Is it right for you to be angry?

November 10, 2024

Is it right for you to be angry?

Angry enough to die.

These are the last words we hear from the sulking prophet Jonah.

(And as something of a content warning or a text note, this language, used twice in the text, is a hyperbolic statement in which the intended humor in the Jonah story takes a dark turn against a suicide rate is as high as it is in our country today. I don’t take that lightly. Someone who is angry enough to die needs help. Please hear the hyperbole as a literary feature in this story.)

Ok. Moving gently with that awareness, let’s move ahead.

You likely know the outlines of the Jonah story – it is a common children’s tale.

· Jonah is sent by God to Ninevah to call the evil people of that city to repentance.

· In response, Jonah heads the opposite direction, instead hitching a ride on a boat to Tarshish.

· (For context, Ninevah was located in modern day Iraq. And Tarshish is believed to have been located somewhere in modern Spain.)

· God whips up a storm on the seas that rocks the boat. Sailors frantically throw cargo overboard in an effort to lighten the load. And Jonah, in the midst of all that, huddles in the cargo hold to take a NAP!!

· Eventually, Jonah tells the sailors to throw him overboard to save their own lives. And once they do, the sea calms and the ship is able to keep sailing on its voyage.

· Jonah is then famously swallowed up by a giant fish, where he hangs out in anguish for three days before offering a psalm of lament and intercession to God.

· According to the sentence just before the text we heard today:

“… the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah out onto the dry land.”

In today’s text, we have Jonah, freshly reminded of his task by God, marching (I have to imagine begrudgingly) into and through Ninevah, threatening all who can hear his voice that in 40 days the city will be overthrown.

And just like that, the people change their ways. They repent of the unspoken evils. The king calls the whole city to a season of fasting, sackcloth, and prayers to the God of Israel (who would have been seen as the God of Israel, not their God).

God sees them do these things, hears their prayers, and changes God’s mind. No calamity for Ninevah.

And Jonah’s response?

He pouts.

He prays to God.

And here we get some details that we wouldn’t hear earlier in the story:

God, didn’t I say this is how it would be while I was still in the comfort of my own land – that you, God, would take it easy on the Ninevites – because you are a good God. You are slow to anger. SO WHY SHOULD I HAVE TO BOTHER?

But NO….you had to force my hand. Make me come here. Now you might just as well take MY life.

And the Lord asks Jonah for the first time:

Is it right for you to be angry?

In response, Jonah plops himself on a hillside, making himself a shady booth where he can look back at Ninevah, watching for what might happen next, brooding about what hasn’t happened. Perhaps God will see the err of God’s ways and bring the originally prescribed calamity upon the city.

So God made a bush grow up over the booth that Jonah had made. It provided shade from the hot sun.

Jonah was happy about the bush.

We haven’t seen much of happy Jonah to this point.

But the text makes a point of saying that Jonah was happy about the bush.

Then God sends a worm to attack the bush. The bush withers and dies.

Next, God sends a hot wind.

As the sun beats down on Jonah, he asks to die rather than suffer further in the heat.

(I wonder, couldn’t Jonah just get up and start walking away from Ninevah now? Head back to where he came from? Resume his prior life? What’s with the drama of sitting there in suffering, Jonah?)

God asks a familiar question.

Is it right for you to be angry about the bush, Jonah?

Angry enough to DIE, Jonah pouts.

God has the final word in this story, pointing out Jonah’s concern for the bush while Jonah begrudges God’s concern for the many living, breathing people of Ninevah.

Now I’ve raised some teenagers. And they are good and fair and regulated young adults now. But when I read this story, it takes me back to some really DRAMATIC, angsty teenage responses to things.

And…

I’ve gotta say…I really GET Jonah this week.

I get Jonah’s ANGER.

If I squint, I can see Jonah’s resentment – he’s been expected to be the messenger and bring people to account.

He’s expecting God to mete out punishment on these people,

but God does what God will do

because God will be who God will be.

God is gracious and good.

God spares the Ninevites.

(Now in case you are jumping ahead and drawing conclusions of your own right now, I need you to hear me say (just in case you are thinking this and making your own assumptions about where this is going) that I do not believe GOD has anything to do with the outcome of any election throughout the globe. God is not moving the pieces on the chess board….that is NOT who God is. But in this moment, in the wake of an election here in the US that surprised me, I get Jonah. Stay with me. Stay open. Listen. Breathe.)

I get Jonah’s sulking because frankly, I thought I understood the way the world worked before this week.

And today I don’t think that I do understand the way the world works.

I’m not sure anyone does.

In the midst of that, when I slow my rage enough to hear above the roar in my ears, I hear God saying, hey listen – I am at work in the world. There’s work to do and I am doing the work.

And I also (beginning sometime on Friday afternoon) hear God saying - Are you going to join in the work? Or sit in your emotions?

Friends, a lot of us are experiencing a lot of different feelings this week – feelings in response to an election that we have all been watching and talking about and holding our breath about for the better part of 8 years if we are honest.

I confess that my emotions have been all over the map this week. And they still are, moment by moment. I have experienced anger and fear and resentment and confusion – sometimes all at once.

I know that I am not alone because I have had more pastoral care conversations with you all this week than I have had since COVID.

I am not making a partisan political statement: it is the reality that we live in as a country that is deeply, deeply divided

….and that many of us do not yet understand how we got here.

Sometime Thursday morning I was able to name what I was feeling:

I am deeply disoriented and I am grieving. I am grieving because (as I said earlier) I thought I understood the way the world worked. I thought I understood the cosmic math of justice and leadership and human thriving. I thought I understood a political system and I thought I understood my neighbors and my family and my friends.

But I do not. And in the discomfort of that, I have found myself angry from time to time…

So angry. So very angry.

I don’t know how you are feeling right now after the events of this week. But I want you to hear that God makes space for our big feelings – all of them. This story handles that message with humor. God has grace for Ninevah and ultimately, he has grace for Jonah and all of Jonah’s big feelings…even as he sends a worm and a hot wind to poke at Jonah.

Right now, we all need to feel our big feelings.

Perhaps you are someone who is feeling comfort and joy over the election results.