We are concluding our study of Jonah. As chapter 3 ends we learn that the result of Jonah’s message to Nineveh is that God relents of the disaster that He said He would do to them, and He does not do it. Now as chapter 4 begins we find out Jonah’s reaction - it displeases him exceedingly and he was angry. The force of the language is much stronger. Literally the texts says, “and it was evil to Jonah, a great evil and it was burning to him.” Jonah, a prophet of God, actually describes God’s action in sparing Nineveh as evil.

Evil is one of those words that has recurred throughout the book of Jonah. Jonah is called to go to Nineveh because Nineveh’s evil has risen to God’s presence. The sailors on the ship Jonah boards to flee Nineveh twice call the storm evil. The king of Nineveh urges his people to turn from their evil. The Lord relents of the evil that the Lord said He was going to do to Nineveh. Now Jonah calls the Lord’s sparing of Nineveh evil and even calls it a great evil. Nineveh was the great city, the fish that swallows Jonah was a great fish, and now the Lord’s action is called a great evil.

After the sailors’ actions lead to the sparing of their lives from certain doom, the pagan sailors respond by sacrificing sacrifices and vowing vows the Lord. By contrast Jonah responds to the sparing of the lives of the inhabitants of Nineveh from certain doom, by calling it evil. In chapter 3 verse 9, the king of Nineveh hoped the Lord would turn from his fierce anger and now the turning on Nineveh angers Jonah.

It is here that we finally learn what it was that made Jonah flee to Tarshish. This information has not been revealed to this point in the story. In our first sermon in Jonah, I made the point that Jonah fled because the Ninevites were part of the Assyrian Empire which was a very brutal and violent regime. The Assyrians were the equivalent to the Nazi regime or ISIS and it was understandable that Jonah would be scared and run away. However, here we learn that while this is true, it is only part of the story.

In fact, if we look at Jonah with fresh eyes as an ancient Israelite who understand exactly who Jonah was dealing with, we would be sympathetic toward Jonah. God sends Jonah to Nineveh with a message of doom because God is wrathful. As an ancient Israelite you would think this wrath is appropriate since you would know it was the Assyrians who destroyed the Northern Kingdom and you knew they were terrible people. You understand why Jonah would go the other way. Who wouldn’t? Then you read that God would not let Jonah run away and miraculously intervenes so Jonah can deliver this message of a wrath to Nineveh. You are not surprised then when you read that the message God gives to Jonah is, “forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown.” Here Jonah delivers God’s message of wrath. So until this point then we have a picture of a scared Jonah and a wrathful God.

In fact, when we look back into the text, we see Jonah purposely undermining God’s message. Jonah says yet forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown. The word yet is ambiguous, you cannot tell if it means during the next forty days or at the end of forty days. Also, the word for overthrow is also ambiguous it means overturned which could be for good or bad. In fact Jonah’s whole message breaks the standard pattern. Typically we expect a prophet to begin an announcement of judgment by stating that it is the word of the Lord. Even though the phrase “the word of the Lord” is found throughout Jonah, Jonah neglects to state it here. Also the whole point of delaying judgment for forty days is to allow time for repentance. Jonah’s message does not make this possibility clear at all, to the point where the king of Nineveh says, “Who knows? God may turn and relent” as if there is only an outside chance.

Breaking the pattern seems to be a trend throughout Jonah. Jonah receives the standard prophetic commission and does the opposite. When Jonah composes his song of thanksgiving in the guts of the fish, he uses a standard formula but leaves out the confession of wrongdoing. Then Jonah breaks the pattern of the judgement prophecy. Interestingly, in the next section of chapter 4 verses 2 and 3, Jonah prays a prayer that perfectly follows the pattern of a prayer of lament or complaint. Previously Jonah had avoided prayer, now Jonah rushes to prayer. Jonah is not good at a lot of things, but one thing Jonah is good at is a complaint prayer.

The most telling part of the whole story about Jonah is found in Jonah’s complaint. Here we learn that Jonah fled because Jonah knew God was gracious and merciful, abounding in steadfast love and relenting from disaster. Jonah suspected that Nineveh just might somehow change God’s mind and Jonah knew God would do so.

