After being vomited out of the mouth of the great fish and landing on dry land, Jonah 2:10, God once again commands Jonah to go to the great city of Nineveh, Jonah 3:1-2 / Jonah 1:2. And so, after his prayer of repentance and thanksgiving, Jonah 2, Jonah obeys God’s commands, Jonah 3:3.
Wiersbe, in his commentary, says the following.
‘The will of God will never lead you where the grace of God can’t keep you and the power of God can’t use you.’
Nineveh was about five hundred and fifty miles northeast of Samaria, the capital of the Northern Kingdom of Israel. I’m sure that as Jonah arrived at the city, he would have been overwhelmed by the size of the place.
The huge fortified walls, the imposing temple within and a great many people who lived there. Archaeologists tell us that the city would have been around 46 miles in circumference. This was a huge city, which took three days on foot to get from one side to the other, Jonah 3:3 / Jonah 4:11.
We can’t begin to imagine how this one man named Jonah was feeling as he began to walk through this huge city, Jonah 3:4. Jonah’s message is simply this: Nineveh needs to repent, or they will cease to exist as a nation in forty days’ time.
Constable, in his commentary, says the following.
‘The essence of his proclamation was that Nineveh would be overthrown in only 40 days. Periods of testing in Scripture were often 40 days long, Genesis 7:17 / Exodus 24:18 / 1 Kings 19:8 / Matthew 4:2.’
Butler, in his commentary, says the following concerning the word ‘overthrown,’ Jonah 3:4.
‘The word ‘overthrown’ here literally means, ‘Destroyed from the very foundation and is the same word used in speaking of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.’
Notice the text says ‘the Ninevites believed God,’ Jonah 3:5. It’s clear that the people understood Jonah’s message as a message which came directly from God Himself.
Barnes, in his commentary, says the following.
‘To believe God means to believe what God says, to be the truth; to believe in God expresses not belief only, but that belief resting and trusting in God; it combines hope and trust with faith and love, since without love there cannot be trust.’
God was speaking through Jonah, and the people repented because of Jonah’s preaching, Jonah 3:5 / Matthew 12:41. Repentance isn’t just about feeling sorry for the sins you’ve committed; it’s more than that.
Repentance involves a complete turnaround from your former sinful practices, which leads to following God and His ways, 2 Corinthians 7:10. The inhabitants of Nineveh did this very thing; after hearing Jonah’s message, they repented of their sinfulness, Jonah 3:5.
It appears that the Ninevites were shocked into action by God’s threat to overthrow the city, and so everyone fasted, and everyone wore sackcloth, Jonah 3:5, which was basically a rough garment made of goat hair, usually associated with mourning, 1 Kings 20:31 / Isaiah 15:3 / Jeremiah 49:3 / Ezekiel 27:31. Sitting down in the dust, demonstrates deep mourning, when someone is at their lowest, emotionally speaking.
Remember, Jonah is surrounded by thousands of foreigners, whose sins include drunkenness, idolatry, sexual immorality, and a whole host of other sinful behaviour.
There’s a possibility that the Assyrians had heard of Jonah and knew he was God’s prophet. It’s also possible that they heard about what happened with the great fish.
This makes sense because he doesn’t appear to get any resistance. The Ninevites were full of evil, violence and wickedness, but they repented, even the king recognised their sinfulness and understood God’s warning, and he joined in. He takes off his royal robes, covers himself with sackcloth and sits down in the dust, Jonah 3:6 / Job 2:8 / Ezekiel 27:30.
The king himself makes a decree and declares a national act of repentance, Jonah 3:7-8. The people and the animals weren’t permitted to taste anything; they weren’t permitted to eat or drink, Jonah 3:7.
Coffman, in his commentary, says the following concerning the animals, Jonah 3:7.
‘The involvement of animals in the general mourning was not due to any notion that the animals had sinned; it was merely an Oriental custom.’
Constable, in his commentary, says the following concerning Jonah 3:7.
‘This verse further describes how seriously the king and his nobles regarded their situation and to what extent they went to encourage citywide contrition. They did not regard their animals as needing to humble themselves but viewed them as expressing the spirit of their owners.’
The king commands all the animals and the people to be covered with sackcloth, and he commands that everyone in the city should call urgently on God, Jonah 3:8.
The king knew that he and the Ninevites needed to give up their evil ways and their violence, Genesis 6:11 / Genesis 6:13, if they wanted God to spare them, Jonah 3:9.
Coffman, in his commentary, says the following.
‘The marvel of this repentance of the Ninevites is nowhere more evident than in this.
1. They repented with no invitation to repent.
2. They repented without promise that it would do any good if they did repent.
3. They repented without any wish or hope on the part of the preacher that they would repent.
4. They repented even in the face of Jonah’s anger at their doing so.
5. They repented en masse, from the greatest of them to the least of them.
6. They backed up their repentance by turning away from their violence and wickedness. Such repentance was rewarded by the blessing of God!’
Jonah had fully obeyed the Lord’s command to preach repentance to the nation, and the people listened and obeyed. The good news is that because Nineveh repented, God relented from destroying them. What a merciful God we serve! Jonah 3:10.
Ellison, in his commentary, says the following.
‘We may know the character of God only from what he does and the words he uses to explain his actions. When he does not do what he said he would, we as finite men can say only that he has changed his mind or repented, even though we should recognise, as Jonah did, Jonah 4:2, that he had intended or desired this all along.’
When you think about it, Jonah is able to get this whole city to repent after only one day of preaching, Jonah 3:4, but he couldn’t get his own people, God’s people, the Israelites, to repent!
The Northern Kingdom of Israel had become so hard-hearted that they were actually worse than the Ninevites because it appears that the Ninevites were more open to God’s Word than God’s own people were.
That’s why Jesus says that ‘the demonstration of the Ninevites’ repentance, would rise up in judgment against anyone who refuses to repent,’ Matthew 12:38-41 / Luke 11:29-32.
Constable, in his commentary, says the following.
‘Jonah was a sign in a two-fold sense. His three days and nights in the fish foreshadowed Jesus’ three days and nights in the grave, Matthew 12:40, and his ministry as a visiting prophet delivering a call for repentance to an evil people under God’s judgment previewed Jesus’ ministry, Matthew 12:41 / Luke 11:30 / Luke 11:32.’
The bad news for Nineveh is that over time, they would slip back into their evil ways, and because they refused to repent, God would eventually destroy them as a nation.
God would use the Babylonians to destroy them in 612 B.C., just as God promised through the preaching of Nahum, Nahum 1-3, and Zephaniah, Zephaniah 2:13-15.
It would be wonderful if Jonah’s story ended here on a high, but sadly, we know there’s another chapter to be told in his life. We must remember that Jonah wasn’t aware of God’s plans for the future.
God isn’t only working on what’s happening here and now, but He’s also working on His future plans for His people. Jonah wasn’t aware of God’s future plans, and he certainly wasn’t aware that he himself was actually preparing the way for God’s future plans for His people.
Because the Ninevites repented here, what God was doing was preparing them to take God’s people, the Northern Kingdom of Israel, into captivity in the future, around 722 B.C. Remember later, when God eventually took the Southern Kingdom of Judah into Babylonian captivity, because of their idolatry and unfaithfulness.
He prepared the way for this to happen by sending Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah, Daniel 1:6, into captivity, and He sent Ezekiel into captivity, Ezekiel 1:1-2, before the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in 586 B.C.