most deeply. God\u2019s goodness gently probes beneath our pieties and asks why we often prefer vindication to rehabilitation\u2014prison cells and death sentences to hospitality and compassion. It exposes our smallness and stinginess, our reluctance to embrace the radical kinship God calls us to embrace. <strong>Why do we grab at the second chances God gives us, even as we deny those second chances to others? <\/strong>God\u2019s goodness dares us to do the braver and riskier thing: <strong>to hold out for the hearts of those who belong to God, whether we like them or not.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Do we have a right to be angry? God knows that the only way to answer this question, and so many others like it, is to wrestle it to the ground. God meets us in the ring, openhanded, willing, forbearing. <strong>God\u2019s hand rests on us in love, even as we prepare to attack. God\u2019s patient love enfolds us, absorbing our anger into God\u2019s all-sufficient self.&nbsp;<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table><tbody><tr><td>Jesus Didn\u2019t Promise You a Mansion.   from Skye Jethani,  With God Daily<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table><tbody><tr><td><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"auto\" height=\"15\" src=\"https:\/\/mcusercontent.com\/87188c8737bc50c1a2fb8e2c9\/images\/b66516eb-1f2d-8d90-0e02-d4223f78f6f7.png\">In his book,&nbsp;<em>The King Jesus Gospel<\/em>, New Testament scholar Scot McKnight makes a simple but stunning observation. The Book of Acts, in which Jesus\u2019 Apostles travel broadly proclaiming his gospel, <strong>contains no mention of heaven. <\/strong>Not one of the seven gospel sermons in Acts speaks of salvation as entering heaven after death. (Hell is also never mentioned in Acts, in case you were wondering.) This raises an important question\u2014<strong>If going to heaven was not part of the gospel Jesus and his Apostles proclaimed, why is it so central to the one we often hear<\/strong>? <br>          It\u2019s hard to imagine a gospel sermon today that doesn\u2019t emphasize the centrality of one\u2019s postmortem residence. Since at least the Middle Ages, much of Christianity has been obsessed with avoiding hell\u2019s eternal slum and entering the gated community of heaven.This ironically unbiblical fixation on heaven is why we see endless religious movies about the coming apocalypse, and why travel guides written by those who claim to have returned from heaven become best-sellers.  <br>         American pop Christianity is enamored by heaven\u2019s golden streets, pearly gates, or other opulent architecture while dismissing their scriptural symbolism to create a virtual map of the afterlife. We also do this with Jesus\u2019 words in John 14:2-3. There he speaks of his Father\u2019s house having many rooms, and that he is going to prepare a place for his followers. <br>              The old King James Version, which poorly translated \u201cmany rooms\u201d as \u201cmany mansions,\u201d has caused Christians for centuries to view the afterlife as merely an idealized version of earthly life, but without the nuisance of taxes, health care, or non-Christian neighbors. We\u2019ve even composed hymns about the mansions and palaces that await us as if the greatest reward of the gospel is an upgrade in real estate.Just like the golden streets or pearly gates spoken of in Revelation, in John 14,<strong> we tend to focus on the metaphor rather than its meaning.<\/strong> We want to know about literal mansions or rooms in heaven rather than what Jesus was communicating about himself and the Father. The word Jesus used is difficult to translate because it only occurs one other time in the New Testament, and it\u2019s just a few verses later in John 14:23. There, Jesus speaks of the Father and the Son making their \u201chome\u201d or \u201cdwelling\u201d within those who keep his word. <strong>The word has nothing to do with mansions or rooms in a palace; it\u2019s simply referring to&nbsp;<em>where one resides<\/em>.<\/strong> And the context eliminates the silly idea of Jesus literally building a house inside our bodies. Instead, <strong>he is speaking of the intimacy and unity that will exist between us and him.<\/strong>Remember, Jesus\u2019 disciples were confused and distraught about his announcement that he was leaving them. His words about preparing a place for them in his Father\u2019s house were meant to comfort their anxiety about losing Jesus. In other words, these verses aren\u2019t about mansions, houses, or even heaven (which, like Acts, is never mentioned in Jesus\u2019 farewell discourse).<strong> It\u2019s about Jesus promising his frightened friends they would have a permanent place in God\u2019s presence&nbsp;<em>with him<\/em>. John 14, like the gospel itself, isn\u2019t ultimately about heaven; it\u2019s about God and living in unity with him<\/strong>.Our common misreading of these verses exposes the pervasive misunderstanding of Jesus\u2019 gospel altogether. <strong>The goal of his life, death, resurrection, and ascension was not to get us into heaven. His goal was to reconcile us to God.&nbsp;<em>He<\/em>&nbsp;is the goal.&nbsp;<em>He<\/em>&nbsp;is our reward. When we make heaven or avoiding hell the goal we\u2019ve exchanged the true gospel of Jesus Christ for a false gospel of pop-Christianity.<\/strong> If we make a celestial mansion our true desire we\u2019ve reduced Jesus into a broker who merely secures it for us. Such a gospel makes Jesus instrumental rather than ultimate in our hearts. As one theologian put it, \u201c<strong>People who would be happy in heaven if Christ were not there, will not be there.<\/strong>\u201d In John 14 <strong>Jesus isn\u2019t promising his followers a mansion in heaven. He\u2019s promising us something infinitely better\u2014himself.<\/strong><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Author Debie Thomas considers how Jonah\u2019s story challenges our notions of God\u2019s mercy:&nbsp;&nbsp; Following his preposterous marine adventure, Jonah grudgingly obeys God\u2019s instructions and warns the people of Nineveh that their wickedness is about to be punished. But then the impossible happens.&nbsp;&nbsp; The Ninevites listen to Jonah\u2019s warning, take it seriously, and repent. And God, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25471"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25471"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25471\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25477,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25471\/revisions\/25477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}