Now we learn that we have it all wrong, God is actually merciful and it is Jonah that is wrathful. Jonah does not want to go Nineveh because he is afraid. Rather by announcing doom, there is a small chance that Nineveh might repents and disaster would be avoided. However, if Jonah does not go then there is no warning and disaster will fall on the people of Nineveh because they will inevitably persist in the violent, evil ways having no chance to reflect on their actions.

Sharp eared listeners will know that this description of God in verse 2 is not something that Jonah just came up with. In our first reading, Moses is interceding for the Hebrews after the Hebrews built a golden calf and began to worship it. The Lord wants to wipe out all the people and start over again with just Moses. Moses asks for mercy on behalf of the Hebrews and offers his life in their place. Moses then asks God to show His glory. God places Moses in the cleft of the rock because if Moses experienced the full depth of God’s glory, Moses would die. Moses shares with us what he experienced, “the Lord the Lord merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and faithfulness.”

These are the very words Jonah uses in his complaint before God. However, unlike Moses, Jonah has not interceded, he asks for death to relieve himself of his anger and not in place of the Ninevites, he does not seek God’s glory but flees. Shockingly, what Jonah is actually angry about is the very essence and being of what makes God who He is that was revealed to Moses in Exodus 34. Jonah is angry not because God does something unexpected, but because God does exactly what Jonah expects because God’s actions are perfectly consistent with His character and that character is one that shows grace and mercy.

Knowing this, we see that Jonah’s complaint is super offensive to God. Jonah has rejected God for being God and yet look at how God responds. God responds not with justifiably harsh words and actions as we might expect, but with a question inviting Jonah to examine himself. God is showing Himself to be merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness by trying to persuade Jonah of his error rather than condemning Jonah. God wants Jonah to answer the question, is your anger really so intense that you want to die?

Jonah never answers the question. Again he tries to flee from God building a shelter east of Nineveh to shield him from the sun hoping God may change His mind and wipe out Nineveh. However, God will not leave Jonah alone just as God did not let his flight to Tarshish become the final word. God still intends to instruct and challenge Jonah but now God does so indirectly as Jesus almost always does in the gospels when instructing others. In fact we can think of this episode with the vine and the worm as an enacted parable.

The question the parable is trying to address is whether Jonah’s anger over God sparing Nineveh is justified. Jonah is in the desert and so had constructed a small structure to protect him from the sun. However, the booth was inadequate because the plant that God caused to grow provided better shade and protected Jonah from discomfort - the word for discomfort is evil. Rather than being exceedingly angry, now Jonah is exceedingly glad. That is until a worm God appointed just as God appointed the plant and just as God appointed the great fish, kills the plant. God then appoints a scorching wind and again Jonah finds himself desiring his death. Jonah is then asked the same question, do you do well to be angry with the plant? This time Jonah answers the question. Jonah feels his anger at the plant is justified.

What this parable has done, as parables do, is remove the person from his immediate circumstances allowing the subject to examine an issue or question more objectively. Good literature or film does this all the time. Huckleberry Finn is on one level an boy’s adventure story but it forces the reader to confront issues about race because it takes the issue out of its normal context.

So in this parable, the plant is like Nineveh. God made the plant grow and become big enough to provide adequate shade and protection for Jonah. Throughout the book of Jonah, Nineveh is described as a great city and in chapter 3, Nineveh is described as a great city to the Lord. What God has done is helped Jonah see the world through God’s eyes rather than his own. It makes sense to Jonah to be sad over the destruction of the plant. What God is trying to explain to Jonah is that destroying Nineveh would anger God just as the death of the plant angered Jonah. As the creator and the one who is sovereign over His creation, God is connected to His creation and that is why God desires its salvation and not its destruction.

God specifically asks Jonah is he right to be angry with the plant. In other words, is Jonah right to be angry with Nineveh? The question is revealing, because it was God who appointed the plant and God who appointed the worm and God who appointed the scorching wind. It makes no sense for Jonah to be angry at Nineveh. What the parable has revealed is that Jonah is actually angry with God and specifically God’s character. Again we go back to verse 2 when Jonah admits that the reason he fled was because He understood God’s character. What God is trying to have Jonah understand is the reason for God’s desire for grace and mercy is because God is intimately compassionate for Nineveh and all His creation because He is the creator and He is sovereign.

That is why their is such an emphasis on animals throughout the book of Jonah and why Jonah ends by mentioning all the cattle saved by not overthrowing Nineveh. In fact verse 6 uses the name Lord God. This is actually a pretty unusual way to refer to God usually one or the other is used but not both. The only other time the Lord God is used together is in Genesis. So what the book of Jonah is trying to do is again try to connect this story to creation.

