When God Hopes--September 25, 2023

When God Hopes--September 25, 2023

"When God saw what the people of Nineveh did, how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity that he had said he would bring upon them; and he did not do it. But this was very displeasing to Jonah, and he became angry. He prayed to the LORD and said, 'O LORD! Is not this what I said while I was still in my own country? That is why I fled to Tarshish at the beginning; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing'." [Jonah 3:10-4:2]

What do you suppose God hopes for?

Is God even capable of "hope"--is that something you can do if you are the Almighty and all-knowing Creator of the universe?

I mean that question sincerely, because it's kind of weird to talk about God hoping for, well, anything, isn't it? Hope seems like a decidedly human thing, because usually we think of hope as an attitude of expectation in advance of an uncertain future--and we usually think of God as being omniscient and eternal, outside of our experience of time.  God never has to wonder, worry, or hope about the future, because God knows it all already, right?  It might seem that hoping--an attitude of expectation toward a future you haven't experienced yet--is something that God can't do, because we usually define God as all-knowing. You can't throw God a surprise party, after all, right? So how could God be hopeful about a possible outcome--wouldn't God know it already and either be pleased or disappointed about whatever will happen?

That is often how classic theologizing goes about God--that God can't be surprised (good or bad), caught off guard, be afraid, or even hope. And I get how that seems a perfectly logical conclusion if God doesn't experience time like we do in a straight light from Point A to Point B, but rather exists beyond and outside the limitations our chronologically-bound minds. 

And yet, here's the climactic point in the story of Jonah that frames everything in terms of God's hope, even when Jonah doesn't want to hope.  This story stretches our understanding of God, because it forces us to see a side of God that is, in some meaningful sense, hopeful about the outcome of human events.  And that hope comes from God's love for the people that are easily written off by the Respectable Religious crowd.

Just to back up for a moment in this passage that many of us heard this past Sunday, this is the second half of the book many of us associate with a big fish or whale swallowing the reluctant prophet Jonah.  And yes, that's the first half of the plot: God tells Jonah to go and preach against the people of Nineveh, the capital city of the ruthless enemy Assyrians. And he runs in the opposite direction (to Tarshish) because he doesn't want to do what God directs him to do.  The reason, as he confesses in the verses above, is that Jonah doesn't want to accept the possibility that the people of Nineveh, whom Jonah has been taught to hate and despise all his life long (and not without reason), might actually listen to Jonah's warning and turn from their violence, cruelty, and idolatry.  Jonah is afraid that the people he has written off entirely as "those people" might finally listen, and God might forgive them, and God might not zap them with righteous fury and wrath.  Jonah, in other words, is afraid of God being merciful--and God, by contrast, is hopeful that the "enemy" will turn from their wickedness.  

This concluding twist in the story changes everything about it.  Jonah's tale isn't simply a warning to do what God says or else (as in, "...or else a whale will eat you..." or "... or else God will zap you with lightning...").  Rather, this is a story about God being hopeful that people can change, and when God sends a warning, God actually does hope that it will be listened to.  God, you could say, takes the risk of hoping, because God takes the risk of loving people who keep messing up.  And Jonah, like so many Respectable Religious Folks, doesn't want to allow the possibility that enemies, sinners, and mess-ups could be shown love.  And so he cannot hope for them.

In the end, the real warning that is left unresolved is the one for Jonah:  what will he do with a God whose mercy reaches to include the people Jonah doesn't think should be eligible?  What will he do when it turns out God's love is wider than he dared to imagine, and God's compassion leads God to take the risk of hoping--even of looking foolish.  That's part of what Jonah is afraid of, too: he went around announcing that the city of Nineveh would be destroyed, afraid that God would relent from zapping them; and now he's worried that God won't look "tough" or "powerful" or "strong" because God did relent.  And Jonah is afraid, too that he'll look like a fool for speaking that kind of message, only to have God forgive the people.  These are the options, I suppose--you can either be afraid of unexpected grace from a God who is known for being unexpectedly gracious, or you can take the risk with God of looking foolish or weak by hoping for an opportunity to show that grace.

To be clear, God has already made that choice and thrown all the chips down, gambling on the hope that there will be a reason for mercy.  God is willing to risk the possibility that the people of Nineveh would dig their heels in and refuse to change their ways. And God is also willing to take the risk that people will look on that mercy as weakness--and God shows mercy anyway.

One of the hardest things for us to do, the more we strive to grow in Christ-like love, is to hope for change or good in the people God calls us to love--especially when God is calling us to love the people we have labeled as enemies.  We are all used to wearing Jonah's sandals. We have our own personal lists of usual suspects for people we give ourselves permission to hate and look down on--maybe they're in the opposite political party from you, maybe their faith or their family is different from yours, or maybe their personalities just rub you the wrong way.  But it is SO easy to cast everything they do in the worst possible light, and also to assume those enemies are doomed to endlessly do terrible things and make wrong choices, rather than ever allowing the possibility of hoping they might do good, get it right, or even have something to teach you.  That's the challenge for today.  It's unlikely you'll have to go far away to Nineveh to find those folks; chances are there are some among your social media circles, in your workplace, on a branch or two of your family tree, and even at your church.  But when we do cross paths with folks we have already written off, God dares us to keep hoping for their good, as a practice of love.  

Maybe today it wouldn't be a bad idea to do some honest reflection on what people in our lives we have put on our "enemies" list (whether consciously or not) and who we have started treating like our own personal Ninevites--as irredeemable opponents beyond any hope.  And maybe today we are called to take the risk of kindness and goodness to the ones we gave ourselves permission to hate, without knowing what will come of it--only the hope that it might lead to grace.  

That's how God is facing this day, after all--with hope.  

Lord God, keep our hearts soft and open to hope, rather than hardened with hatred for the ones we want to close the door on.