The Jonah Sermon

After Alison suggested writing a sermon I was lucky enough to stumble across a Paris Review interview with the fiction writer Marilyn Robinson.

In the interview Robinson says she is sometimes called upon to write the sermon for her church-if their pastor is away, or ill-or like in this case, the pastor stayed up late and went to a sold out Steve Winwood concert with Tim Sharpe.

In the interview Robinson goes on to say that for her "religion is a framing mechanism. It is a language of orientation that presents itself as a series of questions. It talks about the arc of life and the quality of experience in ways that I have found fruitful to think about. Religion has been profoundly effective in enlarging human imagination and expression. It's only very recently that you couldn't see how the high arts are intimately connected to religion."

So it is in that spirit of framing, questioning and connecting that I come to speak today.

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When Alison emailed me "The Lessons Appointed for Use on the Third Sunday after the Epiphany" I was thrilled because the readings were short, concise and they all seemed to be about the same thing. A willingness to drop everything and follow God.

So with that in mind, I started to develop the theme for my sermon. Since I am a doubter, a reluctant feet-dragging Christian-practically a non believer-my sermon would be on the subject of "Fake it-till you make it". If you can't quite imagine dropping everything and following God-so what? -Just pretend and see what happens. Act as if. Maybe I'd even think of an appropriate Sunday morning sense memory exercise!

A few days after I got back from Mexico, I met Alison armed with my "concept." "Alison - I totally get it-the January 25th readings -everyone cooperates! Willingness!" In first Corinthians- it's drop your mourning, your wife, your possessions, the time is near. In Psalm 62-it's trust, waiting, rock and refuge, In Jonah Chapter 3: he goes to Nineveh with a repent warning and everyone does! In Mark 1-the fishermen/brothers IMMEDIATELY drop their nets and follow.

Alison says: "Hmmm, not everyone is willing. Do you remember what happened to Jonah in the previous chapter???

And I'm thinking Jonah? Jonah? Which one is Jonah---I blank- Jonah-which one is he? Is he the smart one? The old one? Job, Jacob, Joshua. I have no memory of Jonah, never mind what happened to him in the last chapter. I don't think I've ever even read the Old Testament start to finish.

Alison says "The whale?"

Oh yeah the whale. I remember! The belly of the beast. Chaos. Archetype. Yes. Yes. Yes.

"Why don't you do that section? We just don't focus enough on the Old Testament readings." Sure sure great idea. I love the ancient world-. Then we get up to leave and she says "Opps we haven't prayed." And we discreetly bend our heads and she says a prayer right there (eekk!) in Jack and Luna's!

And I enter my own belly of the beast… trying to make sense of Jonah

In her Paris Review interview Marilyn Robinson says:

One Calvinist notion deeply implanted in me is that there are two sides to your encounter with the world. You don't simply perceive something that is statically present but in fact, there is a visionary quality to all experience. It means something because it is addressed to you.

Okay since Jonah is the reading I have been led to…by the coincidence of date and fate and Alison's suggestion-there must be something in those readings that is addressed to me and to you.

So I go back to the Bible…old school.

Jonah in Chapter 1 makes a bad decision. Depending on your perspective. Jonah was asked by God to go east to a wicked city, Niveveh, Do you know where Nineveh is? It's like in IRAQ but instead he bolted and went west. He boarded a ship with a bunch of sailors and his presence caused a horrible, dangerous storm to rise- so he was kicked off the ship and landed inside a whale.

Question: Where are we in this story? Refusing to go in the direction that God wants us to go? Maybe even refusing to actually listen to see if there is an advised direction? About to say no? Again…

In Chapter 2 Jonah cries out to God from "the belly of hell" as he puts it. This was not the pretty Disney-a-fied whale containing Pinocchio and the table with the candlestick. No! It's a gross, smelly, slimy rebirth, transformational experience that goes on for three torturous days. And by the end of the chapter God relents, he tells the fish to let Jonah go-so the whale vomits Jonah onto dry land.

Question: If you have ever been in the belly of the whale-what were the lessons you were supposed to have taken with you-did you incorporate them into your life or have you forgotten or abandoned them?

So that's the Jonah we meet in Chapter 3. Our Jonah emerges transformed. Now when God asks him to go into Nineveh he agrees. And as soon as Jonah enters the city, probably looking like and smelling like a Creature from the Black Lagoon he issues a warning; "In 40 days Nineveh will be overthrown."

And you know what happened EVERYONE LISTENED. It was the weirdest thing. Everyone repented; they fasted and wore sack cloths-even the animals!

It's like the whole city sent up a sackcloth surrender flag.

Question: What was so effective about Jonah's message? Was it that he had whale puke all over him? What place should you enter and deliver a transformational message?

I want to pause for a commercial interruption about warnings. I am obsessed with the recent Hudson River plane crash-for all the obvious reasons-the perfect reverse storm. A few days ago in the NY Times there was a short piece about why the behavior of the passengers was so incredible, so tight, so cooperative. It is because as the plane was about to go down-they were warned. They were all of one mind.

So Jonah did his job and then he just sat around waiting for the 40 days to see what God would do. God changed his mind, he spared the people. He did not punish them-at all.

And you know what Jonah's reaction was-he was incredibly angry with GOD!

Again from the interview: There's no reason to imagine that God would choose to surround himself into infinite time with people whose only distinction is that they fail to transgress. King David for example was up to a lot of no good. To think that only faultless people are worthwhile seems like an incredible exclusion of almost everything of deep value in the human saga. I can't believe the narrowness that has been attributed to God in terms of what he would approve and disapprove.

Last night as I was umpteenth drafting I made mint tea-and as the water rushed into the cup I realized-that's a whale on my cup!

I drink out of a whale cup every morning! A whale, who according to a phone message left on my machine from a friend, can symbolize the point where earth and heaven come together. So drink up. Go swimming. Send out a warning. Amen.