In fact you may notice another connection to Genesis. God questions Jonah about his anger and is asked if it is good. In Genesis 4, Cain is also warned about his anger and asked to do good. After Cain’s murder, Cain lives east of Eden just as Jonah moves east of Nineveh. Cain builds a city for protection after spurning God’s promise of protection. Jonah builds a booth to protect himself for shade. Shade is often used in the Old Testament as an image of God’s protection. Both Cain and Jonah are upset over God’s acceptance of another. They both want the other to die. Cain kills Abel, but Jonah has only the option to kill himself. Both desire to limit and control God’s favor for their own concerns. Jonah’s anger, lack of compassion, and self pity have revealed him to fit the mold of Cain the murderer and the great villain of the story of the Old Testament.

Now one of the great curiosities of Jonah is that the book lacks a conclusion. We never learn how Jonah responds to God’s argument. In fact, the book of Jonah exhibits an amazing amount of symmetry. Chapter 1 and Chapter 3 parallel each other very well with the sailors confessing the Lord as a result of Jonah and are then saved from the storm. The people of Nineveh also fear the Lord as a result of Jonah and are saved from being overturned. Chapter 2 and 4 deal with Jonah and his prayers to the Lord. Many charts have been made outlining these parallels and they show a very neat and ordered book. Except there is no parallel for verses 5-11 in chapter 4. So we are already set up for this section to be a little unusual.

There are several examples in the Bible where the conclusion is not supplied. For example, I recently preached on the book of Ruth and we never learn if the ending led to any sort of change for Naomi who describes her life as bitterness. Mark ends with the Mary and Mary Magdalene meeting the risen Jesus Christ silenced by fear. We never learn how the older brother reacts after confronting his father over the love he shows his younger brother the prodigal son. The history of the Old Testament ends with some measure of restoration of Israel but mostly just future promises.

An incomplete ending often functions as a question for the hearer. We are meant to insert ourselves in the story and reflect on ourselves. When confronted with God’s blessing after difficulty will we remain bitter? Will we be afraid or tell the world about the resurrection? In the face of grace will we welcome others or will we persist in our anger? Here the question we are left with is will we have compassion and love for others as God does? Do we understand that God’s character is about mercy and graciousness? Do we understand that God is the creator who loves His creation and if we are followers of God then we should love creation as well - including Assyrians and also much cattle.

The book of Jonah raises the stakes on these questions even further. Throughout the book of Jonah there are multiple references to the first 11 chapters of Genesis. For example, in chapter 1 the evil of Nineveh rises up to the presence of the Lord. In Genesis 11, the tower builders who live in the vicinity of Nineveh build a tower to reach heaven. God issues judgment against Nineveh and the tower. Nineveh is central to the story of Jonah especially its reputation for violence. Genesis 10 mentions the founding of Nineveh by the violent warrior Nimrod. Genesis 6-9 records the story of Noah who survives a watery cataclysm by means of the ark. Jonah 2 has Jonah surviving the great storm by means of a great fish. The flood is a form of judgment and last forty days, Nineveh has forty days before judgment is issued. Lamech brags about his violence, the Ninevites repent of their evil. Both Jonah and Cain are questioned about their anger toward another and move east to flee God. Adam and Eve make clothes from leaves to cover their nakedness, but God provides better clothes. Jonah builds a booth to protect him from the sun, but God provides a plant that does a better job. Adam and Eve are tested by a tree and a serpent is involved. Jonah is tested by a plant and a worm. Adam and Eve are sentenced to death for eating from the forbidden tree. Jonah wants to die after the plant withers. Genesis has man and beast being created in the same day. Jonah shows God concerned for his creation, both man and beast. None of these are probably enough to make a case individually, but added together we can hear a lot of echoes from Genesis 1-11.

