Blessed Advent!
Dear Readers,
A blessed advent to you, I hope you are enjoying this season of preparation for the coming of the Lord. Since the last post, I posted Episode 3 of the Podcast!
Check it out here! It’s about Boundaries I learned the hard way, and it’s things I learned that will help me manage myself and how I interact with others going forward. I found it really useful and some commenters have too, so take a listen while it’s free.
I hope you enjoy those, and enjoy the essay to follow! Thank you as always for reading!
Why Jonah?
You might find it unusual to find a reflection on Jonah coming smack in the middle of Advent. As I write this, it is actually Late November and the thought to revisit Jonah1 came to me, so I abided and re-read it and am sharing my thoughts.
That’s not to say Jonah has nothing at all to do with Advent. As I mentioned above—Advent is a season of preparation. The liturgical color of Purple we get only twice a year—during Lent, which is quite obviously a season of penance and sacrifice; but also now, during Advent. Liturgically that places Advent as a kind of “little lent”. But instead of the lenten focus on the death and passion of Christ, we have as our focus the birth and beginning of Christ’s incarnation on earth.
We can all find in ourselves a little bit of Jonah. Jonah is called to obey God, and at first he flees, and in fleeing encounters hardship, suffering, and even death. Jonah cries out from the bosom of Abraham2, repents, and God has mercy on him and restores him to life, sending him forth to complete his mission.
We are likewise called to prepare ourselves for God. Christ first came to earth incarnate as a baby boy—the beginning of the end of the tyranny of evil and death. We, now, prepare ourselves for Christ’s second coming to earth, incarnate not as a baby but as a King, clad in glory—the final end of the tyranny of evil and death. Confronted with both comings of Christ, his nativity and his glory, how do we respond? Do we flee to Tharsis, seeking to hide from His face3? Do we answer the call, saying “Here I am, Lord?4”
Meditating on Jonah affords us an opportunity to meditate on our preparations to face the Lord in several ways.
We Are Jonah
First, let’s read Jonah, considering ourselves in the person of Jonah, before he arrives at Nineveh. Do you see how we refuse God’s will? God does not ask much from us, as laity—certainly He asks less from us than He asked of Jonah. Jonah fled from God’s will, and suffered for it. How often do we flee from God’s will? How often do we prefer our sins, our own will, our own desires to the will of God?
Helpfully—Jonah, from the belly of the whale, offers us the means of redress. When I re-read Jonah, I thought the prayer in Jonah 2 quite resembled a Psalm, so I’ve taken to referring to it as the Psalm of Jonah. It repents of our sin and folly, and remembers the sight of the Lord. This prayer—this psalm—was pleasing to God’s eyes, and following this prayer God restored Jonah, knowing that Jonah had truly repented and now would fulfill His will.
A wise man once said, “The problem is you, and the solution is repentance.”5 Jonah illustrates this: Whatever ails us, whatever sufferings we receive with confusion, however we cry out to God and ask him “why” His will is so confusing and painful—we can turn to the Psalm of Jonah, and repent of our sins and seek to conform ourselves more fully to God.
When my soul was in distress within me, I remembered the Lord: that my prayer may come to thee, unto thy holy temple.6
We Are Nineveh
Second, let’s read Jonah, considering ourselves as a citizen of Nineveh. Jonah has conformed himself to the will of God and now goes and preaches repentance to the Ninevites. How do we respond to the sign of Jonah7? How do we respond to the call to repent, or else endure a final suffering? Do we reject it—as we do every time we sin? Or do we take on penances, fast, wear sackcloth, sprinkle ashes on our heads? Do we seek to mortify ourselves of our human wants and desires, or do we seek to entrench ourselves in them? Nineveh chose rightly—they listened to Jonah, and were spared. As Jonah preaches a warning of God’s wrath, Christ preaches a warning that when he comes again, we may not have another chance to repent. Better to repent now, than risk being caught like one of the foolish virgins without oil8.
We Are Jonah
Finally, let’s read Jonah, considering ourselves as Jonah after the city of Nineveh repents. Jonah has conformed himself to God’s will, but is troubled because the threat is not delivered—Jonah fears that God will not be taken seriously by the Ninevites. In answer to this, God sends Jonah an ivy9, which shades him, and then makes it whither and die.
This reminds us that our work is not done merely by conforming ourselves to God’s will. We very much like to think that being a servant of God will make things easy, or will make God’s will easy to understand. Jonah did as God asked, and then is troubled and confused that things did not turn out as God had threatened—Jonah doesn’t understand God’s will, even after doing His bidding.
God tells him the answer10: that it is not our part to fret over things we cannot control, but to trust that God’s judgement is perfect, His will is just, and that if we play our part well, the outcome God desires—and not necessarily the outcome we foresee—will be achieved.
A Peasant’s Advent
This last point contains a two-fold truth of living a Peasant’s faith. Our objective is to align ourselves with God’s will, yes—to do the things God asks of us, however small and mundane. But, at the same time, we must also release our desire to control or even understand the outcome. Jonah doesn’t understand what God achieved, and is admonished through the ivy that Jonah didn’t labor to raise it up, and need not fret when it is taken away. The important thing is that God’s will was done.
Even the apostles could not see the sense in Christ’s torture and death. To them, their long awaited messiah and king had come—to lose him in such an ignominious way was heartbreaking at best. But that ignominious torture and death led to the great blessing of Heaven, and a new covenant which all people may participate in.
Advent is the time that we remember and prepare for the coming of the infant Christ, that we can look on the baby Jesus with awe and wonder, and as one of His friends and spiritual Children. Advent is also the time that we look forward to and prepare for the coming of Christ the King, that we can look on his coming not with terror, but with serenity—that His reign will be just, and we have lived as His good and faithful servants.
The key is to do as the Ninevites did: Repent, and sin no more.
Thank you for reading! God bless you all! A blessed Advent to you!
Ad Jesum per Mariam
Jonah is my favorite book of the Bible, so I did not need much persuading to revisit it.
It is phrased as, variously, the belly of the whale, or the depths of hell. The bosom of Abraham is where the virtuous dead prior to Christ went—but the important thing to note here is that Jonah died.
A phrase repeated often in scripture, see this link for examples from Genesis alone.
Note how Jonah must repent before he can go to the Ninevites and ask THEM to repent. We must pick up the burden we call others to bear also. Even God must (and did) do this.
There was an interesting footnote in my Bible that there are alternate translations of the word which is rendered here as “ivy”. One of the alternates is the plant we know as palma christi.
Jonah died? Hm. They didn't have that in the VeggieTales movie.
But seriously, this was an awesome reflection, Scoot. Very nice. I needed that, for a number of reasons.
Heckler: How did Jonah survive inside the belly of the whale for three days?
Fulton Sheen: I don't know, but when I get to Heaven, I'll ask him.
H: What if he's not in Heaven?
FS: Then you ask him!