Channeling Jonah, sans sushi

Jonah was the prophet of record during the reign of Jeroboam II in the Northern Kingdom of Israel, circa 770 BC. He had prophesied peace and prosperity for Jeroboam II's reign, even though he was an unrighteous king. Then God asked Jonah to preach repentance to Nineveh, the capital of Assyria, Israel's mortal enemy. (Assyria was the nation that conquered the Northern Kingdom about 720 BC, some 30 or more years after Jonah's preaching, destroying it forever and resulting in the permanent loss of 10 of Israel's 12 Tribes.)

Perhaps as a prophet, Jonah knew of the catastrophe for the Northern Kingdom that was to come at the hands of Assyria. Or, as he apparently was well connected politically in the Northern Kingdom, he was simply well aware of the mortal threat this neighbor posed to the Northern Kingdom. Assyria was not at the height of its power, however, and an eclipse in 763 BC may have put the fear of God into the Assyrian king when Jonah came to town.

Jonah was famously reluctant to take on the mission God had assigned him. He fled, resulting in his voyage, the storm, the dialogue with the seamen, Jonah's casting into the sea, and three days in the belly of the fish. All this before he called upon God, recognizing, while in the fish's belly, perhaps, that God was not going to let him die—although that seemed to be his fervent wish rather than preaching repentance to Nineveh.

Ultimately, Jonah obeyed and preached to Nineveh. He gave them two score days to repent before they would be destroyed. Jonah knew the outcome, admitting that God was a God of mercy to those who repent, and his worst fears were realized: Nineveh repented, from the king on down, and Nineveh was not destroyed. Jonah had built himself a booth overlooking the city to watch its destruction that never came. God tried to get Jonah to calm down, but Jonah persisted to the end, declaring that he preferred to die rather than live to see Nineveh preserved.

I think I have come to a new appreciation of Jonah's viewpoints and stubbornness, watching Trump snatch defeat from the jaws of victory (like a true Republican). For most of my adult life, I have waited for someone to deliver appropriate recompense to the Mullahs for their crimes. I watched the embassy hostage crisis for weeks and months on end, the disastrous operation in the desert under Carter; I was mollified when the hostages were released as Reagan took office. Then I was dismayed when, after the Beirut Marine Barracks Bombing, with our bombers on the runway ready to take off, those bombers were instructed to stand down by Cap Weinberger (ostensibly without the president's awareness, though Reagan ceded to Weinberger's decision after the fact). No retribution was forthcoming.

And so it has been, on and on, including through the aftermath of the deposition of Saddam Hussein as Iran killed scores of Americans, not to mention Israeli's, and the assistance provided to the 9/11 hijackers by Iran. Will no one rid the world of this terrorist regime? I thought Donald was the one. It is not to be.

I feel like Jonah, sitting in his little booth overlooking Nineveh, waiting for the destruction of the city, incensed at God and the world that we must all continue to suffer the depredations of the terrorist Mullahs. Will we ultimately wind up like the Northern Kingdom?

I will acknowledge that God is just and merciful, and knows the end from the beginning, that His ways are not our ways, and that I should not contest His will. I do not have the poetic skill of Jonah to express that soul's invincible surmise. So here I sit, longing for the utter destruction of the Iranian regime, but without hope that such will occur. And the future will be grim, I fear. For Israel, for the US, for the world. God's judgements are just.

As Ruth Bell Graham put it, if God does not punish America, He will have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah. More true now than when she said it.