The reason I point this is out is because there is a pattern to these Genesis references. The book of Jonah starts with references to Genesis 11 and ends with references to creation in Genesis 1 & 2. So in Jonah we have a reversal of the events of Genesis 1- 11. That means the clock is being wound back because God wants to remind Jonah that He cares about the salvation of His world because He is the creator. This also means that Jonah’s anger and lack of compassion for others is not just disobedience, but it is the fundamental sin equivalent to Adam’s and Eve’s sin in the garden. Adam and Eve also decided it was their prerogative to decide what was right and what was wrong as if God was not the creator. Now Jonah wants to decide who receives compassion and mercy and who does not as if God was not the creator. This is despite that fact that Jonah has received compassion and mercy in the face of his own disobedience and it even led Jonah to confess that salvation is the Lord’s.

Throughout this sermon series I have reiterated our need to think of Christianity in a bigger way with more imagination than we typically do. One of the places we are guilty of this is in the gospels. We usually read the gospels as the story of the incarnation which is really cool but then what’s really important is the crucifixion and resurrection. All the stuff in the middle with the miracles is just Jesus trying to prove He is God. However, if we think of the kingdom of God as the big story and one that encompasses more than sending souls to heaven after they die, we will begin to see the gospels stories as more than that.

If we look at our second reading from Matthew 9 we see that Jesus is going around announcing that the kingdom of God is here. What Jesus sees when He encounters people are people who are broken and lack any hope and have no teacher who will show them a different way. In this way they are like the people of Nineveh who God describes as those who do not know their right hand from their left hand. Jesus’s response then as someone who comes to begin the establishment of the kingdom of God is to have compassion for them. Jesus heals because He sees that His creation is broken. Jesus feeds because He see that His creation is in need. Jesus announces the kingdom because He has compassion for His people. Jesus then commissions His disciples to make the implementation of the kingdom their mission and right after this passage we have the twelve disciples named who are reconstituting the twelve tribes of Israel.

As God’s people we must have the mind of Christ who loves His creation. Who looks at others and has compassion. To understand that Christ’s desire is for everything to be redeemed and restored. A concern for ourselves and our special relationship with God and lack of concern for others is not just wrong, it is THE fundamental problem. We should care for our brothers and for our enemies and even the cattle because God cares for all of these and sees them and has compassion. We are not called as ministers of God’s vengeance, but as God’s emissaries delivering God’s message of hope to a broken world that is harassed and helpless and that does not know its right hand from its left hand. Deliverance is the whole theme of Jonah - deliverance of the sailors from the storm, deliverance of Jonah from the guts of the fish, and deliverance of Nineveh from destruction. Let us be a people who provide deliverance and proclaim deliverance and demonstrate deliverance - because as Christ tells us the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few.

Confronting Empire (Dr. Trey Benfield)

February 12, 2017 Mason Matthews

Scripture Readings:

2 Kings 18:28-35
John 18:33 - 19:16
Jonah 3:1-10

We are continuing our sermon series on Jonah. Last week we looked at chapter 3 and specifically tried to answer three questions: why does God send Jonah a second time? why do the animals need to repent and wear sackcloth? and why does God change his mind? The answer is that God is working to restore his whole creation, including things like animals, and He has chosen his people to do this and this is so important to God that He will give them second chances and will even condescend to change His mind. The role of God’s people then is to be mediators bringing God’s message of blessing, hope, and second chances and work toward His mission of restoring creation.

I want to start todays sermon by telling a story from history. During the time of the Peloponnessian Wars between the Greek cities of Athens and Sparta, a group of Athenians ask the small island nation of Melos to ally with Athens against their enemy Sparta. The Melesians ask why should they join Athens. The Athenian delegation admits that there really is no reason for the Melesians to ally with the Athenians other than out of fear since the Athenians were more powerful than their tiny island city. The Melesians refuse and Athens attacked Melos, killed all its men and sold its women and children into slavery. The Green historian Thucydides concludes his description of the incident with the famous line, “The powerful do what they will and the weak suffer what they must.” For most of human history this this statement has been all too true.

Today we are going to return to chapter 3, but this time I want to look at the chapter from a different perspective. So you may noticed that each of our readings today is an example of God’s people and a confrontation with empire. There is a theme that runs throughout the Bible contrasting the communities who follow God with the people who do not. As those in my Sunday School class know, this division takes place right after the fall when God says that He will place enmity between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. It will develop first in the Cain and Abel story where Cain kills Abel and this is exiled and builds his own city. This city develops technology but also develops the seeds of empire which I am defining as the rule of others by economic or violent power for the purpose of its own enrichment. Such systems are oppressive and exploitative. As the story of Genesis continues we see this demonstrated by one of the descendants of Cain, named Lamech who boasts that his life is characterized by vengeance and murder. We see this demonstrated by the violent warrior Nimrod who founds the great cities of the Ancient Near East that will emerge as the seats of empire.

