Jonah and Home Boys

Sermon: (Jonah, 1-5) Jan. 22, 2012
St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church

This is great. We get to talk about Jonah, God and the Big Fish, based on our Old Testament reading for today. The Book of Jonah is variously called a parable, an allegory or a short novel. What then is it’s message? First the story. Some people here have already found the message. Most people know the story, but maybe not the message. Some people don’t know either. So first the story.

Briefly it is that God told Jonah He wanted him to travel over to Nineveh and warn the Ninevites that unless they repented of their sinful ways they were going to be destroyed. Jonah hated the Ninevites; they were Assyrians. He considered them to be the enemies of the Hebrews. He wanted them to be destroyed. So rather than do God’s will and carry words of repentance to them he set out in the opposite direction to the Mediterranean Sea where he booked passage on a ship headed west. He was running away from God. Do you think God would allow that? How silly, almost as silly as Francesco Schettino, the captain who ran his cruise ship on the rocks in the same sea last week and thought he could abandon ship and his passengers and not get caught. Well, Jonah and he do not get off that easily. In Jonah’s case, God caused a great storm to come upon the ship so that the sailors feared for their lives. They prayed to their gods to be spared but the storm only got worse. Eventually Jonah came clean and admitted the storm was his fault because he was running away from his God. The sailors became believers in the God of Jonah and started praying to Him to save them, but the storm only got worse. Jonah finally said you’ll have to throw me overboard to avoid shipwreck. They did and the sea calmed. God was still not going to let Jonah get away, though. He had this big fish swallow him up. Jonah prayed like crazy to be delivered. God let him squirm for three days and three nights before having the fish belch him up on the same shore from which he had set sail. Then the question: “Are you ready to do now what you were told?” Jonah decided to obey God, (hard-headed fellow that he was), but he didn’t decide to like it. He travelled to Nineveh and told them they would have to repent and change their ways or God would destroy them. This part he was enjoying. It was a big city, more than a 120,000 people. It took him three days to cross the city, shouting “repent or be destroyed.” He didn’t expect they would repent; he hoped they wouldn’t. After all, they were the hated Assyrians. When he had crossed the city he found a hill and sat to see the city destroyed. But lo and behold the king heard the words. He called on the people and even the animals to dress in burlap, put ashes on their heads and fast. God saw their true repentance and did not destroy them. Jonah is got so mad he couldn’t stand it. He is going to hold onto his biases and his hatred, come big fish or high water. He is still sitting in the sun, baking in his misery. Rather than relent he says he wants to die. The story ends there. The Ninevites flourish and Jonah is left in his misery.

So what is the message of this little novel? I can think of two. First, you can’t get away from God. Second, we are the true victims of our own racism, prejudices and hatreds, not the ones we fear and hate.

I wrote the first draft of this sermon last Tues. but was unhappy with the practical applications to our situations in the here and now. Then I had the good fortune to hear Father Greg Boyle Wed. night. You may recall last Sun. I invited people to go to Detroit to hear him as part of our honoring of Dr. Martin Luther King. Well, several of us went and were truly inspired. He is the Jesuit who in his first assignment as a priest went to the poorest Catholic parish in Los Angeles, right between the two largest housing projects west of the Mississippi, an area dominated by Latino gangs. Twenty five years later he is still working with gang members, mostly former gang members, and together they have built a multi-million dollar network of businesses to provide employment for former gang members, known as Homeboy Industries. That is all wonderful and has made him famous, but Greg’s real message is about the Homies, both men and women, Home Boys and Home Girls who with the help of God have transformed their lives. The hatred and killing between rival gangs in L.A. and elsewhere, to an outsider look so senseless because they are between similar people fighting over who would dominate which blocks of the city. It dawned on me that this is what the Book of Jonah is about. The Hebrews and the Assyrians were rival gangs fighting over territory. They are loved and pursued by the same god, the One God. When confronted by God the Assyrians, at least in Nineve, turn and repent. Jonah will not. He wants to keep his attitude.

The most touching stories told by Greg Boyle, and there are many, are those involving rival gang members, who come to Home Boy Industries and find themselves working beside each other. The grace of God works, so they end up being willing to give their lives for the former enemy.

So, the question for us is who are the Ninevites, the rival gang or gangs, we fear and hate, those groups we are unwilling to share territory and jobs with, even though we all are loved by and pursued by the same God. Are they the Mexicans, the undocumented, the Blacks, the Arabs, the poor on welfare who we are convinced are to blame for their own poverty? Or maybe its the people next door.

If you identify such a group that you have an attitude about and you don’t open up to God’s grace-filled attitude adjustment, I recommend you don’t get on a boat in the Mediterranean.

We have acquired a copy of Father Boyle’s book, “Tattoos on the Heart.” It is truly inspiring and available for loan around.