And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?
The book of Jonah ends with this question — and it is left unanswered. Jonah was an Israelite prophet called by God to preach repentance to Nineveh, the capital of Assyria — a cruel empire that was Israel's enemy and oppressor. Jonah fled in the opposite direction, was swallowed by a great fish, and eventually obeyed. Nineveh repented. God relented from the judgment he had planned. And Jonah was furious. He sat outside the city hoping God would destroy it anyway. God caused a vine to grow and shade him, then caused it to wither. Jonah grieved the plant deeply. God's final question exposes the absurdity: if Jonah could care about a vine, surely God can care about 120,000 disoriented human beings — and even the animals.
God, I confess that my compassion has borders yours don't. I want you to be generous with people I like and just with people I don't. Widen my heart. Help me look at the people I've written off with even a fraction of the concern you have for them. Amen.
The book of Jonah ends with a question God never answers — because the question is not for Jonah. It's for us. We're meant to sit with it uncomfortably. "People who cannot tell their right hand from their left" is an idiom for spiritual disorientation — people who are simply lost, wandering without a moral compass, not evil so much as confused. And God says: shouldn't that matter to me? The devastating thing is that Jonah's honest answer would have been no. And Jonah was a prophet. It is entirely possible to be deeply religious and have a shrunken heart. Jonah grieved a plant — something that served his comfort — and felt nothing for a city of people. The question worth sitting with is: who are the people you find it genuinely hard to want God to bless? The group you'd privately like to see get what's coming to them? God's last word in this book is a question about the reach of his own compassion — a compassion that stretches far past the borders of who we've decided deserves it. The ending stays open. Your answer is the rest of the story.
Why do you think God ends the entire book of Jonah with an unanswered question rather than a resolution — what is he inviting the reader to do?
Who are the people or groups you find it genuinely difficult to extend compassion toward? What's underneath that resistance?
Jonah cared more about a plant that shaded him than about 120,000 human lives. Where might you be making a similar trade — prioritizing your comfort over other people's need?
God's concern here extends even to "many cattle" — all of creation. How does the scope of God's compassion challenge the limits of your own?
What would it look like this week to pray — even reluctantly and imperfectly — for someone you'd rather God not be quite so merciful to?
Thy righteousness is like the great mountains; thy judgments are a great deep: O LORD, thou preservest man and beast.
Psalms 36:6
And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.
Jonah 3:10
And God remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the cattle that was with him in the ark: and God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters asswaged;
Genesis 8:1
Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing.
Psalms 145:16
The LORD is good to all: and his tender mercies are over all his works.
Psalms 145:9
He causeth the grass to grow for the cattle, and herb for the service of man: that he may bring forth food out of the earth;
Psalms 104:14
The LORD is gracious, and full of compassion; slow to anger, and of great mercy.
Psalms 145:8
Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.
Isaiah 1:18
Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than 1,0 [innocent] persons, who do not know the difference between their right and left hand [and are not yet accountable for sin], as well as many [blameless] animals?"
AMP
And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 1,0 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?”
ESV
'Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than 1,0 persons who do not know [the difference] between their right and left hand, as well as many animals?'
NASB
But Nineveh has more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left, and many cattle as well. Should I not be concerned about that great city?”
NIV
And should I not pity Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred and twenty thousand persons who cannot discern between their right hand and their left—and much livestock?”
NKJV
But Nineveh has more than 1,0 people living in spiritual darkness, not to mention all the animals. Shouldn’t I feel sorry for such a great city?”
NLT
So, why can't I likewise change what I feel about Nineveh from anger to pleasure, this big city of more than a hundred and twenty thousand childlike people who don't yet know right from wrong, to say nothing of all the innocent animals?"
MSG