We see this battle in the story of the Hebrews who serve as slaves to the Egyptians. We see this in the story of the Philistines and Israelites. We see it in the Assyrians who conquer the Northern Kingdom and the Babylonians who conquer Judea. We see it again in Daniel, who has visions of the great statue and the four beasts symbolic of the great empires who will oppress God’s people. We see it again as Jesus subverts the power structure of both the Jewish ruler and the Romans and as Paul bears witness to the Kingdom of God throughout the Roman Empire. We see it as John uses Babylon and the image of the beast as symbols of all systems that rule through power, violence, and exploitation. The central message of the gospels is that Jesus is Lord and that means that Caesar or anyone else is not.

Augustine writing as the Roman Empire was falling, famously contrasted these as the City of God and the City of Man. Throughout this sermon series I have repeatedly pointed out that Nineveh represented the great empire of its day. The Assyrian empire was really the world’s first empire and ruled mostly through brutality, force, and fear. I have catalogued many of the gory and brutal details of how Empire was done in Assyria, so I will not repeat them again. However, my point is that the Assyrian Empire Jonah is facing is an example of the imperial ideology that is set in opposition to the system and ethics of the kingdom of God.

Now as we look at chapter 3 our focus is going to be on Nineveh and how Jonah confronts Nineveh. The first thing I want us to pay attention to is verse 3, where Nineveh is for the third time in the book of Jonah described as a great city. For reasons unknown to me, most translations do not include this, but it says Nineveh is a great city to God. You may have to look for a footnote if you do not read that phrase “to God.” This means that God is making a couple of claims on Nineveh. Number one we are to think of Nineveh as belonging to God meaning God’s sovereignty extends to Nineveh. Nineveh then does not belong to the king of Nineveh or to its chief goddess Ishtar, but to YHWH. Israel’s God is claiming Nineveh for Himself.

This phrase great city echoes the words of an Assyrian king named Sennacherib. Here is how Sennacherib describes Assyria:

   At that time, Nineveh, the great city, the city bemercyed of Ishtar wherein all the
   meeting places of the gods and goddesses .. the eternal foundation, the plan of which
   had been drawn from of old in the heavens… where the kings who went had exercised
   Lordship over Assyria and had received yearly, without interruption, never ending tribute
   from the princes of the four quarters.

Sennacherib is praising Nineveh because he has just renovated and rededicated the city to Ishtar and is claiming credit for its greatness. However, Jonah is challenging this view that Nineveh’s greatness is due to Sennacherib or because of Ishtar. The greatness of Nineveh is because God is sovereign over Nineveh and God has designated it a great city.

We find this same notion in the confrontation between Jesus and Pilate. Pilate here represents the imperial face of Rome. In chapter 19, Jesus stands silent before Pilate’s questions and Pilate asks, “You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have the power to release you and power to crucify you?” Jesus’ reply to Pilate’s claim of power is, “You would have no power over me unless it had been given you from above.” In both cases, Assyria and Rome, their leaders believe that their power comes from themselves. However, God wants us to know that is not the case and that any ruler or empire only exercises dominion if God allows it.

If you remember by to the sermon I preached during advent on Luke 2, the birth of Jesus makes a mockery of these claims of power. Caesar in his attempt to tax the whole world is but a pawn that God is using to fulfill the prophecies about the birth of the messiah. God manipulates the entire Roman imperial system to ensure that Jesus will be born in Bethlehem, the city of David.

When Jonah is dragged, hiding below in the ship, the sailors ask Jonah what he does and where he is from. Jonah replies by telling the sailors that, “I am a Hebrew, and I fear the God of heaven who made the sea and the dry land.” When Jesus rises from the dead after receiving everything terrible the Roman Empire could do to Him, Jesus declares to His disciples, “All authority on heaven and earth has been given to Me.” The point that I want to make is that there is not one piece of the earth no matter its power or its might is not completely subject to God and the authority of Christ and there is not one piece of the earth that does not matter to God. God claims for Himself Nineveh and Rome and every Empire as His own. That means we as the church must also claim every piece of the earth. Jesus sends his disciples out to Jerusalem, and to Judea, and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.

