Pastor Detweiler’s sermon for Sunday, Jan. 25, 2009:

“God invites us to bring hope to the anxious and hopeless and to be agents of hope by our presence and our words.”

Jonah 3:1-5, 10; Mark 1:14-20

In “Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” “brave” Sir Robin approaches a bridge that is guarded by the knights who go “gnink.” Before being allowed to cross, one must answer three questions. The first two are: “What is your name?” and “What is your quest?” The third question asked those just before Sir Robin was “What is your favorite color?” but when Sir Robin’s turn comes the knight asks him “What is the capital of Assyria?” “The capital of Assyria?” He complains, but he has to find the answer.

It was to Nineveh that Jonah was sent a second time in today’s Old Testament reading. With kings named Sargon I, Sennacherib, and Tiglath-Pileser II, Assyria inflicted death, destruction and bondage on neighboring nations (like Israel) for 200 years. The Assyrians were feared and hated, so Jonah did not want to obey the Lord’s call to him to go there and call for their repentance. The equivalent would be a call to go to Baghdad to ask Saddam Hussein to repent, although Iraq is not the superpower that Assyria was.

In Chapter 1 Jonah gets this call from God, but he gets on a ship headed in the opposite direction - to Tarshish - but there is a terrible storm, for which the sailors look for a reason. Jonah confesses that he is resisting God’s will, so they decide to throw him overboard as an atoning sacrifice, first asking forgiveness.

God is not finished with Jonah, so he provides a great fish to swallow Jonah to keep him from drowning. Chapter 2 is Jonah’s prayer from the belly of the fish with his regurgitation on shore at the end. Here in Chapter 3 Jonah gets the same task and he approaches it with the same attitude as before - resentment toward the Assyrians. He doesn’t want them to repent and be saved. He wants God to destroy them. But this time he feels he has no choice - God won’t let him get away. His attitude is the same, but his actions are different - he does what he is supposed to do. Unfortunately for Jonah, attitude matters. Chapter 4 is the story of God’s prodding Jonah about his resentment and unwillingness to accept the Ninevites repentance.

In today’s gospel we have a much more positive response to a call to announce repentance and God’s forgiveness. Simon, Andrew, James and John hear Jesus’ announcement that the “time is fulfilled, the kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe in the gospel” and respond immediately. They drop their fishing and family and follow Jesus. Unlike Jonah, they are open to new possibilities: to what God is doing in Jesus - which is similar to what God did with Jonah in Nineveh.

Jonah was angry and resentful that the good news was for Nineveh too, and not just for Israel. He wanted Nineveh destroyed, and knew if those people repented God wouldn’t destroy them. He was not happy about God’s grace; he was resentful that God wanted to save the Asyrians. He did not really believe the good news of God’s grace and forgiveness, and he was angry with God for giving the Ninevites the opportunity to repent. God’s forgiveness made no difference in his life - God’s kingdom hadn’t changed him.

These two stories are set in contrast to each other to raise the question of our response to the coming kingdom of God, to God’s grace and forgiveness: that question isn’t “What is the capital of Assyria?” but

• What difference does it make that the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God has come near?

• Are we like Jonah or are we like Simon, Andrew, James and John who allowed their lives to be changed by the good news of God’s love and forgiveness, and made announcing that good news for those who repent the focus of their lives?

• Are we willing to challenge? To lead? To hold out a better way?

• Or are we afraid like Jonah?

The premise of Jonah’s call, that of the disciples, and ours is that God is not finished with us or with the world

• that although the time is fulfilled, the Kingdom of God is not yet fulfilled on earth,

• that God wants to work through us and the Church to announce that better kingdom has arrived in Jesus and is still coming in the future.

The author and teacher of pastoral care, Donald Capps, has a book entitled “Agents of Hope.” His premise is that the role of Christians is to bring hope, by their presence as much as by their words. Congregations do that. This congregation brings hope to people in this community through its ministries and also through the relationships established between people who worship and serve together.

Our job is to be agents of hope who point to the future and God’s coming kingdom which has arrived in Jesus,

• a future continuous with God’s self-revelation in Jesus,

• a future that is God’s and not our’s

• a future that belongs to communities of Christ.

God in Christ is inviting us to be like Jesus’ disciples rather than like Jonah:

• to hear the call to follow Jesus in making disciples,

• to find excitement in sharing the good news of God’s love,

• to be humble about our relationship with God, and therefore excited to see growth in grace in others,

• to forgive as we have been forgiven,

• to know that God’s grace cannot be exhausted,

• that sharing the grace we have received expands rather than depleting it

God in Christ is inviting us to bring hope to the anxious and hopeless, to be agents of hope by our presence and our words.