Stuck in the fish

This week is on Jonah 2:8-10:

"Those who cling to worthless idols
forfeit the grace that could be theirs.

But I, with a song of thanksgiving,
will sacrifice to you.
What I have vowed I will make good.
Salvation comes from the LORD."

And the LORD commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.

That last verse is probably one of the most surreal in the Bible, if you take it out of context. I guess that's why you never see it embroidered on Bible covers or stenciled onto bookmarks. :) Try to block everything else out of your mind, and then picture almighty God commanding a stupid fish, and then that fish swimming up to the shore and vomiting a man out onto a beach. The sheer ridiculousness of it is why everyone should read the Bible on their own, and not just the passages that are shared in sermons or held up on cards at sporting events.

In these verses, Jonah had already decided to bail on his responsibility to deliver God's warning to the evil Ninevites. One thing led to another, and before he knew it, he was inside of a fish. Ever have that happen? There's no cable television or workout rooms inside of a fish, so Jonah had plenty of time to think about his decision. Jonah spits out his confession, and God has the fish spit Jonah out of its gastrointestinal jail.

People who cling to idols forfeit the grace God has for them. Jonah clung to the idolatrous thought that his people were the only people who could be saved. (Ironically, it took him three days to figure out God's grace, but the Ninevites grasped it immediately.) We do the same things ourselves sometimes. People tend to condemn others who sin differently than they do. They forgive their own sin, but expect others to pay up with interest. Adulterers condemn pedophiles. Pedophiles condemn drunks. Drunks condemn thieves. There's no end to it, nor is there any logic. Worshiping yourself or people who are like you is the worst kind of idolatry there is. "If only more people were like me, the world would have no problems. God could sit by the pool, sipping his Holy Iced Tea, while we do the rest."

Jonah didn't think that the Ninevites wouldn't change as much as he was afraid that they would. If the Ninevites gave up their sin, he wouldn't be able to condemn them anymore, and he'd be forced to examine his own sin and the sins of his own people. It's much easier to draw a line in the sand and say "beyond this, there is no hope." As long as you stay on your side of the line, you can convince yourself that you don't need salvation as much as other people do, and concentrate on making sure they know it. Grab the megaphone, go out in pairs, and deliver the holy ultimatum to scores of people who you would never in a million years sit with at lunch or talk to otherwise, because they need it, not you! You can even create a unique world view that allows you to stay exactly as you are, because sin only matters for other people now: "It's OK for me to stay addicted to crack and impoverish the rest of society in order to support my government assistance, but God help the guy who is uptight and churchy, or who is too greedy to share his lunch!" Can you see the ridiculousness of it?

Salvation comes from God, because none of us can muster it up on our own. All of us need it, not just the people we don't like, or who are different from us. Accept God's grace, and don't try to replace it with the idol of your own imagined worthiness. It's funny that the symbol of Christianity is the fish, because a lot of us still seem to be stuck in it. :)