Jesus is asked if it is lawful to pay taxes to Rome and Jesus’ reply is that, we should render unto Caesar what is Caesars and unto God what is God’s” Often this is seen as a way to achieve a nice, separation of the secular and the sacred, between church and state. However, the subversive message Jesus is declaring is that everything belongs to God.

Now the difficulty with this is what about kingdoms like Rome and Assyria that oppress and exploit. So if we look back at the confrontation between Jesus and Caesar, Jesus tells Caesar that he has no power unless it was given you above. However, what we might wish Jesus said was, “God is ending your power.” Jesus does not do this because He acknowledges that God wants His kingdom ordered by human authority. However, God tells us is that God will hold authority accountable. In fact that is what is going on when Jonah confronts Nineveh - God is holding authority into account.

The take home message then is that all the empires of this world with their aspirations of power all receive their power because God allows them too. God holds them accountable and can remove that power when He chooses. As the church confronts Rome or Assyria on any other empire this should provide comfort and hope.

The trick here is that because God has allowed human rulers to exercise power, they inevitably abuse that power. Jesus confronts Rome and Rome crucifies Him. God does not promise a favorable outcome. In our first reading, Jerusalem is surrounded by the army of Assyria under Sennacherib. This takes place about forty or fifty years after the events of Jonah. Every other city in Judea had been defeated and now only Jerusalem stands. Sennacherib has sent out one of his officials called the Rabshakeh to try and persuade Jerusalem to surrender.

One of the arguments the Rabshakeh uses to make Assyria’s case is that Assyria’s success is proof of God’s favor. The teaching of scripture is never so straightforward. God often allows the wicked to prosper. However, we are always reminded that despite appearances, their fate is sealed. Part of the point of Revelation is to paint a picture of human events from the heavenly perspective. In heaven, Jesus is sitting on the throne ruling and actively working to bring an end to the forces of evil that lie behind empire. This is meant to bolster the faith and give hope to those who are presently suffering under Rome’s oppressive might and overwhelmed by its apparent victory. Assyria and Rome will both fall. The message for us is to live by faith and not by sight. That means that we should not be discouraged or lose hope even in the face of the apparent victory of evil. ISIS will fall. It also means that the church should not judge itself by its apparent successes or victories. Success is not not necessarily a sign of God’s approval as suffering is not a sign of God’s disapproval. Often it is the opposite. God has reserved the outcomes for Himself. Jonah succeeds and Assyria repents. Jesus confronts Rome and Rome has Jesus crucified.

Jesus says that He has come to bear witness to the truth, but Pilate asks, “What is truth?” and does not wait for the answer. For the Romans, truth was a simple concept, does the claim correspond to reality? Jesus’ claim of kingship clearly did not correspond to reality as Pilate understood it. Jesus though bears witness to a bigger reality that Pilate cannot grasp. Last week I said our imaginations need to be bigger. That we need to have dreams of not just salvation and escape, but of resurrection involving all of creation. The problem with Pilate and his view of truth is that it is not big enough. There is more to heaven and earth that can be dreamt of in his philosophy. There is the reality that the book of Revelation describes that shows that the raging and rantings of the empires of this present world are still subject to a larger heavenly reality. It is this truth that Nineveh was able to recognize that a bigger world existed outside of them and that God would hold them to account. It this truth that Jesus bears witness to when he announces the coming of the kingdom of God.

Jesus explains to Pilate that His kingdom is not of the world. Again like Jesus’ confrontation with the Pharisees over whether or not it was lawful to pay taxes to Rome, we have often taken this to mean that the world is divided. Caesar has his realm and Jesus has His realm. However, I think Jesus is making a different point - Jesus says my kingdom is not like your kingdom. Jesus is making the claim not that His kingship is entirely different than the kingship as Pilate conceives it because right before making this claim Jesus says, “If my kingship were of this world, my servants would fight that I would I would not be handed over to the Jews.” Jesus instead is presented a kingdom with a different ethic. A kingship that renounces violence.

Again this is what Nineveh grasps that Pilate does not. When Nineveh repents the people of Nineveh turn away from violence. The kingdom of God is not of this world and presents a vision of an entirely different ethic. The kingdom of God is for those who are poor of spirit, who mourn, who are hungry, who are meek, who are pure in heart, who seek peace. The kingdom that loves their enemies. The kingdom of God is that does not seek to conquer or exploit but one that seeks to serve. The kingdom of God is not a nicer version of empire but one that is radically different.

