Week 33 Joel & Jonah
A couple of days after reading Joel I read Jonah.
I like the story. Despite doing exactly the opposite of what the Lord told him to do Jonah finally got to Nineveh and preached to them. The king issued a decree: let everyone call urgently on God. Let them give up their evil ways and their violence. Who knows? God may yet relent and with compassion turn from his fierce anger.
This sounded very familiar to me and I flipped back a few pages. Joel had said: return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and he relents from sending calamity. Who knows? He may turn and have pity and leave behind a blessing.
Who knows is an interesting question. It’s about action that’s taken…but that action has an uncertain outcome.
The action was to call urgently on God (Jonah) and to return to the Lord your God (Joel). The action was based on a couple of known qualities about the Lord: he may relent and with compassion turn (Jonah) and he may turn and have pity (Joel).
Action: turn to the Lord.
Outcome: the Lord might relent. Maybe. Who knows for sure?
On balance I figure the Lord will probably relent nine times out of ten since it takes real effort for someone to get to the Point of No Return. But in Joel & Jonah some uncertainty remained.
Note: quotes from Jonah 3:8-9 Joel 2:13-14 (NIV)