Again we as the church need to embrace this ethic and not seek to replace the current structures of Empire using the same thinking and same tactics. We need to present a different picture entirely. Our imaginations need to be bigger than that. We need to do what Jonah did and what Jesus did and proclaim that another world is possible. We need to present an ethic that shatters the idea that the only way to live is by self service and accumulation and exploitation and oppression and violence. We need to present a world that breaks the current cycle and gives hope to the hopeless. I will even go one further and say that we need to proclaim that another world is not only possible but inevitable.

Now let me pause and say that I do not think this is something that can be fully realized in this reality. Until Christ comes the church cannot achieve this as permanent reality. However, I do think the church is called to bear witness to this reality. In this world the church must present this vision and expect persecution and suffering. That is why Jesus in the sermon on the mount tells those that are peacemakers and meek and mourn are blessed but also says that those that are persecuted and reviled are also blessed. I want to close by giving two modern examples of when bearing witness to this alternate vision has occurred.

The first occurred shortly after the start of WWI. Germany had invaded neutral Belgium on its way to conquer France. A combined French and British army had repulsed the Germans outside of Paris and as the Germans dug in a continuous line of fortified trenches formed from the North Sea to the Swiss alps. Between the two armies was a small stretch of earth called “no man’s land.”

However, a funny thing happened on Christmas Eve in Ypres, Belgium site of some of the most viscous fighting between the Germans and the British. The Germans began lighting candles and setting up Christmas trees in their trench. They began singing carols and the British responded by also singing carols. Pretty soon the artillery fell silent and men began arising from their trenches and exchanging gifts of food, alcohol, and tobacco in “no man’s land.” The two sides even played soccer with each other. It is estimated that 100,000 soldiers participated in the Christmas truce.

What had happened? The soldiers had glimpsed another, bigger world that made what they were doing seem unimportant and inconsequential. For a few days the kingdom of God had broken in and there was love of the enemy and as a result peace. For a few days there was at least some proof that life could be different.

The second occurred after the fall of apartheid. Apartheid was a system a system of racial segregation imposed on black inhabitants of South Africa from 1945 to 1994. Over 3.5 million non-white South Africans were removed from their homes under threat of force and moved to segregated neighborhoods. As time went on, the plight of non-white South Africans actually worsened. In 1970, the right of political representation was taken away and they were actually deprived of citizenship. Public services were also segregated into two systems and predictably the non-white services were inferior to the white services. The state enforced this system by becoming more militarized and using violence and repression to answer any hint of unrest.

Eventually, under pressure from the international community and the realization that the apartheid system was unsustainable, non-whites were again allowed to participate in the political process, pro-black parties were no longer banned, freedom of the press was restored and anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela was released from prison. In 1994 the first truly democratic election was held with Nelson Mandela elected as president.

However, as great an accomplishment as this was, what happened afterwards was absolutely unbelievable. The new black South African leaders knew that something radical must be done to transition to a full and free democracy and promote unity within the country. The new government knew that there had to be justice for the victims of apartheid. At the same time a victor’s justice based on retribution would only lead to more division and violence. As an alternative, the South African government created a system of courts that focused on restorative justice called the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission brought perpetrators of violence before the court to and allowed them to give testimony. Victims of oppression were also encouraged to tell their story so their voice would be heard. Remarkably upon confession, the defendants could also request amnesty and the commission was empowered to grant it.

The ideology of the Truth an Reconciliation Commission was based on Christian concepts and churches played a key role in the commissions. It was important for the architects of the commissions to break the cycle of violence. They were able to imagine a bigger reality outside of the one that they had known and demonstrate to the world that a different world was possible.

I hope these examples give you a concrete picture of what I have been talking about in today’s sermon. Just as for Jonah and for Jesus, it is our mission at Resurrection church to confront the world with an alternate vision. We must give hope to a world broken by the corruption of power that it does not have to be this way. God will hold those in positions of power into account and a new world order is coming that is not a slightly nicer version of the same old structure, but something far more beautiful and perfect than we can imagine. The creator God is reclaiming sovereignty over His world through the slaughtered lamb and He has entrusted to the church the responsibility of bearing witness to Jesus as the world’s true Lord and to His way of victory which is great than the power of Empire.